Yuna was the first to speak, her voice soft, almost swallowed by the thick fog, but not hiding the mix of anticipation and anxiety.
"So... how do we get out of the fog?"
She tightened her grip on the hilt of her weapon, her fingers gradually turning white from the pressure. Her brown eyes wavered between Ren and the blurry figures swaying in the mist. Although she had started to grasp some of the illusions around them, the feeling of unease still hadn't fully disappeared. Because if this labyrinth wasn't real, then what would happen next?
Ren took a deep breath, the excitement of uncovering the truth slowly fading, giving way to the calm needed for the situation. He looked around once more, and this time, there was no longer any doubt or fear in his gaze, only clarity, sharper than before, no longer swayed by the false images.
"We can't push the fog away," he said, his voice steady, carrying the certainty of someone who had just solved a difficult puzzle. "But we can stop letting it control us."
He raised his hand slowly, extending it in front of him. His fingers moved lightly as though experimenting with something invisible in the air. Tiny droplets of mist clung to his skin, cold to the touch.
"First, don't look at things that aren't real. Don't let them deceive us any longer. If we don't believe in them, they can't exist."
With that, he took a step back, then crouched down and pointed at the ground. There, hidden beneath the layer of moist earth, were faint traces of footsteps. They didn't disappear, they weren't blurred by the illusions, and most importantly, they were real.
"We've passed through here already." Ren gave a slight smirk, a smile tinged with confidence and relief. "So instead of trusting what our eyes see, let's trust the real traces we've left behind. They'll lead us out."
Yuna's eyes widened, her lips parted as if to say something, but then she fell silent. Nautilus furrowed his brow slightly, clearly still not fully catching up with Ren's pace, but his expression was no longer one of aimless confusion.
A light breeze swept through, causing the mist to swirl in the air. The distorted illusions were still there, but now, they no longer seemed important.
No one spoke another word.
And so, they began to walk.
This time, there was no hesitation.
But then, the truth hit them like a bucket of cold water, drenching their bare minds and completely extinguishing the faint hope that had just begun to take shape.
They were still lost.
Worse... they had walked in a circle. Not just once, but many times.
That realization struck like a sharp blade, cutting through all thoughts and leaving a chilling emptiness in their minds.
Ren froze mid-step, his breath caught in his chest. His eyes, which had been bright with confidence, were now empty, reflecting the shock that had just overwhelmed him.
He looked down, staring at the deep footprints in the soft ground. They overlapped perfectly, as if all three of them were bound in an endless loop.
The confident steps he had trusted were only pulling them back to the starting point.
"It can't be..." he murmured, his hand unconsciously tightening around the hilt of his sword, his knuckles white from the tension.
A flood of chaotic thoughts rushed through his mind, desperately searching for a logical explanation. But everything shattered in the face of the obvious truth right before his eyes.
Yuna stopped beside him, her eyes wide as she stared at the familiar footprints in a terrifying way on the path they had just walked. Her throat went dry, her heart feeling like it was being squeezed by an invisible hand.
"We... we've come back here?" Her voice trembled, growing quieter, as if she couldn't even believe it herself.
Nautilus gripped the hem of his cloak, his breath growing heavier as he scanned the shadowy figures floating in the mist. They still stood motionless, distorted and vague, like shadows waiting to devour them at any moment.
But now, he understood. They didn't need to attack them.
They just needed to wait.
The feeling of being trapped crept into every breath. An invisible suffocation wrapped around the three of them, like cold chains tightening around their bodies.
This fog wasn't just creating illusions.
It was playing with them.
Ren stood still, staring into the thick mist surrounding them.
In the murky void, the distorted figures still floated, silent and indifferent, like lost souls trapped between two worlds.
They weren't just stationary. They swayed.
Wait...
Swaying?
His consciousness immediately seized upon this detail, as if an invisible hand had grabbed his throat, forcing him to focus.
Looking closer, the shadows weren't completely still; they twisted, swaying in an uneven rhythm, like marionettes being pulled by strings that Ren couldn't see.
A chill crept from his feet all the way to the top of his head. Ren instinctively tightened his grip on the sword's hilt, each breath becoming heavier.
He glanced around, his eyes stopping on the vines winding around the trunk of a nearby ancient tree. They remained in place, dry and motionless, as if frozen in time.
No wind.
Nothing stirred.
Nothing should be moving.
So why?
Why were those shadows shaking, twisting according to some mysterious rule? Why did they sway incessantly, despite there being no external force intervening?
A bad feeling suddenly surged in his chest, rough and uncomfortable, like a dull knife scraping against his skin.
He quickly glanced at Yuna and Nautilus. They were still focused on figuring out their direction, still believing that if they kept walking, they would eventually find a way out.
But Ren wasn't so sure anymore.
He squinted, trying to see through the hazy mist swirling around them.
A thought suddenly flashed through his mind, accompanied by a cold realization that made his chest feel as if someone were choking the air out of him.
It wasn't the mist that was creating illusions.
It was... something moving in the mist.
Something real was slinking through the thick fog, like a predator quietly watching them from behind the veil.
Something alive, hiding, and... waiting.
Looking more closely, Ren felt there was something off about the scene before him.
Something wasn't right, an invisible but persistent anomaly, like a strange sound buried within the white noise.
It wasn't clear, it wasn't overly blatant, but it was enough to stir an unsettling feeling, as if something were whispering right beside him the moment he turned his head away.
He furrowed his brow, carefully observing every small detail, how the shadows swayed to an uneven rhythm, how they twisted according to patterns he couldn't predict, how the mist hovered, curling around them, never dissipating.
It all seemed too perfect to just be a natural phenomenon.
He held his breath, his gaze deepening into the scene before him. Then, as though an invisible thread had finally been pulled taut, he saw it.
A breaking point in reality.
A connection he hadn't noticed before, those shadows, the mist, the distortion in their movement… they weren't separate entities.
They belonged to something greater, something that had been there all along, always hiding right in front of him, but never wanting him to realize its existence.
Ren took a deep breath, feeling like he had just torn away the veil from his mind. The cold air filled his lungs, but he no longer felt shivers.
Now, he knew where it was.
And just as the final piece of the puzzle clicked into place, he no longer hesitated.
Without delay, without second-guessing, he charged straight into the mist, heading towards where the twisted shadows waited.
Yuna and Nautilus quickly noticed Ren's strange behavior. From the start, he had been helping them carefully find their way, quietly analyzing their surroundings.
But suddenly, as if pushed by an invisible force, Ren dashed straight into the fog without any warning.
"Ren! What are you doing?!"
Nautilus's voice echoed, confused and panicked. He took a step forward but didn't dare pursue immediately. A sense of unease crept into his mind.
There was no way forward.
From their perspective, where Ren was heading was just a natural wall, a high moss-covered rock face, vines winding around it like a giant spider's web, almost completely swallowed by the thick fog. If Ren kept running at that speed...
He would crash straight into it.
Yuna tightened her fist. A moment of hesitation flickered in her eyes. Could it be... that Ren saw something they couldn't?
She bit her lip, but logic quickly dismissed that thought. No, maybe Ren was just too stressed.
Even she felt dizzy from the thick fog. It wasn't impossible that Ren was hallucinating after being trapped for so long.
But why...
Why did he seem so certain?
Nautilus took a deep breath, instinctively gripping the hilt of his sword. He couldn't just stand here and do nothing.
"Ren! Stop joking around! Come back now!"
There was no reply.
He didn't stop.
In the next moment, Ren plunged straight into the mist.
And vanished.
Both of their hearts seemed to skip a beat.