Sojourners of a Titan, the name of an eastern fantasy novel, which was about humans living on a Titan the size of a planet. Sojourners of a Titan, the novel Judith had loved so much and had read over a hundred times.
Though there were millions of novels more popular and some would even say better on the Webnovel platform similar to this one. She stuck with it for years, because she felt attached to its detailed world, simple but complex power system and endearing characters which she came to admire and love.
To think she would find herself in this world all of a sudden, had come as an incredible shock to Judith. To think she would find herself in any world whatsoever that wasn't earth, had come as a shock to Judith.
Judith gets pulled out of her thoughts when she had almost tripped over another stone, that somehow conveniently kept coming out of the sand at appropriate times.
With anger becoming her, she had turned her sights to the stone when a gasp escaped her by what she had discovered.
A bone digging its way out of the sand, a human bone.
A rumble had erupted from beneath the sand, breaking Judith's train of thought and frightening everyone present, as they all knew what that rumble meant.
To follow the rumble were sounds that emanated afar back. Sounds that were similar to that of steel and muffled sand, which was reminiscent of a bulldozer haphazardly carrying a bulk-load of sand in its digger.
These sounds had piqued Judith's curiosity, so she looked over her shoulder. But what she witnessed had left her dazed.
A sight in the distance, of three enormous scorpion-like creatures emerging from the ground, and picking apart the slaves that had been left behind.
Even at a distance, the scenery before Judith was vivid and gruesome, so she looked away and pinned her gaze to the path ahead with gritted teeth.
Judith, was a person who valued human life, but not all. She never cared if certain people lived or died. Said certain people being the world's most heinous criminals, which did acts that just made her skin crawl.
And fortunately for Judith, these slaves were non other than such people.
Though the West had labelled them as slaves, they didn't elaborate on the part where they were actually hardened criminals and psychopaths that were tasked to spy on Qugan.
Spies, which the protagonist of the story, Sarah was also a part of.
But the difference between Sarah and the rest of the slaves, was that she was not a criminal. Or at least, not one that took pleasure in killing people anyways.
Judith didn't think on this much, as she had remembered the protagonist's backstory and began to feel bad.
Most especially as this world was now real, which meant those horrible things actually did happen to someone.
Similar to her life.
Judith shook her head and pulled herself out of her thoughts, only to be bombarded by the sound of screams from the slaves being torn apart.
These screams ate into everyone, making them all uneasy.
As reality sank in that Judith was going to get killed by this place, she decided on one thing.
'I have to get back home.' She thought, but as to how, or if it was even possible, was another question.
"Three?" The prince's voice had pulled Judith out of her head. "I didn't think there would be two Parabeasts, let alone three." The prince had said with a grim tone that seemed to eat into Judith, more so than the screams of the slaves that were being torn apart.
Judith had thought on the word Parabeasts. A word used frequently throughout the novel 'Sojourners of a Titan' mainly because these creatures were the primary threat to the inhabitants of this world.
The Parabeasts were like parasites, hence the name.
Whenever the titan would have a rift across it's body -- or a wound -- Parabeasts would fall from the sky in the form of meteors and crash either inside the rift or around it.
When such a situation would arise, this world's warriors would gather to the scene and eradicate the threat.
Only problem was, most times, even though there weren't any rifts, Parabeasts would still crash into the titan at random locations, thus making them part of the ecosystem.
Judith had always wondered how this world would function without the Parabeasts, which were a major part of the ecosystem.
Because their existence did more good than harm she believed. Since they were not only food for humans and other inhabitants alike, but also functioned as grazing control for so many herbivores in this planet. Not to mention their feces and decayed body were incredible fertilizers.
Judith thought on all the positives qualities the Parabeasts had, but by the sight of those slaves being torn apart. Every other use -- no matter how logical -- the Parabeasts had faded into obscurity, as they seemed to be just killing machines in Judith's eyes.
Pulling her thoughts from the Parabeasts and returning it to her current predicament, she had searched her memory for any answers. But again and again, she ran into a blank.
