Abraham leaned against the cracked counter in his dimly lit kitchen, the glow of his MF phone screen reflecting in his eerie, marked eyes. The soft hum of the fridge filled the silence as he scrolled through the latest posts. It was a ritual now—an unspoken addiction to the forum's tales of horror and mystery. He needed them, a part of him craving the next hunt, the next surge of power.
But tonight, the usual cryptic posts and fear mongering felt... different.
"To the Marked One: Beware the Call."
Posted by: Omnivigilant
Abraham frowned. He didn't recognize the username. They were likely new or one of the countless lurkers who rarely posted. The message was simple but unsettling.
"Your power resonates beyond the mundane and the supernatural alike. Something ancient stirs, drawn by your growing strength. It is neither predator nor prey—it is the storm. If you cannot master what you are, it will consume you, and the rest of us will pay the price."
A chill ran down his spine. He stared at the screen, his thumb hovering over the reply button. Was this just another cryptic warning, like so many others on the forum? Or was there truth in the words?
The follow-up post hit harder.
"It's been waiting for someone like you for centuries."
Abraham clenched his jaw and slammed the phone onto the counter. His powers had made him into something more than human—something people feared, something supernatural entities recognized as a threat. But this... this was different. The posts felt less like paranoia and more like a declaration.
The phone buzzed again, the same user posting an image. Abraham hesitated before picking it up. The screen displayed an ancient-looking carving etched into stone. At its center was a figure that eerily resembled a man with elongated, monstrous features, surrounded by spiraling shapes that looked like unending eyes. Beneath it was a caption:
"Do you dream of this?"
Abraham's stomach sank. He had dreamed of it—fleeting images, impossible to remember clearly, but enough to leave him sweating and disoriented in the mornings. The spirals, the eyes, the sense of drowning in something infinite.
The phone buzzed again. This time it was a private message from the same user:
"You've been marked. It knows you. You have three choices: fight, flee, or give in. The choice will not stay yours for long."
Abraham couldn't sleep. Hours later, he found himself walking the dark streets of the city, his new blade tucked inside his jacket. He wasn't sure what he was looking for—trouble, clarity, or maybe just an escape from the gnawing unease the post had left behind. His enhanced senses made every shadow feel sharper, every sound louder.
The air around him felt wrong. Heavy.
A sudden wave of vertigo struck, forcing him to steady himself against a lamppost. When he looked up, the city seemed... different. The lights were dimmer, the streets distorted, and the air carried a strange metallic tang.
"Hello?" he called out, his voice echoing unnaturally.
Nothing answered.
Instinctively, he reached out with his psychic powers, summoning a barrier around himself. The energy crackled in his hands like static, sharp and unstable. Whatever this was, it wasn't normal—not even by supernatural standards.
Then came the whispers.
Low and guttural, they spoke in a language he didn't recognize. The words felt like needles pressing into his mind, and for the first time since he had started hunting, he felt genuine fear.
Out of the haze, a figure began to materialize—a towering, abstract form of shifting spirals and endless, blinking eyes. Its presence was suffocating, its size incomprehensible. It didn't move like a creature but rather like an idea, an unspoken concept that warped reality around it.
Abraham staggered back, clutching his blade. He'd fought creatures born of fear and desperation before, but this was different. This wasn't a mere manifestation of dread—it was dread. It was the thing lurking in the back of every nightmare, the formless terror that even the strongest minds couldn't fully comprehend.
The whispers grew louder, and with them came a singular, resonant voice that pierced his mind.
"Marked One."
Abraham's heart pounded. He raised his free hand, channeling his psychic power into a concussive blast. It hit the entity, but the spirals absorbed the energy like water into sand, distorting and reforming effortlessly.
"Damn it," Abraham hissed. He gripped his blade tightly, the metal cold and reassuring in his hand.
"You cannot harm what is inevitable," the voice intoned, resonating within his skull. "Your power is a beacon. You are not hunter—you are herald."
The spirals surged toward him, their movement defying physics. Abraham's survival instincts kicked in. He raised a barrier to shield himself, but the entity's force splintered it like glass. A fragment of its form reached out, wrapping around his arm like a tendril.
Pain erupted through him—searing, unimaginable pain—as visions flashed before his eyes. Images of destruction, cities crumbling, and humanity reduced to a primal, terrified state. He saw himself in the center of it all, his body twisted and unrecognizable, leading the charge.
"No!" he screamed, pulling every ounce of power he had into a single act of defiance. His blade flared with psychic energy as he swung it through the tendril, severing it. The entity recoiled, its spirals unraveling momentarily.
Abraham didn't wait to see if it would return. He turned and ran, his legs propelled by raw adrenaline and fear. The world around him began to normalize, the haze lifting as he sprinted back toward the city lights.
—–
Back in his apartment, Abraham collapsed onto the floor, his chest heaving. His arm throbbed where the tendril had touched him, the skin marked with faint, spiraling scars.
He stared at the ceiling, his mind racing. Whatever that thing was, it wasn't just some random creature. It had called him herald.
