Chapter 19

Kez's breath came in ragged gasps as he tried to keep pace with Allexis, who pulled him down another narrow, grimy street. The clicking noise was still there, echoing in the distance like the sound of bones cracking, and Kez's stomach twisted with a deep, primal fear. Whatever that thing was, it was still hunting them.

Allexis was quiet for a moment, but Kez could feel the tension radiating off her. He opened his mouth to ask her about the creature or make a dumb joke, but before he could get a word out, she snapped, her voice sharp like a whip.

"Why the hell did you follow me, Kez? Do you have a death wish or something?" Her voice was thick with disgust, her eyes cold and cutting as she shot a glare over her shoulder.

"I told you to stay away, and you still couldn't keep your idiot ass from sticking your nose in my business."

Kez exhaled deeply. Since she was not worried about her voice level, they were likely safe...

for now, at least.

"Huh? Who says I was following you? I came here to...umm...meet my friend."

Allexis shot him a look that could cut glass, her lips curling into a sneer. "Meet your friend?" she repeated, her tone dripping with sarcasm.

"Ya...you saw her a couple moments ago. I don't know why you ran away from her. That was pretty rude."

Allexis looked at him with a dumbfounded expression. Her eyes widening in disbelief as she slowly turned to face him, her expression one of utter confusion.

"That... thing?" she repeated, her voice low and strained. Her hands fluttered up, as if to push the words away before they could fully settle.

Kez smiled lightly. "Yeah. We used to be pretty good friends till she moved to a different neighborhood. But damn I was not expecting this bad of a neighborhood. Guess her family fell harder than yours. Hahaha...uhm too soon?"

She stopped herself, clearly struggling to process what he had just said. Her gaze flickered to the direction the creature had disappeared in, then back to him, and her mouth opened, then closed. "What the hell is wrong with you?" she finally muttered, her voice barely above a whisper, the disbelief still written all over her face. She shook her head, her movements jerky and sharp with disbelief. "I heard you went off the deep end after your family abandoned you," she muttered, her eyes flicking to the ground as if trying to make sense of his words. "But I didn't think you'd be this far gone. I genuinely feel sorry for you."

She took a slow breath, clearly trying to steady herself, her voice turning tight with something almost like fear. "That... that wasn't just someone," she continued, her voice growing more serious, eyes darting nervously around the street as if expecting the creature to emerge from the shadows again. "That was the Hollow Mother."

Kez was about to make another dumb joke but then the name hit Kez like a brick, his pulse quickening as he processed the chilling weight of it. The Hollow Mother. A named demon.

All demons had names. But few had the fortune to be given a name by this world's system...and even fewer that managed to appear in the novel for more than a few chapters.

He opened his mouth to ask more, but Allexis cut him off, her words coming faster now, her tension radiating off her.

"It's a legend," she muttered, more to herself than to him. "But it's not supposed to be real. At least, that's what I thought. It's said to be a deathless thing, wandering the city. The thing it hunts for... it kills you just by touching you." She looked him over with something like pity. "And here you are... so eager to walk into its grasp."

Kez stood silently, recalling bits and pieces from the novel. Hollow Mother appeared at the earlier section of the book which he had read pretty long time ago so it was hard to recall exact details. Where was he back then? Was it Spain? Morocco?

'Was it the time I was trying to get into olive trade? Heh heh I remember scamming those olive farmers. Good tim-Oh shi I can't get distracted here.'

His focused was brought back from the sound of distant clicking that echoed through the streets again, closer this time. The clicking was low and rhythmic—almost like bones grinding together.

Allexis pulled her hoodie tighter around her, her eyes scanning the alley they had come from. "This is bad," she whispered. "This is really bad."

The silence that followed was suffocating, like the weight of the town itself was pushing down on them. Kez felt the tension in the air grow thicker, the familiar clicking still hanging in the distance, dragging the air between them as if alive. He strangely felt a lot calmer than he should be even though he realized there was zero possibility of him surviving if he was actually attacked. This happened to him a lot lately. He also felt a weird urge to scream out loud and give away their location just to see Allexis's reaction. Imagining that was funny. Wait wha-

'Fuck when did insanity activate? Shoo get out of here. I am sane now.'

[ Insanity has been deactivated ]

'Wow I didn't even notice it was activated this time. When did it even activate? This is...very concerning.'

Kez's face hardened as the clicking grew louder, each beat now like a countdown, signaling something worse than just a fleeting terror. His pulse quickened, but his thoughts were oddly detached, as if the distant echo of his own fear was muffled by the overwhelming presence of the creature somewhere out there.

Allexis was still muttering, her voice tense. "We have to go. Now." She tugged at his arm, pulling him down another narrow street, her eyes darting nervously in every direction. But Kez wasn't looking at her anymore. He wasn't even focused on the streets around them. His mind was racing—racing through the vague memories he had from the novel. Pieces of the Hollow Mother, fragmented and blurry, were coming back to him in spurts.

The Hollow Bone Mother wasn't just a physical demon. It was more like a curse. A roaming plague, devouring the remnants of anyone foolish enough to get too close to this abandoned town. They said it fed off desperation, on the hopelessness of those who were on the edge of death. And the longer you lingered in its presence, the more you became its next meal.

But there was something Kez couldn't shake—a sickening, tingling feeling, as if part of him was drawn to it. The way it was always described, it wasn't just a monster. It was a force that corrupted everything it touched. And Kez wasn't sure if his own twisted, chaotic nature had anything to do with it, but there was an inkling in his gut that this encounter wasn't just happenstance.

He glanced at Allexis, who was practically dragging him now, urgency flooding her every movement. Her vermilion lips were pressed tight, the fear evident in her eyes. She wasn't just scared of the Hollow Mother. She was terrified of being caught in the middle of something she knew was far too dangerous.

But she had to know something more about this than she was saying, and Kez wasn't letting it go.

"If you knew what we were up against...why come here in the first place?" Kez muttered, barely loud enough for her to hear over their hurried footsteps.

Allexis didn't answer at first. Her lips tightened, and she kept moving, faster now, her gaze fixed forward. But Kez could feel the moment she cracked. Her shoulders tensed before she finally spoke.

"I didn't think you would be stupid enough to follow me," she said, her voice strained. "I'm trying to survive here, Kez. I don't have time to explain everything."

He was about to argue, but then—click.

The noise, so close now, almost deafening. Kez froze in place, feeling the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. It was there. The Hollow Mother. The clicks were like a million bones shifting, closing in, relentless in their pursuit. The air grew colder, the shadows darker. Allexis grabbed his arm, pulling him again.

"It's coming." Her voice had dropped to a whisper, but the urgency was like a knife edge against his skin.

"Where?" Kez demanded, his heart pounding in his chest.

"It's everywhere," she spat, eyes flicking around wildly.

"I don't know where it is right now, but it's always watching. You can't run from it." She glanced at him for just a second, her face twisted with frustration and fear. "And you can't hide from it, either. You're already in its domain."Kez looked down at his hands, then out at the alley they were moving through, trying to calculate their options. Flee, or face it. Neither sounded appealing.

Suddenly Allexis stopped on her tracks and said, "It's targeting you...".