CHAPTER 50: CHAPTER 50 – GHOSTS IN THE TREES

Recap – Chapter 49: Hunter’s Instinct

The fragile alliance was already unraveling. Kael, Aaron, and Milo tried to regroup while Elena began her own deadly game of cat-and-mouse to keep the USB out of enemy hands. But Leonid’s forces had spread through the forest, forcing everyone into a dangerous scramble. Just as Kael confronted a stranger in the trees — a man whose calm, measured presence set every instinct on edge — the crack of a rifle split the air. It wasn’t his shot. The man recognized whoever had fired, and his chilling words made one truth clear: they weren’t hunting. They were being hunted.

Main Story

The silence after the gunshot was worse than the sound itself.

It pressed in from all sides, a suffocating stillness that made the forest feel less like a place and more like a trap.

Kael shifted his stance, eyes flicking through the dense undergrowth, searching for the source of the shot. Aaron’s breathing was quick, sharp. Elena stayed low, blade ready, her gaze darting between the stranger and the treeline.

"Talk," Kael demanded, voice quiet but edged with steel. "Who fired that?"

The stranger’s lips curled faintly, his head tilting as if he could hear something the others couldn’t.

"Someone who doesn’t miss," he said simply. "Which means..." He glanced at Kael. "...one of you is already dead and doesn’t know it yet."

Before Kael could respond, another crack echoed — closer this time, splinters of bark exploding from a tree inches from Aaron’s head.

"Move!" Kael barked.

They scattered — Kael dragging Aaron behind a fallen log, Elena diving toward a cluster of ferns. The stranger stayed where he was, unnervingly calm, and only shifted when a third shot hissed through the air, tearing a clean hole through the leaf beside him.

"Sniper," Aaron hissed.

"No," the stranger corrected, crouching finally. "Snipers. Plural."

The word landed heavier than the gunfire.

From the south, a flicker of motion — someone moving fast, low to the ground. Kael caught only a glimpse before the figure disappeared again. His instincts screamed at him: this was no random attack. Someone had set the board, and they were the pieces being moved.

"Elena," Kael called softly.

She met his eyes, and in that look was something unspoken — a choice neither wanted to voice yet.

Then came the sound — faint but unmistakable.

Footsteps. Many of them. Surrounding.

Kael’s jaw tightened. "We’re boxed in."

And that’s when a voice rang out from the trees — amplified, confident.

"Drop your weapons. Come out slowly, and maybe we let you keep breathing."

Kael didn’t move.

Neither did anyone else.

The voice came again, sharper.

"I said—"

Crack.

A single shot rang out, not from the treeline, but from somewhere deep inside the forest — and it hit with a sound that was wrong, like a branch snapping under too much weight. The amplified voice stopped.

The stranger smiled faintly. "Well... that changes things."

Kael kept his pistol up, scanning for angles. "Explain."

"Your hunters," the stranger said, "just got hunted."

A shout went up in the distance, followed by two more shots, then a scream. Heavy footfalls crashed through the brush — not the careful, precise movements of trained soldiers, but the ragged scramble of people running for their lives.

Aaron’s grip on his sidearm tightened. "We don’t even know who’s out there anymore."

"Exactly," the stranger murmured.

From the shadows, a shape emerged — tall, lean, and moving with a predator’s precision. Whoever it was wore dark tactical gear without insignia, face obscured behind a half-mask. The weapon in their hands was sleek and custom, a rifle Kael didn’t recognize.

They didn’t aim it at him.

They didn’t have to.

"Leonid’s not your problem tonight," the masked figure said, voice low but carrying. "But if you stay here another thirty seconds, I will be."

Elena rose slightly from cover, her eyes narrowing. "And you are?"

The figure glanced at her, the faintest tilt of the head betraying interest. "Not your enemy... yet."

Another burst of gunfire erupted deeper in the forest, drawing the masked figure’s gaze. "Move north," they ordered. "There’s a clearing. Be there in five minutes, or I leave without you."

Without waiting for a reply, they melted back into the shadows, vanishing as if they’d never been there.

Aaron exhaled sharply. "We’re just... gonna follow the guy who threatened to kill us?"

Kael looked around at the treeline. The footsteps from before had stopped. Too quiet again.

"They’re not the biggest threat here," he said finally. "Not right now."

The stranger — the original one — smirked. "And here I thought you’d never say that."

Kael ignored him, motioning to Elena and Aaron. "We move. Now."

