I am not as familiar with the back of the dorm since we don't really spend a lot of time out here because of all the alarms. And we're not really supposed to go out to the forest because of its many natural dangers, like disease-carrying insects and such. But is there any other building covered in violet lights in the middle of the forest?

  My mind began listing down possible explanations for my current situation. Just a moment ago, I was high up on another mountain far away from this place, reciting this celestial phrase over and over again. Suddenly, I'm here. So...what? Was that tree some sort of a portal? Did it teleport me here?

  A darker thought whispered from the back of my mind.

  Did Reina lie to me?

  I shook my head. All she had were first-hand accounts of the locals. And she tried it herself. But nothing happened. And strangely enough, I believe her. I do believe that nothing happened because she was the priestess of the enemy.

  Daniel Cruz was able to teleport in his Shade Form so this theory really isn't baseless. But that's the Shade, or rather, Azgarmoth's power. Or do the celestials possess a similar form of power?

  But it doesn't explain why it's already night time. It was still morning when I dropped down the tree and started reciting. So it teleported me here but I lost track of that much time just reciting? I find that hard to believe. Mostly because I know it wasn't even an hour when I started doing the thing. And most importantly, my bandages are gone! I looked at my right hand which held the shard. There was no cut. Nor a scab. Or even any trace that I had a cut.

  I need to get inside. Update them of my situation. And get them to explain what's happening to me. Why I'm wearing my school's uniform. I took off. It didn't even took long before my left foot hit something on the ground. Something hard. And the dorm began wailing alarms. Suddenly, the rooftop were filled with guards with assault rifles.

  I raised both hands up. "Don't shoot! Don't shoot!"

  I saw red laser pointers trained on my shirt.

  "Don't shoot! I'm a haunted! Don't shoot!"

  I saw one guy lowering his rifle. And brought out a megaphone.

  "What the hell do you think you're doing?" he snapped. "Get back inside!" He turned to his walkie-talkie strapped to his shoulder, probably contacting Major Coleman who is still on another mountain about the situation.

  I happily complied. I ran as fast as I could to the door. Entering, I found myself at the back of the grand split staircase dominating the center of the building. I was walking past the movie theater, rounding the stairs when I saw someone who just added more to the confusion.

  "Major Coleman?" I asked. "You're here too? Where are the others?"

  "My men told me you were in the forest," Major Coleman said in a stern voice. "Stepped out of the lights. At night."

  "Well, it was morning just five minutes ago."

  "What are you talking about?" Major Coleman said. This is not the first time I have seen him this angry. But usually, his anger was directed towards the Shade and the cult. Not me.

  I stepped back. "I-I was supposed to get my light back. And now it's night. And we're back at Biringan. I—I don't understand!"

  "Major Coleman?" a girl said. "Can we come out now?" Her voice made me freeze on the spot. I couldn't believe it. I didn't turn around. Out of disbelief. Out of fear and shame if it really was her. But another voice dispelled any doubts.

  "What's going on?" The guy's voice said. The hair on the back of my neck stood up. There's no mistaking it. I recognized this voice.

  "False alarm, everyone," Major Coleman said. "It was just Vergil. For whatever reason, he decided to ignore all the rules Mr. Donovan had gone over with you kids and decided to take a stroll in the forest tonight."

  "What?" the same guy said. I whipped around. The disbelief overpowering my guilt. Brown skin. Spiky short hair. It was him... Right before me. The first casualty of the Shade.

  "Kent...," I said. I couldn't stop my lips from shaking. "Kent...Edwards?"

  "Not cool, man," Kent said. "What were you doing?"

  My mind put an embossed overlay image of Kent coughing up his own blood over his face for a split second. I shook my head and immediately zoomed in on his neck. There was no hole in it. No piece of tree piercing him.

  The haunteds started crowding around me.

  "You're not taking any of this seriously, are you?" the blonde girl in the ponytail said.

  "Eris..." Her surname got caught in my throat. She was pointing a finger at me, understandably angry. My eyes started welling up, in danger of overflowing. For a split second, her hands disappeared, and all I saw were bleeding stumps. Then her hands were back again. I stepped back in shock, shrieking.

