The fog was thick when Mark started the climb. It wasn't a gradual ascent, but a sharp rise that seemed to pull at him from below, a constant tug on his legs, a beckoning, a demand. The weight of his backpack pressed against his shoulders, and each breath he took felt like it was being strained through a filter of smoke and dampness. The world had narrowed down to the heavy, unrelenting fog that clung to the mountain like a secret, and the rasp of his own breath.
The path was narrow, sometimes barely wide enough to fit his feet. Jagged rocks poked up from the earth, cruelly sharp, and the slippery surface of the trail made it harder to maintain his footing. He slipped once, catching himself just in time, but the sharp pain that shot up his leg when he twisted it was real enough to make him pause. His boots were heavy, filled with mud and the dust of the trail, and the friction of each step scraped against the already raw skin of his feet. His socks were soaked through, slick with sweat and water from the fog. By now, he could feel the blood pooling around the blisters on his heels, but he couldn't stop. Not yet.
The cold cut through him like a blade, sharp and unrelenting. He had learned to ignore it, to keep moving. Each step felt like a small betrayal of his body, a reminder that it wasn't built for this kind of punishment. But the voice in his head, Emma's voice, cut through the fog just as clearly as the biting cold. "Seven days."
The words had been echoing in his mind ever since she said them. Seven days until whatever it was that had started would reach its inevitable end. Seven days until the final decision, the last choice, whatever that choice would be. But more than that, it felt like a promise, or maybe a warning. It haunted him, but it also drove him forward. He wasn't sure why he had agreed to this--whatever it was he was doing--but the weight of that phrase felt like both a clock and a cage.
Seven days.
It was a countdown, but it didn't come with any comfort of knowing exactly what would happen when time ran out. It was simply the limit, the boundary. And there was something in the silence, in the fog, that made it feel even more real, even more urgent. He couldn't be sure, but somewhere deep inside, he felt as if the end of those seven days would come crashing down on him in a way he wouldn't be ready for.
His legs were screaming by the time he reached a small plateau. His thighs were burning, muscles protesting the continuous climb, but he didn't stop. He couldn't afford to. If he didn't keep moving, he would lose whatever momentum he had left. He wiped his brow, the mixture of sweat and mist stinging his eyes, and glanced upward.
The fog had thickened as he ascended, swirling around him in a disorienting haze. It was nearly impossible to tell how much farther he had to go, or even where the path might lead. It felt as if the mountain itself was hiding the world from him, shutting him off from everything but the fog and the air that was thinner the higher he went. Every breath was a little harder to take, each step a little slower.
But then, through the haze, he saw something that stopped him cold.
A stone marker stood ahead, not far from where the trail seemed to vanish into a sea of gray. It was weathered and old, the stone worn smooth by the hands of time, but it was unmistakable. A carving had been etched into its surface, bold and clear despite the fog that threatened to obscure it.
Qui inizia il silenzio.
Here begins the silence.
Mark's breath caught in his throat, his legs faltering for a moment. His mind raced to process the words, their meaning settling over him like an iron weight. Silence--the kind that stretched between the spaces of thought and reality, the kind that crushed words before they had a chance to leave his mouth. A warning, perhaps, or maybe a promise. Either way, it felt like a boundary, an invisible line that was about to be crossed.
He stood there for a moment, staring at the stone, the words echoing in his head. Something about it felt wrong. No one had told him about this. No one had mentioned anything about a marker or a warning. The climb had been hard enough already, the fog thickening with every step, but this--this felt like something different.
He wanted to turn around, to go back down the mountain. But he couldn't. The decision had already been made. The path had already been set in motion. Emma's voice, still ringing in his ears, reminded him why he couldn't stop now. Seven days. That was all he had.
With a final breath, Mark stepped past the marker, crossing the threshold that the stone had warned him about. He felt it, then--the change. It wasn't physical. Not exactly. But there was something in the air, something in the way the fog pressed in even tighter. The silence seemed to deepen, to stretch outward, like the world had suddenly become smaller, quieter, more suffocating.
The wind had died completely. There were no birds, no distant sounds of life. Nothing but the slow, rhythmic thud of his heart in his chest. His breath, now quick and shallow, felt as if it were being stolen from him. His body tensed. Something had shifted. Something had begun that couldn't be undone.
Mark kept moving, though. He didn't stop.
The fog thickened around him, curling in front of his face like a living thing. He could no longer see the trail clearly. The rocks beneath his feet were slick with moisture, and the world felt closed in, like he was walking through a dream he couldn't escape. His mind began to race, thoughts scattering in every direction. He had made it past the marker. But now what? What had he crossed into? And where was he headed? He couldn't see the end of the trail, and for a long moment, he wondered if there even was an end.
The sound of his own breathing seemed to fill the space, louder than it had any right to be. He reached out, brushing his hand along the stone wall that bordered the trail, trying to keep himself anchored, but it felt like the fog was pulling him deeper into itself. The weight of the silence was beginning to press in on him, suffocating him.
He didn't know how long he walked, but when he finally reached the next plateau, it was nearly dark. The light was fading, the sky turning to a dusky gray, the edges of the world blurring into one indistinguishable mass. The fog had thickened so much that it felt as though the night had come early. He couldn't see the path ahead. He couldn't even see his own feet.
He pulled himself up onto the next ledge, panting heavily, and stood still for a moment, the exhaustion of the climb settling into his bones. The silence had become oppressive now, and there was no sound--nothing but the pounding of his heart and the fog that seemed to encase him on all sides.
He felt disoriented, disconnected from reality, but there was a single thought that cut through the haze of his mind: I can't stop. Not yet.
And then, ahead of him, barely visible through the shifting gray, he saw something. A shape.
It was distant, barely more than a shadow, but it was moving. It was hard to make out, but the figure seemed human, a silhouette against the fog, moving with a deliberate pace. Mark's heart skipped a beat, and his legs went stiff. For a moment, he hesitated. Who could be out here, in this dense fog, in this oppressive silence?
His breath caught again, his pulse quickening as he forced himself to move. Was it someone following him? Someone who had crossed the threshold, too? Or was this just another figment of his tired mind, conjured by the isolation, by the weight of Emma's voice, by the pressure of the seven days?
The figure didn't turn. Didn't look his way. It simply walked--slowly, steadily, with a purpose he couldn't understand.
Mark stood there, frozen, watching as the shape began to fade back into the fog, swallowed by the silence.
He didn't know what was coming next.
But he knew he was deeper now, in a place where the rules didn't apply. A place where time had stopped, or maybe had never started. A place that, once entered, would not let him leave.
He took another step forward.
---
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A/N: if someone dont understand he leave the car to climb.
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