Reid started looking around for a caravan. The village was looking dim, and the streets were lonely. It was night after all. The emptiness was normal. The lights were off in most of the houses. But some still had their lights on.

  Reid slowly approached one of the houses, his boots sinking in the soil. The house's door had a metal knocker. It was clear that the knocker had its share of time—fully rusted.

  Reid knocked on the door gently.

  Three times…

  Knock, knock, knock.

  No answer.

  Reid waited for some time. “Maybe they were busy?”

  He once again gripped the metal knocker. But before he could even knock one more time, a sound made him stop: the sound of a bolt sliding into place.

  Someone locked the door.

  In a moment of disbelief, Reid stepped back from the house.

  “I must have scared them,” Reid thought. Before finishing this line of thought, another one stole its place.

  “But why were they scared of me? I even have my armor,” Reid’s eyes dimmed for an instant.

  But the reason emerged the second he turned his back.

  There was something in front of Reid—something that felt wrong.

  Long black hair that swayed with the incoming wind that came with it, red eyes that resembled the urge that the creature craved—blood. The creature had a feminine figure, almost like a woman. Its long black hair managed to hide the marks and wrinkles on its face. One of the most dangerous and rarest creatures that the bestiary in Aquilonis stated.

  A ghoul.

  Reid gasped. A strong sense of fear shrouded him. His whole body trembled in the ghoul’s deadly presence.

  “I can’t move,” Reid mumbled.

  It was true: any movement, even slight, felt like trying to lift a boulder falling from a mountain peak.

  The ghoul didn’t run. It didn’t jump. It simply walked slowly, toward Reid. Its face began to reveal itself as its long hair swayed more with the wind.

  A mark…

  One which Reid had never seen.

  An eye with no iris and two wings attached to it. The mark was engraved on the ghoul’s forehead, radiating an ominous black aura.

  As the ghoul approached Reid. Its tongue slid out of its mouth, long and horribly stretched. Its nails elongated, turning into razor-sharp, deadly weapons.

  The pressure that Reid once felt began to increase with each step the ghoul took. The pressure was not just crushing Reid, but also the ground beneath it. Soil burst into the air like shrapnel.

  Reid never felt fear like this. His life flashed before his eyes.

  What was going on? Will he die here? Why can’t he move?

  Out of all these questions, one felt heavier than all of them.

  “Arttu is all alone. I can’t die yet.”

  He remembered something.

  If he could somehow direct his mana to his beast eye, there could be a way that the external mana could make him move again.

  Reid calmed himself. The mana coursing through his body was directed toward his beast eye, triggering the release of external mana.

  It worked.

  His beast eye started producing the external mana that flew through his entire body. He felt the pressure easing. Something was changing; he was strengthening.

  “Yes… I managed it,” He once again tried to move…

  He remained deathly still.

  The ghoul stopped a single step away. Reid could smell it now—wet soil, blood, and something rotten. Its breath brushed against his face.

  Was this the end of the Red Rose?

  No.

  Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  Something pulled Reid from his right. Reid's hardened body dissolved like salt in water.

  It was an old man. No—it was the old man that he and Arttu asked questions earlier today.

  The old man pulled Reid into his home, shut the door, and locked it.

  “What are you doing, kid? Are you out of your mi—”

  The man sounded enraged, but he was also out of breath. He stopped talking mid-sentence. He realized that the person he was talking to was not any young man but the person he had talked to this very morning. The old man bowed and said,

  “I am deeply sorry, Red Rose. I didn’t know it was you. Please do not mind my foul tongue.”

  Reid, who was still feeling fear from the earlier interaction, couldn’t even open his mouth.

  He trembled, his eyes wide.

  The old man put his hand on Reid’s shoulders.

  “It’s okay.”

  Reid turned back to the old man. Tears flowed down his face.

  “I can’t stop this. I can’t do it. It’s just too scary.”

  The old man looked at Reid with gentle eyes.

  “Then don’t do it. Ghouls sometimes come to our villages. We just lock the doors until they go. You don’t need to face them.”

  He pointed to a table in the corner of the room.

  “Come, sit. Let me make you a cup of tea.”

  Reid nodded, agreeing to it. He stood up, wiped away his tears, and started walking toward the table.

  In that moment, a thought infiltrated his mind.

  Arttu.

  “No. No, no, no… I should go.”

  The old man was confused.

  “What are you saying? You couldn’t even move in the sight of the beast. Please think about this more. Another hour or two, they leave the village.”

  Reid shook his head left and right.

  “No, no, no. My brother is there—alone. I left him there to keep an eye out for bodies. I should go.”

  He straightened up, ready to go.

  The old man reached out his hand, trying to hold Reid from behind.

  “Are you trying to be a meal of the beast? Once you look at one, you will lose all ability.”

