[Blackwood]: Chapter 1 (Pre-Order)

You are Henry Nicolas Gaeta.

You wake up from the same nightmare you’ve had for years. The sound of gunshots. Your grandfather’s voice. The smell of blood. His last words still don’t make sense, but they never left you. They follow you into the morning, into your house, into your life. You tell yourself it was just a dream, even though it wasn’t.

Blackwood, Kansas hasn’t changed. The streets are the same. The people are the same. School is the same slow, pointless routine. Everyone acts like their lives are going somewhere. You don’t feel that way. You move through the day without caring much about anything or anyone. People talk. People stare. Some try to test you. It doesn’t take long to realize how easy it is to make them stop.

You start to understand how things really work here. Respect isn’t given. It’s taken. Fear lasts longer than kindness. And once people see what you’re capable of, they don’t forget it.

At home, things are quiet. Your brother tries to hold everything together, but neither of you talks about what’s really going on.

You live in the same house, but it doesn’t feel like family anymore. It feels temporary. Like everything else.

Over time, you begin to reconnect with parts of Blackwood you left behind. Old places. Old faces. People who remember you differently. Some of them offer something you haven’t felt in a long time—stability. Others introduce you to things you were never meant to see.

You start to realize that Blackwood isn’t just a town. It’s something else. Something with rules you were never taught, but are starting to learn on your own.

By the end, one thing is clear.

You’re not the same person you were when this began.