Anomaly

Although reluctant, the reaction team members still followed me through the dark mist that engulfed the city. Unlike my steady, untroubled strides, they moved cautiously, casting hesitant glances at the ground from time to time. And to be honest, I couldn’t blame them—the feeling that we could plummet at any moment was hard to ignore.

To be honest, even I half-expected this veil to dissipate at any second and send us tumbling down... Not that it would bother me much. Still, I knew it was almost impossible because falling from here would mean being swallowed by that thing—and that was the last thing my Alter Ego would want.

As we advanced through the dark mist toward our objective, the reaction team exchanged murmurs among themselves. It was impossible not to notice their fleeting glances at me every few moments. And no matter how discreet they tried to be, I heard every word and tracked every movement—nothing escaped my perception.

"Even if I told the others about this, I doubt anyone would believe me" one of the members muttered, his eyes fixed on whatever lay beneath us.

"I think we’re the first squad to go on a mission alongside an anomaly... At least, I can’t remember any other case like ours" another member commented, his uneasy gaze scanning the surroundings.

Their words made sense. If I were in their shoes, I’d also find it strange to receive help from an anomaly. It was natural to be wary of the unknown, of things that defy logic. But for me, there was no such strangeness. After all, I was the anomaly. And at some point, I was... human.

As my thoughts drifted to that distant memory, a subtle movement beside me pulled me back to reality. I blinked, shaking off the fog of recollection, and turned my gaze to the leader. He walked with firm, controlled steps, effortlessly keeping pace with me.

"...Thanks for earlier" he said, his face serious: "If it weren’t for you, we’d all have been slaughtered without a chance to fight back"

Even though his expression was stern and somewhat rigid, I could sense the gratitude behind his words. I blinked for a moment, taking in the weight of the moment, then refocused on what lay ahead. He didn’t seem to expect a response, and honestly, I didn’t feel one was necessary.

As I calmly walked across the dark clouds, my feet stopped almost automatically. The leader beside me halted a few seconds later, and soon, the others followed, one by one, as if moving in perfect synchronization.

"What’s going on? Why did she stop all of a sudden?" one of the members asked, but his voice echoed into the void, unanswered. The tension in the air spread, and no one seemed willing to explain.

I noticed the leader put a hand to his ear, probably receiving a message from Emily. But instead of reacting, I simply lowered my gaze. Almost instinctively, my head tilted, focusing on what lay beneath us. The team still looked confused, their faces full of doubt, but when a deep scowl formed on the leader’s face, he did the same as me. Once his eyes locked onto what was below, he didn’t look up again.

The members were still visibly confused, but following the leader’s example, they all turned their gaze downward. One by one, their eyes widened in shock and fear. Honestly, I couldn’t blame them. Beneath the dense layer of clouds we stood on, though it was difficult to see clearly, something was undeniably there. Something massive. And without a doubt, something dangerous.

We were probably in the city center, a place where the open space seemed endless, but the real horror lay submerged. The murky, almost opaque water made it hard to see, but it wasn’t enough to fully hide what lurked below.

As the thick mist slowly cleared, a face emerged from the depths. Surrounded by grotesquely gleaming scales, its lifeless white eyes locked onto us with a soul-piercing intensity.

It was a fixed, unsettling stare, as if it were absorbing every movement, every breath, in a sickly, insatiable way. Its monstrous mouth opened slowly, revealing an endless row of sharp teeth—some broken, others too large to be natural—aligned in a way that suggested a grin of pure malice.

The presence of this creature, almost entirely hidden beneath the surface, made the air feel ice-cold. But I wasn’t the one feeling the terror—it was the reaction team behind me, frozen in place, powerless against whatever lurked in the shadows, waiting to devour.

The creature remained there, submerged in the dark waters, its vacant white eyes locked onto us, unrelenting and hollow, as if studying our every move. There was no expression, just an emptiness that made its gaze even more disturbing.

For a moment, absolute silence reigned, heavy, as if the very air around us was holding its breath, waiting for something to happen. Then, slowly, with a smooth, unhurried motion, the thing began to withdraw, sliding into the murky depths, as if it knew exactly where it was going but wasn’t in a rush to get there.

At that moment, the reaction team behind me—who had until then seemed like frozen figures of pure tension—finally exhaled in a series of deep sighs. It was as if they had released a massive weight they’d been holding ever since they first spotted the creature.

I could feel their agitation—their rigid bodies finally relaxing, the adrenaline fading into a wave of relief—but as an anomaly, I didn’t share that feeling. I didn’t experience the fear that consumed them. If I were human, maybe that scene would have shaken me to my core.

Maybe my heart would have raced, my senses sharpening at the sight of something that felt like a nightmare made real, a being that simply shouldn’t exist. But instead, the only sensation I had was that of being… watched.

"What the hell... has that thing been following us this whole time?" one of the members muttered, crouching as he gasped for air.

"Shit, I think I just lost five years of my life just looking at it" another member said, breathless, trying to steady himself.

I won’t lie—I was surprised too. The thought that this thing had been trailing us the whole time was, at the very least, disturbing and bizarre. And the fact that it was impossible to see what lurked in the depths of the water only made it all the more unsettling.

