The Marked Chronicles: The Monster Rick Made

📚 THE LIBRARY: The Marked  

The Library is not silent. Its shelves lean inward like listening ears, but tonight they groan like breaking ribs. The air tastes of copper and mildew, sharp as blood on stone. The corridors do not sigh—they hiss, dragging unseen chains across the floor. Every artifact hums faintly, a low, resonant note that tightens the skin on your arms.  

The candles flare too bright, then choke themselves out. Shadows hold perfectly still, watching.  

My steps sound soft, chitinous clicks. My voice is not mine—it is dry and high, brittle as paper tearing, layered with echoes that do not belong to me. I don’t choose the story. The Marked do. I only speak what they feed me.  

I had been refreshing the sealing runes on the Eastern Wall when the absence registered. A rupture in the hum of ancient magic.  

A new entry.  

Filed under: The Marked.  

Born not of forests or oceans, but of cruelty carved into human lives.  

This tale is the echo of what followed.  

A warning.  

A confession.  

Or perhaps, just another hunger filed in the endless catalog of things best left undisturbed.  

Take a breath before reading further.  

This one crawls.  

---

THE MARKED STORY — “The Monster Rick Made”

Rick Carson grew up in a small town where football was religion and he was the star god of Friday nights. A cannon arm, good looks, swagger thick enough to trip over. Everyone wanted to be him. Everyone else wanted to be near him.  

Everyone except the kids he liked to shove, mock, or humiliate. He called them “gnats.” “Runts.” “Future nobodies.”  

Rick believed he’d go from small‑town hero to NCAA powerhouse to the NFL. But scouts saw through the hype. They saw the weak competition. The overconfidence. The lack of discipline.  

“Junior college first,” they told him.  

The words were a punch to the gut. The town pitied him. Coaches lectured him. But Rick kept telling himself he’d rise again. He’d dominate. He’d show everyone.  

Then he got to campus.  

And found out very quickly that he wasn’t even the biggest fish—just another loud one drowning in deeper waters.  

---

MONDAY — DAY 1 OF THE TORMENT

Coach Merrin didn’t care who he had been back home.  

“You EARN a spot here,” the coach barked. “I don’t hand starting positions to nostalgia.”  

It stung. But Rick vowed to prove himself.  

Then he saw them.  

Eli, tiny, bespectacled, physics major.  

Jasper, lanky math tutor, socially awkward but kind.  

Marcos, astronomy geek, worked nights in the campus café.  

Easy targets.  

Rick shoved past them, laughed at their startled expressions, mocked their backpacks covered in patches and game logos. They didn’t fight back. They never did.  

That night, he went out with new teammates. Loud. Drunk. Invincible.  

On the walk back, he heard something breathing behind him.  

Slow. Heavy. Wet.  

He turned—  

Something was approaching.  

Tall.  

Hunched.  

Skin like tar stretched over a starving frame.  

Eyes burning like coals in a furnace.  

The thing didn’t run; it unfolded, sprinting on all fours with a sound like cracked ice breaking on asphalt.  

Rick ran.  

He slammed his dorm door. The impact wasn’t just noise. It was a shudder. It smelled of burnt ozone and iron. Claws screeched against glass.  

He didn’t sleep.  

---

TUESDAY–FRIDAY — THE HUNTING

The next morning, the damage was undeniable. Students whispered.  

Rick tried to play it cool. He failed.  

Every night the creature returned. Scratching. Breaking. Breathing through the vents. Its wet, thick growl always came immediately after Rick remembered calling someone a “gnat.”  

On Wednesday, he confronted Eli, Jasper, and Marcos.  

“You guys know what this is? You play those… creepy games!”  

Eli blinked. “I have physics midterms, dude. I barely have time to sleep.”  

Jasper shrugged. “We’ve all got jobs, man. We’re not summoning demons.”  

Marcos scoffed. “And even if we were, why would we tell you?”  

Rick stared at them, lost. For the first time in his life, outmatched.  

On Friday, he searched the library for help.  

Nothing.  

No answers.  

No allies.  

And he couldn’t ask anyone else—because asking for help meant weakness. Rick Carson did not show weakness.  

At least… he didn’t used to.  

---

SATURDAY — THE BREAKING POINT

He was heading across campus when the air went still.  

Then he heard it.  

The breathing.  

The wet dragging.  

The growl that lived between sound and nightmare.  

The creature burst out from behind the gym, sprinting at him on all fours. Its limbs didn’t just bend—they snapped into reverse joints, each step cracking like wet leather belts. Its tar‑skin stretched too thin over protruding bone.  

Rick screamed and ran.  

Through the quad.  

Down the walkway.  

Towards people.  

He saw Eli, Jasper, and Marcos again.  

“HELP ME! IT’S BACK! IT’S RIGHT THERE!”  

This time, they saw it.  

All three froze—even the creature paused, staring them down like deciding who to eat first.  

“Rick,” Jasper whispered, “run.”  

But they stepped forward.  

Tiny Eli.  

Awkward Jasper.  

Soft‑spoken Marcos.  

Standing between him and the monster.  

Rick watched them. Something twisted in his chest. They were defending him. Him. The guy who mocked them.  

He ran. Instinct more than courage.  

But halfway across the courtyard, he stopped.  

He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t let them get ripped apart for him.  

For once in his life… he went back.  

He grabbed rocks from a planter and hurled them, screaming:  

“HEY! HEY! LEAVE THEM ALONE!”  

The creature turned. Focused on him.  

The boys took the chance and sprinted to find security.  

The monster charged. Rick ran through the tennis courts—but the creature leaped, grabbed him, and threw him into the chain‑link fence so hard the metal caved inward.  

His head split open on impact. Blood flooded his vision.  

Security arrived. The monster vanished.  

Rick was taken to the hospital, stitched up, and questioned.  

He lied.  

“Couldn’t see their faces. It was dark. Maybe… two or three guys.”  

But as he spoke the lie, he tasted copper and mildew on his tongue—the creature’s breath lingering.  

He wasn’t about to tell them the truth.  

Not about the creature.  

Not about the guilt.  

Not about himself.  

---

TWO DAYS LATER

Rick won the quarterback competition. Starting QB. His dream regained.  

But everything felt different.  

And when he walked to the dining hall and saw another student harassing Eli, Jasper, and Marcos… Rick stepped in.  

“Hey,” he snapped. “If you have a problem—take it up with me. Not them.”  

The bully backed down.  

Rick held the door open for the three of them.  

They hesitated.  

He swallowed pride.  

“Thank you,” Rick said quietly. “For… everything.”  

Eli nodded.  

Jasper smiled nervously.  

Marcos patted him on the shoulder.  

They walked inside together.  

But Rick paused before entering.  

Because he saw it across the courtyard.  

Just for a moment.  

The creature.  

Watching him.  

Staring with those coals‑for‑eyes.  

And then it faded—like smoke blown away.  

Sometimes the monsters we create go away when we stop feeding them.  

Sometimes.  

---

OUTRO

The Marked do not always wear their damnation on their skin.  

Some wear it behind their eyes—where guilt festers into shape, bone, and shadow.  

Rick survived his monster because he changed.  

Not perfectly.  

Not instantly.  

But honestly.  

Karma creatures don’t hunt perfection.  

They hunt patterns.  

Break the pattern…  

and sometimes the creature breaks too.  

But the taste of copper never left his tongue.  

And the shadows still watch.  

Until the next story from the stacks…  

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