In a dark room filled with skulls and corpses sits a man on a throne made out of skulls in a black and red overcoat, his hair is dark black. Covering his face is a mask with a permanent frown engraved upon it. There is an aura about him that seems to overwhelm anything at a single glance.
A hooded man bursts through the door, his face in a panic, the man atop the throne turns to look at him.
"Your Lordship! The sacrifice seems to have gone awry! The subject.. escaped!" The man says in a hurry as kneels down before the man atop the throne of corpses and skulls. Cracks could be heard from what he knelt upon.
"I see. It's fine.. it's within my expectations. Kill any other survivors involved in the sacrifice for their failure, as a reward for relaying the message and having absolute loyalty you will be the new Bloodless of the Kharas. The privilege of this role is special, however.. if you fail again.. there might be consequences far worse than death.." The strange man gazes down upon his pitiful disciple and releases a black energy from within him.
The acolyte begins to shake in fear and he puts his head further into the bloody corpse upon which he knelt, to the point of pushing his head through it. He swore he could hear whispers and quiet screams radiating from within his leader's sinister energy.
"Now go. Report back to me how the subject is doing.." The mysteriously masked man says without any emotion. He looks away and begins to think.
The cowering man nervously raises his body up, with his head still facing the ground he nods profusely. He quickly leaves before his leader can change his mind.
'Interesting.. you haven't failed to surprise me this far, Kaulder Stark..' The man smiles underneath his mask as he exits the room.
The new Bloodless then began his search at the scene of the failed sacrifice for the survivors, killing them would not only prove his loyalty, he would also prove his strength.
The Bloodless looks around the aftermath of the attack and shakes his head. There were corpses smashed into the floor ruining the beautiful pentagram. The body of the previous Bloodless had a sword through the chest and the giant of a man who had killed him laid beside with his head severed from body. He made a sigh.
"Those damn Noryir.. they've been hunting us for years!" He shouts as he angrily stomps on one of the bodies.
"Useless! Useless! Useless! All of you!" He yells out as he stomps onto his fellow cultist's bodies. The Bloodless then gathers all of the bodies and chants a few words, causing red lights to flicker and distort space until fire was created, he then lights them on fire. The smell was nauseating, he smiles at the sight of the skin of his fellow Kharas being devoured by the crimson flames.
"Now that that's done.. time to begin my next objective."
The Bloodless then summons a raven out of thin air, it seemed to be made of smoke. He speaks a few words to the raven and sends it away.
This raven was one of the only means of connections used between the two world's. Not many knew of how deep the world went, as the deeper one would go the more terrifying and illogical it became, as well as the fact that it was rumored to be an ever-changing world.
The Bloodless smiles and then begins his search for any more survivors at their houses, as well as taking care of their families in the process.
Kaulder begins to wake up on the cold hard rocky floor. He looks around and sees that there are torches lit up nearby on what seems to be a cave's walls. This just confuses him even more. How did he come here? He was sure he had collapsed elsewhere.
He checks his side and immediately notices his broken ribs were all but completely healed. There is an odd greenish paste covering his mid-abdomen. 'What is this stuff? How did it get on me?'
He gets up and looks around. It was obvious that someone or something had moved him, this just confuses him even more.
"H-hello? Is anyone there?" Kaulder says, looking around his area. Seeing as there was no response he begins to leave the cave.
After talking a few steps he gets visibly annoyed at the fact that he now only had one shoe on and so he simply tosses the other one after taking the laces out and stuffing it into his pocket.
His steps echo into the cave as he exits, the large opening he is in slowly becomes more narrow. Finally he sees light at the end, and occasionally there are what appear to be blue transparent lights floating in the middle of the room. Kaulder takes note of this but for now he prioritizes gaining a grip of his surroundings.
When he comes to the opening of the cave, he is met with a creek that flows next to the cave downwards. The trees were swaying in the wind outside. If Kaulder hadn't gone through everything the day prior he would have assumed he was still in the "real world".
As he sits down and cleans his face in the serene creek, he breathes in the fresh air that strangely seems crisper than usual.
'Let's calm down for now.. this "Hell" is now my reality.. I have to get through this. I CAN get through this.' He quietly thinks to himself in an attempt to reassure himself, as well as gain a grip on reality.
After he finishes cleaning his face he takes note of the surroundings. Besides the trees and the cave, the creek would lead to a river, which means he could potentially get some fish.
