The wind whistled through the trees like an ancient lament.
Valeria gripped the key so tightly she thought the bones in her hand might shatter, but even then, she couldn't let it go.
In front of her, the black-eyed creature smiled with terrifying patience, its hand extended, pulling with an invisible, unstoppable force.
Every second was a battle against something far beyond anything she had ever known.
Ezra, staggering from the venom spreading through his arm, barely managed to step between her and the creature.
—Run, Valeria! —he roared—. Now!!
An invisible force shoved Valeria backward, almost ripping the key from her fingers.
The ground cracked open beneath her feet, vomiting a blast of icy air that smelled of rusted metal and ancient blood.
From the fissure, black hands made of pure shadow clawed toward her, trying to pull her down.
Pure instinct.
Valeria twisted on her heels and ran, dodging the threads of darkness falling from the sky by mere inches.
Ezra's shouts, the hooded figures' threats, the black-eyed being's whisper… all mixed into a symphony of madness behind her.
She had no idea where she was going.
She only knew she couldn't stop.
The forest swallowed her. Roots tried to snare her. Branches clawed at her like desperate hands.
But then, amidst the pitch-black night, something flickered in the distance.
A faint, trembling light.
A chance.
Valeria clutched the key to her chest and sprinted toward the light without looking back.
Because she knew that if she did, she wouldn't have the strength to keep going.
And somewhere deep in her mind, a terrible certainty grew:
The true enemy had yet to reveal its face.
The forest closed around her like a fist.
Every stride was a battle against fear, against the stabbing pain in her side, against the growing sense that she was running in circles.
Until the flickering light sharpened.
It was a cabin.
Small, old, as if torn from another era.
The wood was splintered, the roof slanting dangerously, but from within came an impossible warmth.
Valeria reached the door just as her legs were about to give out.
She turned for a second.
No sign of Ezra.
No sign of the black-eyed being.
Only the pulsing void of the forest.
An inner voice —the same voice she had learned to trust amidst madness— whispered: go inside.
With one last effort, Valeria pushed the door open.
Inside, the cabin was even stranger.
Walls covered in ancient symbols.
Candles burning steadily, unfazed by the wind slipping through the cracks.
And in the center of the room, on a stone table, stood a mirror.
But it didn't reflect her image.
It reflected something else.
A place Valeria had never seen… yet, in the deepest part of her soul, she knew it as her own.
The Threshold.
The key in her hand vibrated violently.
Something —or someone— was calling her from the other side.
And this time, there would be no turning back.
The mirror pulsed like a living heart.
Valeria stepped closer, feeling the key in her hand trembling with dangerous intensity.
And then, without warning, the cabin disappeared.
She was no longer there.
She stood in a street lit by old lanterns, the warm air of a forgotten evening wrapping around her.
In front of her, smiling as if nothing bad could ever touch him, was Nico.
Nico, with his bright eyes and sweet voice, telling her everything she had always longed to hear.
The boy who seemed perfect.
The one who came when her heart was still bleeding from Elías, promising to heal it.
She remembered walking next to him, believing —even if just for a moment— that maybe this time it would be different.
That she wouldn't have to beg to be chosen.
That she wouldn't have to become invisible to deserve love.
But the image shattered.
The same Nico who had held her so tightly was the one who vanished the moment words weren't enough.
The one who lied with smiles.
The one who left her feeling more broken than before.
Valeria blinked.
The mirror was still there, showing her not just what she had lived… but what she still carried inside.
It wasn't just the Threshold she needed to cross.
It was her own story she had to face.
The key burned hotter against her skin, as if it knew the moment of truth was near.
Nico's reflection didn't disappear right away.
As Valeria kept staring at the mirror, his figure began to distort, like a painting melting under heat.
His eyes, once warm, turned hollow.
His smile twisted into something unrecognizable.
And then Nico spoke, but it wasn't his voice.
It was deeper, older.
—How many more times will you trust what shines first? —he whispered—. How many more times will you hand over the key before you even know the door?
Valeria took a step back, her heart pounding against her ribs.
The mirror no longer showed the remembered street.
Now it showed a broken bridge, suspended over an abyss of shadows.
And in the middle of the bridge, a younger, more innocent version of herself extended the key toward a hooded figure.
Valeria understood:
It wasn't enough to find the Threshold.
She had to learn to recognize who was worthy of crossing it with her.
The echo of Nico's false words still vibrated inside her chest.
And as the mirror finally cracked with a muffled sound, she knew the true choice would not be between good and evil.
It would be between the love that chained her... and the love that set her free.
From the other side of the cabin, Ezra called to her in an urgent whisper:
—Valeria, now!
She gripped the key tighter and, without looking back, stepped through the next threshold.
The world beyond the threshold was no refuge.
It was a trap.
Valeria barely had time to adjust to the darkness when the ground beneath her feet trembled.
