For Alaric Thomas, the immediate crisis was already over.
He now had Saw-Tooth under his control, and the Ghost Cards had proven that they could turn even a murderous cannibal into loyal combat power.
Jessie and the others, however, still believed two members of the cannibal family were hiding somewhere in the darkness.
Their only thought was to get away from the mountains and call the police.
Chris, Jessie, Scott, and Carly stayed together as they moved toward the highway.
Alaric followed them for a while before deliberately falling behind.
He still had unfinished business in the forest.
One-Eye had been badly wounded during the fight near the burning watchtower.
If he died before Alaric could contain him, losing a perfectly usable monster would be an enormous waste.
In a world where supernatural creatures and horror-movie killers could appear without warning, having more cards filled with loyal monsters would make sleeping at night considerably easier.
Through his connection with Saw-Tooth, Alaric could roughly sense where his subordinate had gone.
He followed that direction deeper into the woods.
It did not take long to find them.
Saw-Tooth had pinned One-Eye against the trunk of a large tree and was holding him there despite the other cannibal’s furious struggling.
One-Eye’s legs were still badly damaged from the shotgun blasts, leaving him unable to properly fight back.
He continued roaring at Saw-Tooth as though he couldn’t understand why his own brother had betrayed him.
Alaric had no interest in explaining it.
With a thought, another black card appeared between his fingers.
The Two of Clubs.
[Containable Target Detected: One-Eye] [Status: Severely Injured | Restrained | Containable] [Contain?
Yes / No] “Contain.” The Two of Clubs flew from Alaric’s hand and struck One-Eye in the chest.
A dark pulling force erupted from the card.
One-Eye’s huge body distorted before being completely absorbed into its surface.
The Ghost Card then returned to Alaric’s hand, and a detailed image of the disfigured cannibal appeared across its formerly blank face.
His twisted features and damaged eye made him immediately distinguishable from Saw-Tooth.
Alaric examined the card carefully.
One-Eye was another member of the same inbred cannibal family, but his mutations had developed somewhat differently from Saw-Tooth’s.
The brothers in Wrong Turn were the result of generations of severe inbreeding that had produced extreme physical deformities along with unusual strength, resilience, and pain tolerance.
They were not supernatural creatures, but they were still far more difficult to kill than ordinary humans.
Alaric glanced at Saw-Tooth standing beside him.
The massive cannibal remained completely still while waiting for another command.
Even in the middle of a pitch-black forest filled with killers, Alaric felt surprisingly calm.
This was the importance of having subordinates.
There was another Ghost Card function he had not properly tested yet.
Extraction.
According to the information transmitted by the system, every contained target possessed traits or abilities that could potentially be extracted.
The result would not necessarily equal the original ability at full strength, and depending on luck, he might obtain only half of its effectiveness or even less.
Fortunately, if the extracted trait was something useless or harmful, Alaric could simply reject it.
That last part was extremely important.
He had no desire to accidentally extract the cannibals’ genetic deformities and permanently turn himself into something resembling them.
Alaric was quite satisfied with his current appearance and preferred keeping his face exactly where it belonged.
If he ever wanted to temporarily assume their physical characteristics, the Fusion function already gave him that option.
Alaric focused on the Two of Clubs.
A new panel appeared.
[Contained Target: One-Eye] [Extractable Traits: Genetic Mutation | Strength Enhancement | Resilience Enhancement | Reduced Intelligence | Reduced Pain Sensitivity] There were several options, but only a few were actually desirable.
Strength Enhancement and Resilience Enhancement were obviously useful.
Genetic Mutation was immediately rejected.
Reduced Intelligence was even worse.
As for Reduced Pain Sensitivity, Alaric wasn’t convinced it was beneficial.
Pain existed for a reason, and becoming unable to recognize serious injuries could easily get him killed.
He had no interest in discovering that someone had stabbed him only after noticing blood soaking through his clothes.
He shifted his attention to the Two of Spades.
Saw-Tooth’s information appeared next.
