'Ugh…'
This was the only thought in Lune's head as he fought to open his eyes. A heavy, gritty weight pressed down on his eyelids, refusing to give way. He dragged his arms forward, feeling the sand grind against his skin. The grains were rough and clinging, slipping past his fingers as he pushed.
With a groan, he shoved himself up, spitting a mouthful of crimson grit from his lips.
His eyes widened the moment they finally opened.
A desert stretched to every horizon, but not like any from the textbooks. This one was red, as if the very sand had been stained by blood or something far worse. A dry, hissing wind lifted streams of scarlet grains into the air, scattering them into the endless nothing.
And above it all, was the sun.
A merciless, burning disk of white radiance. Its light was like a physical pressure, sharp enough to sting his eyes no matter how tightly he squinted. There was no shade, no refuge—only the crushing weight of its endless glare.
'Well… at least it seems like there aren't any Soul Creatures nearby,' he thought, a sliver of desperate relief cutting through the disorientation.
He lifted an arm to block the piercing glare, the motion feeling clumsy as the weight of getting transported to the Realm Beyond still lingered.
He stared at the sun through his fingers, a strange awe momentarily overpowering the pain.
'So this is what it looks like…'
On Earth, the sun had died long before he was born. He'd read about it, seen the depictions, but its relentless, living brilliance was something truly otherworldly. He stared for a few moments too long, only closing his eyes when the stinging became unbearable.
'But why does it hurt to look at it?'
Rubbing his eyes, his gaze swept his surroundings. Before he could plan his next move, there was something far more pressing to do. And after confirming he was alone with a quick glance, he closed his eyes and concentrated on a single word.
'Status.'
A small burst of energy expanded from within his abdomen. His eyes shot open. There, hanging in the air before him, was a window of text.
***
Name: Lune
Title: Void's Servant
Title Description: [You are a loyal servant of the Hollow God.]
Core: -
Abilities: -
Relics: -
Quest: [Find the temple of the Hollow God and bring a sacrifice to show your loyalty.]
***
Lune lingered, rereading the text, hoping the words would shift and change but they didn't.
"A fucking servant? Seriously?!" he cursed into the empty air, as if the entity that made this decision could hear him.
After a long, disappointing sigh, his eyes dropped toward his quest.
[Find the temple of the Hollow God and bring a sacrifice to show your loyalty.]
It didn't sound too hard, at least in theory. The problem was that things in the Realm Beyond were never simple.
He looked around once more. Nothing. No landmarks, no targets, only a sea of crimson sand and a sun that for some reasons hurt his eyes. Gritting his teeth, he shaded his eyes and picked a direction, making sure to keep the sun at his back and away from his eyes.
Each step was a struggle. His boots sank deep into the sand, dragging and slipping with every movement. The sharp grains clung to his clothes and scraped against his skin. He forced himself to keep moving, counting steps in his head, a meaningless ritual in this endless red.
But the dessert was ruthless.
The sun beat down, turning the air above the dunes into a wavering haze that twisted his sense of distance. His throat turned to dust, his lips cracking, but he pushed on, one foot in front of the other, ignoring the fire in his legs.
After what felt like an eternity—but was likely no more than twenty minutes—a sound tore through the oppressive silence.
A loud, unnatural screech echoed from above.
Lune froze, his heart hammering against his ribs.
His eyes darted upward.
There, in the vast, hateful sky, a massive vulture-like creature was turning, its gaze locked on him. It adjusted its wings and dove down, heading straight toward him.
'Fuck!'
He barely muttered the word as the creature's long, black beak tore through the air at immense speed. He barely managed to throw himself to the side, the bleak digging deep into the sand right where he had stood a moment before.
Lune's eyes lingered for a split second on the creature's dark figure. Its feathers were completely black, its beak a stark, bloody crimson that matched the desert.
Then, as the vulture-like monster tore its beak free from the ground, Lune's senses snapped back into focus.
Instinct took over. He lunged forward, wrapping his arms tightly around one of the creature's massive wings.
The bird moved violently in a storm of feathers and fury, trying to shake him off. Lune held on as if his life depended on it—because it did.
But luck wasn't on his side. The two of them tumbled down the small dune in a chaotic whirl of limbs and wings, and during that fall, the vulture landed on top of him, pinning him into the sand.
Lune wrapped his arms around its torso, but the bird's long neck gave it just enough space to strike.
The crimson beak tore deep into Lune's shoulder, sending tremors of excruciating pain across his entire arm.
Blood bubbled from the wound. But with no time to waste and no weapon to use, Lune did the only reasonable thing he could think of—he bit the bird back.
His teeth dug into the vulture's neck.
The bird shrieked in pain, dragging its bleak away from Lune's shoulder as it tried to escape. But Lune held on and bit again and again, his teeth sinking deep into the creature's flesh. Dark, foul-tasting blood spurted from the wounds he opened on its neck.
'Gods, this tastes awful!' he cursed in his head, but he wasn't about to let this overgrown bird kill him.
He continued to bite even harder. The bird shook in a futile attempt to escape, and in its thrashing, it fell onto its side. Suddenly, Lune found himself on top of the bird. His hand scrabbled across the sand until closing around a heavy, jagged rock. Without a second thought, he smashed it against the vulture's head.
The shrieks grew louder and more desperate with each strike, until, after one final, sickening crunch, the bird's head fell and hit the sand with a soft, final thud.
Lune stared at the lifeless body, breathing heavily, his own blood and the monster's staining the red sand a deeper, darker shade.
Then, a voice resounded in his head.
[You have slain a White Stage, Dormant Monster: Crimson Vulture.]
Just as the system announced the kill, Lune let go of the bloodied rock and fell to his side, laying in the sand as he gulped down ragged breaths.
But the system wasn't done.
[You have received a Relic: Scavenger's Glaive.]