"Nghhh..." He groaned.
Sat with his back against a tree, sunlight flittered through the leaves, landing on his grey eyes as he raises his arm to block the invading light.
His body felt like it had just awoken from a coma, every movement made his bones creak, every muscle felt on edge and tense, as if it would cramp at the slightest movement.
As he tries to move his body slightly, he feels a hard weight on his lap. He looks down and sees a silver longsword, in strangely pristine conditions, a contrast to himself.
He grabs the hilt of the sword, and runs his other hand over the flat side of the blade, feeling a sense of connection with the weapon.
'My sword...' His first thought.
His eyes fall next on his arms, wrapped in a red robe, it feels dry and stiff.
'I don't think my clothes were originally this color.' He speculates.
On the back of his hand that was running along the blade, he spots an embedded... stone? With strange, red engravings in a diamond shape.
Laying his sword back on his lap. He scratches and feels the stone, his eyes only then to widen. 'I can feel this stone as part of my body... does everyone have one of these?' He wondered.
He closes his eyes and leans back against the tree, trying his hardest to remember... well, anything. Anything at all.
"Nothing. I don't even know my name." His voice, dry and archaic. Despite his blank mind, he feels an overwhelming sense of calm.
"And you there." He glares over at what seems to empty space. "The one who's been staring at me. State your name." His voice deep, commanding.
"Ho..." A voice fills the air around him. That breath sending chills down the back of his spine. "To think... Kehehe. Is it not impudent to ask my name when you don't even know your own?"
His eyes narrow, but his lips curl into something resembling a smirk. "Then you do have one."
The air seems to hum in brief silence. "Perhaps. Perhaps not. You may call me whatever your small mind can muster." A pause, the faintest hint of mirth in his tone. "But for now… Unseen Watcher will do."
The man tightened his grip on the sword's hilt. "Watcher of what?"
"Of you," the voice cooed, slipping through the leaves and air around him. "Until you prove not worth watching."
All he can sense is a presence, the hairs on the back of his neck stands each time the Watcher speaks.
His next words are chosen carefully. "Then... my name. Do you know it?"
"Of course." The voice booms, displeased. "To think you'd forget it, when names are so important to your kind."
He frowns, feeling shamed but for a reason he cannot place.
"Hero." As those words enter his ears, Hero's body thrums with electricity, sending spasms throughout every fiber of his being.
His dull, grey eyes changing color to a crimson hue, his canines seem a little, pointier?
His previously rigid body... now felt warmed up, limber, ready.
"What just happened?" He asks, as he stands with the help of his silver longsword.
...yet no answer came.
Hero sighed. "At least I have my name," he raises his sword toward the sun, "and my sword."
He takes this moment to look at his surroundings, taking advantage of being on a conspicuous hill that stood out like a sore thumb.
Staggeringly tall red and yellow trees for as far as the eye can see, bedded by red and yellow grass, he spots a dirt path and a clearing leading down the hill and into the woodland.
'This place is like a jungle. Wild, but more than that, dangerous. What was I doing here?'
Staring out into the forest he felt slightly overwhelmed and more than anything, lost. Hero had no memory of his past, or if he even had one. He knows nothing of this world, not even its name.
'No point in waiting here, and there's only one path to follow so... onward.' Hero sighed, descending the hill he awoke for the first time in who knows how long.
The dirt path narrows into a tunnel of red and yellow, it's dark, there is no light let from the canopies above, yet Hero walks on unhindered.
Hero's eyes dart around at the bushes and trees, glimpsing shadows that he's not quite sure if he's imagining, his hand is firmly wrapped around the hilt of his blade.
He continues for short while maybe 20 minutes or so before he spots a peculiar light in the distance, a lantern glowing blue, held by a hooded figure in a ratty grey robe that looks like its been worn for centuries, from the looks of it all he has is a large leather pack on his back and the lantern.
The robed figure turns, noticing Hero approaching from the darkness into the blue light of the lantern.
A coarse, grating voice drifts in the air from the hunched figure, "Greetings, bloodspawn."
Despite Hero being able to see so uncannily in the dark, he cannot see this figure's face, only a dark haze with translucent blueish tendrils prodding out, and two glowing eyes staring at him.