  "Ow!" a little kid's voice said. I drew in a sharp breath upon hearing his voice.

  "No...please no," I thought. "No more. I can't...please..."

  Slowly, I turned around. My heart thumping in my ears, faster and faster with anticipation.

  "You stepped on my foot," said the kid still wearing his middle school uniform. A cut suddenly opened on his neck. Blood came spilling out like an overfilled cup.

  "Are you okay?" Demi stepped closer and put his face near mine. "You don't look so good."

  The images of Demi begging us to save him, of Daniel cutting open his neck with his Shade Arm, of Demi's lifeless eyes as he lay sprawled all over the floor. It all came flooding back in an instant to the point that my brain hit its limit.

  "AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!"

  I clasped Demi's neck with both hands.

  "S-stop..." Demi croaked out. "You're...hurting me..."

  He tried peeling my hands off but it was no use. I was bigger. And stronger. And more determined than him.

  "You won't die!" I wailed. Tears started flowing down my face. "Not-not again. Not this time..."

  The haunteds shouted at me to let Demi go. But the blood kept seeping down my hands. I gripped tighter.

  Demi's eyes started to roll back inside his head when behind me, an arm slid under my neck and tightened, lifting me off the floor.

  Tha pain immediately made me release my grip on Demi. My hands went to the arm, tapping it for release.

  I dropped on the floor on all fours, rubbing my throat.

  "Are you okay?" I heard Eris said to Demi. "What was hell, Vergil?!"

  I looked up from the floor to their direction. "B-but...I was just—"

  My eyes popped when I saw, or rather, not saw the cut on Demi's neck. His uniform remained unsoiled with his blood.

  "What—what's going...on?"

  I saw Eris coming towards me. She picked me up by shirt's collar. "You attacked Demi," she said fixing me with her hateful glare. "That's what's going on."

  The bleeding stumps reappeared once again, making me scream. I grabbed the rest of her hands and removed them from me.

  I screamed at my hands, painted with Eris' blood.

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  "What is wrong with you!?" She said. She stood there with her hands intact. I was breathing rapidly. I looked down my hands again. The blood is gone.

  I flinched when a hand touched my shoulder, screaming. I swatted it away with the back of my hand.

  "Aah!" Cana yelped. She was rubbing her hand that I hit. Her brows creased in concern. "Vergil? You're scaring me."

  "What the hell, dude?" Kent said. I saw him advancing towards me, an arm outstretched. I flinched, jumping away from him. "What's going on with you?" He said as blood started dripping down his mouth. The haunteds started crowding me once more.

  Their voices of concern overlapped into a muddle of noise that threatened to rend what remained of my mind.

  The terror from the past ordeals, the exhaustion, the guilt crushing me ever stronger each time my eyes met theirs, and now the confusion of my current situation. It was all too much.

  I curled on the ground and screamed. I put my hands over my ears in an attempt to block the muddle of concerned voices from the haunteds, living or dead. But that wasn't enough.

  Their voices...

  Voices I thought I would never hear again...

  Penetrates through my cries. I flinched and curled smaller every time a hand touched a part of my body. I saw them all around me. Confused faces. Scared faces. Dead faces...

  I closed my eyes shut, pushing out all the tears that built up inside. I wished to be awoken from this nightmare. Yes. This is a nightmare. Nothing more. I cursed Reina. For lying. For telling me that it was only supposed to be some sort of inspiration.

  A hand grabbed my arm. Then I felt a pinch on my shoulder, making me retract into a ball. I didn't have to check what it was. I just knew I was injected with something. I kept cursing Reina. Flinching at every touch. Screaming.

  All that must have taken a toll on me because I was starting to get tired. I don't know if it's the tears but my vision was getting blurry. So does everyone's voices. I felt sleepy.

  "I know it's hard," Major Coleman said but his voice sounded like he was underwater. "If you can, don't take it against Vergil. Being ripped away from you families and forced to leave with strangers in a far away, secluded location is not something you kids are expected to deal with..."

  Those were the last words my mind registered before a wall of blackness washed over my eyes.

