Chapter 15 Seth
Seth
The pull hasn’t stopped.
It’s been—hours? Days? Who the hell knows—since that silver light flickered through the dark, and the thing hooked under my ribs hasn’t let up since.
Worse, actually.
It’s gotten sharper. Tighter. Like someone replaced the thread with barbed wire and decided to yank.
I stumble over nothing—because everything here is nothing—and catch myself against empty air.
“Fantastic,” I mutter. “Haunted by a ghost with better cardio than me.”
I keep walking anyway.
What else am I going to do? Stop? Let the pull rip me apart from the inside? At least moving feels like I’m doing something.
Even if that something is probably walking straight into a trap.
The scent hits me again.
Ozone. Sharp. Clean.
Stronger this time.
I freeze, breathing it in like it’s the first real air I’ve tasted in years.
It probably is.
I turn slowly, trying to pinpoint the direction, but it’s everywhere and nowhere. The Void doesn’t do directions. Doesn’t do anything except crush hope and swallow light.
But this—
This is different.
The darkness around me feels… wrong. Not the usual oppressive nothing. There’s a pulse to it. Faint. Like veins of light running through the black.
Silver veins.
I reach out, and the air shimmers where my fingers pass through.
“What the hell?”
I’ve been here long enough to know the Void doesn’t change. Doesn’t react. It just is—static, eternal, empty.
But now it’s moving.
Breathing.
Alive.
And I realize: it’s not the Void changing.
It’s them.
Whoever crossed over, whatever power they’re carrying—it’s rewriting the rules just by existing here.
I laugh. It comes out sharp and bitter.
“Of course. Of course you’re that strong.”
The pull jerks hard, and I stagger forward.
Then I hear it.
Voices.
Faint. Distant. But there.
I stop dead, every muscle locking up.
The Void doesn’t echo. Doesn’t carry sound. When people scream here, it swallows the noise before it can travel.
But I’m hearing voices.
Whispers threading through the dark like they’re being carried on wind that doesn’t exist.
A laugh. A sob. A word I almost recognize.
“Okay,” I whisper. “Now I’m officially losing it.”
But I keep listening.
Because even if I’m going insane, it’s the first sound besides my own voice I’ve heard in so, so long.
The whispers fade, but the pull doesn’t.
It drags me forward, relentless, and I follow because I don’t have a choice anymore.
My legs are shaking. My chest aches. I haven’t rested in—
Actually, I don’t remember the last time I rested.
Used to be able to. Used to find pockets of relative safety where I could stop moving for a while.
But the pull won’t let me anymore.
It wants me there. Wherever “there” is.
And it’s not taking no for an answer.
I stumble through zones scattered with ash.
Old crossings. Failed attempts. People who tried to walk through the Void and didn’t make it.
I’ve seen this before. Too many times.
The last time I followed a light, it screamed until it turned to ash. Took me a week to stop hearing it.
But this—
This feels different.
Less like a candle burning out.
More like a wildfire spreading.
The silver veins in the darkness get thicker. Brighter. Like roots growing through stone.
And I realize: they’re not fading.
They’re taking hold.
I press a hand to my chest, trying to ease the ache where the pull digs in.
“If you’re Ethos bait,” I mutter, “this is a really elaborate setup.”
But I don’t feel his presence.
That’s what’s unnerving.
He should be here. Should be circling, watching, waiting to strike.
But there’s nothing.
Just the pull. Just the light. Just the voices whispering through the dark.
Either he hasn’t noticed—
Or he wants me to find them.
Either way, I’m already caught.
“Might as well see it through,” I say to the empty black. “Hard to lose when the bar’s this low.”
The pull jerks again, so hard I nearly collapse.
I stumble forward, gasping, and the darkness shifts.
Thins.
That’s the only word for it.
Like I’ve walked into a pocket where the Void is less dense. Less absolute.
The air changes. Warmer. Almost breathable.
And I hear it.
A voice.
A woman’s voice.
Not a whisper this time.
Clear. Close. Real.
One word.
“Stop.”
I freeze, breath caught in my throat.
It’s her.
It has to be.
I whisper into the thinning dark:
“…Who are you?”
No answer.
Just the pull, stronger than ever.
And the certainty that I’m close.
So close I can almost feel her breath.