The Hollow Depth had never been a place where mistakes could be corrected.
That was something every hunter who had survived even a single expedition into its outer regions understood.
A wrong turn could lead into the territory of a predator strong enough to wipe out an entire team.
A moment of carelessness could expose a trail to creatures that could follow blood for days.
Even weather behaved differently beneath the enormous black-leafed trees, where mist clung close to the ground and distant cries often sounded much nearer than they truly were.
For Rhea’s group, however, the problem was no longer a mistake they could retreat from.
They had already crossed that line several hours ago.
“Keep moving!” Daren shouted from the front of the group as he forced his way through a wall of thorn-covered vines.
Blood had dried across the left side of his leather armor, while one of the metal plates protecting his shoulder had been torn away entirely.
He had stopped feeling the wound beneath it some time ago, which was probably worse than still being able to feel it, but there was no time to check.
Five hunters followed behind him, though none of them looked much better.
Their formation, once disciplined and practiced, had collapsed into something held together mostly by desperation.
One man was limping badly enough that another had to support him.
Their archer had only four arrows remaining.
The healer had exhausted nearly everything she carried, and the pale look on her face suggested she would not be able to use whatever little strength remained for much longer.
Rhea stayed near the rear.
Her right arm trembled each time she tightened her grip around the short spear in her hand.
The weapon had already cracked near the base, and she knew that one more heavy impact would probably break it completely.
Even so, she kept glancing behind them while running, searching the thick forest for any sign of movement.
She did not need to search for long.
A deep impact shook the ground somewhere behind them.
Then another followed.
The trees trembled.
Birdlike creatures hidden among the upper branches suddenly scattered in every direction, and the group’s expressions became even worse.
“It’s still following us,” one of the hunters whispered.
Nobody answered.
There was nothing useful to say.
The creature pursuing them was known as a Graveback Ravager.
Rhea had only ever seen one before, and even that had been from a distance during an expedition conducted under the protection of three veteran teams.
The beast had looked enormous then, but the one chasing them now was larger.
Much larger.
Its body stood nearly four meters tall even while moving on all six limbs, and thick overlapping plates of dark bone covered most of its back.
The front pair of limbs ended in curved claws long enough to tear through tree trunks, while the secondary pair beneath its chest gave it an unnatural stability whenever it charged.
Its head was low and wedge-shaped, almost completely protected by layers of armored growth, leaving only two narrow yellow eyes visible between them.
Worse still, Graveback Ravagers were territorial.
Once one had decided something belonged inside its hunting range, it rarely stopped until that thing was dead.
“We need somewhere narrow,” Rhea said between breaths.
“A ravine.
Rocks.
Anything.
If we can stop it from charging—” “It climbed the last ravine,” another hunter replied bitterly.
Rhea had no answer to that either.
The group broke through the tree line and entered a wide clearing covered in waist-high gray grass.
For half a second, Daren slowed as if he had finally found somewhere they could defend themselves, but then his face hardened.
There was nowhere else to go.
A steep stone wall rose beyond the clearing, covered in roots and hanging moss.
It stretched in both directions farther than they could see through the fog.
Climbing it with two injured members would take too long, and the forest behind them had already begun shaking again.
Daren turned around.
“Formation.” Everyone stopped.
Nobody argued.
The injured hunter was lowered against a rock while the remaining members spread out in front of him.
The archer moved behind the others and placed one of her four remaining arrows against the string.
Their healer lifted both hands despite the exhaustion in her face.
Rhea moved beside Daren and tried to ignore how badly her arm was trembling.
The Graveback Ravager emerged from the forest less than ten seconds later.
Several smaller trees broke beneath its body as it entered the clearing.
Fresh blood covered part of its jaw from one of the creatures it had killed while pursuing them, and a broken arrow still protruded from the thick plate above its left eye.
That arrow had been fired by their archer earlier.
It had barely penetrated.
The Graveback released a low growl.
Rhea felt the sound in her chest.
Daren lifted his sword.
“We hit the same point.
Eye first, then the joint beneath the front leg.
Don’t spread your attacks.
If we’re dying here, we at least make the bastard remember us.” Someone behind him laughed weakly.
It was not because the line was funny.
The Graveback charged.
The clearing exploded into movement.
The archer released first.
Her arrow struck the narrow opening beside the creature’s eye, but the Graveback twisted its head at the last moment and the projectile shattered against bone.
Daren moved immediately afterward, crossing the remaining distance with surprising speed despite his injuries.
His sword glowed faintly along the edge as he brought it down against the creature’s forward joint.
The strike landed perfectly.
The sword broke.
Daren barely had enough time to widen his eyes before the Graveback’s secondary limb struck him across the chest and threw him through the air.
“Daren!” Rhea moved before she could think.
She drove her spear toward the same joint he had targeted.
The cracked weapon pierced between two armored plates, sinking several inches into dark flesh beneath them.
For one hopeful instant, she thought she had finally done something.
Then the Graveback turned.
Rhea saw one enormous claw moving toward her.
The world blurred.
Something struck her side and threw her away before the claw could connect.
One of her teammates had tackled her out of the path, but the same swipe caught him instead.
His body spun through the air before crashing into the grass several meters away.
Rhea landed badly and rolled onto her back.
Her spear was gone.
For several seconds she could only hear shouting, growling, and the dull impacts of weapons against armor.
She forced herself upright and saw Daren trying to stand with one arm hanging uselessly at his side.
Their healer was already beside the hunter who had saved her, but the amount of blood surrounding him made the situation obvious.
The Graveback was barely injured.
They were finished.
Rhea knew it.
The others knew it too.
And then, for some reason, she noticed a man walking out of the forest.
At first she thought the impact had damaged her head.
Nobody should have been there.
