Enigmatic rune cards

Bo City was shrouded in darkness for an entire night, its citizens gripped by primal terror. Screams and chaos echoed through the streets, though none could name the dread hanging over them.

Ethan Lewis lay unconscious in his room, his expression serene, as if cradled by an unseen force. Two obsidian cards etched with sinister runes rested on his pillow. His fractured wristband—now inert and ordinary—offered no clues. Above him, tendrils of shadow seeped into his body, stitching his wounds with impossible speed.

In his nightmare, Ethan writhed on a hospital bed, faceless figures looming. Despair choked him until a familiar grip steadied his hand—Mother's. Her whispered words dissolved into static, save for a distant command: "Awaken."

He jolted upright, disoriented. "My room? How?" Memory flooded back: the Level 3 Aberration, its voice nearly killing him. Grace Quinn's warnings rang truer than ever—such entities could annihilate cities. Yet here he lived, surrounded by three Aberrations.

Mother had intervened. Her victory over the Elder defied logic, but Ethan's survival proved it.

10:15 a.m.

Silence unnerved him. Mother always raged at his door by now. Peering into the hallway, he found nothing. The kitchen hinted at her abrupt departure: vegetables half-chopped, broth still steaming.

Ethan pocketed the enigmatic cards. Their runes pulsed faintly, oddly comforting. "Grace will know," he reasoned, though caution ruled him. Even mundane objects could kill—a lesson learned when a withered weed mutated into a venomous centipede.