Opening his eyes, the young man growled in pain and rolled on the ground like a worm. He felt his head splitting apart, his eyes about to pop out, and his heart aching as if it was gouged out. His entire body jolted with agony and pain, forcing him to stay on the ground for several minutes.
"Damn it! You accursed poet!" Mumbling curses, he crawled to the nearest tree and pulled himself up to sit leaning on its trunk. For a long while, he could only listen to the thumps of his pained heart, his aching head, and his rumbling stomach. His vision slowly cleared, but the pain only faded after a whole hour.
He was tired, starved, exhausted, and confused. Looking around at the awfully green vibrancy of the forest, he felt both disgusted and alienated. Just the bright sunlight and smell of leaves were enough to make his head spin and his stomach churn.
He tried to speak, but all that came out of his throat was a pained cough, followed by a splash of coagulated blood. Looking at his own crimson blood on the ground, he smiled, feeling much better. He had to get that out of his system.
"At least… I don't think I need to show up for work anymore…" He coughed again, spitting another mass of coagulated blood, and gasped for air.
First, where is he? Second, who is he? Trying to remember how he got here only gave him a painful headache, and the strange feeling he was getting from looking at the forest only made him certain he was in a weird place.
Since when was the world so... green? Hell, it should be red, like blood.
"Don't know where I am? Who am I? And got no idea what to do now. Great, great... really, really great..." He couldn't help but start seething and cursing for a while. He didn't know why, but this situation made him want to burn everything to the ground.
After sitting still for a long while, he finally decided to move. Many things can keep a man angry, but when hunger starts to sting, even wrath has to take the back seat. Forcing himself to move, he leaned on the tree's trunk and stood, finally getting a clearer look at his surroundings.
"Augh!" He gasped for air, feeling his stomach turn and twist from both hunger and the disgusting green scenery surrounding him. His entire body reeled back at the repulsive verdant vegetation, and deep down, he had a feeling all of those plants had to be toxic.
His legs felt as heavy as boulders, but he still forced them to move, dragging one after another on the forest floor. He avoided stepping on the grass, making sure to only step on dirt and stones, and when he had to brush against plants, he let the vital job of protecting his legs from the leaves to his newly found ally, his pants.
As the blood flowed down to his legs and his muscles got moving, the pain and numbness slowly faded, and quickly he was able to walk more easily. Now that he was up and could take a better look at himself, he was glad to find out he wasn't naked. Thank the hells! What would he have done if he were barefoot in this terrifying place?
He couldn't remember why, but just looking at the verdant fauna of this accursed place made his skin crawl, his eyes tear up, and his back shudder in disgust and fear.
He walked and walked, carefully making his way through the forest, looking for something to eat. And while he was at it, he tried to remember who he was or how he ended up here, but nothing came out of his cracked dome.
Each time he tried to remember, his head would split apart with pain, and he would only see flashes of bright light, muffled screams, and a feeling of hellish agony. Something, or someone, must've messed up his brain.
But soon, he heard it. Somewhere in the distance, the murmur of flowing water. His body froze in place, his eyes darted around, and his ears twitched like a cat. Where was that sound coming from?
"A river must be near..." But he then blinked. "What is a river?" His mind was blurry, in pain, and confused.
The fact that he said a 'river' means he knew what a 'river' was before, and that it could get him some food. But he couldn't remember what it was when he tried. ^Whoever did this to me must have done a sloppy job, or maybe I was just too smart for them to wipe everything^
^Sticking with the latter, for good morale^
Either way, the more he tried to remember, the more his head hurt, and the more it hurt, the harder it became to endure the stings of hunger, so he decided to let it rest and find food first.
After all, it won't matter who he is if he becomes a was.
Soon, he found it. The long, near-endless, serpentine, and twisting river cut through the dense forest like a great beast, roaring and frothing as the violent tides smashed against the countless protruding rocks in its middle. Swimming across might be impossible without getting swept away, but the gentle flow at the shore was promising.
"Now, which one is better, food poisoning or eating poisonous plants?" He then smiled, "Raw fish all day long, not gonna risk it with the toxins." Walking on the shore, he looked for the first and best weapon mankind had ever used, the undisputed stick. If he could find a decent one, he could turn it into a club or, potentially, a spear to fish with.