The landscape had changed: no longer forest nor cabin, but a narrow corridor made of living stone, like a labyrinth carved deep within a mountain.
And she wasn't alone.
Far ahead, a whisper crawled along the walls, like a thousand voices speaking at once.
Valeria took one step forward… and the corridor slammed shut behind her.
There was no turning back.
Suddenly, something moved ahead.
A metallic glint.
Claws scraping against the stone.
Valeria held her breath.
Every instinct screamed at her to run, but the passage was so narrow she could hardly move without exposing herself.
A sharp sound: click, click, click.
From the shadows emerged a creature, elongated and translucent, its bones glowing with a sickly light.
Its eyes, completely white, locked onto her.
And then it charged.
Valeria spun on her heels, running blindly, the key trembling between her fingers.
But the labyrinth seemed to move with her, closing paths, forcing her to face it.
There was no escape.
She would have to fight.
Valeria felt the stone wall at her back.
The creature advanced, each step echoing like a sinister drumbeat in the narrow corridor.
There was no way out.
No help.
Just her... and the key.
Instinctively, Valeria closed her eyes.
Not to surrender, but to reach for something she had felt before: that pulse, that energy rising deep from her chest.
The key burned in her hand.
And then, she understood.
It wasn't just an object.
It was a channel.
A spark between her will and something much greater.
When she opened her eyes, the corridor wasn't so dark anymore.
A faint blue glow radiated from her fingers, tracing symbols in the air.
The creature hesitated, confused.
Valeria, following an impulse she didn't fully understand but trusted, lifted her hand and drew one of the symbols before her.
The air vibrated.
The creature let out a piercing shriek and was slammed against the wall, as if struck by an invisible force.
Valeria gasped, stunned.
But there was no time to celebrate.
The key kept burning.
And the labyrinth was still alive.
This had only just begun.
Valeria ran.
Her footsteps echoed through the corridors of the labyrinth, where the walls seemed to pulse as if the place had its own beating heart.
The air was thick, filled with whispers brushing against her mind like invisible insects.
She reached a fork.
Two paths opened before her:
The left one, lit by a flickering, trembling light, seemed safer… but the ground was cracked, as if it could collapse at any moment.
The right one, plunged in absolute darkness, carried a faint scent of rusted metal and damp earth, as if something was decaying deep within.
Valeria hesitated.
A slight tremor shook the ground.
From the dark corridor, a deep, low growl rose, as if something colossal was waking up.
From the lit corridor, she could hear childish laughter — too sweet, too... false.
Valeria swallowed hard.
She knew standing still was more dangerous than choosing wrong.
She glanced at the key in her hand, hoping for a sign.
And in that moment, the key vibrated faintly… pointing toward the darkness.
—You have to be kidding me —Valeria muttered, but she didn't wait for an answer.
She took a deep breath and sprinted into the abyss.
The dark hallway swallowed her whole.
The light behind her vanished as if it had never existed.
The air was dense, almost solid, and each step felt like wading through an invisible liquid.
Then she heard it.
A voice.
—Valeria...
She froze.
The voice was soft, almost familiar.
—Valeria... did you forget me so soon?
She spun around sharply.
There, in the darkness, barely visible, was Nico.
Or at least, something that looked like Nico.
The same crooked smile.
The same intense gaze that had once melted her heart.
But something was off.
His eyes gleamed in an unnatural way, and his skin looked too flawless, like a mask stretched over a false face.
—I believed in you —Nico said, stepping closer slowly—. And you? What did you believe in?
Valeria stepped back.
Her heart was pounding, not from love… but from sheer survival instinct.
Deep down, she knew that this wasn't Nico.
It was something that had taken his form to break her.
And yet, a part of her trembled.
Because old wounds... never fully healed.
—You're not real —she whispered.
The false Nico smiled, baring teeth that were too white.
—Aren't I? Then why does it still hurt?
Before she could react, the ground beneath her feet split open.
And Valeria fell.
Fell into the darkness, with Nico's laughter chasing her downward.
The darkness wasn't just an absence of light; it was a living substance that brushed against her skin, whispering promises and threats in a language she couldn't understand.
When she finally hit the ground, she didn't feel pain.
Just a strange heaviness.
She staggered to her feet, blinking to focus.
And what she saw froze her in place.
She was inside a twisted replica of her old apartment.
The walls were gray, the windows showed a permanently overcast sky, and everything felt utterly devoid of life.
On the table, there were photographs...
Pictures of her and Nico.
Moments that had never happened.
In one, he was sliding a ring onto her finger.
In another, they danced under nonexistent rain.
In another, they kissed in front of a house she didn't recognize.
It was as if this place was trying to build the life she never had, using her memories, her deepest wishes... and her fears.
Valeria took a step toward the pictures.
At that moment, the walls began to moan.
