The scavengers of Norvinsk knew the cycle by heart, even if they couldn’t explain its origin. They called it the Tarkov Time Phases —a strange, rhythmic distortion that bent the hours of the exclusion zone into three distinct, repeating chapters. Each phase demanded a different kind of survival.

“The phases aren’t a curse,” he said, handing Anya his locket. Inside was a photo of a city that no longer existed. “They’re a lesson. Dawn teaches patience. Rust teaches courage. Night teaches… that you are still real.”

They reached the extraction point—a collapsed subway vent—just as the sky began to bruise with the first hints of Glass Dawn. Mikhail checked his watch. It was spinning backward and forward at the same time.

Old-timer Mikhail, a BEAR veteran with a limp and a locket, loved the Glass Dawn. “This is the phase of the patient,” he whispered to his protégé, a quiet girl named Anya. “Every crow caw is a lie. Every shadow is a man holding his breath. You don’t hunt here. You wait.”

As they crossed the broken highway, Anya saw a man in Soviet-era militia uniform standing perfectly still, pointing at a drainpipe. He wasn’t there. Then he was. Then he was gone. “Echoes,” Mikhail muttered. “Don’t talk to them. Don’t follow them.”