In a desolate wilderness, night shrouded an empty field in a blanket of fog and darkness, a windless howl echoing eerily through the vast expanse, its presence cold and hauntingly reminiscent of a ghostly wail.
Except for the ghostly howls, everything was deathly silent. Occasionally there would come a rustling in the ground, like the sound of earth shifting, that would be later drowned out by the howls.
Just then, a muffled sound, much louder than any other in the wilderness, came from within the earth.
Bang!
It was the sound of something being struck, followed by a relentless pounding which caused the noise to increase steadily, disturbing the eerie peace of the wilderness.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
The pounding continued unstoppably, with every passing second making it more and more audible, until finally, with a mighty push, a patch of earth was forcefully broken through by a gloved fist ascending from underground, revealing an arm that was covered in dirt and grime and in a state of complete dishevelment.
Wiggling around for a bit, the arm was met with no resistance, so it unclenched its fist before finally placing its open palm on the ground and beginning to apply force.
A second arm suddenly burst out of the earth again, and together both arms worked to clear the surrounding soil, creating a small hole from which a head was finally able to break free.
The head belonged to Duncan, who, after spending a lot of time and effort, had finally managed to dig himself out of the grave that he had inexplicably been buried in.
Haaa!
As soon as his head was out of the dirt, like a prisoner achieving freedom, Duncan quickly sucked in a lungful of air, which led him into a severe coughing fit immediately after.
Cough! Cough!
It was a soul-wrenching cough that sounded like his organs were about to spill out of his chest and onto the dry earth before him.
Only after his coughing fit was over did Duncan finally feel better, and he then proceeded to completely free himself from the ground.
Exerting a bit more effort, Duncan pulled himself out of the grave, and moments later he was finally free from the earth.
"Ha, thank goodness I'm finally out of that blasted grave," Duncan muttered to himself, his mind fully occupied with the ordeal he'd gone through to free himself to notice his surroundings at all.
With that out of the way, there were still other things that needed sorting out—like figuring out where in hell's backwater he actually was.
But before that…
Instead of immediately checking his surroundings or cleaning himself up, the first thing Duncan did was to reach into his pocket and quickly pull out a locket from within it.
It was an old brass locket with a golden chain fastened to his belt. Its body was worn, the metal clearly old with traces of tarnishing present on its surface, giving it a gentle green tint. Yet despite this, it shone lustrously with a brilliant sheen, a sign that it was well polished and maintained despite its obvious age.
Evidently, Duncan took great care in maintaining this locket, showing it held significant importance and was very special to him.
"Hello, old friend," Duncan whispered to the locket.
"I'll be relying on you from now on so let's hope you work in here, okay? Don't let me down."
Duncan didn't bring out the locket to check on its condition. Instead, after speaking, he immediately pressed the switch on the top, causing the locket to spring open where it was revealed to actually possess a clock within.
It was a pocket watch, one that seemed quite ordinary at first glance. The only notable difference was the lack of a seconds and hour hand, leaving just a single long minute hand to occupy the center of the clock face.
It appeared like a broken watch, one that couldn't be used to tell the time, but Duncan paid it no mind and instantly began staring at the minute hand of the clock as soon as it was open.
Tick! Tick! Tick!
As soon as Duncan opened the watch, a low ticking sound could immediately be heard. Clearly, the watch's gears continued to function, and despite lacking a second hand, it continued to tick away constantly in a steady rhythm as if still keeping time properly.
Duncan only observed the watch for a few seconds as if trying to determine something in particular—what, it was hard to tell, but evidently satisfied with what he saw, Duncan finally breathed a sigh of relief, then proceeded to close the watch and put it away.
"It looks like things aren't very dangerous here… that's good. I was afraid I ended up in an extremely dangerous place but it seems the danger in here is relatively negligible."
Duncan was awash with relief, having assuaged his number one concern.
Only after doing all of this did Duncan finally bother to take a look at his surroundings to determine where he was after escaping the grave.
