Yxthul cut through the woods like a phantom of the deep, gliding between tree trunks as though swimming through water. Grass didn't bend. Branches didn't snap. His body flickered between material and immaterial, his form half-mist, half-muscle. To any bystander, he was a ripple of shadow sliding through the world, neither touching it nor truly part of it.
He did not breathe. He did not sweat. But his mind was a tempest.
Georan must be dead by now, he thought. Eaten, like the fool he was. He bit down a twisted smile. He had warned him, hadn't he? Said it clearly—"Trust me, it won't hurt you." But of course, it would. That was the whole point. The second version of the spawn, that hideous bloated creature, was not a tool. It was a tide. Something that couldn't be commanded, only unleashed.
He was getting stronger.
