Chapter 13: Chapter 13 – The Pulse of Instinct

Bright didn’t dream in the Shroud.

Sleep came like a collapse, shallow and brittle, but his mind never drifted into anything soft. So when the cold ripple crawled up his spine and every nerve in his skin lit like static, he wasn’t startled awake—he was alert, instantly, eyes opening to darkness before thought even formed.

He didn’t move.

Didn’t speak.

His hand slid toward the sword at his side almost involuntarily.

A second later, stone cracked somewhere behind the ruined wall of their camp—just a pebble slip, barely a shuffle. Link jerked upright with a quiet curse, Duncan snatched his spear, and Adam froze mid-breath.

No movement followed.

The silence afterward felt like held breath.

Link’s eyes flicked to Bright. “You heard something?” he whispered.

Bright didn’t answer. He didn’t know how to explain it. He hadn’t heard it—not with his ears. Something in him had surged before the faint shift in stone, like a muscle tensing at the edge of catastrophe.

He didn’t sleep the rest of the night.

By the time the dim haze of Shroud-morning bled across the ruins, people were already arguing.

The missing man from the night before left a hole in the Company no one wanted to talk about, but the tension made their voices crack. Some blamed the Crawlers. Others muttered about deserters. A few stared at the fog with haunted eyes and said nothing at all.

Roegan stood near the center of their makeshift refuge, arms crossed, his frame casting a long shadow across stone and rubble. His loyalists gathered close, their weapons sharpened and their expressions set.

When he spoke, he didn’t raise his voice—but everyone quieted.

“We survive by order,” he said. “Not panic.”

Murmurs stirred in the gaps between his words.

“You all know Tier Two means Crawlers with more strength, more instinct—and some with powers none of you are ready for. If you want to last even a week in here,” he continued, “then every squad, every soldier, brings in one core per day. Minimum. Or you don’t stay in this zone we’ve cleared. I am not doing this out greed, well I am a bit greedy but i need the men completely loyal to me to have incentives to stay loyal.”

The reaction struck like thrown gravel.

“What?”

“You’re joking.”

“Taxing us? Here?”

Roegan didn’t flinch. “If you don’t contribute, you leave. I’m not letting dead weight drain resources. We keep this building fortified. We build reserves. We plan for whatever is in the heart of this place.”

Someone spat on the ground. Another soldier cursed under his breath. The grumbling swelled but no one drew steel.

Silas Drey leaned against a broken column nearby, his group fanned out behind him—six survivors who’d chosen him over Roegan overnight. His smirk was a shadow barely lit by morning gloom.

“A core a day?” Silas said lazily. “Careful, captain. Keep this up and they’ll start calling you Commander.”

Roegan’s gaze cut to him but he didn’t rise to the bait. “You’re free to leave the camp perimeter any time you feel brave.”

Silas shrugged. “We’re hunters, not housecats. We’ll bring back more than the minimum—and keep what we earn.”

Several soldiers glanced at his group with unease. Bessia stood slightly apart from Silas’s closest men, arms folded, eyes unreadable.

“Then get moving,” Roegan said. “Just don’t come crawling back empty-handed and expect shelter.”

Silas flashed a grin that didn’t touch his eyes. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”

He jerked his head and his group began to move—heading toward a crumbling archway that led deeper into the fog-choked district. The sound of their boots faded into damp silence.

Roegan turned on the rest. “The rest of you are free to complain,” he said, “as long as you still hunt. We settle into routine, or we die faster.”

A few swore under their breath, but the threat of being pushed into the dark without allies silenced most of the resistance. Soldiers drifted into their squads, muttering, some adjusting armor, others counting weapons.

Bright watched from the shadow of his group’s alcove.

Adam scratched his chin. “Well. At least he didn’t ask for limbs too.”

Duncan’s jaw tensed. “He’s not wrong. If we stay huddled here, the Crawlers will come eventually—or we’ll starve.”

Link’s tone was cool. “Silas is making a point. He’ll come back with more cores than us if we move too slowly.”

Bright didn’t answer immediately. The echo of his sudden awakening still hummed behind his ribs—a pressure that wasn’t physical but instinctual. Something alive and new.

Adam squinted at him. “You’re too quiet. Your wrist worse?”

Bright met his gaze. “I’m… doing alright.”

Duncan turned sharply. “Already?”

Link straightened, studying him. “Maybe the improvement in our physicality is starting to show”

Bright ran a thumb along his sword hilt. Words felt incomplete next to the sensation itself.

“It’s not just feeling danger,” he said to himself after a pause. “It’s… like a pulse. A push in my nerves. If something’s about to happen near me—something violent, something with intent—it hits before it hits.”

Danger sense was directional. It didn’t tell him what. Just where. It felt short, maybe twenty, thirty paces? Less if there were walls. More if he focused.

Bright flexed the wrist where the phantom tremor had first struck. “We need to move before Silas clears every easy kill.”

Duncan grinned. “You volunteering to lead, or just pointing fingers?”

“Doesn’t matter who leads,” Link said. “We pick a direction and hunt small groups. No overreaching.”

Adam patted his bag. “And someone better carry the cores this time without dropping them like candy.”

Bright looked past them, toward Roegan’s staging area. The captain’s squad was already preparing—a tighter formation than the rest, disciplined, armored, dangerous. His authority had been challenged but not broken.

One of the neutral soldiers—thin, jittery, muttered to his partner, “A core a day? I’ll be dead by day three.” His companion winced but said nothing.

A different voice called across the ruin. “Form up! Roegan wants hunting groups of four to six!” More groans. More shuffling.

Duncan glanced at Bright. “You good to fight with one hand?”

Bright lifted his sword slightly. “I’ve fought with worse.”

“Not comforting,” Adam muttered.

Link peered into the fog. “The Crawlers hunt in clusters near the old streets. We start there.”

“And avoid Silas, that guy gives me the creeps” Duncan added.

They gathered their gear. Duncan adjusted the straps of his improved spear. Link checked the edge of his blade and the weight of his boots. Adam tied his satchel more securely and tugged his coat tighter.

Bright stood, the echo of instinct still tingling down his fingers.

Roegan’s voice cut the air again. “Move in squads. Bring back something before nightfall or don’t bother returning.”

Someone behind him snapped, “We’re not your soldiers!”

Roegan didn’t turn. “You’re alive because you stayed near structure. The Shroud will sure as hell eat the rest.”

Silas and his crew vanished into the fog, half laughing, half murmuring among themselves. Their silhouettes dissolved as if swallowed.

Bright watched until nothing remained but gray.

Adam exhaled. “If we see any of his group, we let them take the hits first.”

Duncan smirked. “That’s the smartest thing you’ve said all week.”

Link started walking. “Save your voice. The Maw listens, shit! That sounded more cooler in my head”

Bright followed, the pulse of his new power simmering like a warning in his bones.

The Shroud seemed to breathe around them, unseen things shifting in corridors of shattered stone and fog. The ruins groaned with old memory. Every step forward felt like a trespass.

But one certainty remained clear—

They hunted now. Or they would be hunted.

And Bright could feel the difference.

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