There were plenty of sticks around thanks to the dense forest, but… he would die before touching a single green leaf. He wanted a dried, leafless one. Soon, he found the right one.
Long, thin, a bit jagged, but it'll get the job done. Swinging it around, he felt a bit nostalgic. The weight in his hand, the swings, and how each arc flowed into the next. He was used to swinging sticks, or maybe other kinds of similar weapons.
When he stopped reminiscing about the swings, he paused and gave the stick's tip a sharp glare. It was dull and not as sharp as he needed it to be to fish. He would rather not use his teeth to sharpen a stick that once was toxic, but since this one was dried, it might be safe.
He knew it wasn't wise, but he wanted food fast, and if he didn't get to work, he might just eat the stick.
The hunger was already getting painful, and he couldn't wait to get something into his system, even if it was a disgusting, raw fish riddled with parasites.
Thinking about those parasites, a thought came to his mind. "Shouldn't I just burn them?" And from that thought, he could remember the concept of cooking. That was right; he could just ignite a flame with magic and roast the fish.
He sat down, rubbed his throbbing temples, and growled. "Whoever did this to me... I'm going to skin them alive." He remained silent for a few seconds. "What or who was it?" No matter how much he tried, only his headache grew stronger.
After a while, he sighed. It might just be better to focus on getting something to eat, then sleeping for a while before he could reliably remember anything. He couldn't even remember his own name, so the situation might be even worse than he could imagine.
Giving up on trying to remember his past and how he got here, he approached the river with careful steps, his eyes locked onto any fish that swam close to the edge.
It was then that he saw them, three orbs of dark light moving at the bottom of the river, hiding in the murky and muddy water.
Even if he didn't know what those orbs were, his body reacted immediately, and a rush of cold sweat washed down his back as he slowly backed away from the water, terrified. Slowly and silently, he made his way back into the woods, hid behind a tree, and kept on observing the river.
Not long after, those orbs started approaching the surface, and three eyes gazed at the sky. A six-meter-long, three-eyed black mass of writhing reptilian flesh and scales, a horrid Abomination and a disgusting mockery of life, shot its gaze toward the heavens, as if cursing them.
For a moment, it was as if reality itself contorted around the thing, and for but a moment, the river was swimming in its unfathomably disgusting body. That was at least the closest approximation the poor man looking at it could fathom.
A deep, rumbling below shook the entire river, and the bleeding third eye of the creature glared right toward the man hiding behind the trees. It assessed him with its twisted madness, judged him for a whole minute that felt like centuries, and then dove back into the river, deciding that he was too scrawny to be palatable.
As the giant Abomination left, the three dark orbs left with it. The poor young man came out of hiding and gasped for air. He didn't know what that thing was, and didn't want to know. That thing should stay unknown for all eternity.
He didn't know why he was spared, why that mockery of life didn't attack, and he was certain that he would never survive a second encounter with it. Even now, he still couldn't take his eyes away from the river in fear of it coming out, and his knees couldn't stop shaking.
After calming down, he could finally think back on other things, like the three black orbs the creature had. Now that he saw those, he started to notice many more similar orbs of light, but those were all white, flowing through the river. Each one was attached to a fish, and the bigger those fish were, the stronger and brighter those orbs became.
Gulping, the man looked at his own chest, and he could see one. Small, white, and looking like it was about to fade away. It was even smaller than some fish, providing him a possible explanation why the creature didn't bother with him; maybe it saw him as less than even the fish around.
But after a while, the pain of hunger forced him to move again, and as scared as he was, he still approached the river with his sharpened stick, aiming to get at least one of those countless fish. As long as he didn't see those three black orbs again, that creature must not be around. A bold assumption for someone who lost his memories and knows nothing about the world, but what could he do? Starve and cry himself to sleep under some rock?
He approached the edge of the river, watched the flowing orbs of light carefully, and after standing still like a statue for a few seconds, counting his breaths and feeling the chilling cold of the water on his feet, he finally threw it; his spear-like stick pierced right through one of the countless fish swimming through the river.
