My Hollow System

Chapter Nineteen – Shadows of War

If you’ve ever had one of those mornings where the universe seems to have forgotten your existence, let me tell you mine had it beat by a landslide. My ribs ached like they’d been used as a battering ram. The sky looked like it had been scorched by a cosmic blowtorch, and my internal beast the one that wasn’t supposed to be real, let alone awake was pacing like a caged animal, itching to rip something apart. Again.

But I wasn’t going to let that happen. Not this time.

Adrian stood beside me, jaw clenched and eyes scanning the broken skyline ahead. Smoke billowed from collapsed towers, casting a gray haze that turned the sun into a dim orange eye glaring down at us. The air reeked of sulfur, charred metal, and something far worse blood. Lots of it.

We weren’t just in a city under siege we were in the middle of a full-scale apocalypse.

Yay.

"How many do you think made it out?" I asked, trying to keep my voice level, even though my insides were doing gymnastics.

Adrian didn’t answer immediately. He crouched low beside a crumpled car husk and tapped his earpiece. Static. Nothing but static. He sighed.

"Not many," he said at last. "The Scourge hit fast and hard. We got lucky."

I didn’t feel lucky. I felt like the gods had dropped a flaming anvil on my life and said, “Surprise.”

We moved through the ruins, keeping low and silent. The enemy was everywhere creatures born from the virus, twisted into nightmares. They scuttled through alleyways, crawled on walls, and hissed from the shadows, their distorted silhouettes flickering in the corner of my vision like bad memories.

That’s when we found them survivors.

A group of ragged, terrified civilians hiding beneath the wreckage of a collapsed metro station. Kids, parents, a woman holding a blood-soaked baby to her chest. An elderly man clutched a rusted cane like it could ward off demons.

One of the kids a boy with dirt on his cheeks and a makeshift bandage around his arm,looked up at me with wide eyes. "Are you the monster who saved the city?"

Cue internal panic.

“No,” I said. “I’m just... me.”

Adrian shot me a look. He didn’t correct the kid. Didn’t need to. I guess the rumors had already spread. I could feel the way the others looked at me. Like I was a weapon. A thing.

We helped them move, one careful step at a time. Every shadow felt like a trap. Every sound made me flinch.

And then came the scream.

It tore through the silence, raw and chilling. A woman’s scream close.

I turned, already moving, my senses sharpening as the beast inside me surged.

We burst into the clearing to find a Hollowed beast eight feet tall, hunched, with sinewy arms and a face that looked like it had been sculpted by nightmares. Its skin was mottled gray and violet, and its eyes glowed with a sickly green light. It was dragging a woman by her leg, her fingers clawing at the ground as she screamed.

I didn’t think. I didn’t strategize. I let the beast go.

Muscles stretched. Bones cracked. My skin shifted. I exploded forward, claws out, fangs bared, and collided with the creature like a meteor.

The fight was brutal. Raw. No finesse, no elegance. Just teeth and claws and violence.

I tasted blood,his and mine. I ripped, slashed, and snarled. I barely noticed the gashes forming on my chest or the shattered bone in my shoulder. At some point, I stopped being Elias and became something else entirely.

When it was over, the creature lay dead, its skull a mangled ruin. The woman lay nearby, staring up at me with glassy eyes.

“You’re him,” she whispered. “The beast of salvation.”

Adrian helped me back, my breath ragged.

“You okay?” he asked.

“Define okay,” I replied, spitting blood.

He nodded like that was the best I could manage.

That night, we holed up in an abandoned high-rise. Third floor. Windows shattered. The floor was littered with glass and old paperwork. The power was long gone, but the moonlight poured through the cracks in the wall like silver smoke.

I stared out over the ruined city. Fires burned in the distance. Sirens wailed and then died off. The beast inside me was quiet for now. But I knew it was only temporary.

Adrian joined me. He was eating a protein bar like it was the last good thing left on Earth.

“They need a leader,” he said. “Someone who can do what others can’t.”

“You mean a monster,” I said bitterly.

“I mean someone who can walk in both worlds.”

I looked down at my hands. The claws had faded back into skin. They looked normal again. Human. But I knew they weren’t.