Taking in the sight of his environment, Duncan furrowed his brow, his previously relaxed body tightening up once again from what he was seeing.
The barren and empty wilderness presented itself before Duncan like an abandoned reserve stripped bare of all its resources and left to waste away and decay. It was an open field as far as the eye could see—there was not a single blade of grass to be seen, and everything was covered in a layer of thin fog that looked like escaped gases seeping out from the bowels of the earth.
That was when Duncan noticed a foul smell that lingered in the air.
"Gods be damned, what is this foul stench!" Duncan cursed aloud while hurriedly trying to cover his nose to prevent himself from perceiving the terrible odor.
It was the smell of death and decay and the festering of waste—like a corpse left to rot out in the open, and though he blocked his nose with his hand to block out the disgusting smell, doing so proved to be completely futile because it was all around him in the fog, and nothing short of holding his breath would allow him to escape it.
"I need to get out of here quickly—I feel like I'm gonna be sick."
Feeling a knot forming in his stomach, Duncan felt like throwing up, but he forced himself to hold back the urge, trying to breathe as little as possible to cope with the rising disgust.
One thing was certain: of all his bizarre encounters, this was by far the most disgusting Duncan had ever been exposed to, and he felt that being buried underground wasn't even as bad as this.
At least inside the earth, Duncan was isolated from the fog and its disgusting stench, and he was half tempted to crawl back inside and just lie down to die.
Of course, it was only a subconscious instinct and Duncan wouldn't really off himself over something as ridiculous as this, not after everything else he had been through.
It took a while for Duncan to finally get used to the environment. It helped that he had a handkerchief in his pocket that he used to wrap around his face like a mask to filter out the foul odor, although admittedly it did little to actually help Duncan and served more as a psychological comfort to him.
But just when Duncan was ready to continue investigating his surroundings, that was when he felt it.
Huuu!
A sharp howl pierced through the air like the sound of wind blowing fiercely through a narrow gorge.
There was no wind at all, yet at the moment the howl sounded, Duncan felt as if something had immediately passed through him, entering his body before swiftly leaving and taking something away from him in the process.
Bang!
In that moment, Duncan felt all his strength leave him, and he immediately dropped to his knees with a loud bang.
Kneeling on the ground, Duncan's face paled, turning ashen white with moisture soaking his entire body as he immediately began to sweat profusely.
Large beads of sweat dotted his ashen face… Duncan, without any strength in him, was trembling like a leaf in a fierce storm. He was completely hollow inside, with what little strength he had left being used to keep himself from tumbling completely to the ground.
And so, Duncan remained like this for a while until he finally began to feel his strength returning to him.
First, he felt a warmth originating from the gloves on his hands spread to his fingers, after which he was able to wiggle them about slowly, with the warmth gradually spreading to the rest of his body.
Not only that, but the same happened with his feet as Duncan's boots began to grow slightly warm, which also allowed him to move his legs a little.
But the biggest source of heat actually came from Duncan's pocket where the locket was stored away. If the others were like a matchstick, then the heat from the pocket watch was like a raging bonfire.
With the heat coming from these three items, Duncan was quickly able to regain his strength, finally allowing him to pick himself up from the ground.
Lacking the strength to even speak, immediately, Duncan pulled out the locket again, grimacing a little from the heat it was emitting, yet not letting go as he quickly opened it to reveal the watch inside.
After everything that had occurred, there was finally a change in the pocket watch.
Its appearance remained the same, but the ticking sound it emitted had increased in speed and tempo, filled with an urgency that spurred one into taking action.
That was not all… the single hand of the watch that had previously remained motionless when it was first opened had now moved a little—but only a little.
Before, it sat under the 12 o'clock position, but it had now moved 3 degrees to the right.
Although the change was small, seeing this, Duncan's expression darkened gravely, signifying a less than fortunate meaning to this change—especially since, although the clock hand no longer moved, it actually continued to tremble as if saying that it would still move at any given moment.