A whisper wrapped around the room:
—You could have had all this... if you had been someone else.
The floor trembled.
Valeria forced herself to look at the photos again.
And then she saw it.
In each one, her reflection was blurry.
Distorted.
As if the Valeria in those images wasn't truly her.
A deep sadness gripped her chest.
But also a spark of anger.
She would not lose herself in an illusion.
She took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and ripped one of the photographs in two.
The world around her cracked open.
And a door, until now invisible, appeared in front of her, trembling, about to open.
Without thinking twice, Valeria ran toward it.
She knew there would be no comfort on the other side.
But at least it would be real.
Valeria crossed the door.
The change was immediate.
A blast of freezing wind slammed into her, knocking the air from her lungs.
On the other side, there was no solid ground. Only a floating platform suspended in endless void.
Beneath her feet, just a narrow strip of cracked stone.
All around her, nothingness.
And in front of her...
Someone waiting.
It wasn't Ezra.
It wasn't Nico.
It was Elías.
But not the way she remembered him.
This Elías had empty eyes, a twisted smile, and an energy so heavy it almost forced her to her knees.
—Did you really think you could escape everything you never faced? —he murmured.
Every word seemed to drag a poisonous echo with it.
Valeria stepped back, her mind struggling to make sense of it.
—You're not real —she whispered.
—And are you? —Elías smiled bitterly—. Always running, always building new versions of yourself to survive... but none of them are enough.
The platform beneath her feet trembled, as if her thoughts could trigger earthquakes.
Valeria clenched her fists, feeling the invisible weight of every decision she had ever made.
She couldn't stay here.
She had to move.
She had to choose herself, even if it meant walking alone through the abyss.
She took a deep breath.
And stepped forward.
Elías raised a hand, as if he could stop her.
But Valeria passed through him like mist.
The true enemy wasn't outside.
It was everything she carried inside.
And now, finally, she was beginning to face it.
Valeria emerged from the other side of the void as if she had walked through an invisible wall.
The landscape shifted again.
Now she stood in a forest, but not like before: this one was made of crystalline trees, their trunks glowing faintly as if they held living light within.
The air smelled of electricity, of something ancient and sacred.
And ahead of her, a few meters away, rose a massive structure:
The Threshold.
A colossal arch carved from black stone, covered in symbols that pulsed with bluish light.
The space inside the arch shimmered like a curtain of water suspended in time.
Her heart pounded so hard she could hear it in her ears.
She knew —without knowing how— that crossing that Threshold would change everything.
There would be no turning back.
But she wasn't alone.
To her right, emerging from between the trees, Ezra appeared again, more wounded than before, his jacket torn and blood staining his side.
When their eyes met, no words were needed.
He had made it too.
He had survived.
Valeria took a step toward the Threshold, but the ground beneath her feet cracked with a roar.
From the fissure, a dark creature emerged, formed of liquid shadows, multiple glowing eyes scattered across its shifting body.
The final guardian.
Ezra pulled a short knife from his belt, his hand trembling slightly.
—We can't stop now —he whispered.
Valeria nodded.
This wasn't the time to give up.
It was time to fight.
And cross.
The guardian lunged at them with a roar that shook the treetops.
Ezra charged forward without hesitation, his knife slicing silver arcs through the air.
Valeria, clutching the key to her chest, felt a strange force urging her to move too.
It wasn't just Ezra who had to fight.
It was her too.
The guardian's first strike was a whip of shadow. Ezra dodged it by inches, but the impact shattered the ground beside him.
Valeria sprinted to the left, looking for a blind spot. The creature tracked her with its multiple eyes, each one gleaming with malice.
Then, without thinking, Valeria lifted her free hand.
A flash burst from her palm: not fire, not ordinary light.
It was memory.
The guardian shuddered as if Valeria's very energy had wounded it.
Ezra seized the moment. With a savage yell, he plunged his knife into one of the creature's eyes, and it shrieked with a sound that made the air tremble.
But it wasn't enough.
The beast dissolved into a cloud of shadows and reappeared behind them, larger and more furious.
The Threshold began to vibrate, calling them.
Valeria understood then: they couldn't defeat the guardian by fighting.
They had to cross.
—Run! —Ezra shouted, grabbing her hand.
They ran.
Every heartbeat was a whip of life and death.
The guardian thundered behind them, each of its steps exploding like a cannon blast.
The edge of the Threshold was only a few meters away when Valeria stumbled.
The key flew from her hand.
Ezra lunged, catching it in midair just before it hit the ground.
Without pausing, he shoved her toward the arch.
—Now, Valeria!
She closed her eyes.
She felt the brush of shadows at her back.
She felt the blade of death licking her skin.
But she also felt the key vibrating against her chest, like a final silent command.
And then she stepped through.
She crossed the Threshold.
Everything exploded in light.
And the world, as she knew it, shattered.