The Celestial Hunt

CH14: Celestial Game Hunt

**Chapter 14: The Phantom Signal**

Yuuto jolted awake, drenched in sweat. The dream had been vivid: a black sun hanging over a crumbling city, and Lyra walking away from him with tears in her eyes, disappearing into a vortex of stars. His heart pounded with a mix of fear and urgency.

The app pulsed beside his bed.

[New Signal Detected: Coordinates Locked]

[Type: Phantom Beacon]

[Difficulty: Unknown]

[Warning: Not Recommended for Wanderers Below Level 10]

Yuuto was only Level 7, but something about the dream urged him forward.

He got dressed, clipping the feather pendant around his neck. Lyra had gone silent since their last encounter in the mirror world. Rei was unreachable too. Even the usually cryptic voice of the Celestial Hunt app had stopped responding to his queries.

He stepped outside. The night was thick with fog, curling in tendrils around the streetlamps. The beacon's signal led him to the edge of town, where an old, abandoned radio tower loomed against the starless sky.

Yuuto approached cautiously. The chain-link fence had long since collapsed, and weeds clawed their way through the cracks in the pavement. The moment he passed through the rusted gate, the temperature dropped.

[Entering Phantom Zone: All External Signals Jammed]

The world around him fell into silence. No breeze, no crickets, no hum of streetlights. Just an oppressive stillness.

As he ascended the tower's staircase, each step groaned under his weight. The screen on his phone flickered with static, then a message appeared:

[Warning: Presence Detected]

Yuuto froze. A shadow detached itself from the metal structure above. It floated down, soundlessly—vague, translucent, and cold. A humanoid shape with no face, only a mask where one should have been. Red eyes blinked into existence.

"You are not the first to seek the truth," it whispered. Its voice echoed directly in his mind. "But will you be the last?"

The phantom lunged.

Yuuto leapt back, activating his Celestial Affinity. A thin shield of starlight shimmered before him, absorbing the first blow. He slashed with his dagger, enhanced with a Spectral Edge modifier he’d won in a previous hunt. It passed through the entity—but not harmlessly. A ripple of resistance.

[Target Weakness: Emotion-Based Projection]

He gritted his teeth, drawing from the fear in his chest, from the sorrow of the dream. The dagger shimmered blue. He struck again.

This time, the entity screamed. Images poured from it—memories not his own. People trapped in loops. Failed hunts. A hidden room beneath the tower with a glowing relic that pulsed like a heartbeat.

The phantom vanished in a blast of cold air.

Yuuto staggered, breathing heavily. The tower’s top platform came into view. There, sitting on a pedestal surrounded by glyphs, was a strange orb—pale and flickering with faint voices.

[Item Acquired: Memory Orb - Echo of the First Hunter]

[Skill Unlocked: Whisper Recall - Allows user to relive past hunts and extract data]

He touched the orb.

A flood of vision surged through him. The First Hunter—masked and unnamed—facing the gods. Challenging them. Bleeding celestial light as the heavens fractured.

Yuuto dropped to one knee. The power was overwhelming.

Then, he heard a whisper not from the orb, but from behind him.

"You shouldn’t have come here alone."

He turned.

Lyra stood in the fog, her eyes no longer glowing with ethereal light but clouded—controlled. Her hand gripped a spectral weapon shaped like a scythe.

"Lyra?"

"The Hunt has rules, Yuuto. Break them, and even your allies become your enemies."

Before he could speak, she vanished.

The orb stopped glowing. A new notification pulsed:

[Celestial Hunt Phase II: Activated]

[Choose: Save the Hunter / Destroy the Source / Reclaim the Sky]

Yuuto’s journey had just become a war.

And he was running out of time.