[Contained Target: Saw-Tooth] [Extractable Traits: Genetic Mutation | Strength Enhancement | Enhanced Vision | Resilience Enhancement | Reduced Intelligence | Reduced Pain Sensitivity] Saw-Tooth possessed one additional useful trait.
Enhanced Vision.
That made sense considering the cannibal family’s hunting lifestyle and Saw-Tooth’s familiarity with ranged weapons and tracking prey through dense forests.
Even a weaker version of that ability could prove useful in darkness.
Alaric selected Extraction on both cards.
The available abilities began cycling rapidly across the surfaces of the Two of Spades and Two of Clubs.
Different traits flashed one after another before the cards finally stopped.
Two results remained.
[Extracted Traits: Genetic Mutation | Enhanced Vision] Alaric stared at the first result.
“Absolutely not.” He discarded Genetic Mutation without hesitation.
Enhanced Vision remained.
It wasn’t the Strength Enhancement he had hoped for, but it was still useful.
Considering the odds, Alaric couldn’t complain too much.
There would be plenty of opportunities to obtain better abilities later.
“Fuse Enhanced Vision.” A cool sensation immediately spread through his eyes.
Alaric instinctively closed them.
The strange feeling lasted only several seconds before disappearing.
When he opened his eyes again, the difference was obvious.
The forest remained dark, but details that had previously vanished into the shadows became much easier to distinguish.
Tree trunks, uneven ground, branches, and distant shapes were suddenly clearer.
It wasn’t true night vision, but the effect reminded Alaric of looking through a low-powered night-vision device.
According to the information from the Ghost Card, he had obtained roughly half of Saw-Tooth’s natural visual enhancement.
For an ability taken from an ordinary mutated human rather than a supernatural monster, it was already impressive.
Alaric was satisfied.
The cannibals from Wrong Turn were dangerous, but compared with the demons and supernatural creatures existing in this world, they belonged near the bottom of the food chain.
If creatures at this level could already provide useful permanent enhancements, then stronger Containment Targets might eventually give him abilities that completely surpassed normal human limits.
There was still one problem.
Three Finger.
Alaric looked deeper into the forest.
Where had the last brother gone?
In his opinion, a family should stay together.
Running away while both of his brothers were sitting comfortably inside Ghost Cards was simply unacceptable behavior.
…
Back on the highway, Chris looked like a man who had barely escaped his own funeral.
He had originally been driving through West Virginia toward Raleigh for a job interview and had taken the back road only because the highway was blocked by traffic.
Somehow that simple decision had turned into being hunted through the mountains by a family of cannibals.
At this point, Chris was fairly certain the interview was already ruined.
His future employer would never believe the explanation.
Chris had barely finished thinking about that when Jessie and Carly began arguing nearby.
The reason was Alaric.
Somewhere during their escape, everyone had finally noticed that he was no longer following them.
“We can’t just leave him back there,” Jessie insisted.
“We need to go find him.” Carly immediately shook her head.
“I’m not going back into those woods.
No way.” She had only just reunited with Scott after believing he might have been killed, and the thought of deliberately returning to the mountains terrified her.
Scott, however, felt differently.
Alaric had already saved his life once.
“We can’t abandon him,” Scott said.
“He came back for us.” Chris remained silent.
His rational side told him the smart decision was obvious.
They should reach somewhere safe, contact law enforcement, and send trained officers back into the forest.
Emotionally, however, leaving Alaric behind after everything he had done felt wrong.
None of them realized Alaric was already listening from the trees beside the road.
He had returned only moments earlier.
Three Finger had disappeared somewhere in the mountains, and searching blindly through the forest at night would accomplish very little.
Alaric therefore decided to regroup with Jessie and the others first.
The final cannibal could always be dealt with later.
For all their questionable survival instincts, Chris and the others were decent people.
That alone made them worth keeping alive.
Alaric recalled Saw-Tooth into the Two of Spades before placing One-Eye securely inside the Two of Clubs.
After making certain no trace of either cannibal remained nearby, he stepped from the woods.
The sudden movement immediately frightened everyone.
Scott raised his weapon before recognizing him.
