The mist had settled low, curling around Ian's boots like smoke of breath from the abyss.
He stood still, his breath slow and steady, the aftershocks of Torkas' fall still echoing in the marrow of the forest.
The red-cloaked stranger hadn't moved. His presence felt like a wound that refused to close—pulsing, taunting, deliberate.
Ian's gray eyes narrowed. A long exhale drifted from his nose.
"What you're looking for…" he began, voice barely louder than the wind, yet honed like glass, "what point is there in seeing it? The moment I let it happen, your curiosity might be satisfied—" he tilted his head slightly, "—but you'll most certainly die. And then who will you report to?"
The man cocked his head to the side, that wretched smile still fixed on his face. "Awfully confident, aren't you?"
Ian's response was immediate, unblinking.
"This isn't confidence," he said. "Nor is it pride. It's simply fact."
The forest seemed to still at that. Even the fog paused, as if listening.
