The town of Red Hollow wasn't much to look at—a few rows of buildings, a diner that always smelled like burnt coffee, and streets that emptied well before sundown. It was the kind of place hunters passed through without a second glance. But for Alex, it had become something else: a training ground.
Three months had passed since the hellhound hunt. Three months of relentless training, of pushing his body and mind to the brink. Of learning how to control what he took. No more waking up feeling like something else was inside him, clawing at the edges of his thoughts. No more slipping into instincts that weren't his own. He had found a way to master it.
But that didn't mean it had been easy.
---
It started with discipline—small, controlled uses of his abilities. Testing the limits of his senses without letting them drown him. Forcing himself to shut out the whispers, the lingering echoes of creatures long dead. The biggest hurdle had been the instincts, the way his body wanted to move like something else, react like something that wasn't human. He had to break those habits and rebuild them on his own terms.
And so he trained.
Mornings were spent refining his control. Meditation, breathwork, drills. He carved sigils into the dirt, tested their effectiveness against simulated threats. Some worked flawlessly. Others backfired spectacularly. Afternoons were for sparring—either against dummies or, when he could find someone willing, against other hunters. He took hits, learned to fight without relying solely on stolen abilities. He learned when to use them, and when to rely on pure skill.
By night, he hunted. Not monsters, at least not always but the feeling of them. He tracked the remnants of old haunts, studied cursed places, tested exorcism rites in abandoned buildings. He pushed himself to the limit of his endurance, then past it. Every day, he felt himself growing steadier, the line between human and something else sharpening into clarity.
During one of his solo hunts, he had encountered a low-tier specter haunting an abandoned factory. A simple salt-and-burn job. But he had stopped himself from absorbing its essence. Not out of fear—but out of choice. He no longer needed to take every power he came across. He only took what mattered.
Until one night, he realized the hunger was gone.
Not the kind that gnawed at his stomach, but the other one. The pull of power, the itch beneath his skin that had once demanded more. It was still there, faint, but it no longer controlled him. He had bent it to his will.
And with that came confidence.
---
"Three months and you still order the same damn thing," Caleb muttered, dropping into the diner booth across from him.
Alex smirked, sipping his coffee. "Creature of habit."
Caleb snorted. "Yeah, that's definitely what I'd call you." He leaned back, scrutinizing Alex with the sharp eyes of a veteran hunter. "You seem… different."
Alex raised an eyebrow. "Different how?"
"Less twitchy. More sure of yourself. Like you finally stopped waiting for something to crawl out of your own damn shadow."
Alex didn't answer immediately. Because Caleb wasn't wrong. He was different. More grounded. More in control. The last three months had reshaped him in ways he was still coming to terms with.
"Figured some things out," Alex finally said. "Got a handle on some stuff."
Caleb studied him a moment longer, then nodded. "Good. 'Cause we've got a problem."
The problem was simple: Something was hunting them.
Hunters had been vanishing. Not just the rookies, not just the reckless ones. Good hunters. Experienced ones. Some left behind signs of struggle, others left behind nothing at all. The only clue? A pattern disappearances circling closer and closer to Red Hollow.
Alex felt a familiar thrill at the thought. A hunt, but different. Not him tracking something. Something tracking them.
He flexed his fingers, feeling the steady hum of power beneath his skin. This was what he had trained for. This was what he was ready for.
"Alright," Alex said, setting his coffee down. "Let's get to work."
The night air carried a damp chill, the remnants of an earlier rain still clinging to the pavement.
Alex sat in his motel room, flipping a silver coin between his fingers. The dim light cast shifting shadows across the walls, and his eyes flicked toward the window for the third time in as many minutes. Something felt off.
'It feels like something is watching' Alex thought gravely.
It's not that he is being watched rather this whole town seems to be watched.
The feeling had been lingering since his conversation with Caleb at the diner. Hunters were going missing. That was fact. The why was still a mystery. And mysteries, in Alex's world, had a habit of turning into very real, very lethal problems.
He exhaled through his nose, letting the coin fall onto the table with a soft clink. Three months ago, he might've doubted his own instincts, might've wondered if this was just paranoia, if the residual effects of absorbing too much had skewed his perception. But now? Now he trusted himself. If something felt wrong, it was wrong.
A knock at the door broke his thoughts.