Even if he can't see the fish in the murky water, those orbs make it easier for him to know where they are.
As he felt the fish struggle, his stomach rumbled, anticipating what kind of feast awaited him. He had long since forgotten the horror he witnessed. But when he pulled the spear out of the water, what was on its tip was just a two-finger-long aracu.
He frowned; it wasn't as big as he expected it to be. But he wasn't going to let it go; as small as it may be, it was still far better than nothing. Besides, it was already dead. You can't exactly release a fish that you speared out of the river.
But as he was at it, he noticed something strange. The moment the fish stopped struggling, the orb of light faded away and disappeared, and he felt a bit strange about it.
He already wanted to catch more, but for now, he'll grill and eat this one first. Quickly getting away from the cold water, fearing that the creature from earlier might sniff and snatch away his great and magnificent catch, he quickly found a clear and rocky spot at the river's side, gathered some sticks, and then piled them up to create a fire.
Now, it was time to ignite it. He doesn't have any flint or steel, but what he has is magic. Looking at his finger, he could feel a single drop of mana coursing through his system. From what he instinctively could understand: One, all people had it; it grows somehow with use and can be very hard to train, like physical endurance and stamina.
One drop of mana is enough to light a torch flame for a single second; a one-inch core of magical heat is all it could create, and it wasn't much. To avoid having to wait, he went around, gathered the driest bushes and leaves he could find, used sticks to carry them so he wouldn't touch them directly, in case they were still poisonous, and piled them at the base of his stick collection.
Having some dry kindling, he reached into the base of the wood with his finger and activated his magic. It was simple, not even worth being counted as a spell. A one-inch ball of crimson heat emerged, and from it flames burst out and lasted for one second. The kindling and wood caught on fire, but he had to quickly pull his hand out and growl as he fell face-first to the ground.
Feeling the headache of his mana running dry on top of his memory loss headache and starvation wasn't fun at all. It was as if needles were stuck behind his eyes, and it made him regret not eating the fish raw.
As he groaned and moaned, the flames spread and got stronger, eating at the sticks he gathered. Knowing that he should get to work, he gritted his teeth through the pain and sat up, grabbed the fish, and skewered it with a stick beside the flames. He didn't even bother gutting it; he only wanted a few bites first.
The pain of his mana running dry wasn't so bad on its own, but when combined with his headache and twisting hunger, it felt like a sore tooth getting poked with a hot rod deep within his skull, a pain so numbingly agonizing that it made light flash before his eyes and his entire body sweat like a hog.
As the fish was cooking, he went back to the river to catch more. Just sitting by the flames and waiting won't help after all. So then, by the time the fish cooked, he had already caught and skewered four more.
He even gutted them with a sharp stone and washed their innards at the river's side. He was going to have a feast now. He sat by the flames, pulled the first fish, and took a large bite. It was bland, tasted a bit weird, and was filled with sharp bones, but to him, this was the best meal he could ever remember.
He could even forget about the disgusting verdant forest, winding ancient trees, and the nightmarish Abomination hiding in the river beside him. He probably shouldn't stay for too long here with how dangerous this place looks, but… food first.
He wolfed the fish one after another, and finally could feel his energy slowly returning. His headache wasn't gone, but at least he didn't have to worry about his stomach growling at him. His belly felt warm, his arms and legs shivered as he could feel his veins filling with blood, and his entire back relaxed for the first time ever that he could remember.
He didn't know when the last time he ate something was, but with how good he felt after this humble meal, it might have been days since he ate last.
CRACK! But then, out of nowhere, he felt something hard and heavy smack the back of his hurting head, and he fell face-first beside the flames, feeling his warm blood dripping across his face.
"Who is this weirdo? Here all alone like some insane hermit." A tall man carrying a bloodied club walked in front of him and grabbed him by the hair, taking a look at his face. "This place is riddled with Abominations, even Cursed ones."
"Doesn't matter. If he is healthy, he'll sell well. Patch and tie him up. And we should probably leave quickly. I've heard reports that a Cursed Alien was spotted in this river." Those were the last words he heard before his consciousness slipped away. "Hahaha… That thing needs a Veteran to slay, and even then… it isn't…."