Late morning sunlight filtered through the thick canopy, falling to the damp forest floor in narrow strands like threads of golden silk. The air was heavy with the smell of wet earth and the decay of old leaves. Every step pressed softly into the soil, the faint crunch sounding almost like a warning—turn back, trespasser.
A figure cloaked in black moved silently beneath the trees. Mortis.He walked deep into the southern forests of the Khonkaen Kingdom—a land steeped in legends and death, where even the bravest dared not speak its name aloud.
He had chosen to stray from the main road, avoiding humankind.Not out of fear... but uncertainty.He did not know what he was in their eyes—a being of life, or something that should not exist at all.
The wind whispered through the leaves. The forest murmured its ancient warnings to those who lost their way. Around him, the trees grew so tall that the sky vanished entirely. Their trunks twisted upon themselves as if writhing in eternal torment. Thick vines hung down like veins, and roots as wide as a man's body jutted from the soil like the ribs of some buried giant.
A thin white mist drifted low across the ground, crawling along the roots like frozen breath. In the center of the woods lay a sunken hollow the villagers called "Sok Phi Dib"—the Ghoul Hollow.
They said it had once been a battlefield. Hundreds of soldiers buried here without rites, stacked upon one another in mud and blood. When rain fell, water gathered into the pit, turning the soil to black sludge that fumed faint wisps of vapor even on the driest days.
Each step Mortis took produced a soft plop as bubbles rose and burst beneath his boots, as if the forest itself were trying to swallow him whole.
He froze.A sound—a faint dragging noise—echoed through the trees. Beneath the roots of an ancient tree, a figure lurched from the shadows: a corpse walking on trembling legs. Its blind eyes stared at nothing, unaware that it still walked this world.
Mortis crouched behind a bush. Though he knew the dead could not see him, some human instinct urged him to hide. Moving with deliberate slowness, he passed among them. His black cloak rippled gently with the wind.
A sliver of sunlight slipped through the leaves, brushing across his hooded face, revealing for an instant the hollow shape of bone beneath the fabric.
One step… two…
The undead turned toward him—but did not react.No growl, no movement.It was as if he were merely one of them.
Mortis moved past without even the pretense of breath. Only when he left the cursed aura of the forest behind did he finally stop.
Above, the sky had grown pale. The sunlight was cold, and the air reeked faintly of iron—of blood.
Before him stretched an abandoned carriage road. Wheel tracks carved deep into the mud, as though someone had fled through a storm in desperate haste. A broken carriage lay tipped on its side, one wheel torn away, iron chests scattered about—and a long trail of blood leading into the woods beyond.
The stench grew stronger.A horse lay collapsed ahead, its belly ripped open, ribs gleaming white through torn flesh. Most of its meat had been devoured; only dry, string-like sinew clung stubbornly to the bone.
"...This wasn't done by any beast of the forest," Mortis muttered, his hollow voice echoing faintly in his chest.
Everything had been looted. The boxes were torn apart, the valuables gone. Only the scent of death remained, clinging to the air like oil.
Then—a scream shattered the silence."AAAAAAHHHHH!"
A woman's voice. Deep in the woods. The same direction as the blood trail.
Mortis lifted his head. For a moment, the light beneath his hood flared a deep violet—then he ran.Through branches and roots he darted, unhesitating, the forest howling around him.
Something moved above—fast. A hunched shadow, vaguely human, bounded between the treetops with unnatural speed.
Mortis followed the trail until it ended at the mouth of a cave. The entrance gaped wide like the maw of a beast awaiting its prey. The air that flowed from within was cold—so cold he could not tell if it was merely air, or the breath of death itself.
He stepped inside. His eyes dimly glowed gray, lighting the darkness. Blood streaked the stone walls in long, dreadful smears. The stench of rot was so strong that even one without lungs could almost gag.
Deeper in, he found what awaited him—arms, legs, entrails, and heads scattered across the cave floor like discarded toys.
Broken swords. Torn coin purses. Silver coins rolling in the faint flicker of dying firelight.A single torch still burned on the ground, its weak flame trembling as though exhausted. Shadows of bones and weapons twisted upon the rock, dancing like demons in the dark.
He knelt to examine the remains—then something beneath the pile twitched.A soft slither.
Mortis drew a short blade without a sound. He pulled aside the bloody heap—and found a woman beneath it. Her body was covered in deep wounds and claw marks, her clothes torn to rags. Yet she still breathed—barely.
He leaned closer to check her pulse—
"GRAAAHHHH!!"
A roar split the air, half beast, half man.
From the darkness behind, a hunched figure lunged forward with inhuman speed. Mortis raised his blade—
Clang!
The impact was enormous. The short sword snapped in two, shards scattering across the stone. The attacker was a ghoul, its skin ashen gray, its body thin and crooked, eyes white and lifeless, claws dripping with human gore.
It leapt again. Mortis caught the blow with his arm, bone striking bone with a harsh crack. He was thrown back into the wall, stone dust falling around him.He felt no pain—only the raw force of something alive struggling against the chains of death.