“What if I lose myself again?” I asked.

“Then I’ll pull you back. Like you did for me.”

We sat in silence for a while.

Then the comm crackled.

“To all resistance units. This is Haven Outpost. We’re under attack. Requesting immediate backup. Repeat: Haven is falling.”

Adrian and I locked eyes.

“We have to go,” I said.

“Then we go.”

The city roared below us, alive with chaos.

And we ran into it, together.

The streets were a battlefield.

Creatures roamed freely now, feeding on the remnants of humanity. Fires lit up the night, casting flickering shadows that danced like ghosts. We moved quickly, ducking into alleys, leaping over wreckage, always staying one step ahead.

I caught glimpses of people fighting for their lives resistance fighters wielding flamethrowers and shock cannons, civilians being dragged from rubble, gunfire echoing like thunder.

When we reached Haven’s perimeter, it was worse than I’d imagined.

The outer walls had collapsed. The defense towers were rubble. And the gate if you could call it that anymore,was just a jagged maw of broken metal.

Inside, I saw a massacre unfolding.

Dozens of Hollowed. Some small, hunched, and fast. Others towering like ogres, covered in bony armor. They were slaughtering everything in their path.

And in the center stood something new.

It was massive,ten feet tall, with obsidian skin and horns like jagged blades. Its mouth stretched across half its face, full of serrated teeth. It didn’t move like the others. It watched.

Adrian breathed out a curse. “That’s no regular Hollowed.”

“No,” I said, my voice barely a whisper. “That’s an Alpha.”

It turned and looked straight at me.

Like it knew me.

And smiled.

I surged forward.

Adrian shouted something behind me, but I was already gone. The Alpha met me halfway, its speed shocking for its size. We collided in a thunderous crash, shockwaves ripping through the ground.

This wasn’t like before. This was different.

Smarter.

Faster.

Stronger.

It anticipated my strikes. Dodged. Countered. Its claws raked across my chest, and I howled in pain. But I kept fighting. I had to.

Behind me, Adrian led the remaining fighters, rallying them into position. The survivors scrambled for cover, trying to hold the inner compound.

The Alpha roared, sending a shockwave that shattered windows and sent people flying. I tackled it, slamming it into the side of a bus. It laughed. Laughed.

“Elias,” it hissed, its voice a hundred whispers in one. “You’re not the only one who evolved.”

I froze.

How the hell did it know my name?

The hesitation cost me. It slammed its fist into my side, sending me skidding across the pavement. Pain exploded in my ribs.

Adrian rushed in, unloading his shock rifle. The Alpha barely flinched. One swipe sent Adrian flying into a concrete wall.

I got up, vision swimming.

I let the beast go.

This time, I didn’t hold back. I let it take over. The change was faster. More violent. My bones stretched. My spine cracked. I grew—taller, broader, stronger.

I roared and lunged, claws slicing through air.

The Alpha met me again, and we tore into each other. The world vanished into red and black.

Screams. Fire. Blood.

Then something snapped.

My mind.

My soul.

I saw everything past and present. Visions of me tearing through crowds. Innocents. My hands,drenched in blood.

I faltered.

The Alpha struck. My head slammed into the pavement.

I didn’t get up.

It leaned down, its breath hot on my face.

“You can’t save them,” it whispered. “You’re just like us.”

It turned and walked away.

Leaving me broken.

When I woke up, the sky was burning.

Adrian was dragging me behind cover. He was bleeding from the forehead. The Alpha was gone, but the damage was done.

Haven had fallen.

What remained of the resistance was either dead or captured.

And the Alpha had left me alive.

Why?

I didn’t get a chance to ask.

Because a voice echoed from the shadows.

“You’re awake. Good.”

We turned. A woman stepped into the moonlight. Pale skin. Long black coat. Eyes like knives.

She wasn’t Hollowed.

She was human.

But something told me she was worse.

“Who are you?” I rasped.

“I’m the one who created the Alpha,” she said. “And soon, I’ll create something better.”

She smiled.

“You.”

Before I could move, the world went white.

And everything vanished.