Chapter 5: Saturday Night - Street 07 Forest

They gathered at the edge of the forest, the seven members of the Phenomena Research Club, flashlights in hand and breath visible in the cold night air. The forest ahead was a silhouette of shadows, black against black, with towering trees reaching endlessly into the starless sky.

Ruri stood near the front, her fingers brushing the charm in her pocket. It pulsed again, faintly, but alive. She said nothing.

Reina, calm but alert, adjusted the straps of her backpack and unfolded the weathered map by flashlight. The light caught the edges of handwritten notes and decades-old club scribbles. 

"Alright," she said in a low tone, barely louder than the wind. "We follow the eastern path. Based on past records, there's supposed to be a clearing past a broken shrine."

The group nodded silently and stepped past the first line of trees. Darkness swallowed them almost instantly. 

No insects. No birds. Just the crunch of leaves underfoot and the soft beam of their flashlights dancing over roots and trunks. Even the wind seemed to pause as they moved deeper into the forest.

It didn't take long before Koharu stopped, her light fixed on a tree to their left. 

"Guys… look." 

A talisman. Old parchment, edges curled and damp. Ink, once red, had faded to brown, and its lines still curled unnaturally across the paper. It was torn down the center.

"There's another," Haruki said, crouched near a gnarled root. "Burned, but the tree behind it isn't."

Ruri stepped closer, her heart tightening. The scorch marks licked the edges of the paper, but the bark behind it was untouched, like the fire had burned only the talisman and nothing else.

"Half of this one's missing," Koharu murmured, her voice barely above a whisper. "It's like… something peeled it away."

They spread out, their lights revealing more. 

More talismans. Scattered. Not in a clean circle, but stretched across the forest in lines, diagonals, and arcs. Some nailed to high branches, others hidden beneath moss or wrapped around stones. Every single one faced inward.

"Incredible…" Minato muttered, snapping photos. "They're all pointed toward the mountain."

"Not a seal," Ruri whispered. "A barrier network."

Takumi's voice cut through the dark. "Some of these symbols match what I found in old village texts. This whole mountain might be part of something ancient."

"You're saying it's not just one ritual?" Daiki asked, stepping carefully between two rotted logs. "But an entire system—designed to hold something in?"

"Or out," Reina added, kneeling by a talisman with only a single line left intact. "Some still have energy… but most are dying."

"Which means whatever was here might already be moving," Ryo said.

No one spoke after that. The forest was suffocatingly quiet. 

Takumi knelt by a stone nearly buried under years of earth and roots. "Over here."

Ruri joined him. Her flashlight caught the rough lines of something carved deep—something violent. A symbol gouged into the rock. It wasn't carefully drawn; it was etched with desperation. 

"It's not decorative," Ruri murmured. "This was meant to bind something."

Ryo crouched beside her. "Or warn us."

Before she could say anything more, Koharu's voice pierced the silence. 

"…Guys."

She stood near the tree line, flashlight trembling. 

Beyond her beam, just barely visible through the mist and branches, was a figure. Still. Tall. Faceless. Shrouded in black smoke that didn't move with the wind, as if it wasn't part of this world.

Ruri's blood ran cold. The charm in her pocket pulsed again, stronger this time—hot.

Then, in a single blink, the figure vanished.

Minato's camera clicked. "I-I got something, I think"

"That wasn't a person," Reina said quietly, her knuckles white around her notebook. 

"No way," Daiki muttered, backing up. "That wasn't anything normal."

Takumi stood quickly, glancing around. "We need to leave. Now."

Ryo didn't argue, nor did anyone else. 

Reina snapped her notebook shut. "We regroup tomorrow. Get this mapped out everything. Something here is unraveling fast."

Ruri hesitated, her eyes fixed on the empty patch of forest where the figure had stood. The silence around them had changed. Now, it wasn't just an absence; it was awareness.

The charm pulsed once more. And somewhere deeper in the trees, something knew they were there.

In the Clubroom-

The soft buzz of fluorescent lights filled the quiet room where the Phenomena Research Club had gathered. The long table was cluttered with papers, hand-drawn maps, sketches of talismans, faded photocopies of old village records, and Minato's camera, which lay carefully among them, its screen still glowing faintly.

Reina stood at the front, pinning items onto the corkboard in silence as the others watched, feeling uneasy. 

"So," she finally began, breaking the silence, "we've confirmed at least two dozen talismans scattered across the forest."

"Not in a circle either," Takumi added, tracing his finger along the edge of the map. "More like a fragmented net. All of them are positioned to face one general direction deeper into the mountain."

Minato raised his camera. "I managed to get one decent shot of the figure. Barely." He set the photo down on the table. It depicted a tall silhouette, out of focus and wrapped in something dark and fluid, like smoke that didn't disperse.

Daiki leaned over the photo, frowning. "That thing… it didn't run or flinch. It just watched us."

"Like it knew we were coming," Ryo said from his seat, flipping through the old club journal. "And it didn't care."

Ayaka shifted in her chair, visibly unsettled. "So… what was it?"

Reina pointed to a section of an older notebook she'd marked. "The last team to explore that part of the mountain wrote about 'interference in spiritual containment' and 'active visual anomalies.' Whatever's out there… it isn't new."

Koharu hugged her sketchbook closer. "And those talismans… they weren't just charms. They were holding something back, weren't they?"

"They were," Ryo confirmed, finally looking up. "And they're weakening."

Reina nodded. "Some of them still hold energy; others are dead. The seal system is deteriorating."

Ruri sat quietly at the end of the table, her eyes fixed on a map but not really seeing it. Her hand brushed against her pocket, where the charm rested warm, steady, and quiet for now. She hadn't told anyone how it had reacted in the woods or about the strange, flickering images she couldn't explain. She didn't even know what to call them, so she kept silent. No one had noticed. Not really. Just as she wanted.

"We need more data," Reina said, snapping the corkboard shut. "We'll map the remaining seals, document the condition of the talismans, and try to find out what this thing is and how long it's been locked up."

"And what if it's waking up?" Daiki asked.

Reina's gaze was steady. "Then we better be ready when it does."

Koharu's voice came quietly. "But why now? Why is it breaking down after all this time?"

"Something's changing," Takumi murmured. "Either inside the seal… or outside."

Ryo closed the journal with a quiet snap. "Either way, we'll find out. Together."

The others began to gather their things, some quieter than others, with the unease still fresh in their bones. A mystery larger than the club's usual ghost stories now lay before them, sprawled across maps and photos, flickering behind tree shadows and symbols they barely understood.

Ruri lingered at the window as the sun dipped low over the mountains, casting the forest beyond in gold and ash. Something was waiting out there, and she could feel it calling her. But she wouldn't say a word. Not yet.