Things Turn Dark

"Are you sure it's here?" Dom looked at the path on the map from his position and asked to be certain.

Luke, who had had a nightmare about that fateful night when he hid instead of fighting to help his friend, looked at Dom and said, "From our location, it's about fourteen or fifteen kilometers on foot, but we have to hurry."

It looked like it was going to rain. The entire group felt the same way, so they decided it was time to honor their fallen friend. Everyone had agreed to take this trip for this sole purpose.

"We're here, buddy. Soon we'll be together, so don't be anxious to see us again." Luke took a small flask of tequila and took a sip. Everyone took a sip before pouring the remaining contents over the artificial grave they had made for their friend.

"Yes, we all know you would have died soon after if you kept drinking." Hutch made a small joke to lift the spirits of his friends, who had been silent since morning.

Not everything was rosy. It was far from pleasant, so talking wasn't on everyone's agenda. But since they had decided to make this trip, there was no way they could stay down the entire time.

This was something everyone understood, so after Hutch's joke, everyone began to smile and talk for a few minutes before wanting to resume the journey.

"Alright, let's continue before it rains again."

"The weather really sucks."

Luke looked at the tower of stones he had left for his friend and couldn't look any longer, despite having let him die. It wasn't something he wanted to repeat, but he would always remember it.

"What a damn coward." Hutch appeared next to Luke and said these words.

"Who?" Luke was surprised by these words.

Hutch looked at his friend in confusion and said, "Of course, the idiot who did that to our friend. Who else?"

"Sorry, I had a bad dream today." Luke sighed once more, remembering everything that had happened the night before.

"Ah!!!"

But at that moment, Dom, who was walking behind, fell to the ground. Everyone turned their worried gazes, and when they realized Dom couldn't continue along the established route, they looked at the forest, thinking of taking a shortcut.

That was the worst decision they had made in a long time because they had no idea what they were getting into.

Luke was the only one observing everything with much more caution.

Spending so much time in silence was what he usually did behind the group, and soon things got murky when they discovered a circus artist hanging from a tree with strange runes on his body.

"Was it a bear?"

Luke looked at Dom and asked, "Have you ever seen a damn bear leave its prey in a tree?"

"I didn't mean that."

"We know what you meant." Phil, who was in the group, tried to calm those who were panicking.

If those who did this were nearby, they should have seen or heard them.

"I've heard a lot about sects; could this be the work of one?" Dom gave his humble explanation about what he had read on the internet.

Luke looked around, and among the trees, he could see a huge thing moving, so he quickly signaled everyone to get down.

"What did you see?"

"I don't know... That thing was too big to be considered any type of animal in the forest." Luke tried to explain what had fallen, but as he expected, no one believed him.

But no matter what the others thought, everyone believed him when a roar worse than a bear's was heard coming from the farthest trees.

"What's that?"

"Whatever it is, I'm not going to find out."

Boom!

At that instant, a huge arrow pierced Dom's stomach as he rested on the ground. He looked up only to see, in the distance, a man with a deer head shooting an arrow at him.

"Everyone run…"

"No!"