The phone buzzed again, its sound cutting through the silence like a knife. Abraham hesitated before picking it up.
"It won't stop. You can't outrun it. But there's still time to prepare."
—Omnivigilant
Abraham's hands trembled. For the first time since he'd been marked, he wasn't sure if he was hunter or prey.
Abraham remained on the floor of his apartment, his breaths shallow and uneven. The room was bathed in a harsh orange glow from the streetlights outside, casting long shadows on the walls. His marked arm throbbed, the spiraling scars faint but persistent, as though the tendril had burned its presence into his very being.
He reached out and grabbed his blade, still faintly humming with the residue of psychic energy. The weapon felt heavier than before, not physically but emotionally—a grim reminder of how close he had come to death, or worse.
The phone buzzed in his pocket again, jolting him from his spiraling thoughts.
"Prepare."
The word burned into his mind. What could he possibly prepare for? That thing—whatever it was—had toyed with him, its power so overwhelming it made even the most fearsome entities he'd faced seem insignificant.
His gaze drifted to his small apartment. The cluttered desk where he once worked on programming projects now lay buried under books on the occult and supernatural. The TV in the corner was dust-covered, abandoned in favor of MF posts and field hunts. Even his kitchen, once a source of comfort, now felt alien and unused.
His life had shifted entirely into the realm of the extraordinary, and with each passing day, the divide between him and the mundane world grew wider.
Am I even human anymore?
The thought was unbidden, and it chilled him more than the entity's touch had. He'd seen the looks on people's faces when they glanced at his eyes—the way they averted their gaze, the way children cried when he passed. The powers he wielded, the aura he gave off—it was changing him, pulling him further away from the world he once knew.
He stood slowly, the blade still in his hand, and walked to the bathroom. Flicking on the light, he stared at his reflection in the mirror.
The eyes stared back. Alien, unnatural, their depths shimmering with a faint glow. He leaned in, tracing the faint scars on his arm. The spirals were intricate, almost artistic, as if the entity had left a piece of itself behind as a reminder.
"No more running," he whispered, his voice hollow.
He tightened his grip on the blade, holding it up to his reflection. "If the world wants a monster, I'll show them one."
—–
The next day, Abraham dove into research with an obsessive fervor. The MF forum became his lifeline as he scoured every thread, every obscure post, for mentions of the spiraling entity.
In the deep recesses of the forum, he found a thread buried under years of inactive posts, the title ominous:
"The Eternal Spiral: A Warning to All Awakened."
The original poster, long inactive, claimed to have encountered something similar decades ago—a being not born of human fear but of the collective dread of all sentient creatures. It wasn't a manifestation of a single fear but the embodiment of inevitability, the despair of being caught in a cycle with no escape.
The Spiral, as it was called, was ancient, its existence predating human civilization. It thrived in liminality, appearing in places and moments where reality frayed: crossroads at midnight, forgotten ruins, or the edges of dreams. Those it encountered were marked, drawn into its orbit until they became part of its endless design.
"The Spiral doesn't hunt. It waits. Its power lies in its inevitability. You can run, but every step brings you closer to it. You can fight, but every strike strengthens it. The only way to win is to never draw its attention—but if you're reading this, it's too late."
The thread's final post included a crude sketch of the Spiral's form, eerily similar to what Abraham had seen. The words beneath the sketch read:
"Beware the Herald. They bring the Spiral with them."
Abraham's blood ran cold. Herald. That's what the entity had called him.
—–
The following weeks became a blur of feverish activity. Abraham pushed himself harder than ever, seeking out creatures to test his limits. The rush of power each time he absorbed an entity was intoxicating, but it came with a price. The hunger gnawed at him, the same insatiable void that no amount of food or rest could fill.
He found himself drawn to the darkest corners of the city, places where reality felt thinner, where whispers of supernatural activity lingered. Each encounter left him stronger, but it also left him more detached.
His reflection in the mirror became a stranger. His once vibrant features were now hollow, his expression cold. Even his catchphrase, once delivered with a wry grin, now sounded like a death sentence when he whispered it:
"You should've run."
—-–
Late one night, as Abraham sat surrounded by open books and half-eaten takeout, the MF phone buzzed. The screen displayed an unknown number, its edges flickering with an unnatural glow.
He answered, the voice on the other end distorted but familiar:
"You're walking a fine line, Marked One."
"Omnivigilant," Abraham muttered. "You seem to know a lot about me."
"I know enough. The Spiral is awake, and it's watching you. Every hunt, every power you take—it draws you closer to it."
"I don't care," Abraham said coldly. "If it's coming for me, I'll be ready."
"You can't fight the Spiral."
"Then I'll find a way to destroy it."
The voice paused, then chuckled darkly.
"Destroy it? No, Abraham. You don't destroy the Spiral. You become it."
The line went dead.
Abraham sat in silence, the weight of the words pressing down on him. His mind raced, but one thought stood out above the rest:
If I don't master this power, it will master me.
With renewed determination, he stood and grabbed his blade. The Spiral could wait. There were creatures to hunt—and he needed every ounce of strength he could gather before the storm came.