Chapter 183. OBSESSION
While the trio wandered along the forest’s jagged perimeter, the air grew heavier—denser. At first, it was subtle, something easily brushed off as paranoia. But it wasn’t just their nerves this time. The fog wall that had loomed in the distance was no longer stagnant. It was growing.
Mia noticed it first.
She squinted through the haze, then nudged the other two with a sense of urgency. "Guys... the fog. It’s expanding, right? I’m not hallucinating, am I?"
Verena gulped and scanned the forest’s edge, eyes narrowing. "No. You’re not wrong. That thing’s spreading."
Kaelira’s lips pressed into a thin line. She clutched her daggers tighter. "Should we... run? That thing doesn’t feel natural. More cursed than the monsters we saw earlier."
Verena didn’t hesitate. "Yeah. That’s not something we want to be anywhere near."
Mia was about to nod in agreement—when her eyes went wide.
Her breath hitched.
"What the—"
Out from the fog’s swirling embrace, a silhouette emerged. A figure—familiar, but changed.
Middle-parted amethyst hair, sharp violet eyes, and an open black hoodie billowing behind him. It was Cassius. But something was deeply wrong.
The right side of his face was veiled in a translucent white mist, like a mask made of vapor. The left side was worse—deathly pale, hollow, almost corpse-like. Lifeless.