The stranger looked young, perhaps somewhere in his twenties.
His black hair was slightly messy, and his clothes were simple enough that they looked completely out of place beside the armor and equipment carried by hunters.
There was no weapon visible anywhere on him.
No pack.
No protective gear.
He was simply walking.
Worse, he was walking directly toward the Graveback.
Rhea stared at him for a full second before her survival instinct overcame the absurdity of what she was seeing.
“HEY!” she shouted.
“GET AWAY FROM HERE!” The man looked toward her.
Then he continued walking.
Rhea’s mouth fell open.
“Are you deaf?!
RUN!” One of the other hunters finally noticed him as well, followed by another.
Their confusion lasted only a moment before something stranger settled over the clearing.
Rhea could see him clearly.
She could hear his footsteps through the grass.
She could see the movement of his clothes as he walked.
Yet she could feel absolutely nothing from him.
Hunters spent years developing instincts for living things.
Even ordinary people had a presence if they were close enough.
Powerful creatures were especially obvious.
Their existence pressed against the senses even before they were seen.
This man had none.
It was not that his presence was weak.
There simply was no presence to feel.
The Graveback seemed confused as well.
Its head turned slightly toward the approaching stranger, and for the first time since the fight began, the creature hesitated.
The young man stopped several meters away from it and looked over the beast with an expression so casual that Rhea almost became angry.
The Graveback lowered its body.
Its confusion disappeared.
Then it lunged.
Rhea opened her mouth to shout again, but the words never came.
The grass around the stranger changed first.
Gray-green blades lost their color almost instantly and folded toward the ground.
The effect spread outward in a quiet circle, touching the roots of nearby trees and turning their outer bark brittle.
Then it reached the Graveback.
The massive creature was still moving when the first crack appeared across the armor covering its front limb.
Another followed.
Then dozens.
Its bone plates lost their dark sheen and became dry and pale as though years were passing over them in moments.
Flesh beneath the armor shrank.
Muscles that had carried several tons of weight began deteriorating before Rhea’s eyes.
The Graveback tried to take another step.
Its front limb collapsed.
The creature roared and twisted violently, but the sound weakened halfway through.
More cracks spread across its body.
Its armor peeled apart.
Skin dried.
One of its yellow eyes clouded over before sinking into the socket.
The entire process lasted only several breaths.
The creature that had chased six hunters through the Hollow Depth and nearly killed them all collapsed into a deteriorated mass of flesh, bone, and broken armor.
Silence filled the clearing.
The young man looked at the remains for a moment.
“Still aggressive after all this time,” he muttered.
Then he stepped around the corpse and continued walking.
Nobody moved.
Rhea slowly turned her head toward Daren.
Daren was staring at the stranger with the expression of a man trying very hard not to breathe too loudly.
The archer lowered her bow.
Their healer had completely forgotten what she was doing.
Rhea looked back at the corpse.
They had hit that creature with everything they possessed.
This man had not even touched it.
The stranger walked another ten steps before stopping.
He turned around.
His gaze passed over the group, lingering on them with mild curiosity rather than concern.
For some reason, that expression made Rhea more nervous than hostility would have.
“You’re humans, right?” he asked.
Nobody answered immediately.
Daren eventually cleared his throat.
“Yes.” The stranger nodded.
“Good.” That was all.
He turned around again.
Rhea stared after him.
Something inside her moved before her common sense could stop it.
“Wait!” The man stopped once more.
Rhea ignored Daren’s horrified expression and hurried toward the stranger.
Her side hurt, her arm was bleeding, and she was fairly certain asking strange men questions in the deepest region of the Hollow Depth violated several important rules of survival.
She did it anyway.
When she reached him, she bowed.
“Please take me as your disciple.” The clearing became silent again.
The stranger looked at her.
“No.” Rhea immediately raised her head.
“Why?” “Why would I?” That was a surprisingly reasonable question.
Unfortunately, Rhea had not prepared a reasonable answer.
“I can work hard.” He stared at her.
“I’ll listen to whatever you teach me.” Still nothing.
“I can carry your things.” “I don’t have things.” Rhea glanced at him.
That was true.
Her mind raced.
“I can cook.” For the first time, something changed in his expression.
It was very small.
But Rhea saw it.
The man looked at her for several seconds before turning his head toward the forest behind him.
He had seen those trees for a long time.
Long enough that every path, every monster cry, every hidden nest, and every shifting territory had become painfully familiar.
There had once been a time when the Hollow Depth interested him.
There had been a time when every day brought something new.
That had ended a long time ago.
He looked back toward the hunters.
Humans.
They had come from somewhere beyond the Depth.
Somewhere he had not bothered visiting.
The thought was unexpectedly appealing.
“Fine.” Rhea blinked.
“What?” “I’ll be your master.” She stared at him as though she had misunderstood.
“Really?” “For now.” A smile spread across her face so quickly that Kael almost regretted answering.
Behind her, Daren looked as though his soul had left his body.
The hunter leader cautiously approached, stopping several steps away.
“Senior… may I ask your name?” The stranger glanced toward him.
“Kael.” Rhea straightened immediately.
“Master Kael.” Kael looked at her.
She looked extremely pleased with herself.
He decided not to comment.
Daren swallowed before asking the question that had been bothering everyone since Kael appeared.
“Senior Kael… why are you this deep inside the Hollow Depth?” Kael’s expression remained unchanged, but for the briefest instant something old passed through his eyes.
Cold ground.
A strange sky.
A body that felt familiar and completely wrong at the same time.
Then the memory disappeared.
“Long story,” he said.
Rhea tilted her head.
“How long?” Kael thought about it.
A faint smile appeared on his face.
“Very.” None of them understood what he meant.
Not yet.