The city breathed beneath a sky bruised deep purple, its twin moons bleeding shadows that seeped like poison into every cracked stone and rotten plank. Nerin's footsteps echoed hollow, swallowed by the sickly pulse of the blood-red moss crawling insidiously up the walls, its thorns digging into reality like a parasite gnawing at flesh and bone.
The Edge of Remembrance hung from his fingers, a cold weight humming with memories not his own, each echo clawing at the edges of his sanity. The blade tasted like rusted iron and lost dreams—a weapon forged in the crucible of agony, whispering promises soaked in cruelty.
He had learned the brutal truth: the Hollow Mark was no mere curse. It was a covenant—an ancient pact binding the living to the unliving, a contract signed in screams and betrayal. Every Hollowed carried a fragment of that shattered vow, shackled by the twisted will of something far older than time.
Ahead, the air shimmered with malevolence. Figures stepped from the shadows—agents of the city's dark heart, their eyes empty voids reflecting the fractured moons. They wore chains that rattled with each movement, the links forged from memories stolen and lives devoured.
One stepped forward—a gaunt man with skin like cracked porcelain, a grin stretched unnaturally wide, teeth too sharp and eyes that flickered with madness. His voice was a rasp, like dry leaves scraping against stone.
"You think the Edge is your salvation? Fool. It is your shackle. Every strike feeds the hunger beneath the city."
Nerin's jaw tightened, the Mark burning hotter beneath his skin, a pulse syncing with the cruel beat of the city's heart. The hunter was also the hunted.
Chains rattled, shadows writhed, and the gaunt man lunged, claws dripping with cursed fire.
Steel met shadow.
The world cracked open.
Pain screamed.
And in the abyss between moments, Nerin saw the truth: survival demanded sacrifice. Not just of flesh, but of soul.
The city was not just a prison.
It was a tomb.
And the Hollow Mark was the key that could either lock him in or set him free.
The sky bled its dying light, twin moons casting cracked shadows over the broken cityscape—a labyrinth of rot and sorrow. Nerin's breath came in ragged gusts, each exhale curling like smoke into the suffocating dusk. The Edge of Remembrance hung at his side, cold and humming, a dark heartbeat tethered to his soul.
Behind him, the gaunt man's laughter echoed—an abyssal rasp scraping at the edges of sanity. The cursed chains still clattered in the air, but the hunter's strike had been parried, a brutal dance of steel and shadow barely paused.
Nerin didn't have the luxury of endless fights. The city whispered secrets, and some were louder than chains.
From the twisting alleys emerged a figure cloaked in tattered black, a Hollowed marked not with fear but with defiance. Her eyes burned with a feral light—sharp, fierce—a reflection of a will unbroken by the curse.
"You're wasting your strength chasing ghosts," she said, voice low, carrying the weight of a thousand scars. "The city's heart is deeper than your blade can reach."
Nerin studied her—skepticism curling like poison. Allies here were as rare as mercy, and just as deadly.
She extended a hand, the faint glow of a mark pulsing beneath her skin—a mirror of his own cursed sigil but fractured, jagged, like a broken promise.
"Name's Sylra. I've been hunting the chains for longer than you've been marked. We can tear this city apart, but only if we stop fighting each other."
The gaunt man's mocking cry faded into the distance, but the threat remained—a beast lurking beneath the surface, waiting for cracks in their fragile truce.
Nerin's fingers brushed the Edge of Remembrance, the cold fire licking his palm. The choice hung between them: trust the Hollowed rebel and risk betrayal, or walk alone and be swallowed by the shadows.
The city waited, patient and hungry.
Because in the Hollowed, the darkest alliances were often the only way to survive.
The city breathed like a dying beast, its rotten lungs exhaling a fog heavy with decay and whispered curses. Nerin and Sylra moved through the twisting alleys, shadows melting into shadows, their footsteps swallowed by the sick pulse of the blood-red moss curling along the cracked stones.
Sylra's fractured Hollow Mark glowed faintly beneath the torn sleeve of her cloak, jagged and flickering like a dying star. It was a wound and a weapon—proof of a past sacrifice that had both shattered and strengthened her.
"Most Hollowed think the Mark is just a curse," Sylra said, her voice barely above a whisper, "but it's also a chain. And some chains can be broken."
Nerin's fingers clenched the Edge of Remembrance tighter, the icy fire within the blade flaring in response. "How? I've seen the price."
She glanced over, eyes sharp with bitter resolve. "There's a ritual. Forbidden. Ancient. It can sever the bond, but it demands a sacrifice like no other. A memory you can never reclaim—a piece of your soul, burned away forever."
The words sank deep, a poison seed taking root.
The city groaned, and shadows twisted closer. A cold wind carried the faintest hint of ash and burnt flesh—a reminder that survival was a ledger written in blood.
Suddenly, from the darkness, a howl shattered the night.
Figures emerged—hollowed wraiths, their forms ragged and dripping with corruption, eyes empty but hungry. The gaunt man's agents, drawn by the faint pulse of rebellion.
Sylra drew a blade, its edge shimmering with stolen light. "They'll kill us both if we don't move fast."
Nerin nodded, the ritual's terrible cost burning in his thoughts. The chains could be broken—but at what price?
Steel met shadow once again.
Pain screamed into the void.
And somewhere deep inside, a memory began to fade—a fragment of a past life slipping silently into oblivion.
Because in this cursed city, freedom was the cruelest sacrifice of all.