Xam lay motionless on the cold cobblestones, his cheek pressed harshly against the rough cobblestone.
The chill seeped through his clothes, invading his skin, a bitter flashback to the sharp pain lodged deep in his back.
A crimson bloom unfurled beneath him with dark and visceral color painting the uneven pavement.
His legs sprawled unevenly, tangled like broken limbs forced into unnatural shapes, as though the earth itself sought to grip and claim him in its embrace.
For a grim moment, Xam resembled nothing more than just a discarded sack of potatoes, tossed carelessly to the roadside.
The distant murmur of the city floated faintly to his ears. Horses hooves clattered somewhere far away, indistinct voices slurred conversations, and the faint rattle of a cart over cobblestones but it all seemed wrong, distorted, as though muffled beneath a veil, existing outside the bounds of his reality.
Time lost meaning in the hovering haze, stretching and folding around him.
Minutes bled into moments, moments melted into endless nothingness.
The world narrowed to the pain searing his side and the dull throb deep within his ribs.
Slowly, from the periphery of his blurred vision, shadowed figures emerged, drawn by curiosity like fire moths to a flickering flame.
Their faces loomed near, strangers weighing his worth with cold-blooded detachment.
First came a lean man, flour-dusts clinging to his rough shirt sleeves rolled back to big, hairy forearms.
His gaze was sharp and full with both amusement and disdain. "Well, that's one way to make an entrance huh? This guy gets stabbed by ten-year old and still pretends to be some kind of hero."
His voice was laced with mockery as he shook his head and turned away.
A second figure appeared, his nimble fingers twitching with faint tendrils of flame still dancing above the calloused palms.
He moved with a grace that contradict his threadbare clothes and smeared lipstick streaked carelessly across his lips, marking him unmistakably as a street performer.
Peering intently at Xam's barely twitching hands, he asked, "Hey, is he still alive?"
He asked, voice thick with worry disguised by a practiced bravado.
Before the words fell silent, a third man pushed forward. A vendor known for his rough voice and terrifying facial scars that reach from his almond eyes to his muscled neck, loomed close with a swagger that filled the narrow alley.
His gaze flickered with a mixture of curiosity and pragmatism. "Hmmm… maybe he's one of the southern people," he suggested cautiously, eyes narrowing.
"Nah," his companion grunted, dismissive. "He's probably just some random guy with some stupid sense of justice."
"Yeah, yeah. Forget about him... Lets just continue working, don't you think so?" The vendor gave a quick quarky remarks to them.
Xam groaned weakly, accidentally snorting a bit of blood. "Uhm...Guys… do I get a some kind of respawn? Like some save point or something? Haha..ha" His voice rasped, half-joking, half-terrified.
"What's this brat talking about?" The three of them simultaneously muttered out of confusion.
Then, cutting through the murmurs and the stale alley air, an impossible sound emerged, a sharp buzz against the cobblestones.
Xam's broken phone, an unknown artifact incongruous in this village glowed faintly beside him.
His eyes fluttered open sluggishly, drawn toward the eerie light amidst the shadows.
He blinked, disoriented. The lantern light of Cadensia flickered dimly, casting hazy pools of illumination across narrow streets.
His fingers shook as he reached for the device, heart hammering wildly in his chest. He swiped across the screen, and a message scrolled across in chilling indifference:
"Arghhgh… What a shame, looks like this guy is trash too. I liked the previous one though…"
Xam's breath hitched. "What's...going on?"
His skin prickled with cold despite the faint warmth blossoming deep within. The message continued:
"Hmmm, looks like he's still alive… wanna live or not? Looks like he does…"
A shiver raced down his spine as the last outrageous line appeared, echoing from nowhere:
"Hmmmm how about this—you give up your privileges like the system, etc? Something like 'protagonist would have' . Hmm? Sure hehehehe~"
The text ended with a sinister titter that seemed to reverberate inside his skull.
Xam's pulse thundered in his ears. How could this be? No signal, not a whisper of modern technology in Cadensia and yet, here was a message dripping with dark amusement mocking his very existence.
His fingers trembled gripping the phone tightly as the screen's glow faded to empty blackness reflecting his own face.
With a fierce warmth spilled through his back. The pain that had scorched and twisted inside him softened. The crimson stain beneath him stopped spreading, as if time itself retreated and stitched his flesh with uncanny skill.
The miraculous healing did not come easily, for it robbed him as much as it restored.
His mind, once a storm of chaotic memories, now lay barren a yawning void where names, faces, and remembrances vanished like smoke on the wind.
