章 15: Chapter 15: The Midnight Encounter

Exhausted from the day's events, Ryo had barely settled into bed when a loud noise shattered the silence of the night. Startled awake, he sat bolt upright, his heart racing in his chest as he listened intently to the strange sound that echoed through the walls of his apartment.

It was a chilling noise—a low, guttural growl that seemed to reverberate from every corner of the room. Ryo's breath caught in his throat as he strained to make sense of the eerie sound, his mind racing with fear and uncertainty.

As the seconds stretched into eternity, the noise grew louder and more insistent, sending shivers down Ryo's spine. With a trembling hand, he reached for the curtains and pulled them aside, peering out into the darkness beyond.

What he saw sent a cold chill down his spine.

There, creeping along the outer walls of the building, was a grotesque creature unlike anything he had ever seen. Its bald, misshapen head was crowned with a pair of empty, soulless eyes that seemed to pierce through the darkness with an otherworldly glow.

As Ryo watched in horror, the creature moved with an unnatural grace, its limbs contorting and twisting in ways that seemed impossible for a human. It moved like a lizard, its body undulating against the rough surface of the wall as it slithered closer and closer to Ryo's window.

Frozen in terror, Ryo could only watch helplessly as the creature drew nearer, its gaze fixed on some unseen target in the distance. He felt a primal fear grip his heart, squeezing tight with each passing moment as he waited for the inevitable.

But to his astonishment, the creature paid him no mind. It simply continued on its relentless journey, its movements swift and purposeful as it disappeared into the darkness once more.

For a long moment, Ryo could only sit there in stunned silence, his mind reeling from the encounter. He had come face to face with a nightmare—a creature born from the depths of the apocalypse, a harbinger of the horrors that lurked just beyond the veil of darkness.

And yet, even as fear threatened to consume him, Ryo knew that he could not afford to falter. He was a survivor—a beacon of hope in a world consumed by despair. And no matter what terrors awaited him in the night, he would face them head-on, armed with nothing but his courage and his unyielding determination to survive.