“Damn, what a gruesome scene,” Detective Marlowe muttered under his breath, his eyes narrowing as he took in the aftermath of the wreck. The twisted metal carcass of the sedan was barely recognizable, its front end folded in like a crushed tin can. Dried blood streaked across the cracked windshield, and the pungent scent of burnt rubber still clung to the air like a ghost that refused to leave.

  There were signs (and very strong ones too) of a Kavarthi attack, but no one could say for certain in these kinds of situations. But the most notable lead he has right now is the fact that the primary suspect, Nathaniel Patch, has vanished, which could mean two things, both of which aren't good. Either a Kavarthi attacked them and afterward took him as a trophy for some other reason, or Nathaniel himself was responsible for the atrocity.

  Marlowe crouched beside the wreck, brushing his gloved fingers along the scorched edge of the driver’s side door. The metal was warped with heat and saturated with Mana, which was already weird on its own since regular mundanes couldn't produce that much Mana. But that alone wouldn’t be enough to confirm Kavarthi's involvement, since that just left the possibility of a hollow or Shedim having been the one behind the attack, which was even weirder. However, coupled with the strange, claw-like gouges in the asphalt and the faint shimmer of residual aether in the air, it was more than just a hunch.

  “Jones,” he called over his shoulder. A younger officer, pale-faced and visibly uneasy, stepped closer.

  “Yes, sir?”

  “Get me a full spectrum scan of this area. I want every trace of residual energy cataloged. Cross-reference with the Kavarthi resonance database to see if we’ve got a match. And have them bring Mana tracking hounds. If Patch is still alive and on foot, they might pick up his trail.”

  Jones nodded and hurried off, leaving Marlowe alone with the wreck again. He stood, a cigarette lit in his hand, before bringing it up to his mouth and inhaling slowly.

  “Why would a powerful evil spirit attack a group of mundanes anyway? There's no reason for that, and judging by the amount of mana hanging in the air, it doesn't seem plausible that it was trying to feed because it was hungry... So what the heck is going on?”

  It was dark... and silent... and very, very tight. Attempting to move was nearly impossible, and for a moment, he almost gagged at the stale and musty air, his lungs itching as he clutched them, his eyes bulging in pain from the lack of air. He kicked up, only to hurt his legs by doing so, but the moment he tried to scream, he quickly found out that he couldn't. His eyes fluttered open, but there was nothing to see. In fact, he couldn't see at all, as the only thing that greeted his vision was an all-encompassing blackness that seemed to press against his eyelids. Panic settled tightly in his chest, and attempting to move was a mistake that he quickly regretted, as the action caused his head to hit something above, and blood poured out of his head.

  The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  "No. No, no, no—" Nathan wheezed, his fingers clawing at the wood, splinters jabbing under his nails as blood slowly trickled out of his fingers. He kicked out, but the space was too tight, and all he ended up accomplishing was getting his knees jammed against the inside of the... whatever it was, which further fueled his feeling of entrapment.

  He was trapped.

  That much was obvious to him, and he was trapped in the worst way possible. His breath came in short, ragged gasps. His lungs burned, but—wait. His lungs? Shouldn't he be dead? Memories of his old life began to pour back into his head, and the scene of him dying quickly nestled itself tightly among the various vast memories that lingered in his mind.

  His heart thundered in his chest, which was an odd sensation considering he was not supposed to have a heart anymore, or a body, for that matter. But here he was, in the dark, in pain, and most definitely corporeal. Nathan coughed, a wet, ugly sound that echoed back at him, and he instantly froze. That echo, it wasn't quite right. He reached out again, his palms sliding against the smooth surface overhead. It was… oddly soft. Really, really soft. It was slightly splintered in some places, but it was… soft.

  Which was surprising, to say the very least. He was more or less expecting to be buried inside some kind of coffin due to the tight space, but… no, he wasn't buried anywhere.

  'Goddamn it...' he internally yelled, weakly banging his bloodied fist upward, only for another surprise to strike him back in the face.

  He wasn't human. Staring down at his arm, what greeted him weren't human hands, or hands at all for that matter. Instead, they were paws... he had paws... dog paws.

  '"Wh—" he tried to stammer, only for blood to vomit out of his mouth as his paws fell down, his entire body spasming as his vision blurred. For a moment, he could have sworn that his consciousness almost slipped free of his body, but that was all pushed to the back of his mind as another searing hot pain raced across his entire being.

  After a comfortable few minutes of him just writhing around on the ground, the pain in his chest had finally started to dull, not because it was fading, but because his body was adjusting.

  Or at least that's what he thought.

  But the moment he tried to get up, he couldn't even manage three steps out of the tight tunnel his body was trapped in before falling back down to the ground, this time impaling itself on a sharp rock as it did. His vision completely blackened... at least for a moment. For some odd reason, his consciousness buckled before being slammed outward from the corpse, and his vision momentarily reeled as he tried to get his bearings.

  “Ok…. What the actual—!!!”

  Marlowe exhaled a plume of smoke, the orange ember of his cigarette flaring as the sound of machinery echoed in the distance. The scan drones had begun their sweep of the entire area the moment the TVO field team started working on it, the piece of machinery humming softly as they floated across the wreckage, mapping out the distorted mana fields. The scent of ozone lingered, making his skin prickle slightly.

  He tapped the ash off the end of his cigarette and narrowed his eyes as a faint ping sounded from one of the drones. “Already?” he muttered, throwing aside the cigarette as he strode toward the source of the noise.

  Jones jogged over, tablet in hand. “We’ve got something, sir, but it's a little weird and not for the faint of heart.”

  Marlowe’s cigarette twitched at the corner of his mouth. “A summoning?”

  "Nope, but it could be a forced transition. Either way, it’s not natural. Look at this—" Jones turned the screen toward him.

  On the screen was the mutilated corpse of a man, an image that, even after all he had witnessed, was difficult to stomach. Scattered across the ground lay the man's severed arms and legs, while the remainder of his torso hung grotesquely from a tree. Twisted around his body were his own intestines, working as some kind of rope that bound him to the tree. But that was far from the worst of it. Nestled within the hollowed remains of the poor man were a pair of eyes accompanied by a mouthful of jagged teeth, the parasite in question devouring the man from the inside out while a viscous fluid oozed from his gaping mouth.

  “Well, shit, I'm going to lose a few nights of sleep after that. But on the bright side, we found our man, and we can officially declare Nathan deceased.”