The creatures stopped.
The combat between them ceased as if it had never existed.
Both dark masses turned slowly toward him.
There was no longer any dispute.
No distraction.
Their full attention was on him.
On the anomaly.
He held the blade with difficulty.
Its weight felt strange in his hands…
as if that object did not belong in that place.
And yet…
he held it.
The creatures began to move.
This time they were not fighting each other.
They advanced together.
The layer rippled beneath their deformed bodies.
As if the void itself recoiled before them.
The smaller creature did not advance.
It disappeared.
And by the time he realized—
it was already in front of him.
The attack came without warning.
Without sound.
Without preparation.
The impact sent him backward.
His body tore through the layer—
dragged against it as if the void resisted his presence.
The sword nearly slipped from his fingers.
His essence vibrated violently.
But…
he still existed.
He didn't understand.
He still existed.
He had barely stopped when he felt the shadow.
Larger.
Heavier.
Denser.
The larger creature did not disappear.
It didn't need to.
It simply advanced.
And the blow that came was not a blow—
it was pressure.
It was weight.
It was the entire darkness being pressed against him.
He was crushed against the layer.
The surface gave beneath the impact.
Cracked.
Split open in silent waves that spread through the darkness.
His essence trembled to its core.
Pain.
Not the pain of a broken body.
The pain of an existence being questioned.
But…
he still existed.
He didn't understand.
He still existed.
He tried to get up.
The sword was still in his hands.
Without knowing why… he had not let go.
The creatures watched.
For an instant—
neither of them moved.
As if it were impossible.
As if something had failed.
And then the smaller creature tilted its head.
It distorted.
Structures began to emerge from its dark mass.
Claws.
They were not appendages.
They were extensions of the darkness itself—
sharp as the absence of light,
thin as the boundary between existing and not existing.
They cut through the space around them.
Tore through the void before touching anything at all.
Even the darkness seemed to split before them.
He understood.
This was not meant to devour.
It was meant to erase.
The smaller creature disappeared again.
He tried to sense the direction.
Too late.
It was already in front of him.
He raised the sword.
The claws passed through the steel—
passed through the steel as if it didn't exist—
and tore directly into his essence.
He was hurled away.
This time it was not an impact.
It was a cut.
Something inside him had been separated from something else.
He didn't know what.
But he felt the absence.
Like a word forgotten in the middle of a sentence.
Like a name that once existed and no longer does.
He struck the layer.
Tearing through the surface of the void as he was thrown—
leaving a trail of existence where no trail should have been.
No answer.
He lay still.
The sword still in his hands.
The creatures did not advance immediately.
They watched.
Even after everything…
even after the blows,
the cut,
the pressure that should have erased anything—
he was still there.
Something was wrong.
The smaller creature distorted again.
This time differently.
Not to attack.
To analyze.
The larger creature stepped back half a step.
As if it needed distance to understand what it was seeing.
He tried to rise again.
His arms trembled.
The sword weighed more than before.
But he rose.
Slowly.
With difficulty.
With a stubbornness that had no name.
The creatures watched his every movement.
And then—
something changed in them.
Not hunger.
Not rage.
Recognition.
He was not prey.
Not food.
Not something to be devoured and forgotten.
He was a problem.
The message passed through his consciousness before any voice existed.
Direct.
Without sound.
Like a thought that was not his own.
— You don't belong here.
He did not respond.
There was no response to that.
Only the bare truth of what he already knew.
— Anomalies must be erased.
Silence.
Both creatures advanced.
Together.
Without hesitation.
Without haste.
As if this time—
there was no room for error.