At that moment, a new thought crossed my mind. With all this destruction happening… how exactly are they going to explain it? I mean, people are dying because a giant fish is eating them. How do you justify something like that?.

It's hard to imagine that no one was recording all that... though the chances of whoever did also getting devoured are pretty high. Either way, I really want to know how they plan to cover this up. After all, it’s not like the world could just find out about anomalies—doing so would definitely cause mass panic.

As I got lost in thought, I felt something wrap around my feet. When I looked down, I saw darkness creeping over them. I blinked, confused by the strange sensation, and as I glanced at the others around me, I realized I wasn’t the only one experiencing it.

"What the hell is this?" one of the team members muttered, startled, as he watched his foot being swallowed by the darkness.

The other members reacted similarly, but the captain, on the other hand, looked at me for a moment, clearly confused. However, there was no fear in his expression, just perplexity. The next moment, without exception, we were all hurled into the sky. I blinked, trying to figure out what the hell my Alter Ego was doing, but the answer came seconds later.

A deafening roar echoed, like an entire ocean being torn in half. When I looked down, I saw a grotesque spiral of twisted blades spinning in the void—no, it wasn’t just a spiral. It was a mouth. The thing burst from the depths with overwhelming force, breaking the surface like a nightmare made real.

Water cascaded off its body in torrents, and its jagged teeth gleamed under the pale light. Against all logic, that monstrosity reached us—even though we should have been at an impossible height. Behind me, the reaction team members held their breath—or maybe they had forgotten how to breathe.

To make matters worse, the mist generated by my Alter Ego was simply sucked into the monster’s massive mouth. Though it had been strong enough to support us, its resistance was no match for the anomaly’s sheer power, vanishing as if it had never existed.

As the colossal anomaly slowly sank back into the water, we also began to fall. This time, there was nothing to cushion the impact. My Alter Ego was still acting as our bridge, but that only meant we would crash straight onto the mist it continued to generate.

To my surprise, as soon as my feet touched the regenerated mist—after it had been swallowed—I felt something unexpectedly soft rather than solid. My body sank slightly, as if landing on a fluffy, cushiony surface, letting me land gently, floating for a moment before regaining my footing.

The leader had a similar experience, though he lost his balance for a moment upon landing. The other members weren’t so lucky—most were sprawled on the ground, some with their faces buried in the mist, grumbling that they’d like a warning before something like that happened again.

Honestly, I would have liked a warning too. I nearly had a heart attack when I was suddenly thrown into the air! I mean, you and a part of me... couldn’t you have given me a heads-up first? I grumbled internally, puffing out my cheeks and stomping down on the mist beneath me. It rippled gently in response, almost as if it were apologizing timidly, which only made me sigh.

As I mentally complained to my Alter Ego, an authoritative voice cut through my thoughts. It came from the leader nearby, sounding tense and laced with suspicion: “What the hell is that thing?”

My gaze immediately snapped to him, and without hesitation, I started walking in his direction. He stood frozen, eyes fixed on the ground in front of him, as if he were staring at something with an almost obsessive focus. As I got closer, I caught sight of what had his attention.

A mass of twisted flesh, pulsating and writhing grotesquely, was crawling across the ground. It was as if the earth itself were rebelling, distorting in a horrific dance of suffering.

Whatever it was, its appearance was a revolting fusion of viscera and tissues stretching and contracting in impossible ways. The sight was nauseating—repulsive, even to me.

I quickly glanced around, my eyes moving swiftly but cautiously. There were more of these things—far more than I could count. They were scattered across the entire field of view, writhing and shifting into grotesque shapes.

A feeling of a distorted yet unmistakable presence filled the air, and a strange unease spread through the reaction team members behind me. I wondered for a moment what these creatures were, but the answer came immediately—faster than I could process.

The mass of flesh twisted, letting out a sickening crack, as if the meat were alive on its own, folding inward in a grotesque motion. Each contortion seemed to generate more and more flesh, forming an even larger mass that pulsed and expanded with a sound that made the bones of those behind me go cold. They could barely keep their eyes open as the monster grew before us, turning into an amorphous, grotesque entity that defied all logical comprehension.

The masses around us writhed grotesquely, as if alive, and I could hear the wet, squelching sounds of movement. Then, suddenly, from within those writhing mounds, humanoid figures began to emerge—deformed and nightmarish.

Their bloated, fish-like heads rose as if molded by some unnatural force. Their grotesquely large eyes bulged from their sockets, locking onto us with a vacant, insane stare.

Their mouths, twisted into a horrifying grin, oozed a thick, foul-smelling liquid that dripped onto the ground with a sickening plop. Their gills throbbed at the sides of their necks, eerily similar to the monster that had just tried to swallow us whole.

The group members slowly closed ranks, forming a circle around me and the leader, who remained silent, his fingers tightening around his weapon’s grip with visible tension.

Then, as if finally awakening, the monsters let out strange noises—deep, guttural growls—and began advancing toward us with heavy, clumsy steps, as if their legs struggled to support their grotesque bodies.

"Get ready for combat!" the leader commanded, his voice firm as he aimed his weapon at one of the approaching creatures, moving step by step, slow but undeniably threatening.