"321 days left…" by Duvencrune, Edgar O. Diary of the Long Night, 111th Edition

The Shadow World stretched endlessly around Zora, its road crumbling into a void where time didn't pass, only dissolved. The road shifted under her boots, its brittle fragments grinding into dust.

She was late.

Above her, a sky without stars churned like liquid smoke, its dim, shifting hues casting shadows across her path. Zora glanced over her shoulder, her hand brushing the hilt of her blade. Nothing followed—only the soft hiss of her breath and the crunch of her boots against the fragile road.

Then came the sound—a single click, like a tongue striking the roof of a mouth. It echoed, faint but distinct. Zora froze mid-step, her breath catching. Her eyes darted to the edges of her vision, searching for shapes in the swirling shadows. There was nothing—only another click.

Her grip tightened on the hilt as her jaw clenched. She knew this sound too well—too many Long Nights had passed with it in her ears. The clicking surrounded her like a mocking chorus. She didn't need to see them. She had planted these seeds herself.

Zora had placed them here—Lamias, or better, Nightmares—dragged them from land and bound them in this purgatory.

Each click echoed like a taunt, daring her to stop, to turn back. But she didn't. These were her prisoners. Since her earliest days working for the royals of Sorgenstein, Zora had used the Shadow World as a temporary cage, a place to store these creatures where they could do no harm.

They belonged here, locked in the suffocating darkness. Someday, when the sun returned to the sky, she would release them—not to freedom, but to its blazing light.

She could already picture their forms scorching under its heat, their grotesque shapes reduced to ash and nothing more. It was a quiet hope she carried, one she had never voiced, not even to Orlo.

Another click, louder now. A shadow darted across her path, too fast to follow. Zora's pace didn't falter, though her fingers flexed instinctively around the hilt of her blade.

Most of them hung suspended in the desolate expanse, their contorted forms entwined in glistening. The webs shimmered faintly in the dim, swirling light of the Shadow World, a latticework of Lolth's making, her Spirit's delicate traps turned into prisons. Lamias writhed within them, dangled like broken ornaments as if part of the bleak landscape.

The patterns were perfect and efficient—Lolth's skill was evident in every silken strand. Yet, even this mastery couldn't catch them all.

Not Monica.

The thought of her sent a fresh wave of exhaustion through Zora. Monica wasn't tangled in the threads. She never was. She had slipped past them over and over again, roaming the Shadow World as a predator rather than prey.

Each encounter ended the same—monstrous laughter and that haunting truth that she killed her first love.

This place never grew easier. No matter how many times she passed through, no matter how many Lamias she and Lolth trapped, the vast emptiness always seemed to press heavier on her shoulders. And Monica's absence hung like a guillotine over her thoughts.

The clicking sound returned, threading through the silence like a whisper. Zora didn't flinch, didn't break stride, though her fingers kept brushing instinctively over the Ulencia's Swords. She was tired—too tired for another hunt, too exhausted to deal with the ones that still roamed free.

The soft jingle of chains stirred her—a sound that could cut through the Shadow World like an unwanted bell. If she drew it too soon, the ring might carry farther than she dared risk, inviting more trouble than even she could handle.

The distance to the shadow portal seemed to stretch endlessly before her, its calling just barely visible on the horizon. Safety lay there, in its pulsing darkness, a way back to Ostesh. To Orlo.

Crackling branches echoed through the air, growing closer with every second. Zora's jaw tightened, her stride faltering just enough to glance over her shoulder. Nothing but shadows swirled behind her, but she knew better than to trust the silence.

"For fuck's sake!" The words hissed through clenched teeth as her hand snapped to the hilt.

The chain released with a metallic hiss, the Ulencia Sword spinning free in a fluid motion. Its blade whirred around her in a deadly arc, a blur of silver cutting through the little light available around her. The hum of the blades was a warning as much as a defence as well.

Zora's stance shifted, her feet steady against the road. The sword's circular path carved a momentary boundary around her, dancing as the blades spun, daring anything to come closer.

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The crackling branches grew louder, the unseen presence pushing closer. The shadow writhed and flickered, their forms constantly shifting, but none settled into the grotesque outlines she expected.

Her fingers flexed around the hilt of her sword, the rotating blade slowing as her frustration mounted. Nothing. No twisted limbs, no glint of jagged teeth, nothing that screamed Nightmare.

But that meant nothing anymore.

The fiends could be anything now—anyone. The fight had changed. It wasn't just force and blade anymore; it was deception, instinct, and the gnawing uncertainty of not knowing what form the enemy would take.

The shadow seemed to mock her hesitation, their edges fraying and reforming. She couldn't trust what she saw, and every second spent waiting felt like an invitation for them to strike.

Fighting them had become more than a test of skill. It was a battle of who made the rules at every encounter. And the Shadow World never played fair.

A sudden rush above her head. A blur of motion descended fast and recklessly, its arrogance unmistakable. Zora's muscles coiled instinctively, her body reacting before her mind caught up.