'So there's that for food..' He then walks towards the trees in an attempt to locate any fruit or berries but the trees themselves were quite odd. The leaves were all blood red and the shape wasn't quite right. They strongly smelt of iron. Kaulder coughed when he first smelt them out of surprise from the overwhelming smell.
As he surveys his surroundings a strange sound, that Kaulder could only assume came from a creature, roared out shaking trees and sending birds fleeing in every direction.
Kaulder stood there for a few seconds behind the tree in shock, his blood begins to pump once more.
'What the hell?' Kaulder thinks as he slowly heads back into the cave.
'Okay.. I need to figure out a plan, and fast. That creature sounded huge, it wouldn't be an exaggeration to say it would easily kill me on sight.' Kaulder remains quiet as he contemplates what to do next.
He then hears a strange noise as if something was loudly piercing through something like skin. Cautiously he pokes his head out of the cave's entrance, only to see a horrific sight.
The sky had turned a deep crimson red, large amounts of fog set in, the trees were transforming into fleshy bones protruding out of the ground, and the creek he had just been washing his face in turned brown. The terrain itself turned into a red muscle-like substance. This sight made Kaulder sick to his stomach.
In the distance, he hears the howls and screeches of beasts running towards his area. As he scans the forest around him, he is able to see a short distance out behind a tree, a person frantically running his way!
'I need to save him! I need to warn him!' Kaulder thinks as he readies his voice to scream. The man is quickly approaching and almost to him! It is then that out of nowhere Kaulder sees a beast similar to the one from the day before burst out of the thick bush. This one seemed to be dyed a puke green color and looked as if it had more scales. Its mouth had stains of blood on it. It is quickly approaching from behind the man.
Before Kaulder could scream out, the monster tackles the poor guy down and starts to devour parts of his torso. The man with despair in his eyes looks down and can only watch as pieces of him are being eaten and he is helpless to do anything. He cries out in agony.
"AAHHH PLEASE SOMEBODY HELP!" He screamed as the ferocious beast bit into him, blood squirted everywhere. This sight makes Kaulder puke.
'What.. what am I going to do?"
More beasts show up and start to eat the man alive, crunches and disgusting sounds could be heard until there was nothing left of the screaming man. The beasts then start to move towards Kaulder's location.
Immediately Kaulder quietly goes farther into the cave, he prays for his life. Kaulder's mind flashes to the horrible screaming and agony of the man he had just watched be devoured. Knowing a terrible agonizing death is only moments away, Kaulder grabs his shoe lace out from his pocket and attempts to strangle himself, but to no avail. He just couldn't do it. He pushes his head deep between his knees and closes his eyes, awaiting his impending doom. Time slowed down.
He waits for what seems like eternity.
But.. nothing happens?
Kaulder opens his eyes only to see the beasts that had been closing in on him were dead. They were all missing chunks out of their bodies, pierced right through the chest.
He looks farther down and he sees another person, it was a man in a robe with a demonic mask on, horns protrude out from the forehead and the face is completely red. He seemed to be summoning large red spears from out of nothing and somehow shooting them directly into the beasts..
'Is that.. magic?' Kaulder is shocked. Everything that's has happened so far has completely rewritten reality in his head.
The stranger continues to kill the last remaining beasts, creating a bloody mess of the surrounding area and when the last one is dead, the surrounding area suddenly begins to turn back to normal. The mist dissipates, the bones turn back to trees, the terrain is normal greenery, and the water in the stream sparkles with beauty.
'It seems the area is only affected when the beasts are around.. it's almost like they're infecting the land...'
The stranger continues walking in Kaulder's direction as he readies another spear and once again Kaulder accepts his fate.
"Hey, Kid. It's safe now." The stranger says with a calm voice.
"What? Who are you?" Kaulder replies, visibly shaken. Kaulder then gets up from the ground and approaches the man.
"Me? I'm a nobody. I'm just the one who brought you here, and saved you, twice. Now are we gonna talk until they find us again or are you gonna shut up and stop asking stupid questions and follow the guy who obviously knows what he's doing?" The man says bluntly as he lowers the spear, it then disintegrates into nothing.
"We need to move. This was a good temporary shelter, but its already been infected, chances are, they're going to return. Come with me." The stranger says and takes off in the opposite direction. Kaulder had no time to reply or take in any of these ever increasing chunks of information, he just quickly follows behind him.