Night of the Fallen Ones

Yuccavale slept in peace. For weeks, there had been no mutant attacks, no reports of missing bodies or unexplained deaths. The townfolk had started to breathe easier, their fear of the unknown fading into quiet acceptance. Even Barry, isolated as he was, had begun to believe that maybe—just maybe—the worst had passed.

But peace was always an illusion. And that illusion shattered in the dead of night. 1 Byeolhwa, Suiseibi 1312 Third Age. The night watchman on the northern border was the first to die. He never saw the shadow moving in the trees. Never heard the whisper of breath behind him. Only the wet snap of his own spine.

His body slumped forward, blood pooling beneath him. His face, frozen in silent agony, was the first to greet the coming slaughter.

Then came the screams. They descended from the darkness like ghosts from the abyss. The Hollow Man moved ahead of them, and as his presence touched the land, sound died. The alarms, the shouts, the warnings—all swallowed into the void of his existence. The guards at the outer gates turned in confusion, their lips moving in silent cries, unable to understand why they could no longer hear themselves.

Then, Garrick the Iron Maw was among them. A wall of steel and teeth, he tore through flesh and bone with horrifying ease. A man's head caved inward like soft fruit beneath his grip. Another tried to run—only for Garrick to catch him by the legs and slam him against the wall, again and again, until nothing remained but red smears.

The Red Hound followed, a blur of flickering embers, slashing throats faster than their victims could comprehend.

And behind them all, Fletcher came. A God of Horror He's not a man anymore. Not even a mutant.

He's a writhing nightmare, an eldritch beast of tendrils and hunger. His elongated limbs coiled and slithered, his face an unnatural mass of shifting tentacles, their slick surfaces pulsating with a mind of their own. His eyes—if they could even be called that anymore—were deep, abyssal pits, reflecting no light, no soul.

And as he walked through Yuccavale's border, he did not rush. He did not sprint. He only reached out.

A woman—one of the few townfolk assigned to night patrol—made the mistake of looking him in the eyes. A tendril snapped forward, wrapping around her waist, lifting her off the ground. She struggled, sobbing in silent terror, her hands clawing at the inky, wet mass constricting her.

Fletcher tilted his monstrous head. Then, he pulled. Her body ripped apart like paper, organs spilling to the ground in grotesque ribbons. Her legs and torso fell in separate directions, still twitching. Fletcher dropped the remains without thought, already moving forward.

The town of Yuccavale was still asleep. But they would wake up to a massacre. The attack spread like a cancer. Homes ripped open, doors torn from their hinges as Garrick dragged screaming men from their beds, tearing them apart limb by limb. The Red Hound hunted those who tried to flee, stalking through the alleyways, his glowing eyes the last thing they ever saw before the darkness took them.

Vael, the Withered Witch, strolled through the streets, her skeletal fingers grazing walls, trees, people. Wherever she touched, life decayed. The grass beneath her feet turned black. A mother clutching her child gasped as her flesh withered and caved inward, her face shriveling into a hollow skull before she crumbled into dust.

The child did not even have time to scream. And all of it—all of it—was happening in silence. No sound. No warning. Only death.

Far away, Barry's eyes snapped open. His breath came ragged, his senses on fire. Something was wrong. Then he smelled it. Blood. And beneath that… something else. Something he knew all too well. Fletcher.

Barry shot up from his bed, his chest tight with an unspeakable dread. He had feared this moment. Prayed it would never come. But it had. And Yuccavale would burn before dawn.

So, Barry ran like hell. His muscles stretched, twisted, snapped as his bones cracked apart and reformed in mid-stride. Fur erupted from his skin like wildfire, claws shredded through the ground beneath him, and his breathing turned into an animalistic snarl. The moon burned in his vision, but he barely noticed—his mind focused on one thing. The scent.

Blood. Thick, heavy, drowning the air. His stomach turned, his instincts screamed, but he didn't stop. Couldn't stop. Then he reached the border. And froze.

