Chapter 61: Cogito, Ergo Sum

Chapter 61: Chapter 61: Cogito, Ergo Sum

’What the hell?’

Victor immediately went on the defensive, but the floating eyeball did nothing. It remained completely motionless as it hovered in front of him.

"An... eye..."

He glanced behind him, where the memory was fading into darkness. Then he turned back to the eye and examined it closely. Noticing that it wasn’t doing anything, he reached out and poked it with his finger out of sheer curiosity.

A shiver ran down his spine. The eye’s texture was slimy, like touching a wet grape. The eyeball itself didn’t react until a second later. It slowly turned toward Victor, moving closer until it was right in front of him. Then, against all expectations, it spoke:

[Cogito, ergo sum.]

"What?"

[Cogito, ergo sum], the eye repeated. Its voice sounded robotic, even though it had no mouth to speak with. In appearance, it was an ordinary eyeball, complete with a brown iris and a couple of thin veins peeking out from behind the sclera.

Victor took a step back.

"What are you saying? No, wait. What the hell are you?"

It was clearly a living eye, but who—or what—was it really? Victor looked up at the sky, imagining the Wendigo watching from above, just like the gods did.

"Is this your doing? Answer me, monster!"

There was no response. Victor sighed and turned his attention back to the eye.

[Cogito, ergo sum.]

"Yeah, I heard you. And what’s that supposed to mean to me?"

The eye remained motionless. Victor waited a few seconds, but there was no explanation, nor was there a System window to clarify what was going on. There was only that eye hovering in front of him, repeating a phrase it had no intention of explaining.

’Cogito, ergo sum... I think, therefore I am.’

He’d heard that phrase before. It was one of those things that showed up in books or that some teacher would mention to sound smart. However, he didn’t understand what it had to do with this place, let alone the Wendigo.

"Do you want me to think? Is that it?"

[Move forward. Move forward. Cogito, ergo sum.]

Victor frowned. The eye slowly drifted away and began floating toward the darkness. It didn’t seem to be forcing him to follow, but it didn’t look like it would wait forever, either.

’What kind of riddle is this?’

He glanced at the countdown. Time was still running out, and he didn’t have any better clues. If that eye was a trap, then he’d already been caught in one from the moment he agreed to play the game.

"Fine. Let’s see where you want to take me."

Victor followed the eye. As he moved forward, the trees gradually disappeared behind him, and darkness spread all around. He couldn’t see the ground clearly, but he wasn’t tripping over anything, either. It was like walking through an empty space that somehow knew where he needed to place his feet.

The eye stopped for a moment.

[Move forward. Move forward.]

"I’m coming, I’m coming. You don’t have to keep repeating yourself."

He took a few more steps, and suddenly, the darkness came to an end.

Victor emerged onto a cobblestone street. Rain poured relentlessly over the buildings, forming little streams along the sidewalks. Everything was covered in different shades of gray, from the sky to the storefronts, and the streetlights barely managed to pierce through the curtain of rain.

He stood there, staring at the place.

’What the hell...?’

There were no colors. Not even the red of traffic signs or the green of the trees. Everything looked like an old photograph that had somehow come to life.

A man wearing a trench coat crossed the street with a newspaper held over his head. Farther ahead, a woman walked beneath a black umbrella while two men argued near the entrance of a bar. In the distance, an old-fashioned car drove through a puddle, splashing water onto the sidewalk.

No one seemed to notice Victor’s arrival.

"This looks like something out of a detective movie..."

His gaze swept across the buildings. There were neon signs, cigarette advertisements, and shop windows that looked as though they’d been taken straight from another era. Even the sound of the rain felt strange, as if it were the only noise that truly existed in this city.

A streetcar passed by with the muted ringing of its bell. Victor instinctively stepped aside as the vehicle crossed in front of him, even though not a single drop of water splashed onto him. For a moment, he had the impression that he wasn’t walking through a real city, but through the set of a story someone had left playing.

The eye floated beside him.

[Move forward.]

"Now what? Am I supposed to look for something?"

He received no answer. The eye began moving along the sidewalk, and Victor followed, though he remained on guard. He didn’t know whether this was another memory, a part of Richard Graves’ mind, or some kind of scenario constructed by the Wendigo.

Unlike the forest, this place wasn’t familiar to him. There were no signs of his childhood or people he recognized. It was a completely foreign world.

They walked for several minutes. They passed a café, a newspaper stand, and a police station. Everywhere, people were busy with their own affairs. Some wore hats, others long trench coats, and a few smoked beneath awnings, watching the rain with weary expressions.

Finally, the eye stopped in front of a multistory building. At the entrance, a metal plaque announced that the place housed a private detective agency.

Victor looked up. The windows were lit, and behind one of the second-floor windows, he could make out the silhouette of someone sitting at a desk. There was a lamp, some documents, and a half-closed blind.

On the second floor, the silhouette moved an arm. A cloud of smoke rose beside the lamp and disappeared behind the blind.

Then he saw the name written on the office window.

RICHARD GRAVES

Victor froze.

"So, here you are..."

The name left little room for doubt. Richard Graves wasn’t just the real name of the infamous Wendigo. In this scenario, he seemed to be someone with a life of his own. A private detective, apparently, in a city that looked like it belonged in a film noir.

The eye floated closer until it was directly in front of Victor. Its brown iris contracted slightly.

[Cogito, ergo sum.]

Victor stared at it, still trying to understand what that phrase had to do with Richard Graves.

The eye moved a little closer.

[Think, therefore you are. Move forward, move forward, Victor.]