Chapter 15: The Forgotten City
The air grew colder as John, Jake, Cherlyn, and Rick left the depths behind, stepping once more into the sickly light of the surface. The Ashen Vale now lay quiet behind them, its whispers silenced—for now—by the awakening of the Ward Stones. But Rick's words haunted them still.
"The next stone lies in the Forgotten City."
It had a name once—a thriving place, Rick claimed—but after the Hollow invasion, it vanished from memory. Even the map they carried showed only empty space where it should have been.
As they crossed the wasted fields beyond the Vale, they saw the truth.
The Forgotten City rose like a dead titan from the earth—skyscrapers broken and slouched, streets split by yawning cracks, glass and steel twisted by old violence. Faint blue light bled from shattered windows. The wind here whispered in a strange tongue.
"Feels like the Tower all over again," Jake muttered, gripping his crowbar tighter.
John scanned the ruins. "Rick. Where's the Ward Stone?"
The ghost flickered into view beside a crumbling statue. "The Stone of the Forgotten is deep inside the city's heart—beneath the old Metro station. But the city... remembers you. And it's awake."
The sky darkened suddenly. Across the distant rooftops, shapes stirred—shifting shadows, too thin, too tall, moving against the wind. Hollow Ones. Dozens of them.
"They're hunting again," Cherlyn whispered, clutching her talisman.
"We have to go now," John said. "Fast and quiet."
They slipped through cracked alleys and broken tunnels. The city was a maze of memories and horror. Cars frozen mid-crash. Skeletons sitting in restaurants as if waiting for food that would never come. Billboards whispered to them—soft voices promising "Come home... stay forever."
In one ruined square, they passed a reflection in shattered glass—a flicker of their old selves. The Tower days. Filthy, starving, terrified. The city played their fears back to them.
John shoved the glass aside. "Ignore it. We're not them anymore."
But the city knew. And it watched.
Suddenly, a shriek split the air.
A Hollow Pack swarmed from the subway mouth—crawling things with jointless limbs and eyeless faces, chittering hungrily.
"Move!" Jake barked, swinging his crowbar as one lunged. The creature burst apart into shadow and ash, but more surged behind it.
They bolted for the station stairs, stumbling down into the dark. The Hollow Pack shrieked, filling the tunnels.
"Rick!" John gasped. "Where's the Stone?!"
"Below the central platform," Rick hissed. "Hurry—they follow!"
Lights flickered wildly as they ran. On the platform below, they found it—the Stone of the Forgotten, set into a rusted pillar, its runes flickering weakly like a dying heart.
But guarding it was something worse.
A figure rose from the shadows.
It wore John's face.
But wrong.
Gray, cracked, smiling too wide. Its eyes—bottomless voids—watched him with delight.
"The Echo," Rick whispered, voice tight with fear. "A Hollow copy... made from your fears. It guards the stone. You must face yourself."
John stepped forward, pipe in hand.
"Jake. Cherlyn. Guard the stairs. This is mine."
The Echo laughed—John's own voice, warped, cruel.
"You're still afraid. Afraid you failed them. Afraid this 'Last Shelter' will fall like the Tower. Afraid you're not strong enough."
John swung hard.
The Echo dodged fast—impossibly fast—and raked him with claws of shadow. John staggered back, blood blooming on his sleeve.
It grinned wider. "Weak. Always weak."
"Not this time," John growled.
He lunged—pipe striking the Echo's chest. It screeched, cracking apart—but not dying.
Rick's voice rang out. "Touch the Stone, John! Channel your strength—your truth!"
John broke free, sprinting to the Stone. He slammed his hand on the runes.
Light flared—bright, burning, pure.
The Echo screamed as cracks raced across its form. It reached for John—only to shatter into dust.
The Hollow Pack above howled... then fell silent, lifeless, collapsing like puppets cut from strings.
The Stone of the Forgotten pulsed with new power, sealing the cracks around the city. The ruin quieted. The shadows fled.
Rick sighed with relief. "Three stones awakened. The barrier strengthens. But the last remains—the hardest of all. The Stone of the Mountain Heart."
John wiped his brow, turning to Jake and Cherlyn.
"One more. Then this ends."
But far above them, in the distant clouds over the mountain, a shape moved—vast, shifting, watching.
The Harbinger was stirring.
And it would not let them succeed without a final reckoning.
End of Chapter 15.