Yuccavale's outer streets were unrecognizable. Houses had been ripped apart, their walls splattered with gore, their rooftops torn open like broken ribcages. The cobblestone streets were slick with blood, pooling in dark lakes where bodies had collapsed. But they weren't just bodies. They were piles.

Barry's breath caught in his throat. The remains had been stacked on top of one another—torsos and limbs and heads, mangled, twisted, and half-consumed. Arms twitched without bodies, severed hands still clutched weapons, their owners already scattered in broken, gnawed pieces.

He took a step forward—his foot landed in something wet. Barry looked down. It was a face. A man's face. Just a face. His expression frozen in terror, his mouth slightly open as if his last breath had been a silent scream. His body was nowhere in sight.

Barry staggered back. His chest heaved. His claws dug into his palms. His ears rang. This isn't real. It had to be a nightmare. Some sick illusion. But then he saw them. They were still alive. If alive was even the right word.

Some of them crawled, dragging their broken bodies through the blood-drenched streets, their mouths open in silent pleas for mercy. Others sat rocking back and forth, their eyes empty, their minds already gone.

A woman stood against a wall, clutching her stomach. Barry took a step toward her—she turned. She wasn't holding her stomach. She was holding her insides, trying to shove them back in.

Barry's breath hitched. The crimson strings of her intestines spilled between her trembling fingers, slipping down in slick coils. She looked at him, her lips quivering, her voice a broken whisper.

"…please…" Her knees buckled. She collapsed face-first into the blood. And Barry couldn't move. He couldn't move. His mind screamed at him to deny it. To reject what he was seeing.

This isn't happening.

This can't be happening.

Then came the laughter. Barry snapped his head up. There, standing in the carnage like a god of death, was Fletcher. Or what was left of him.

His monstrous form stood at the center of the wreckage, his tendrils coiled around fresh bodies, lifting them into the air like a grotesque display of his art. His many eyes—black, abyssal voids—stared at Barry, unblinking.

And he was smiling. Not a grin. Not a sneer. A smile of pure, malicious joy. Barry's vision blurred with rage. His claws dug into his own arms, drawing blood. But still, he could not move. For the first time in a long, long time... He was afraid.

Barry collapsed to his knees. His claws sank into the blood-soaked earth, his breath ragged, his body trembling. His fur bristled, damp with the stink of death. His golden eyes darted from corpse to corpse, from ruin to ruin—a town he swore to protect, now nothing more than a slaughterhouse.

He had failed. The weight of it crushed him, sank its fangs into his heart. All the pain. The terror. The lives snuffed out before they could even scream for help.

He wasn't fast enough.

He wasn't strong enough.

A sheriff? A protector? No. He was nothing but a beast shackled in human skin, running in circles, pretending he could keep order.

He clutched his head, sharp claws digging into his scalp. This is your fault. This is what happens when you try to pretend you're something you're not.

Fletcher was right. The weak die. The strong kill. That was the law of the world. And he—

"Barry…" A voice. Not from the carnage. Not from the dead. From her. Lillian. Her voice drifted through his shattered thoughts, pulling him from the abyss.

She had never been afraid of him. She had stood by him. When the town turned against him. When the truth clawed at his heels. When his own past threatened to swallow him whole—she was there.

Barry's hands slowly uncurled from his head. He wasn't alone. And if he let Fletcher win—if he let this monster erase what little hope remained—then all of it would be for nothing.

His pain. His regrets. His guilt. It was his burden to bear. But not alone. Slowly, he lifted his head. The moon hung above, silver and vast, its cold light cutting through the darkness. Barry sucked in a sharp breath, filling his lungs, feeling his heart ignite.

Then—He howled. A deep, mournful, defiant howl. It ripped through the night, shaking the broken rooftops, echoing through the ruins. It was a call to war, to vengeance, to every last shred of strength he had left in his bones.

And Fletcher, standing amidst the carnage, grinned. The challenge had been made. And the real battle was about to begin.

Barry launched himself at Fletcher, his muscles coiled like steel cables, every fiber of his being screaming for vengeance. His claws slashed through the air, aimed straight for Fletcher's throat. But Fletcher was fast.