Alex was on his feet instantly, blade in hand before his conscious mind caught up. He took a breath, forcing himself to relax. He wasn't a rookie. He could handle this.
He cracked the door open an inch. "Yeah?"
Caleb stood there, eyes sharp, mouth set in a grim line. "We need to move. Now."
Alex didn't ask questions. He grabbed his gear and was out the door within seconds. Caleb led him to his truck, the engine already running. As soon as Alex was in the passenger seat, they were moving.
"What happened?" Alex asked, scanning the road behind them.
"Another one's gone," Caleb said. "Ben Rowe. Left his room at the boarding house around midnight. Never came back."
Alex frowned. Ben wasn't a novice. He was methodical, cautious, the kind of hunter who didn't take unnecessary risks. "No signs of a struggle?"
Caleb shook his head. "Nothing. Just gone."
That was worse than a struggle. That meant whatever took him did it fast. Efficiently.
The truck rumbled down the road, the only sound between them for a while. Alex let his mind work through the pieces, sifting through everything he knew, everything he'd learned. He glanced at Caleb, noting the tension in his jaw. The older hunter was rattled, and it took a lot to rattle someone like him.
"This thing," Alex said carefully, "it's hunting us."
Caleb nodded. "Yeah. And I don't like that one damn bit."
The boarding house was exactly as Alex expected quiet, the kind of place that had seen better days. The owner, a wiry man in his sixties named Hank, met them at the door.
"Didn't hear a damn thing," Hank said, rubbing a hand over his stubbled chin. "Ben was here one minute, gone the next. Left his door unlocked, which ain't like him."
Alex stepped inside, scanning the dimly lit hallway. The air smelled stale, with a faint trace of old wood and dust. But underneath it, something else.
Copper.
He followed the scent, pausing outside Ben's room. It wasn't strong whoever had cleaned up had done a decent job but it was there. A hint of blood.
He knelt, brushing his fingers over the floor. Psychometry pulsed through him, threads of memory unraveling in his mind.
A hand gripping a doorknob. The feeling of being watched. A shadow moving impossibly fast.
Pain. Then—nothing.
Alex pulled back, exhaling sharply. Whatever had taken Ben, it hadn't given him time to fight.
Caleb came in. Alex met his gaze. "Something pulled him out of here."
Caleb's frown deepened. "Pulled?"
Alex nodded. "Not a struggle. More like… a snatch."
That changed things. Most creatures left traces claw marks, broken furniture, blood. This was clean. Too clean.
They spent the next few hours combing through town, questioning anyone who might've seen something. Most people had nothing to offer. Some had closed their doors before they could even ask.
It wasn't until they hit the outskirts that they found their first real lead.
A young woman, no older than twenty, approached them hesitantly outside the gas station. She looked nervous, shifting from foot to foot as she spoke. "I—I think I saw something last night. By the old mill."
Alex's attention sharpened. "What did you see?"
She swallowed. "It was late. I was walking home, and I—I heard something. Like a *whoosh*, almost like wind, but heavier. And then I saw a shadow. It was—" she hesitated, struggling for words. "It was... I can't..."
"Relax madam tell us slowly what happened we're here to help" said caleb.
The woman exhaled.
"It was really tall and it didn't look like something solid like...like it was shifting"
Alex exchanged a look with Caleb. That description wasn't one he liked.
"Did it see you?" Caleb asked.
She shook her head. "I don't think so. I ran as soon as I saw it."
Alex reached into his jacket, handing her a number. "If you remember anything else, call."
She nodded, tucking it away quickly before disappearing back into the store.
Caleb exhaled. "Shifting shadows? Sounds like a wraith, maybe a reaper."
"Or something else," Alex muttered.
Because deep down, something told him they weren't just dealing with a creature.
They were dealing with a hunter. of hunters.
---
By the time they reached the old mill, the sun was starting to rise, casting long shadows over the abandoned structure. The place felt wrong, the kind of wrong that made the hairs on the back of Alex's neck stand up.
He took a slow breath, steadying himself. He had spent three months preparing for this. Learning to trust himself. To trust his power.
And now, it was time to put that to the test.
"Ready?" Caleb asked.
Alex rolled his shoulders, fingers curling around the hilt of his knife.
"Ready as i'll ever be".
---
To be continued…