  Reid’s hand reached the top of his head, hitting it to gather up an idea, a kind of solution. He panted in distress.

  “He is right. What should I do? What should I do… What?”

  Reid started pacing around the room, the voice in his head becoming louder and faster.

  “What? What? What? What? Wha—”

  A thought.

  “Hey, sir. Can I borrow some cloth?”

  The old man couldn’t really grasp the intention of Reid.

  “Of course. As much as you want, Red Rose.”

  The old man handed out some cloth. Some were torn and worn, while others were excellent in both material and condition.

  He took some of the good ones and sat in the chair. His face looked serious; the old man didn’t question. He just stared at Reid—curious.

  Reid gathered the parts and tied them together closely. With elegant handwork, he successfully turned the cloth into a headband.

  “That will do.”

  Reid took the headband and stood up. He handed the rest of the cloth he had borrowed from the old man and bowed gratefully.

  “Thank you for both saving me and giving me the cloth, sir. I am sorry, I currently have no money, but I’ll surely pay you back once I receive my wages”

  The old man waved his hand, trying to reject the offer.

  “No need to thank me, Red Rose. Everything you did for the people is already enough.”

  But the old man hadn’t yet understood what Reid was going to do with the headband, but he was also respectful enough not to ask.

  Reid walked toward the gate, opened the lock, and turned his head for a singular moment.

  “Thank you.”

  He put the headband he had made on, covering his eyes, and opened the newly unlocked door.

  He stepped outside and gently closed the door behind him. The night air was cold. Something was colder.

  Breathing sounds surrounded him.

  Three from his right.

  Two from his left.

  Two in front.

  Reid remembered the face of the ghoul earlier. How it was near him. How it didn’t attack him instantly.

  But this time, instead of fear, there was resolve.

  According to the bestiary, ghouls are man-like beasts who grow stronger and more human-like with every consumption of human blood.

  The bestiary gave no explanation of their weaknesses, but more of a single warning sentence, which states:

  “AVOID IN ANY MEANS!!!”

  Therefore, Reid didn’t have any knowledge of the ghouls or, in any sense, how to fight them.

  He only knew one thing: He couldn’t look at them.

  That was why he had made the headband.

  A deep breath.

  “Ugh…”

  He waited.

  The breathing of the ghouls surrounded him.

  But nothing happened.

  His body wasn’t frozen anymore.

  He moved one foot forward.

  It obeyed.

  So that was it.

  It wasn’t fear.

  It was their eyes.

  A shaky breath escaped his lips.

  “Then I just won’t look at them.”

  Reid dashed left—toward the foul ghoul voices.

  His Genusrosa gleamed in the moonlight as he activated his Beast Eye, external mana surging through his veins like a burning current.

  The blade flashed.

  It cut across a ghoul’s abdomen.

  Blood spilled onto the street, dark and thick. A pool began to spread across the stones, some of it staining Reid’s boots.

  The ghouls gasped and staggered back.

  The same Reid who once trembled before a single ghoul now wore a different expression.

  “I can’t see anything… but I can feel it.”

  A smile spread across his face.

  Not madness.

  Not gentle happiness.

  Amusement.

  In that moment, Reid discovered the true pleasure of curiosity.

  It felt as if—

  He could see everything without seeing anything.

  The air trembled. Footsteps, breath, claws scraping stone—everything painted a picture inside his mind.

  He tightened his grip on Genusrosa and swung again.

  Another slash.

  Another wound.

  Pfoosh—

  Blood burst from a ghoul’s chest.

  The others began retreating, their steps frantic, their snarls uneasy.

  But they could not outrun the beast that had just awakened.

  Reid Corvane.

  He thrust forward, the blade piercing one throat.

  A circular slash split another open.

  A cut.

  A tear.

  Steel danced in the moonlight.

  One by one, all seven ghouls fell, their bodies collapsing into the widening pool of blood.

  The last one twitched… and went still.

  Then—

  More snarling echoed from the darkness.

  Instead of fear, excitement stirred in Reid’s chest. His heart pounded as if it had been waiting for this very moment.

  His smile widened.

  He adjusted his stance.

  A dash.

  A slash.

  A clash of claws and steel.

  The newly awakened monster vanished and reappeared like a flicker of moonlight.

  Reid moved with elegant precision, Genusrosa flowing like a ribbon in a dancer’s hands.

  Each strike deepened the pool of blood.

  With every step, he sank further into it.

  At the end, Reid stood alone in the crimson circle he had created…

  …without a single scratch.

  He tilted his head slightly.

  “Isn’t there more coming?”

  There was a hint of disappointment in his voice.

  He giggled.

  “That was so much fu—”

  The words died in his throat.

  What was he saying?

  He had lost himself in the thrill of cutting down beasts.

  He had forgotten the most important thing.

  Arttu.