She leapt back, boots skidding on the road, her hand already moving. With a flick, she released the second blade. It spun out in a wide arc, the chains humming in opposition to the first, carving a path through the shadow.

The Lamia swooped low, its twisted form diving straight into the whirling steel. The blade met its chest with a sickening impact, slicing cleanly through. The creature's body crumpled mid-flight, its severed halves falling away in opposite directions before dissolving into the darkness below.

Zora landed on her feet, the blades still spinning in their deadly rhythm around her. She didn't flinch, her eyes already scanning the shadows for the next threat.

Two halves of a man lay before her, barely more than bones stretched thin with skin. Their severed forms dragged themselves forward with grotesque determination, clawing at the crumbling ground. The clicking of their tongues was taunting, echoing in the empty air as if mocking her efforts.

Zora's fingers flexed, and the blades whirred back into her grasp with a satisfying snap. Her eyes narrowed as she stepped toward the writhing remains, and her boot fell heavy with intent.

With one swift motion, she raised her foot and drove it down with a force reverberating through the fragile road. The crunch of shattering bone filled the silence as the creature's skulls caved under her heel. A grotesque mix of fragmented bone and slimy brain matter splattered across the ground, dark and viscous against the dim light.

She didn't linger, already expecting the inevitable. The halves twitched, fingers clawing through the gore, dragging their mangled forms forward with the same relentless hunger. The fragments of their skulls barely slowed them; their clicking tongues echoed louder now, more insistent as if the attack had only emboldened them.

Zora's lips pressed into a hard line. There was no final blow, no way to end them. Nothing she did would truly kill them.

Zora pressed her fingers to her lips and let out a sharp, piercing whistle that sliced through the thick silence. The shadows stirred, and a hulking figure emerged from the void, its movements eerily graceful despite its size. A giant spider, its seven legs tapping softly against the crumbling ground, materialized as if it had always been there, waiting.

The creature paused, tilting its angular head toward her. Its many dark eyes reflected the faint shimmer of the Shadow World. A low, almost begrudging hiss escaped its mandibles as it leaned closer.

"Could we wrap this one up?" Zora asked, her smirk teasing. "Pretty please?" She rested a hand on her hip, waiting.

The spider's front legs twitched as if in irritation, its mandibles clicking in a way that was almost conversational. Then came the dry, gravelly voice that Zora had come to know too well.

"This is… gross," it grumbled, the disdain dripping from every word as it shifted uncomfortably on its legs.

Zora chuckled softly, rolling her eyes. "And yet, you always manage, Lolth," she said, gesturing toward the writhing halves on the ground. "Go on, you're good at it."

The spider let out a low, resigned growl, its legs moving in smooth, deliberate steps toward the twitching remains.

"Yesterday, you called it repulsive," Zora said, stepping back as Lolth began her work. "You're running out of words."

Lolth's mandibles clicked an annoyed rhythm that made Zora's smirk even wider. She didn't need words to know the spider was muttering curses in its own way.

Instead, the Spirit shifted her bulk, carefully positioning her seven legs. From her abdomen, threads of shimmering silk spun into the air, catching what little light the Shadow World offered.

Zora watched as the Nightmare's writhing halves were cocooned, the silken strands tightening around the grotesque forms until they were immobilized. The creature's clicking tongue was muffled under layer after layer of Lolth's intricate weaving. Soon, only smooth, glistening silk spheres remained, their surfaces faintly trembling with the imprisoned foes inside. The webs looked fresh and out of place, glimmering like forgotten stars against the bleak, crumbling pathway.

Zora tilted her head as she glanced at Lolth. "Not bad."

The Magi grabbed one of the thick silken strands trailing from Lolth's abdomen, using it to pull herself up onto the spider's broad back. The surface was smooth and oddly warm beneath her palms, the faint hum of Lolth's energy pounding through her.

Lolth shifted her seven legs, the rhythmic tapping of her movements resuming as they pressed forward into the endless shadows.

"You're late," Lolth's gravelly voice broke through the silence.

"Shut up," Zora said without malice, rolling her eyes. "I know."

As I pen this passage of my book, the authorities of the United Nations estimate that 3.9 million creatures are afflicted by the contamination of black blood. 3.9 million Nightmares free in the open world. What they don't know—and what I fear to even speculate on—is the exact number of Lamias trapped in the Shadow World. Neither do I know nor do I possess the courage to call Zora and ask. Not that it matters much; I don't have her number anyway. It is peculiar to her aversion to technology. A quirk that baffles me to this day, though the reasons likely lie buried in some part of her story I've yet to uncover—or perhaps never will. But I digress. I don't wish to be accused of presenting a tale so scattered it loses its thread. It is, admittedly, chaotic at times, but let us at least strive to keep the proper timeline intact. There is much to untangle, and we'll get there, piece by piece. If you trust the precess... ——The Hexe - Book Two by Professor Edgar O. Duvencrune, First Edition, 555th Summer

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