ECHOBURN

The sky was purple again. Or maybe it always had been.

Aoto couldn't tell anymore. The color didn't matter. The cold did. The ache in his legs did. The dry crack at the edge of his mouth did.

He staggered over broken stone, one foot dragging. Hunger curled around his ribs like a fist. His breaths came ragged and sharp. He'd forgotten how long it had been since the Trial began — days? Weeks? Time here stretched. Folded. Mocked him.

He had not died.

Not yet.

But death had stared at him often.

His fingers clutched a jagged stone — sharp enough to stab something soft, not sharp enough to matter against anything larger. Still, it made him feel better. Less helpless. Less like meat.

And that's when he saw it.

A glow. Small. Orange-red.

Fire.

He froze. Blinked. Rubbed his eyes.

Still there. Flickering, warm, real.

A shape crouched beside it. A man — or something shaped like one. Pale skin. Torn clothes. Thin arms hugging knees.

Aoto stayed in the shadow of a broken tree trunk, squinting.

The figure looked up.

Smiled.

Didn't speak. Just held up a hand and waved him closer.

Aoto's first instinct was to run.

But that fire looked real. He could almost feel the heat. And the hunger was worse now, like something chewing through him from the inside.

"Maybe…" he whispered to himself, "maybe I'm not the only one."

He stepped forward, slowly, heart pounding. The stone stayed hidden in his hand.

Ten steps.

The fire didn't flicker like normal fire.

Five steps.

The man was still smiling. Not blinking. Not breathing?

One step.

The fire made no sound.

Too late, Aoto noticed it.

No shadows.

The fire cast no shadows. The man's clothes were torn in the wrong places. His smile was too wide, too still.

Aoto stepped back—The man lunged.

No warning. No scream.

Just claws.

The figure slammed into him with the weight of a falling boulder. Aoto hit the ground hard, air knocked from his lungs. Teeth tore at his shoulder. The thing wasn't speaking — wasn't trying to scare him — it was devouring him.

Aoto panicked.

He jammed the stone into its side. Again. Again.

It didn't scream — just snarled, biting deeper.

He clawed for anything. His fingers closed around a broken, burning log — he didn't think — he jammed it straight into the thing's throat.

A dry, crackling screech ripped the air.

It stumbled back.

Choked.

Convulsed.

And fell.

Twitching. Hissing. Finally still.

Aoto gasped. Blood soaked through his shirt. His hands were shaking. His legs barely moved.

He stared at the body.

The fire was gone.

The man's face twisted into something else now — not human — teeth that didn't end, eyes that didn't blink.

It had never been a man.

Just a lure. A perfect, predatory trap.

He stayed there for a long time.

Breathing.

Bleeding.

Alive.

He had killed. It hadn't felt heroic. It hadn't felt like winning. It felt like breaking something inside himself and realizing it wouldn't grow back.

"I did it," he whispered. "I actually—"

CRACK.

He froze.

A sound behind him.

Not a branch. Not wind.

Something real. Something close.

He turned his head—

Darkness.

There was no sound.

No pain.

No warning.

Just—gone.