The Downworld

Chapter 3 : The Glowing Woman

50 days in the Downworld

The thunderstorm had finally stopped barking at Shane, when he arrived to the Endless Forest. For hours he had paced in this nightmare, not even stopping once. His feet were burning him, but pain had become a familiar thing to him now, a sting reminding him that he wasn't dreaming. That reality had Shane trapped here, all alone, and perhaps forever...

Shaking off the eventual bad thoughts he was having, Shane continued following the path taken by the elves, and noticed they did not go by the Swamps, and instead found a way to enter the forest safely, without having to worry about the predators from the Swamps... The Endless Forest was, as its name gave it away, Endless. Or at least that's how it appeared to be, as no one ever found a limit to this dark area. The Reaper entered without hesitation, aware of what creatures were living there, but not fearing any of them. He was a Champion, after all, he had nothing to fear. His first attempt to take down the elves who had spread false rumors about Cassius had miserably failed, but he did kill two of them, meaning there were three remaining. One of them, the one with the black hair, supposedly had the answers Shane was looking for, but it appeared these elves were clever enough to outsmart a champion... He wouldn't give them another chance. No. Next time, he wouldn't even let them fight back. In fact, the Hunter Curse was probably affecting them already, slowing them down, but this wasn't necessarily a good thing, because Shane wasn't the only predator in the Forest. And if something happened to kill the elves before Shane could get the answers, the punishment would be severe. Painful. Traumatic, as always. Which is why he started running, dodging eventual branches and jumping over obstacles in silence, making sure he wasn't getting any unwanted attention...