Ashfall's mind did not wander toward morality, because morality was something for those who had the luxury of safety. Here, in the ruins of a world gnawed apart by the Stars of Madness and Clock of Apocalypse, right and wrong were luxuries that got you killed. What mattered was survival, and survival demanded answers that didn't fit inside anyone's neat definition of "good."
Ryn's weapon was steady, its barrel drawn not at the twisting, half-formed Mythborne frozen in the shape of some grotesque statue, but at Deryl's chest. Deryl, trembling, broken, unable to make a sound beyond shallow gasps. His wide eyes flicked desperately toward Ashfall, searching for something—guidance, protection, mercy—but Ashfall only met that gaze with cold calculation.
What will it be, Ashfall? he thought bitterly to himself, the question echoing in his own skull. Save the weak one, who will only drag you down, or keep the snake alive, who will gut you the moment it serves him? There is no choice that leads to safety... unless you carve one out yourself.
The silence was torn apart by a muffled gunshot. A wet sound followed it, something between a cough and a sigh, and the splatter of warm blood marked the end of hesitation.
It wasn't Daryl who fell.
Ryn staggered, confusion flickering across his face, his smirk vanishing as his knees buckled. His gun slipped from his grip, clattering against the floor, and then he dropped with a dull thud. A crimson bloom spread across his chest where Ashfall's stolen silence had spoken for him.
Ashfall's hand lowered the smoking pistol, his face unreadable in the dim light. His decision was made, and it was the only one that ever made sense: remove the greater threat.
Daryl's trembling grew worse, his mouth opening and closing like a fish desperate for air. "Y-you…" he whispered, unable to even form a sentence.
"Don't waste your breath," Ashfall muttered coldly as he stepped past the corpse. He crouched, his hand moving quick and precise, looting the weapon from Ryn's limp fingers. The gun was still warm, a fresh magazine inside, another tucked into the dead man's pocket. A practical and necessary reward.
For a moment Ashfall considered stripping the body further, but the sound of Daryl's ragged breaths and the low groan of shifting Mythborn flesh behind them reminded him of the clock ticking on all of their lives. He stood, slipping the weapon into his belt.
"Move if you want to live," he said sharply.
But Daryl didn't move. He just stared at Ryn's body as if the reality hadn't sunk in yet. His hands twitched uselessly, his knees trembling. Then the first scream tore out of him, raw and high-pitched.
Ashfall froze for a second, listening to it. The scream wasn't just panic. It was a signal, like a beacon of weakness that would call every lurking horror straight to them. The Mythbornes transformation was completed, which took Daryl's last opportunity to join Ashfall.
"Idiot," Ashfall hissed under his breath, turning toward the exit.
He made it three steps before the sound struck him. Daryl's voice cracked into sobs, begging to gods that had long abandoned this place, while the echo of monstrous laughter—the long, stretched howl of the Core Mythborne—answered in the distance. The laugh crawled across the air like claws scraping over glass, growing louder with each heartbeat.
Ashfall's foot hesitated mid-step. His hand tightened around the pistol he had stolen, his other hand brushing the hilt of his knife. His chest rose and fell slowly.
Go back? For what? To save him? He'll only be a burden like right now. He'll only weigh you down. You don't owe him anything. He'd be dead already if not for you, and this is how he thanks you... dragging death closer.
The thought was sharp, logical, but still his muscles refused to obey for a heartbeat. A shard of something human tried to whisper at the edges of his mind. He clenched his teeth and smothered it.
"No," he muttered to himself. "Not my problem."
The building groaned behind him, Daryl's screams twisting into a single drawn-out note of terror before cutting off, swallowed by the chaos inside. The silence that followed was broken only by the booming steps of the Core Mythborne. Ashfall turned once, just enough to see through the shattered wall.
The other Core Mythborne was there; the long, grotesque figure with a thin stretched body. It stalked between buildings, every step shaking the ground. Minor Mythbornes crawled toward the noise of Daryl's final cries, their shapes all wrong and different, like discarded sketches of monsters brought to life.
Ashfall saw the Core trample over some of them without hesitation, crushing them beneath its massive weight. Flesh tore, bones snapped, but instead of falling apart the creature's wounds closed in seconds, the flesh bubbling and sealing until no damage remained.
It heals itself, Ashfall noted grimly. That's probably like our clocks, which give us an ability with every moving of the hour hand... this thing is a step closer to becoming something worse than a Core; a Major Mythborne…
The thought chilled him, but only for a moment. He checked his pockets and kept running, forcing himself away from the bloodbath. Survival meant distance, not pity.
He moved through streets littered with broken glass and shattered stone and ice shards, the shadows alive with the quiet scratching of Minor Mythborn claws. They did not attack, not yet, but he felt their eyes tracking him, their faces twisted in childish weeping expressions that mocked humanity itself. He didn't bother killing them unless they came too close, and when they did, his knife whispered through flesh with quick, practiced precision. Each kill tugged faintly at the tattoo in his eye, the hands of the clock turning, but the changes were small. Too small to matter right now.
Hours seemed to pass in silence broken only by his own breath. He pushed himself further, further from the ruins, further from Daryl's screams still echoing in his skull. Every step toward the Metropole was a reminder of why he was still alive: because he chose to be, because he made the decisions others couldn't.
Yet the thought that something was watching him wouldn't leave. Every shadow seemed thicker than it should be, every ruined window felt like an eye. He turned once, twice, but nothing was there except the faint sound of laughter on the wind and the endless weeping of distant Mythbornes.
He told himself it was nothing. He told himself it was paranoia. But still, the weight of unseen eyes pressed against him like a hand on his shoulder.
By the time he stumbled into a half-collapsed house, exhaustion was finally clawing its way through his body. His legs ached, his lungs burned, and even his sharpened instincts whispered that he needed rest. The laughter of the Core Mythborne had grown faint, finally far away.
Inside, the air was not as cold as outside, but still too cold. The staircase leaning against the far wall was half destroyed and frozen, each step threatening to give way, but Ashfall forced himself upward, gripping the banister with white-knuckled hands until he reached the first floor.
He exhaled, ready to collapse against the wall, until something happend.
A cold circle of a silenced pistol pressed against his forehead.