He sizes up the hooded... person? He was unsure what he was looking at.
'Bloodspawn...' That title sounds familiar.
Hero bows slightly, "Greetings, I did not expect to meet someone out here." He says.
It's true. When he saw nothing that looked like civilisation on that hill, he thought he wouldn't see sentient life for miles.
'Was kind of hoping for a human...' he groans internally, swallowing to wet his dry throat.
The hunched figure lets out an unnerving laugh "Kukuku. A bloodspawn bowing? Alone, are you? No kin, no crypt? Strange! Strange, indeed." He cocks his head in confusion? Perhaps.
Hero's crimson eyes narrows and asks, "You speak as if you know me."
Another wheezing chuckle left the figure as if it was a joke, "Know you? No, I do not know you. Your kind, I do know. A bloodspawn alone, without crypt or kin is like a wolf without a pack. Dangerous, cautious, but lost."
He felt no hostility from entity in front of him, just a little unease.
Keeping his voice calm, "You are correct. I am lost. Perhaps you can tell me where I am?"
The glowing eyes blinked although the rest of it's body was still, "Here? Not a place of note. Not important. The roots remember better than men, but the blood?" He lets out a broken chuckle, "The blood remembers best. Or so Malaketh thinks. I have yet to verify her words..."
Hero started plainly at the hunched figure, "That makes no sense. Who is Malaketh?"
The chuckling stops abruptly as he stares directly into Hero's red eyes, "You are in the middle of Kynesfall Forest. West of the town of Kynesfall. Where you should be. Not here. It is not safe here, bloodspawn."
The hunched figure shifts around restlessly.
Hero's brow furrowed, "Not safe from what?"
He had already guessed this place wasn't somewhere he should stay, this place made his blood flow unnaturally.
The figures hazed tendrils shudder as his body freezes briefly. Before returning his gaze to Hero.
"Kynesfall." It responded, "There you will find your kin - or your enemies, mayhap both. It's all the same." He lets out a more broken chuckle, before it breaks off, leaving nothing but the sounds of the forest.
Hero opens his mouth to ask more questions, yet the figure vanished on the spot.
"Meeting one of them all the way out here... I don't know whether to call you lucky or unfortunate." The watcher's voice is heard again, but is gone as quickly as it came.
He shook his head, standing alone once more in the forest. The silence pressing down, leaving only one path to continue along. "Let's hope this path leads to Kynesfall."
Sighing, he treads the path with the same caution as before.
'That... thing, said this place wasn't safe, they didn't tell me from what though, and that's really gnawing at me...' He grinds his teeth, cursing the hunchback under his breath.
He may not know much but he does know that a lack of information is as deadly as poison.
30 minutes later...
Hero kept on the path, it felt like he was in a tunnel, the red shrubbery around him so dense he can't see past it.
Not so far in front of him, he sees remnants of what seems to be a camp, or what used to be.
'Finally. I was going crazy seeing nothing but this dirt path and that strange person.'
He approaches the camp with the same caution he came here with, he sees four makeshift tents, a few hitching posts, and a put out campfire in the middle.
Crouching down over the campfire, he hovers his hand over the ashes.
He frowns, 'Still warm, must be recent... which means they shouldn't be-'
His words were cut short. And suddenly, his eyes are close, his nostrils flared.
'T-that smell... it's unmistakable, ah.'
The scent sends shivers down his spine. Metallic, alive, and so very sweet.
Hero's mouth began to salivate.
The Unseen Watcher's presence intensifies.
His eyes shot open as he sniffs the air sporadically, his body twitching in excitement, 'B-blood! From humans, I smell blood! Nearby, so close I can taste it!' his mind was clouding, hands shaking.
There's no sight of his calm mask to be seen.
Hero breaks out into a deranged sprint, following his nose for the scent of blood. The closer he gets the more a wide smile creeps onto his face, showing his two pointy fangs.
"Aaah~ There it is, the ugly beast is rearing it's putrid head. Poor souls." The watcher looks on with interest.
Hero roared, eyes shining crimson, the forest around him faded away, his thoughts collapsing onto one blazing desire.
"Blood."