They ran. Low, fast, weaving through the trees. The forest seemed to press in tighter the farther they went, branches clawing at their clothes, roots grabbing at their boots. Every sound felt amplified — the crunch of leaves underfoot, the distant metallic click of a weapon being readied, the occasional ragged breath that wasn’t theirs.

Somewhere behind them, someone screamed again. Then... silence.

Kael didn’t stop.

Not until they saw it — a sliver of moonlight breaking through the canopy, revealing the clearing ahead.

But even from here, Kael could tell they weren’t the first ones to arrive.

There were shapes in the clearing. Standing still. Watching.

And when one stepped forward, the moonlight revealed the glint of a blade slick with fresh blood.

Kael slowed, signaling the others to drop low behind a fallen log.

From their cover, the figures in the clearing came into sharper focus.

Five of them.

Four armed with rifles, one holding the blade.

But it wasn’t just the weapons that set Kael’s nerves on edge — it was the way they stood. Motionless. Unblinking. Their heads tracked the treeline with eerie precision, as if they could see through the dark.

The man with the blade stepped forward again, turning it slowly so the moonlight danced along the edge.

"Kael," he called, voice calm, unhurried. "We’ve been looking for you."

Aaron muttered, "That’s never a good opening line."

Elena’s eyes were locked on the man’s stance. Her fingers twitched near her concealed pistol. "They’re trained. Look at their feet — weight forward, no wasted movement. They’re not here for negotiations."

The man’s blade dripped once, a dark drop hitting the dirt with a sound Kael swore he could hear from twenty feet away.

"I’m going to ask you once," the man continued. "Where is it?"

Kael’s jaw tightened. "Where’s what?"

The man smiled. Not warm. Not human. "The thing that makes you think you can walk away from this alive."

The four riflemen moved in unison, taking two steps closer.

Kael’s pulse spiked. There was no cover past this point. No time to circle around.

The masked figure from earlier appeared at the opposite side of the clearing, leaning casually against a tree.

"Tick-tock, Kael," they said. "Choose fast."

Kael scanned the faces, calculating. Too many rifles to rush. Too exposed to run. If he waited, they’d close the gap and fire.

And then, from somewhere beyond the clearing, a flare arced into the sky — bright red, casting the whole forest in blood-colored light.

The riflemen turned their heads for just a fraction of a second.

Kael knew this was the only opening they’d get.

"Elena — left. Aaron — cover me!" he barked, breaking into a sprint.

Bullets tore into the log behind them as they launched into the open, the sound of gunfire mixing with the hiss of the flare burning above.

The blade-wielding man stepped to intercept Kael, their weapons meeting in a blur of steel and fury. The clash sent shockwaves up Kael’s arm — this was no ordinary opponent. His strikes were precise, almost surgical, each one aimed to disable rather than kill... at first.

Aaron’s shots drove one rifleman back, but the others adapted fast, sweeping around to flank. Elena ducked low, firing controlled bursts that dropped another to the ground.

"Move!" Kael shouted, parrying a slash that came an inch from his throat. He countered with a knee to the man’s gut, just enough to break contact.

They ran again, plunging deeper into the dark forest, the flare’s glow fading behind them.

Somewhere in the chaos, the masked figure had vanished.

Kael didn’t know if they were still being hunted, or if they’d just been herded.

They didn’t stop running until their lungs burned and their legs screamed in protest.

Kael stumbled to a halt beside a moss-covered boulder, the night pressing in like a living thing.

Aaron leaned on a tree, reloading with shaking hands.

Elena crouched low, eyes scanning the shadows with that same predator’s patience — the look of someone who knew they weren’t alone.

Somewhere behind them, a distant whistle cut through the forest.

Not a bird. Not the wind.

A signal.

Kael tightened his grip on his weapon.

"They’re not giving up," he said.

And from the way Elena’s jaw set, he could tell she’d already figured that out long before he did.

Chapter 51 Preview – "No Way Out"

The flare’s glow may have faded, but the danger hasn’t.

Kael, Elena, and Aaron find themselves funneled into an unfamiliar part of the forest — a maze of twisted paths and dense undergrowth.

Every trail they take seems to double back on itself, every sound in the dark pushing them further from safety.

But when a sudden rainstorm forces them to seek shelter in a rotting cabin, they discover they’re not the first ones to be trapped here.

Inside waits a clue... and a body that hasn’t been dead for long.

Worse still — the killer might still be inside.

CTA:

The hunt is far from over — and the walls are closing in.

Who sent the signal in the forest?

What secret does the cabin hold?

And will Kael’s team survive the night... or will they become the next set of unmarked graves in these woods?

Keep reading Chapter 51 to find out — the game has only just begun.