A gentle breeze brushed against his cheeks, like the touch of a dream on the verge of fading.
His body shifted on the rough ground, feeling the coarse, bare earth and the cold soil against his skin, as if trying to rouse him from a long slumber.
Slowly, he opened his eyes. The screeching wind pierced his ears, carrying with it a faint metallic tang, as though the earth had once been soaked in blood from a distant time.
The sky above was not blue.
It was a pale gray, like the surface of a dust-covered mirror, faint cracks of dim violet light breaking through.
Nool lifted his head with difficulty and sat up, leaning on his trembling hands.
Before him stretched barren lands, surrounded by jagged rocks jutting from the ground like the fangs of a slumbering beast.
There was no trace of civilization, no people, not even the familiar features of nature he knew.
Only rocks, plains of dark soil, and twisted, withered shrubs as if writhing in pain.
There was a silent melody in this place.
As though the abyss itself whispered buried secrets between its stones.
"Where… am I?"
His voice came out hoarse, as if ash had been scattered in his throat.
His memory was foggy.
The last thing he remembered… screaming, an explosion, and blood.
A burning sigh.
He wanted to believe he was still dreaming, but he felt everything: the weight of his body, the pain in his shoulder, the dryness in his throat, the strange scent lingering in the air.
He looked at his hands.
They were clean, but his skin was slightly cracked, as though days had passed since he last touched water.
He scanned the horizon for any sign of guidance.
No roads, no markers, no ruins.
Only an endless, desolate wasteland, and everything in it felt… *wrong*, as if the laws of the natural world had been violated.
He staggered to his feet.
His feet sank into the soil as though it were trying to drag him down.
He began to walk.
Step after step, in heavy silence.
The wind howled between the rocks, whistling as if someone were whispering his name.
*"Nooool…"*
He turned abruptly—but found no one.
Instead, behind him, he saw footprints… that were not his.
He stopped.
Grabbed a handful of dirt and let it sift through his fingers.
It was strangely warm.
Hours of walking later, the terrain gradually shifted.
From rocks to plains of dark grass.
But the grass here… was unnatural.
Its leaves were a grayish-blue, emitting a faint, sour scent.
Nool found a lone tree, its leaves shimmering a sickly pale green.
He approached it, opened the small bag that had appeared beside him when he woke, and found inside a piece of dry bread and a half-empty flask of water.
He sat by the tree and took a slow sip.
But before he could raise the flask to his lips again—
*That smell.*
Rotten flesh.
He shot to his feet.
His heartbeat quickened.
He looked around.
At first, he saw nothing.
But when he focused, he spotted something in the grass, not far away.
A corpse.
Or what remained of it.
Torn apart savagely, its organs scattered like stones tossed in haste.
He took a step back, his eyes locked on the corpse.
His heart began to pound violently.
*"This isn't… just a dead animal."*
There was something else.
Claw marks gouged deep into the earth, deep enough to rend stone.
Nool turned his head slowly, his eyes widening in horror.
Twenty meters away, between the grass, stood a massive black creature.
Its eyes glowed red.
Four arms, a body like a wolf's, but twice the size of a full-grown bear.
It breathed slowly, its lower jaw hanging as though its saliva burned the ground.
Nool froze.
He remembered reading about this creature once in the *Black Lotus.*
*"Aergol: a Class One predator of the Abyss."*
Even seasoned hunters avoided facing it.
His hand crept slowly toward the small dagger he'd found in his bag.
But the creature twitched its ear.
Then—*vanished.*
*"What?!"*
A sound behind him!
He turned on instinct.
But what he saw defied explanation.
The creature was above him.
Its teeth bared, its body casting a massive shadow that swallowed half the plain.
Nool threw himself aside, his body barely escaping the monstrous jaws.
He hit the ground and ran without direction.
The creature roared, its voice splitting the horizon.
Nool sprinted without thought.
But the terrain began to slope.
He tumbled down a steep incline, rolling between rocks, until his head struck stone.
Darkness crept into his vision.
The last thing he saw was the gray sky cracking slightly, a flash of violet lightning streaking across it.
Then… nothing.
.
.
.
(To be continued...)