Ethan started walking into the woods.
With each step, the air thickened—humid, oppressive, charged with a primal heat. The sun had already dipped below the canopy, but the light didn't vanish; instead, it twisted. Shadows warped. The treetops seemed to curl inward. He felt it then—subtle at first. The temperature began to climb, unnaturally fast. Sweat clung to his back like damp silk. The scent of char and heat thickened—sulfuric, acrid, like the breath of a forge, or the last exhale of something dead and burning.
Something was wrong. And something was calling.
Could it be a Fire-type?
The thought tugged at his ambition, even as a deeper instinct—older, animal—whispered turn back. He ignored it.
A strong addition to his team, perhaps. Something brutal. Efficient. A living weapon.
The sounds of battle weren't far. Roars. Screeches. Cries that didn't just echo—they lingered, as though the trees themselves remembered violence and fed on it. He moved low and silent through underbrush damp with decay. Leaves crunched underfoot—softly. The dirt smelled like blood.
Then he found the clearing.
It opened like a wound in the jungle. Charred earth. Smoking craters. Trees half-melted. Behind a wide, gnarled trunk, Ethan knelt and observed.
A Pokémon stood alone—fierce, burning, wrong.
It resembled an Arcanine, but only barely. Not the noble creature etched in textbooks or children's tales. No, this one was forged in suffering.
The Hisuian variant.
It looked as though magma had clawed its way into the shape of a beast. Its body was coated in a rugged blend of ash-grey and molten red, fur resembling jagged volcanic rock—dense, armored, and cracked with glowing heat. Its mane wasn't fur; it was flame made flesh, flaring out in living wisps. The fire inside it couldn't be contained. It pulsed from its eyes, its teeth, even the cracks in its ribs.
But it was wounded.
Deep, blackened slashes marred its flanks. Burnt fur peeled back to expose muscle, blood, even splintered bone in places. It bled smoke. Yet it stood—no, it defied—like something ancient, cornered, and unforgiving.
Behind her, a smaller figure cowered—a pup. A Growlithe, maybe, though its fur also smoldered faintly. Its body trembled. Its eyes were wide. Terrified.
Ethan's gaze lingered for only a moment.
It explained everything. The desperation. The madness. The mother's fury. The beast wasn't just fighting for survival—it was fighting for its child.
But the Hisuian Arcanine was not Ethan's concern.
Not really.
She was dying. That much was clear. The tremble in her legs. The stagger in her stance. The flickering in her flames. Her death was written into the rhythm of her breathing.
No.
The real threat was the humans encircling her like wolves. Or demons.
Three remained. Two men, one woman. Seven others already lay scattered across the battlefield—charred and smoking. Their corpses were twisted, burnt beyond recognition. Flesh fused to armor. Robes half-melted into their skin. But the remnants still bore symbols. Symbols that pulsed with malevolence.
Crimson sigils. Sharp. Ritualistic. Familiar.
The Crimson Eclipse.
Terrorists. Fanatics. Monster-makers.
Now they were here. Desecrating the wild. Tearing at the sacred. Ethan's eyes narrowed.
Their Pokémon swarmed around the dying mother. Golbat. Magneton. Feraligatr—savage, snarling, a monster shaped from flesh and fury.
Ethan's mind moved like a blade.
The leader was the man in the center. Tall. Commanding. But not sloppy. No braggart. He moved with intent, and his face was covered—no identity. Just authority. His Feraligatr was likely his partner: the way it paced, its eyes flicking to him between attacks.
The Golbat screeched and dove.
The Arcanine unleashed hell.
A fireblast roared from her mouth—not a move, but a cataclysm. It struck the Golbat mid-flight. There was no scream. Just incineration.
Ash fell like snow.
Still, the odds were cruel. The Magneton buzzed louder, spinning. Electricity cracked the sky. The Feraligatr advanced again, jaws snapping. Unrelenting.
But Ethan didn't move.
Didn't flinch.
He stood in the shadows, calm as winter. Watching. Calculating.
Like a butcher inspecting meat.
Then he vanished.
The jungle hushed. Even the insects dared not speak.
He slithered leftward, toward the woman barking orders at her Magneton. She was focused. Too focused. On the Arcanine. On the kill.
She never heard him approach.
Because no one expects death to whisper.
Ethan was right behind her.
The Magneton wailed, disrupted. She cursed, snapping at it—then froze.
She never saw the Sandile.
"Bite," Ethan whispered.
Sandile obeyed.
Its jaws latched around her throat—crushing bone and cartilage in one clean snap. Her eyes bulged. No sound came. Just gurgle. Her body collapsed like discarded meat.
The Magneton spun in agony—frantic, lost.
The Arcanine struck.
A second fireblast. It tore through the Magneton and lashed against the Feraligatr's side. The alligator beast reeled, screeching, flesh scorched, but it endured.
The captain was rattled. He turned sharply. One of his own was dead.
Smoke. Chaos. Blood. The battlefield had turned.
And Ethan?
Already gone. Again.
Now crouched by a collapsed tree, where a burned man gasped for breath—half-alive. His limbs were cooked. Face swollen. But still breathing.
Barely.
Ethan knelt beside him, tilting his head like a curious predator.
The man blinked up at him. Gasping.
"Please," he croaked.
Ethan didn't answer. Instead, he pulled out a black combat knife—sleek. Precise. Familiar.
"You trained that Golbat?" he asked quietly.
The man nodded, terrified.
Ethan's eyes were flat. Empty. Unmoving.
"It screamed," he said, "while it burned."
He gripped the man's jaw.
Pressed the blade against his cheek.
Then carved.
Flesh opened like wet parchment. The man shrieked—high, animal—but it quickly devolved into a choking howl as the knife scraped against teeth, then gum. Blood poured in thick, syrupy ropes.
Not sadism. Precision.
"You're going to die," Ethan whispered, "but you'll understand why."
The man tried to speak, gurgling through torn lips.
Ethan silenced him by driving the blade upward—under the jaw, into the roof of the mouth. Bone cracked. The eyes rolled. The body convulsed, then stilled.
Ethan rose.
The Feraligatr bellowed in fury. The captain turned again—and saw the second body.
Bleeding. Butchered.
His head snapped around, eyes wild. Searching the shadows. But there was nothing.
Only smoke.
Only ghosts.
Ethan had vanished once more.
He was the jungle now.
Watching.
Hunting.
The last man's breath quickened. He called out orders, shouted for someone—anyone—but silence was his only reply.
The Arcanine limped forward, dragging her bleeding body. Still protecting her child. Still defying fate.
Ethan circled again, unseen.
The jungle pulsed. It wasn't just alive—it was awakening. With every death, it fed. With every scream, it listened.
None of them would leave this place.
Not while Ethan was here.
Not while the forest whispered his name.
Because the jungle had eyes.
And now… so did he.