Chapter 35: The Truth in the Darkness

The road stretched endlessly before Kai, bathed in the cold glow of his headlights. The encounter on Route 16 left a weight in his chest, one that tightened with each passing mile.

A monster had spoken to him.

Not just snarled. Not just attacked. It had warned him.

"You're already part of it."

Kai gritted his teeth. He had seen things that defied logic, battled creatures that shouldn't exist—but this was something new. This wasn't just another nightmare crawling out of the dark.

This was personal.

The road signs blurred as he pushed the car toward the station, but his thoughts were already ahead of him, unraveling everything. If the curse had spread, if it had evolved, then something had changed. Something he'd done last year had set this in motion.

He needed answers.

And he knew where to start.

The station was quiet when Kai walked in, but Taylor was still at his desk, stacks of reports spread out in front of him. The younger officer looked up, his face tight with concern.

"Sir," Taylor said. "I found something."

Kai tossed his shotgun onto the desk and leaned over the files. "Talk to me."

Taylor pointed at a set of documents. "You asked me to look into disappearances along Route 16? Turns out, they go back decades. Every few years, someone vanishes without a trace. At first, I thought it was just bad luck—people getting lost, hitchhikers running into the wrong person."

Kai's eyes narrowed. "But?"

Taylor swallowed. "But then I checked the dates. Every disappearance happened during December. Always within the 27-day period."

A cold wave ran down Kai's spine.

It wasn't random. It had never been random.

Taylor flipped another page. "And that's not all. I cross-referenced the reports with what happened last year. The disappearances... they stopped after the 27th night. The same night you ended it in Stowntown."

Kai exhaled slowly. So that was it.

The curse hadn't just haunted Stowntown. It had been happening in the background everywhere. And when Kai thought he had ended it—

He had only forced it to evolve.

"This thing... it's spreading," Taylor continued, his voice low. "And it's getting worse. Whatever was keeping it contained before—it's not working anymore."

Kai nodded. That much was clear.

But there was still one piece missing.

"Something triggered this shift," he said. "Something changed the rules."

And then he remembered what the creature had told him.

"You took one piece off the board. And now... the rest are waking up."

The thing at the farmhouse. The shifting face on Route 16. The escalating violence.

The game wasn't over.

It was resetting.

Kai rubbed his jaw. He needed more information. If this was truly connected to Stowntown, then there was only one person who might know more.

Eleanor.

He grabbed his phone and dialed.

Eleanor picked up on the second ring.

"Kai," she said, her voice tense. "I was just about to call you."

Kai didn't waste time. "Tell me what you know."

A pause. Then: "It's happening, isn't it?"

Kai's grip on the phone tightened. "You knew this wasn't over."

"I suspected," Eleanor admitted. "But I didn't have proof. Not until tonight."

Kai frowned. "What do you mean?"

Eleanor exhaled. "There was another attack. Not here—somewhere else. A small town about 200 miles from Stowntown. Three people dead, one missing. No signs of forced entry, no human tracks. Just... claw marks. Deep ones."

Kai closed his eyes for a moment. The pattern was clear now.

"It's spreading," he murmured.

"Yes," Eleanor said. "And I think I know why."

Kai opened his eyes. "I'm listening."

Eleanor's voice was grim. "When we stopped the cycle last year, we broke one of its rules. We thought ending it in Stowntown would kill it completely—but instead, it forced the curse to adapt. It's no longer tied to one place. It's breaking into new locations, growing stronger."

Kai's jaw tightened. He had hoped for a different answer.

He should have known better.

"There's more," Eleanor said. "I've been looking into historical records, trying to trace this curse back to its origin. And I found something."

Kai sat up. "Go on."

Eleanor hesitated, then said, "The cycle didn't start in Stowntown. It started somewhere else—long ago. And Stowntown was just the latest place it settled."

Kai felt the pieces clicking together. "So if we want to stop this for good..."

"We need to find its real origin," Eleanor finished.

A silence settled between them.

Kai exhaled sharply. "Send me everything you have."

"I will," Eleanor said. "But Kai... be careful. The closer you get to the truth, the more dangerous this will become."

Kai smirked despite himself. "Wouldn't be the first time."

Eleanor sighed. "Yeah. That's what worries me."

The line went dead.

Kai leaned back in his chair, staring at the ceiling.

The road ahead was clear now.

He wasn't just dealing with a monster.

He was hunting the source of it all.

And he had a feeling that whatever was waiting at the end of this trail—

It was watching him too.