As he read the message in his mind, an involuntary shiver ran down his spine. His breath hitched, and a cold sweat began to form on his brow as his eyes darted frantically around the shadowed room.
The suffocating silence pressed in on him, amplifying every creak of the floorboards and groan of the walls. It felt as though unseen eyes bore into him from the surrounding darkness.
His fear was palpable. He scanned his surroundings, but the dim light from the strange stone barely illuminated anything beyond a few feet in front of him.
Shadows twisted and danced at the edges of his vision, obscuring whatever might be lurking in the far corners. He cursed the faint light, feeling vulnerable with every moment that passed.
'Seeing how abandoned this village is... and how hurriedly its people fled... there must have been something dangerous, something they were running from.'
He thought, piecing together the clues with a growing sense of dread.
The realization sent his heartbeat racing. Danger was near, or perhaps it had never left. He couldn't afford to remain defenseless. Driven by urgency, he moved to search the room, his hands trembling as they rifled through decayed furniture and discarded belongings.
His fingers brushed against the brittle edge of a wooden chair. Desperation fueling his strength, he broke off one of its sturdier legs, wincing at the sharp crack it produced in the silence.
His search continued until he found a rusty knife buried beneath a pile of debris. The blade was dull and speckled with corrosion, but it was better than nothing.
With swift, determined movements, he bound the knife to the wooden leg using strips of torn fabric from a rotting curtain. The makeshift weapon felt crude and fragile in his hands, but it gave him a sliver of confidence amidst the chaos.
'This will have to do,' he thought to himself.
The weight of his inexperience pressed heavily on him as he examined his rudimentary weapon
'I've never done anything like this before.'
He disappointingly said to himself, his grip tightening on the crude handle.
He sighed, the sound tinged with frustration and regret. If only he had stayed in the real world a little longer.
The school had offered survival training—classes designed to prepare them for situations exactly like this. But his curiosity had betrayed him, and now he was here in the Fable, woefully underprepared.
'I wonder if time flows the same here as it does in the outside world...'
The thought lingered in his mind, a faint glimmer of hope that maybe, just maybe, he could return before too much time had passed. But for now, survival was his priority.
The eerie silence of the room served as a stark reminder that he couldn't afford to waste another moment. He tightened his grip on his makeshift weapon and braced himself for whatever lay ahead.
Carefully exiting the abandoned house through the front door, he made sure not to make too much noise that could attract attention. He constantly crouched down to his knee level, blending into the eerie stillness of the village as best as he could.
As he walked through the streets, he noticed how the buildings seemed warped and distorted, as if they had been stretched unnaturally by some unseen force.
The windows were cracked in symmetrical patterns that almost looked deliberate, and the wood of the walls had dark veins running through it, pulsating faintly like living tissue.
'What happened here?' he thought, his unease deepening with every step.
Continuing to walk, he came across a strange temple nestled at the edge of the village. The structure stood out against the warped houses, its stone surface glowing faintly with an unnatural blue hue.
The front door, however, was barricaded by a heap of fallen debris—broken beams, shattered stones, and twisted metal. Despite the obstacle, something about the temple called to him, a faint pull in his chest that he couldn't explain.
'There might be something inside that can help me survive,' he reasoned. Perhaps supplies or even answers to the mystery of this abandoned village.
Driven by both curiosity and necessity, he began searching for another way inside, his heart pounding with anticipation and dread.
Circling the temple, he spotted a narrow, partially collapsed window on one side. The opening was just large enough for him to squeeze through if he could clear some of the debris blocking it.
With cautious determination, he began to remove the jagged rocks and broken glass, mindful of the noise it made in the unsettling quiet.
After clearing enough space, he slid his body through the gap, wincing as the rough edges scraped against his arms and legs.
Inside, the air was heavy with an ancient, metallic scent, and faint blue light seeped through cracks in the walls, illuminating strange, swirling patterns etched into the stone. Dust motes floated in the air, adding to the otherworldly ambiance.
Once inside, he adjusted to the dim light and took in his surroundings. The interior was a stark contrast to the warped village—structured and deliberate, as though it had been untouched by whatever force had ravaged the rest of the area.
Shelves lined the walls, holding objects he couldn't yet identify, and a large altar sat at the center of the room, emanating a faint hum.
But what caught his eye—and sent a chill racing through his body—was the strange figure kneeling in front of the altar. For a brief moment, relief washed over him as he thought he had finally found another survivor.
'A survivor?'
Yet, a creeping unease quickly replaced his hope.
'No... finding a survivor in this abandoned village feels oddly creepy,' he thought, gripping his makeshift weapon tighter.
His instincts screamed at him that finding someone alive in this desolate, abandoned village was too strange to be a mere coincidence.
As his eyes adjusted further, the figure's unnatural appearance came into focus. Its limbs were unnervingly long and thin, bending at awkward angles as though they had too many joints.
The head tilted slightly, revealing a face obscured by deep shadows, but he could make out faint, glowing lines that seemed to pulse beneath its skin. Worse still, the figure's back moved with an unnatural rhythm, as though it were breathing—or convulsing—to some inaudible tune.
He felt frozen, his makeshift weapon clutched tightly in his hand. The figure remained motionless, its focus fixed entirely on the altar. He didn't know whether to feel terrified or grateful that it hadn't yet noticed him.
Slowly, he began retreating toward the window he had entered through, his breath shallow and his movements deliberate. As he moved, a chilling sound reached his ears.
The figure seemed to be murmuring something, its voice barely audible yet amplified by the oppressive silence of the temple. The haunting words echoed off the stone walls:
"God is dead... forgive us... God is dead... forgive us..."