Grabbing a broken blade, an arrow from a corpse, even a severed head at his feet, Mortis prepared himself. When the ghoul charged, he thrust forward. The metal split flesh with a wet thud! The creature howled, but did not fall.
Then a voice spoke inside his mind—the same voice from his dreams."You are not among the living. Do not fight as one of them."
He froze for a heartbeat—and understood.
Mortis hurled the severed head in his hand. It spun through the air, striking the ghoul square in the skull. In that instant, the head's jaw moved on its own, biting into the ghoul's neck with a sickening crack!
The monster shrieked, thrashing wildly. Mortis lunged and drove his broken sword straight through its chest. Black blood spattered across the stone.
The ghoul twitched once… then stilled.
But before he could withdraw the blade, heavy footsteps echoed behind him—
Thud!
A blow slammed into his back, hurling him against the wall. Rocks fell.
He rose to his knees. Another ghoul crept forward, eyes burning with hunger. Its claws slashed, tearing away his hood.
The firelight caught his face—pale bone, empty sockets glowing faint violet.
The ghoul froze.It did not understand what it saw.
What stood before it was not man, not prey—but something older than its own death.
One creature shrieked and fled into the darkness. The other trembled where it stood.
Then... darkness stirred.
An aura seeped from Mortis like a rising fog—thick, purple, and cold as dry ice. It swirled around him, hiding the stone beneath his feet. A soft hissing echoed each time it touched the walls. The torchlight flickered violently, its orange hue twisting into a dim violet.
Frost spread across the cave walls. The air itself seemed to freeze. The stench of death thickened until the world felt as though it had stopped breathing.
The last ghoul stumbled backward, terrified, then fled into the shadows—never to return.
"...I didn't even do anything," Mortis murmured.
He glanced around the silent cave. The darkness pressed in from all sides, swallowing every sound. He had no idea that something was moving—slowly—around him. A faint purple mist flowed from his mouth and eye sockets, crawling across the ground like frozen breath.
But Mortis could not see it.He saw only emptiness. Silence.And the lingering scent of blood.
What were they afraid of?
Only the drip of water from the cave ceiling answered.
He turned back to the wounded woman. She still lay in the pool of blood. Carefully, he lifted her into his arms. She was light—too light, like someone who had already lost half her warmth to death.
Carrying her out of the cave, he followed the sound of running water. By the stream, he built a small fire beneath the trees. The soft light dried his cloak. From a pack he had taken from the cave, he found a small bottle of red liquid that smelled faintly of rusted iron.
He poured it over her wounds. Ssshh! Smoke rose, the cuts closing before his eyes.
Before long, the gashes faded into faint scars. He cleaned her face and arms gently with a damp cloth. No words. No emotion. Only the quiet presence of something that once had been human.
As dusk fell, the woman stirred. Her eyes opened slowly, as though waking from a nightmare.
"...Where am I?" she whispered.
Mortis sat beside the fire, roasting fish skewered on a stick. The flames cast warped shadows of his figure upon the grass.
"You're safe," he said, without looking at her. "I pulled you out of the ghouls' den."
She glanced down at the bandages on her arms, her memory flashing back to the screams, the darkness, the blood.
"...I thought I was dead."
Mortis handed her a stick of roasted fish. "Eat. You must be hungry."
She hesitated, then nodded. "Thank you… sir. My name is Fern."
"And I," he replied quietly, "am Mortis."
She lifted her gaze—and in that instant, the firelight revealed his face.A pale skull. Empty sockets. A thin crack running down the bridge of his nose.
Her eyes widened."Ah... I..." she stammered—then fainted dead away.
Mortis sighed softly and scratched the top of his skull."...Forgot to cover my face again."
He carried her into the small tent and pulled a thin blanket over her.
"Sleep well, Fern," he said gently, his voice almost a prayer from one who no longer knew if he was allowed to pray.
Outside, he extinguished the lantern and sat beside the fire. The night wind passed through the trees, rustling the leaves with faint footsteps of the unseen.
Mortis stared into the darkness.Something was out there.Not beast. Not man.A presence watching from afar—the gaze of the underworld itself, observing something that should not be alive.
The fire flickered. For a heartbeat, he saw a tall shadow move between the trees. When he rose, it was gone.
Then a whisper brushed his mind—the same voice that had spoken in the cave."...Mortis."
He stood motionless, watching the fire slowly die to gray ash. The night wind carried the faint scent of old blood that would never wash away.
Mortis turned toward the tent. Fern slept soundly—no nightmares, no screams. At least tonight... she would live.
As for him... he was no longer sure what "living" meant.
He sat again, lowering his gaze to his skeletal hands gleaming white beneath the moonlight filtering through the trees.
"Life... death... or something in between?" he whispered.
Then he looked up at the sky—at the lone moon above, the same moon that had watched over him the night he awoke.Perhaps the only witness left who knew whether Mortis had truly died... or had never lived at all.
And in the depths of the forest, something stirred once more.