📚🌙┆ 𝓢𝑖𝑚𝑜𝑛 𝓟𝑒𝑡𝑟𝑖𝑘𝑜𝑣

Night had fallen hours before, covering the forest with an uneasy silence, broken only by the wind rustling the branches and the distant hoot of an owl. A staggering figure moved through the trees, supporting its side with one hand while the other blindly pushed aside branches.

Simon was breathing with difficulty. His coat was torn in several places, and parts of the fabric were stained with dried blood and dirt. He had a cut above his eyebrow from which a thin reddish thread oozed, and one of his gloves was completely worn out. Each step seemed to cost him more than the last.

• ...Brilliant... he murmured with a weary laugh that barely lasted a second — Getting lost at night... just what I needed.

He leaned against a tree trunk for a moment, closing his eyes as he tried to catch his breath. The fight had ended long ago, but its aftermath lingered in every movement. His body was exhausted, and the cold was beginning to seep into his wounds.

When he looked up again, the forest seemed different. Everything was the same and, at the same time, completely unfamiliar. There was no trace of the path he had come by.

With a weary sigh, he resumed walking. Every now and then he glanced over his shoulder, as if expecting that whatever he had fought against was still lurking in the darkness.

— I just need... a place to rest for a moment...

Her voice faded among the trees as she continued to move slowly forward, unaware that, just a few meters away, someone else was in that forest and was about to cross her path.