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Description

So an enemy turned invisible when I played Hollow Knight on desktop ages ago. No clue how it happened or why.

[Image ID: A fully-colored digital Hollow Knight comic, taking place in the City of Tears. Each part takes up equal amounts of the entire comic. In the first panel, the Knight is looking down at their map. In the second, the Knight looks up when they hear something off-screen say ‘hoiyah!’. The third panel is from behind the Knight, looking toward the darkened hallway ahead of them. The sound of footsteps is approaching, but there is no enemy in sight.The fourth panel takes place from the side view. The Knight looks down the hall with confusion as the footsteps get closer and louder.The fifth one is the same picture, except the Knight is sent flying through the air. There is still no enemy, but the white and black particles emanating from the Knight, as well as the word ‘SLAM’ above them, indicate that they have been hit.The second picture is a screenshot from the Hollow Knight game. It takes place under the bench where you can locate Cornifer in the City of Tears. The Knight has been hit, white and black particles emanating from them, but there is no enemy visible on the screen. End ID.]
Image Description in story format below:

The City of Tears probably wasn’t the original name of the city, but it was the one that the Knight decided to give it. The perpetual rain from somewhere above loaned the name meaning, and any potential records that might have the original name were so saturated with moisture that they couldn’t make out a word. There might be documents elsewhere, untouched by the rain, but they couldn’t be bothered to commit themself to looking. So, City of Tears it was.

The halls of the City of Tears, the Knight found after a time, was gloomy. They found themself walking down one such hallway, after sitting down at the bench that Cornifer once sat beside, and started walking, looking down at their map as they do so.

The city by now was well-explored--there were only a few places that they hadn’t been able to reach, particularly a curious ledge to the east of the Soul Sanctum. Perhaps there was something else among the ruined kingdom that would let them ascend-- They hear a cry.

They lower their map and look up, peering down the hall, as ready to fight any of the husks roaming about the corridors as they have ever been. They know which one patrols this place--a large, lance-wielding bug, grounded with a lack of wings and gifted with a tendency to charge. After all, they had killed it once before.

And it always puzzled them, somewhere in the back of their mind, how they kept coming back, reconstituting themselves every time that they settled down to rest and gather their thoughts--but by now, they were well past that problem, more focused on the issue at hand.

They hear footsteps approach, but there is nothing there.

They aren’t sure what to think of it at first--as they had rested, the husk should be here. It should be standing before them, ready to fight, but the only thing that they see is the hallway spanning ahead of them, a stark contradiction to what they hear. And they hear something approaching from ahead, but they don’t know what.

They don’t move. The footsteps are before them now. And then--
CRACK.

Splinter, shake--they explode from themself, gather themself up, grasp their nail and swipe before them, pointedly ignoring the fractures of their chitin and the numbing distant pain that comes with it. The swipes are blind--they think they nick their aggressor, see orange blood flying from nowhere, but then it’s gone until they turn abruptly and swipe haphazardly behind them.

CRACK

Snap, boom--gather themself up again, clench their nail, summon their soul for vengeance and--

There it is.

The large lancer gives a final yelp as its husk gets sent into the air, collapsing to the floor with a dull thud. The orange ooze leaks from its shell, turns to nothing. Their enemy is dead.

Their invisible enemy.

They can only stare for a moment, gripping their nail, staring at the corpse.

...What?

Description

So an enemy turned invisible when I played Hollow Knight on desktop ages ago. No clue how it happened or why.

[Image ID: A fully-colored digital Hollow Knight comic, taking place in the City of Tears. Each part takes up equal amounts of the entire comic. In the first panel, the Knight is looking down at their map. In the second, the Knight looks up when they hear something off-screen say ‘hoiyah!’. The third panel is from behind the Knight, looking toward the darkened hallway ahead of them. The sound of footsteps is approaching, but there is no enemy in sight.The fourth panel takes place from the side view. The Knight looks down the hall with confusion as the footsteps get closer and louder.The fifth one is the same picture, except the Knight is sent flying through the air. There is still no enemy, but the white and black particles emanating from the Knight, as well as the word ‘SLAM’ above them, indicate that they have been hit.The second picture is a screenshot from the Hollow Knight game. It takes place under the bench where you can locate Cornifer in the City of Tears. The Knight has been hit, white and black particles emanating from them, but there is no enemy visible on the screen. End ID.]
Image Description in story format below:

The City of Tears probably wasn’t the original name of the city, but it was the one that the Knight decided to give it. The perpetual rain from somewhere above loaned the name meaning, and any potential records that might have the original name were so saturated with moisture that they couldn’t make out a word. There might be documents elsewhere, untouched by the rain, but they couldn’t be bothered to commit themself to looking. So, City of Tears it was.

The halls of the City of Tears, the Knight found after a time, was gloomy. They found themself walking down one such hallway, after sitting down at the bench that Cornifer once sat beside, and started walking, looking down at their map as they do so.

The city by now was well-explored--there were only a few places that they hadn’t been able to reach, particularly a curious ledge to the east of the Soul Sanctum. Perhaps there was something else among the ruined kingdom that would let them ascend-- They hear a cry.

They lower their map and look up, peering down the hall, as ready to fight any of the husks roaming about the corridors as they have ever been. They know which one patrols this place--a large, lance-wielding bug, grounded with a lack of wings and gifted with a tendency to charge. After all, they had killed it once before.

And it always puzzled them, somewhere in the back of their mind, how they kept coming back, reconstituting themselves every time that they settled down to rest and gather their thoughts--but by now, they were well past that problem, more focused on the issue at hand.

They hear footsteps approach, but there is nothing there.

They aren’t sure what to think of it at first--as they had rested, the husk should be here. It should be standing before them, ready to fight, but the only thing that they see is the hallway spanning ahead of them, a stark contradiction to what they hear. And they hear something approaching from ahead, but they don’t know what.

They don’t move. The footsteps are before them now. And then--
CRACK.

Splinter, shake--they explode from themself, gather themself up, grasp their nail and swipe before them, pointedly ignoring the fractures of their chitin and the numbing distant pain that comes with it. The swipes are blind--they think they nick their aggressor, see orange blood flying from nowhere, but then it’s gone until they turn abruptly and swipe haphazardly behind them.

CRACK

Snap, boom--gather themself up again, clench their nail, summon their soul for vengeance and--

There it is.

The large lancer gives a final yelp as its husk gets sent into the air, collapsing to the floor with a dull thud. The orange ooze leaks from its shell, turns to nothing. Their enemy is dead.

Their invisible enemy.

They can only stare for a moment, gripping their nail, staring at the corpse.

...What?