His monstrous tendrils shot out, whipping through the darkness like living serpents, colliding with Barry mid-air. The force sent Barry spiraling, crashing through the wreckage of a collapsed home.

Before Barry could rise, Fletcher was already on him. A massive hand, now grotesquely elongated with razor-sharp talons, drove straight into Barry's chest—tearing into fur and flesh.

Barry roared in pain. Blood gushed from the wound, steaming in the cold night air. But he didn't stop. With sheer brute force, he gripped Fletcher's arm, twisted it—then bit down.

Fletcher screamed as Barry's fangs sank deep into his corrupted flesh, tearing through sinew and bone. The taste was vile, rancid with an unnatural bitterness, like biting into something that should never exist. Barry didn't care. With a feral snarl, he ripped the limb off.

Fletcher stumbled back, his severed arm writhing on the ground like a dying parasite before dissolving into black mist. But instead of pain, Fletcher laughed.

"You're finally fighting like the beast you are!" His voice dripped with madness. His form twisted further—his tendrils thickened, his skull distorted, and his remaining arm grew back in an instant, now even more monstrous than before.

Barry barely had time to react before Fletcher's tentacles lashed forward, spearing through his shoulder, his thigh, his side—pinning him like an insect.

Barry howled in agony, struggling against the impaling tendrils, feeling them writhe inside his wounds like hungry worms.

"You're nothing but a chained dog, Barry!" Fletcher hissed, towering over him. "You fight, but you hold back. You kill, but you regret. It makes you weak."

Barry, breathing raggedly, spat blood onto Fletcher's face.

"And you're just another monster who doesn't know when to shut up."

With a surge of fury, Barry ripped himself free from the tendrils, his flesh tearing open but already beginning to stitch back together. He leaped, claws forward, slashing across Fletcher's chest with bone-deep cuts.

Fletcher howled, but Barry wasn't done. He grabbed Fletcher by the throat, lifting him with monstrous strength before slamming him into the ground, creating a crater beneath them. The sheer impact sent shockwaves through the battlefield, dust and debris spiraling around them.

Barry dug his claws into Fletcher's face, inches away from gouging out his eyes. But Fletcher smirked. Then Barry felt it. The tendrils under him moved.

Before he could react, they coiled around his waist and launched him into the air. Barry soared upwards before being slammed back into the ground with enough force to shatter stone. The breath was knocked from his lungs. The pain was unbearable. But he wasn't done. Not yet.

Meanwhile, in Abysra, the high-security prison for mutants and witches, alarms blared. The prison riot had turned into full-blown chaos.

CPG guards struggled to regain control as escaped mutants rampaged through the lower levels. The reinforced barriers had failed in some areas, and prisoners were pouring out, fighting their way to the surface.

But the real problem?

The Nexus had intervened. General Calloway's voice crackled through the comms. "Silas. The prison break is worse than expected. Deploy the anti-mutant prototypes. Now."

In a hidden Nexus facility, Silas leaned back, smirking. "Oh, General. You're going to love what I've been working on."

He flicked a switch. Deep in Abysra, massive containment doors hissed open. And the prototypes stepped out.

Tall, faceless androids, sleek and unnervingly human-like, their silver bodies glinting under the emergency lights. Their eyes, or rather, the glowing red slits where eyes should be, scanned the prisoners. Then, in unison, they moved. Fast. Too fast.

One mutant barely had time to turn before a metallic hand burst through his chest. Blood sprayed, his body convulsing before the android tore out his heart and crushed it.

Another prisoner, a telekinetic, tried to hurl a chunk of debris—but the android dodged effortlessly, appearing behind him in an instant. A sickening crack echoed as the android snapped his neck.

The anti-mutant prototypes weren't just killing. They were erasing. Silas watched the slaughter unfold through the live feed, a satisfied smile playing on his lips. "Let's see how many of you make it out alive."

Back in Yuccavale, the fight between Barry and Fletcher raged on. But Barry could feel it—something was changing. The night air felt charged, wrong. Something worse is about to coming...