“Alaric?” Everyone visibly relaxed.
Jessie reacted fastest.
She rushed forward and wrapped her arms around him.
“Oh my God.
You’re alive.” “Apparently.” “Thank God.” Alaric gave her an awkward pat on the back.
“Jessie, I don’t think God had much to do with this.
Let’s get out of here before something else happens.” Jessie didn’t immediately release him.
After everything that had happened, her earlier attraction toward Alaric had clearly grown stronger.
He had repeatedly remained calm when everyone else panicked, fought the cannibals directly, and returned alive after disappearing alone into the woods.
From Jessie’s perspective, staying close to him probably felt safer than standing beside anyone else.
Alaric wasn’t interested in thinking about relationships right now.
Survival came first.
Fortunately, everyone agreed it was time to move.
The five continued down the road together.
When they finally approached the main highway, their phones began receiving signals again.
Everyone immediately called 911 and explained that they had been attacked in the mountains.
Seeing normal traffic passing nearby gave them more relief than any of them expected.
Alaric quietly summoned the Two of Spades and Two of Clubs into his hand.
The cards rested between his fingers for a moment before disappearing again.
Police officers were useful.
Two loyal cannibal mutants were more reassuring.
Several patrol cars eventually arrived.
Chris tried explaining everything that had happened, including the cannibal family, the cabin, Francine’s body, and the attack at the watchtower.
The officers clearly believed something serious had occurred but were understandably skeptical about parts of the story.
They promised to search the area and investigate the cabin.
Jessie looked ready to start yelling at them.
After everything they had witnessed, being treated like frightened tourists exaggerating a story was incredibly frustrating.
Still, the officers had multiple injured and traumatized witnesses in front of them, along with two people who remained missing.
They couldn’t simply ignore the situation.
The group was taken to the local sheriff’s station to provide formal statements.
Evan and Francine were both dead.
That fact made the investigation much more serious.
Chris finally managed to relax once they were sitting inside an actual police station surrounded by deputies.
No matter how insane the day had become, even he couldn’t imagine Three Finger casually walking into a sheriff’s office and trying to kill everyone.
For the first time since the car crash, he felt almost safe.
After giving their statements, the group found a motel in town.
It was already late.
Nobody wanted to travel any farther after what they had endured.
Chris took a room by himself.
Scott and Carly naturally shared another.
Jessie insisted on staying in Alaric’s room.
After watching him fight the cannibals and repeatedly save members of the group, she clearly trusted him more than anyone else.
What had started as simple attraction before the trip had grown considerably stronger after seeing how capable he was under pressure.
Alaric didn’t object.
He wasn’t planning a relationship with Jessie, and he wasn’t pretending to be some emotionless monk either.
She was attractive and clearly interested in him, but whether anything happened between them tonight was far less important than understanding the world they had barely survived.
On the second floor of the motel, Jessie went into the bathroom to shower.
Alaric sat at the small desk with a laptop he had temporarily rented from the motel office.
He began searching the internet.
Cannibal attacks.
Missing hikers.
Haunted houses.
Possessions.
Unexplained murders.
Ghost sightings.
When Alaric first arrived in this world, he had believed it was simply another version of ordinary America.
After detecting traces of Valak, he had briefly considered leaving the area and keeping as much distance as possible from anything supernatural.
Now that he possessed actual combat power, avoiding everything no longer seemed like the only option.
He finally had time to investigate properly.
That turned out to be a mistake.
The more Alaric searched, the more disturbing reports he discovered.
There were far too many unexplained incidents scattered across the country.
Missing families, abandoned houses with violent histories, mysterious deaths, supposed possessions, and eyewitness reports of things that should not exist appeared everywhere.
Even worse, many names, places, and stories felt strangely familiar.
Alaric’s expression gradually became serious.
Then he discovered something even stranger.
There was an actual television series dedicated to investigating supposedly haunted locations and proving whether ghosts existed.
Alaric clicked on several clips.
The longer he watched, the more familiar the show seemed.
In fact, it looked almost exactly like…