  I woke up in one of the familiar rooms inside the shelter. The metallic pen on the bedside table confirmed that this was indeed my room. Soft beams of sunlight was streaming in through the windows. Realizing I slept through the night, I sat bolt upright and flung the covers down to the floor.

  I went to the window and looked outside. Immediately, my greatest fear was realized. The tree was already down.

  My heart sank.

  If that tree is down, then that means... I thought.

  And of course, there were no dead bodies on the ground. So at least I'm spared of seeing their deaths in my face once again. I turned around, not wanting to be reminded of the horrible memory any longer.

  I noticed my door was wide open.

  No one has come up to check on me. That's to be expected. They must be downstairs. Staying together as we did last time.

  Last time... I thought.

  I still don't understand. Where am I? Or rather, when am I? Of course, the answer to the question is so obvious. But is it really the case?

  "There's no way..." I said with a shaky breath. "Right?"

  I hurried to my cabinet and opened it. All my clothes, arranged, exactly the way I arranged them the first time.

  I pulled open the drawer of my bedside table. A pen came rolling over the Haunted's Handbook. I opened it and found no new entries. Of course. It was only the first day in. And I've only written in it at about lunchtime, after Major Coleman briefed us of Kent's situation.

  It all tracks. The dead haunteds, the fallen tree, the empty Haunteds' Handbook. My old uniform on me. And my missing cuts! All these evidence points to one conclusion—I'm back to the past, the first day after the tragedy, to be exact.

  But I refused to believe it. It's just not possible. So another idea came. Something I believe will wake me up from this messed-up dream. I clenched my teeth and braced myself for what I'm about to do.

  SLAP!

  My right cheek stings. But what stings more is my disappointment that I'm still here. That the slap didn't wake me up from this nightmare. Isn't that how it works? Now my confusion turns to frustration upon realizing that Hollywood movies lied to me.

  "So I'm really back?" I said. Defeated, I sat on my bed.

  "I'm back," I repeated. Because even now, I still do not believe it. That tree...that incantation I was reciting over and over again...It was time travel.

  The hair on my body stood up. It's a different kind of fear from when the Shade is chasing after you, but just as effective in inspiring terror to my body.

  I can't be back.

  Despite the overwhelming evidence, my brain still refuse to believe. Immediately, my fingers went to my neck to inspect the cruel reminders Daniel Cruz had left me, desperate for proof that my insane theory was wrong. But my fingers only felt unbroken skin.

  I stood up and rushed towards the bathroom sink, where the mirror is. I craned my neck this way and that, checking for the scars and other deformities on my skin. But my eyes failed to find any.

  My hands grabbed the sink for balance, to steady myself from the horrible truth that threatens to make my knees collapse.

  "I really am back..."

  I went out of the bathroom and just stared at the window. Just drinking in the beautiful day we are having. Knowing that such a day will not last long. Because if that tree is already fallen, then that means...

  My eyes widen.

  "The tree!"

  If the tree was a portal I activated then logically, it should sent me back. Because that's how portals work. Even if it closed, I can just recite the words to have it open again...right?

  Or it may sent me back to another time?

  Or it doesn't work at all?

  Or...

  I shook my head. I'll leave that worries for future me. Right now, all that matters is getting back to the tree. Should be easy too.

  Hope has overridden my fear, my confusion, and my exhaustion. I don't need to figure out what's going on if I can just go back to my present time. Back to Reina and Major Coleman and Cana and the rest.

  Thinking of Reina, I didn't realize I was longing to see her. For help. For explanation. If anyone can make sense of this, she can.

  Let's see...

  They are probably downstairs, meeting about the fallen tree and Kent...

  The knowledge of seeing Kent alive and well only to wake up to a day he's gone. Again. Threatened to shrink me back to the fetal position on the floor. So I gritted my teeth to force myself to focus on the plan.

  My plan was simple, really. Get out of the building without anyone noticing me, and therefore stopping me. Going downstairs, where everyone is at, is obviously a no go. There's no way anyone would miss someone going down that conspicuous centerpiece of the dorm. So the stairs is out of the equation.

