Chapter 1: The solitude of the road - Part 4- END

The bear didn’t answer with words. Instead, he pointed toward the nearby train tracks, those old relics, and traced an imaginary line in the air toward the forest, as if drawing the path with precision. Mi Fan followed his movements with her eyes, completely focused.

Then, suddenly, without warning, a woman’s voice echoed from the trees. It was a clear voice, almost hypnotic, singing a tune I half-recognized, and before I could process what was happening, the giant bear, without saying another word, began walking toward the forest, as if following a call only he could hear.

Mi Fan and I stood there, watching in silence. Her brow furrowed, while mine rose., Curiosity and cats go hand in hand and i'm feeling positively Feline right now.

The voice... there was something about that voice. It felt familiar, like I’d heard it somewhere long ago, like an echo from another time. But I couldn’t place exactly where or when.

“Well, Mi Fan, we’ve arrived at Hemlock Ridge… probably,” I said, trying to sound optimistic.

“Mr. Mahayan, night is falling. What do we do?” Mi Fan asked, in that serious tone she always used during uncertain moments. She was young, yes, trained for tough situations, sure, and yet I couldn’t help feeling responsible for her.

We’d been in situations like this before, facing the unknown in remote places, with friends who were no longer with us. But this time was different. This time, I was the one who had to make sure everything went smoothly.

“Yeah, we head into town. I’ll leave the car here. I don’t think anything will happen... not yet,” I replied, heading back to the car to adjust the roof and make sure it was securely closed.

Mi Fan dashed over to the car and grabbed her small backpack and her red kukuri, that special umbrella her grandfather had given her. The kukuri had always seemed extraordinary to me, a masterpiece of Zhou craftsmanship.

We’d seen it in action during our more tumultuous days, when Fan family members knew how to wield it like an extension of their own body.

But now, seeing it in Mi Fan’s hands, I noticed something I hadn’t before: the kukuri looked more worn. Time had left its mark, the edges were a little duller, the shine wasn’t the same. Everything changes, I thought. Even what seemed invulnerable. Objects, like people, accumulate the wear of time.

“Time catches up with everything, huh,” I murmured, more to myself than to her, as I watched her hold the umbrella with both hands.

I sighed and offered her my hand.

“Let’s go,” I said, trying to make my voice sound more confident than I felt. We could face anything, but this time, she had to learn to face what was coming too.

We walked into the forest, leaving behind the small service station and the closed car. The darkness was falling quickly, wrapping the trees in a cloak of long, twisted shadows. There was something about the way the light disappeared that always reminded me that what seemed normal during the day took on another form at night. We knew that all too well.

The woman’s voice that we’d heard earlier had faded, but its echo still lingered in the air, as if the trees had trapped it between their leaves and branches. The forest was full of sounds: the crunch of leaves beneath our feet, the wind whispering through the branches, and the silence that slipped between those noises, like an invisible thread tying everything together.

We moved between the trees, their elongated shadows stretching over us, and gradually, bit by bit, the forest opened up. Before us lay a path. A dusty trail leading directly to the tracks, that place where man had cut through nature and left his scar of iron.

The tracks stretched out, disappearing into the horizon like a still river, separating the forest from something... different. It was as if the natural world had surrendered at that point. The grass no longer grew, and the earth itself seemed to have given up. We’d seen these kinds of places before. Places where civilization and nature stare, but never touch.

On the other side of the tracks, a small town stood, bathed in the faint glow of street lights just flickering to life, one by one, like earthly stars. The houses were modest, with low roofs and lit windows. From where we stood, I could see people walking through the streets, greeting each other in a way that seemed almost rehearsed, like they were following a silent choreography.

“Welcome to Hemlock Ridge,” read a wooden sign at the entrance, its letters worn by time. The sign swayed slightly in the breeze, producing a soft creaking sound that broke the silence.