The rain began subtly, a persistent drizzle that clung to the cobblestones of Oakhaven. It wasn’t the rain itself that was unsettling, but the scent. A cloying sweetness, like overripe lilies mixed with something… metallic. I, Silas Blackwood, Chronicler of the Unseen, had been tracking a series of disappearances – mostly children, snatched from their beds in the dead of night. The local constabulary dismissed it as youthful folly, a penchant for wandering into the Blackwood Mire. They were fools.
The Mire doesn’t simply *take*. It… harvests.
Days bled into weeks, and the disappearances continued. I discovered a pattern: each child had been found later, seated perfectly still in the center of the Mire, a single, phosphorescent lily clutched in their hand. The lilies were the key. They weren’t native; they pulsed with an unnatural light, and their scent intensified with proximity. I began to suspect a presence, something ancient and profoundly *wrong* residing within the peat.
It whispers to the lost. Promises of solace, of belonging… it feeds on their innocence.
I attempted a ritual, a simple warding against the unseen. It failed spectacularly. The air thickened, the scent of lilies reached a fever pitch, and I experienced a cascade of… impressions. Not memories, not thoughts, but *feelings*. The cold, suffocating dread of a child’s last moments. The hunger. The relentless, patient anticipation. The Mire wasn't merely a location; it was a vessel, and it was beginning to respond to my intrusion.
The Mire remembers. It remembers every sorrow, every fear, every unfulfilled desire. And it uses them.
The Horrormonger, as I’ve come to call it, isn’t a being in the traditional sense. It's a state of being, an amplification of the Mire's inherent negativity. It thrives on isolation, on the erosion of hope. It doesn't seek to destroy, not directly. It seeks to *consume* – not just lives, but experiences, memories, emotions. The children aren't simply killed; they become components in the Mire’s ever-growing tapestry of despair.
The more lost souls feed it, the stronger it becomes. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy of horror.
I found him – or rather, *it*. Not a form, but a distortion of light and shadow, centered around a particularly large cluster of phosphorescent lilies. It manifested as a profound sense of melancholy, of unbearable regret. I realized then that the Horrormonger wasn’t just feeding on the children; it was feeding on *me*. It was showing me my own deepest fears, my own unacknowledged regrets. It was stripping away my defenses, leaving me vulnerable.
Resist the reflection. It will shatter you.
I destroyed the lilies. A futile gesture, perhaps. The Mire remains, and the horror lingers. But I understand now: the Horrormonger isn’t something to be fought, but something to be… witnessed. To acknowledge its existence, to confront its influence, is the only defense. The silence is the only victory. I sit here, writing, the scent of lilies a constant, insidious reminder. Perhaps, in the end, I am already consumed.
The Mire is always listening.