  And the tree is at the back. Opposite of my room. Luckily, all rooms here have fire escape ladders we can release with minimal effort. The only worry I have is the noise it will make and the eyes on the rooftop. I don't have a plan for that honestly, because what are they going do once they spotted me? Shoot me? Highly doubt that. It's not like last night where I'm coming from the forest. Most probably, they'd be shouting at me to stop and come after me. But by the time they got down, I'd already have a significant lead on them.

  With my mind and plan set, I set about on my one-way trip.

  Before leaving, my eyes set on the metallic pen on my table. It was the pen with the hidden knife. A gift from Cana. The very same one I used to cut off Daniel's tongues and defeat him. It doesn't make sense. After all, what's a pen going to do to bullets traveling at the speed of sound? But for some reason, I pocketed the thing. I can't explain it but having the pen gives me a sense of comfort I couldn't describe.

  I take one last look on my bedroom. Realizing how wrong it is to be back here, to see them again. And I also realized that time is of the essence.

  The longer I stay here, the higher the chances of someone coming up to check on me. And that would make it difficult to escape. Wanting to waste no more time, I walked outside of my room and put my plan in action.

  I looked at to my left and the right. I listened to footsteps downstairs or climbing up the stairs.

  Nothing.

  I walked over and put my ear on the door opposite of my room.

  Still, everything was silent.

  I tried twisting the knob. With last night's business, I doubt locking their doors would be their top priority. The click! proved I was right.

  I closed the door behind me and went to work.

  I opened the window and brought down the emergency escape ladder. That noise probably got the attention of some of the guards on the rooftop. Which is want I wanted so they recognized it's me and not shoot.

  "Hey!" A soldier said.

  I climbed over the window and headed down the ladder. My bare feet touch the wet earth.

  Did it rain that night? I thought.

  But the angry shouts above multiplied. Forcing me back to my current situation.

  I turned around saw the forest. I could see the hair-like roots of the Balete Tree. It's not that far.

  I took off.

  Immediately, loud, blaring noises sounded off.

  I ignored them and doubled down on running. My feet forming depressions on the soft mud. I skipped over surface roots. Break through the long stems of wild plants. Weave between thick, tree barks. Finally, I reached the tree.

  I almost dove inside the cavity but remembering the height of the fall, I decided to lower myself carefully instead. The moment my feet touched the cold, damp soil inside, I closed my eyes and started reciting with my legs crossed on the mud.

  I finished once.

  Twice.

  Three times.

  I was a monk in prayer. I threw away all the anxiety of the situation, the confusion, and the terror of last night. I ignored all other bodily sensations and lost myself reciting the phrase.

  But my concentration was broken by the stern voice of Major Coleman.

  "Now what are you doing?" his voice echoed down here.

  My eyes flew open. Shocked. But that shock quickly turned to fear.

  It didn't work...

  But I closed my eyes and recited again.

  I'm still here... I thought as I desperately try and retry the incantation over and over again.

  I got choked up halfway through the phrase because my throat started constricting as I held back tears, tormented by the fact that I was still here...That the phrase that was supposed to bring me back didn't work. That I am forced to endure another week of the horrors that are sure to pass.

  But I kept reciting.

  Because the thought of enduring all that all over again kept me on. Even though I can now hear Cana and Leo's voices pleading for me to get out, I held out hope that it would work.

  That shock and fear had now turned to frustration. Tears started rolling down my face. My voice breaks as it gets out each word of the phrase.

  Why is it not working! I cried.

  I was on the verge of screaming out my frustrations when a hand grabbed me by my collar and lifted me out. I was caught in my own turmoil that before I knew it, I was already above ground, surrounded by Major Coleman and his men. Syringe at the ready.

  I thrashed around, struggling to get out of the soldier's grip. I was about to lash out when I heard his voice.

  "Seriously, man," he said. "You're scaring us."

  I stopped fighting. I turned around in the direction of the voice. I saw him clearly, standing shoulder to shoulder with the other haunteds around me. No piece of wood was penetrating his neck.

  "K-kent," I stammered. "You-you're...alive?"