'There's nothing that could've possibly caused…' Judith paused when an aggressive memory had rammed into her.
A memory of her falling from a building. 'Did…I really die?' Judith wondered, as she found a faint moment of that instance not obscured by this fog in her head. And in that instance, she remembered that she somehow survived the fall.
"Move faster." Prince Lee said to Judith, snapping her back to…reality?
When she turned her sights to the prince, she frowned, as she became angered by the prince himself.
She wondered to herself how he could be riding his beast, while she walked beside him.
Of course she is a slave, but what happened to chivalry?
The highest chivalrous act he did so far, was to give her a canteen full of water to wash her mouth from her assailant's blood. After that, he had hopped onto his mount and told her to follow behind.
'I swear I don't remember him being this annoying.' Judith said to herself, vividly remembering how heroic and chivalrous prince Lee was in the novel.
Of course that was later on, when he progressed as a character, and went through many horrible experiences that changed him. But this was the part Judith liked to remember, not the earlier version of himself.
Unfortunately though, this was who she had to be stuck with. And on top of that, he was the second main character and the love interest of the protagonist.
'Wait a minute,' Judith paused. She had looked in every direction, scanning the multitude of slaves before coming to a very crucial conclusion. 'I'm the protagonist?'
She asked herself, only now realizing she was the only female amongst the crowd of male slaves.
And the only female in the novel amongst a crowd of male slaves, was Sarah, the protagonist.
"What are you doing? I said keep moving." Prince Lee had said, which pulled Judith out of her head again.
Judith dashed forward so she could catch up with the prince's mount. Upon arriving and ensuring the prince had taken his eyes off of her, she shook her head, so as to try and form coherent thoughts.
If she was the main character, that would mean she was in for a whole world of pain and struggle.
As soon as this thought had passed her neurons, her demeanor fell.
'What else is new?' Judith had said, as her whole life had been pains and struggles.
From the moment her mother became ill, she was the one who had to provide for both herself and her ailing mother, and the things she had to do to put food on the table was nothing to run home about.
And at the end of the day, even after all her best efforts to keep her mother alive, it was all a futile effort.
The image of herself falling off a building had replayed in her head, a thousand times over till it began to burn.
"Ah!" Judith screamed and crumbled to the ground.
And with that scream, the images had stopped and one thing was made very clear.
"Here we go again." The prince had complained, then he brought his mount to a halt and came down the beast.
It didn't take more than five strides till he reached Judith, and proceeded to stare at her with folded arms.
"What is wrong with you this time?" He asked, now tapping his feet on the sand.
Judith, after realizing the prince was standing in front of her, had risen off the ground as fast as she could.
Upon erecting herself, the prince's anger quelled, when he saw tears forming at the edges of Judith's eyes. Which Judith hadn't even realized was there.
"I'm sorry prince Lee." Judith had said, while turning her gaze to the ground, a show of respect and a result of her fallen demeanor.
The prince, now left flustered as to how to react, had turned his head in every direction so as to find something to do, or say, but failed in this attempt.
"Whatever, just don't fall behind again. Unless you want to be Skorpon food." He said, then proceeded to make his way toward his mount, before stopping halfway through.
With a sigh, he walked over to Judith, and once again stood before her.
Judith, not even caring to ask why he came back, stood completely still. But found herself flinching when he reached out a hand for her.
Her guard fell as quickly as it rose when his hand latched onto the chains that was holding all three manacles together.
And with one grip, the chains broke apart.
"You're not really a harm anyway." The prince said, but with a second thought he decided to rephrase his sentence. "You're not a harm to anyone useful." He said, then turned his back to Judith and proceeded to his mount.
Judith, had appreciated his kind gesture, but found herself fixated on the revelation in her head. A revelation, which had brought down her spirits to the bottom of the earth.
That revelation being, that she had been diagnosed with the same terminal illness that killed her mother, which was going to kill her too.