With a ragged breath, his eyelids fluttered open again. The eyes that gazed upward were empty, searching, lost.
"Who... am I?" he whispered, voice cracking with raw vulnerability.
Night cloaked Cadensia in velvet darkness, heavy with secrets and suspended in silence save the faint echo of soft footsteps beneath bioluminescent lanterns that shimmered faint blue and violet like stars caught in glass.
*************
Xam pushed himself to his knees, and then unsteadily to his feet. The cobblestones beneath were cool and unfamiliar beneath trembling soles.
An unsettling sensation fanned its way across his skin. He was not alone, eyes watched him from shadowed doorways, twisting faces halting mid-step to assess the stranger that unwelcomely visited their village.
Distrust mingled with curiosity, and darker whispers skated on the edges of his vision.
His steps were hesitant, aimless pulled neither by will nor knowledge, wandering through alleys 'till he enters the main street, that hummed unknowable songs, unfamiliar melodies drifting just beyond hearing.
Hours dragged on like held breaths underwater, blurring lines between the present and the past.
Then, utterly spent, a crushing wave of exhaustion pressed down, stealing strength and will alike.
Beneath a faintly flickering sky, where clouds momentarily parted to reveal cold starlight, Xam collapsed.
The last conscious shard he clung to was a maelstrom of confusion and fear as the shadows wrapped heavy and complete, snuffing out sensation and thought alike.
Xam's dark-blue eyes fluttered beneath heavy lids as unconsciousness struggled to release him from its grasp.
The murmur of distant laughter, the clinking of metal hooks on stalls, the soft rustle of cloth all seeped into his awareness like whispers from a dream.
He did not know where he was, nor who he was only a void and an aching body tethering him to a world that felt both familiar and alien.
**
As the cold slowly left his bones, he tested the strength in his limbs. They trembled but obeyed. His hand brushed against something rough beneath the ragged blanket draped over his shoulders.
The metallic taste from dried blood lingered in his mouth, reminding him of something that happened in his past.
Yet strangely, his back now throbbed faintly where the wound had sealed itself as if healing carried a price not just for the flesh but for memory itself.
He pulled himself up on unsteady arms, eyes searching the dim interior of a small, sparsely furnished room.
The walls were made of stone, etched faintly with strange sigils that hummed faintly in the air.
A single window framed a glimmering night sky, alive with the gentle flicker of bioluminescent lanterns hanging from twisted iron posts below.
Outside, murmurs deepened footsteps drawing closer. A creak of the wooden door and hesitant knocks interrupted the stillness.
A slender form appeared in the doorway. A young woman with dark hair. Her gaze was cautious but not unkind, her lips pressed in a thin line. She wore simple clothes, well-worn but carefully kept.
"You're awake," she said softly, stepping inside. "We found you near the main street, unconscious. You've been out for days."
Xam's throat felt dry, voice rough as he spoke. "Where... am I?"
"Cadensia," she replied. "A village not easily found, and once found, not easily left. Specifically, you're currently on the eastern part."
Confusion clouded his mind. "I don't remember…"
"Do you?" she interjected gently. "Memory has a way of hiding in places we fear to look. But you're safe, for now."
Her words offered little comfort but something inside Xam stirred an emotion — an uncomfortable feeling etch in the back of his mind.
Days passed in a blur of quiet care and aching uncertainty. The woman — named Claire, as she told him; and always brought simple meals and water, her presence alone is a steady anchor in the shifting tides of his lost memories.
Occasionally, strangers peeked in with wary glances, their whispers a mixture of suspicion and fascination.
Xam slowly learned to move again, each step was an uncertain claim on a past he could not grasp.
The city, Cadensia, was a place thick with magic and mystery, where sound itself was woven into symphony and harmony.
He wandered cobbled streets, eyes wide at neon glyphs gleaming faintly in mist, lanterns casting ethereal paths through the darkness.
But beneath its beauty lay shadows darker than the night. Eyes watched from shuttered windows, whispered voices followed him through twists and alleys.
One evening, as a chill wind swept through narrow lanes, Xam found himself drawn to the river's edge.
The water shimmered beneath the moonlight, reflecting fragments of a sky full of stars he no longer recognized.
He knelt cupping icy water to his lips the cold biting but real. For a long moment, he closed his eyes and let the silence envelop him, the strange hum of the city beneath his skin like an unfamiliar heartbeat.
"Who am I...?" he whispered to the shadows.
The silence answered with nothing but the rustle of leaves and the distant call of a night bird.