Chapter 3 : Unseen Forces

The air in the room had grown colder, the shadows lengthening as Alistair stood by the desk, staring at the chair. There it was again—its position had changed, though not by the same imperceptible degree as before. This time, it was clearly moved, dragged with purpose. It sat now, slightly askew from its previous position, as though someone had been sitting there just moments ago.

Alistair's mind worked quickly, the gears of his logical thoughts spinning as he tried to piece together the mystery. The chair had moved. But how? The windows were shut tight, the air still. There had been no gusts of wind, no disturbance in the room. The rug beneath the chair was slightly askew, but not enough to suggest that it had been moved forcefully. He took a step closer, his gaze fixed on the seat, his pulse quickening as he scanned the room. 

His fingers twitched. He wanted to check for signs of disturbance—any marks on the floor, anything that might provide an explanation—but there was nothing. His eyes darted toward the closed door, then the shadows in the corners of the room. He could feel it—the growing unease. Was it his mind playing tricks? Was he imagining things?

"No," he muttered under his breath. "I'm not some fool who lets his imagination get the better of him."

But something gnawed at him. Something felt wrong, and he couldn't shake the feeling. He had spent his entire career dissecting facts, uncovering the truth hidden in the most obscure corners of life. There had to be a logical explanation for this. He simply needed to find it.

He bent down, examining the floor closely. No signs of scraping, no indentations in the carpet. Just… an empty room. He shook his head and stood up straight. 

"Perhaps I'm merely exhausted," Alistair mused aloud, pacing to the window, peering outside into the moonlit courtyard. His breath fogged the glass as he stared out, searching for any signs of life, any interruption. "I've been here too long. A bit of sleep is all I need to clear my head."

Yet, despite his rationalizations, the weight in his chest didn't lighten. His mind kept pulling him back to the chair—its presence, as if it were watching him, waiting for him to make a mistake. The eerie quiet of the room seemed to be closing in on him, thickening like fog.

A subtle, cold draft swept through the room, lifting the corners of the curtains. His eyes flickered back to the chair. "No… it couldn't be." His breath hitched in his throat, his hand involuntarily reaching for the edge of the desk.

"You're being ridiculous," he whispered to himself, but the words sounded hollow, as though they lacked conviction. "I've seen far stranger things, haven't I? A simple chair moving. There has to be a reason."

The sound of a faint whisper reached his ears, so quiet that he almost missed it. Alistair froze, his blood turning cold.

*"Come closer. You cannot run from what is already inside."*

He whipped around, his heart slamming against his ribs. The room was still. The shadows cast by the lamps stretched and swayed, but nothing moved.

"Did you hear that?" Alistair demanded aloud, his voice firm. "Who's there? Show yourself!"

There was no answer, only the creeping sensation that something unseen was hovering just out of his reach. 

It couldn't be. It couldn't be real. It was impossible. He was a man of facts, a man who had spent his life investigating the mundane and the obscure. There was always an explanation. Always a reason. He had seen it before—people claiming the supernatural, only to reveal that their fears were based on ignorance or hysteria.

Yet, in this moment, he couldn't deny the unease crawling up his spine. The whisper had felt too real. The chair, the room… everything about this place felt wrong. 

"By God, I'm losing my mind," Alistair muttered. He ran a hand through his hair, trying to ground himself, focusing on the physical. His fingers found a loose button on his coat. He twisted it idly, trying to ignore the gnawing feeling of being watched. But when his gaze moved back to the chair, he saw something new. 

The figure.

It was there, in the chair. A shape, darker than the room's shadows, something that bent the light around it. It had no form he could recognize, only a silhouette—a swirling vortex of inky darkness. It was a presence that pressed against him, stretching the very air in the room. His breath caught, his mouth going dry.

"No… no, this can't be. This isn't possible." His voice cracked, the disbelief evident in his words.

The figure didn't move, but it seemed to be drawing him in. His instincts screamed at him to run, but his body didn't obey. He stood rooted to the spot, transfixed by the figure's presence. The shadow stretched and shifted, its form flickering in and out of focus like smoke on a still night.

"You have unlocked the door," the voice echoed, the words reverberating in his skull. It was deep, resonant, as if the voice was not speaking through the air, but directly into his mind. "You sought the truth. And now you will know it."

Alistair's legs shook beneath him. The room had become distorted, the walls breathing in and out, their angles bending in impossible directions. The floor seemed to ripple like water, warping the space he stood in. He could feel the pressure in the air, a weight that pressed against his chest, squeezing the air from his lungs.

"No. This… This is impossible," Alistair gasped, his thoughts muddled. He wanted to run, to escape, but the room held him prisoner. There was nowhere to go. Nothing to do.

The figure in the chair seemed to pulse, its form a shifting mass of darkness. It was not a person, not even an entity that could be defined by his limited understanding of the world. It was something *else*. Something alien.

Then came the voices, not just one but many—whispers rising in unison, filling the room with a cacophony of unintelligible words. The sounds crawled into his mind, twisting the very fabric of his thoughts. They spoke in languages that were not human, that transcended any knowledge he had. The words were ancient, primal, like a song from the dawn of time, sung in a forgotten tongue.

*"You are chosen,"* the voice spoke again, *"You have begun the journey. And there is no turning back."*

Alistair staggered backward, his breath shallow and erratic. He reached out for anything, his fingers brushing against the desk. He felt the cold wood beneath his fingertips, grounding himself in the physical. But the shadows closed in, tightening around him. The air grew thick, suffocating.

"Who are you?" Alistair's voice cracked, but he forced the words out. "What is this? What do you want with me?"

The figure remained silent, and the whispers fell into an eerie silence. The pressure around him intensified, suffocating his thoughts, until—

The room shattered.

It was as if the world itself had cracked open, splintering in all directions. His vision blurred, the darkness spilling in as though it were liquid. The floor fell away beneath him, and he was swallowed whole by the void. His scream was lost in the emptiness, as the room dissolved around him.

The last thought Alistair had before the darkness consumed him completely was the sound of the voice, echoing in his mind:

"You are marked. Now… the path begins."