Pain. That was all Haruma could feel at first.
A pain so bad it burned in his side as if someone had stabbed him he guest and left the weapon to rot between his ribs. His breath came shallow, irregular. His body was heavy, his fingers numb.
Chilled air kissed his skin, and brought with it the smell of wet ground and something metallic.
Blood.
His own?
No. The heat of it, the way it stuck to his fingers — it wasn't just his.
Haruma's eyes fluttered open.
The night sky stretched endlessly above him, except something was wrong. It was a fractured moon, jagged cracks running through its glowing surface.
His heart pounded. This wasn't Earth.
The epiphany hit him like a ton of bricks.
He wasn't home.
He wasn't anywhere familiar.
And he did not know how he got here.
Haruma attempted to move, but pain lanced through his ribs and he bit back a groan. His clothes were torn, drenched with someone's blood, but he could not remember a fight. His hands shook as he pushed himself up, his vision tilted from the exertion.
He was in a forest, but not a forest he had ever seen. They were enormous, black so black it almost felt like a pine, twisted like fingers opposed to the sky. Weird, glowing flowers pulsed gently in the underbrush, giving the damp earth an eerie illumination.
And then—footsteps.
….
Haruma froze; his senses sparked to life. It was a distant sound that came rushing toward me.
Instinct told him to run.
But his body wouldn't cooperate.
His ribs hurt as he struggled to stand, his legs nearly crumpling beneath him. Who was coming? Bandits? Hunters? Something worse?
His pulse banged in his ears. He needed to move. He needed to—
Too late.
From the trees, a shadow other than my own emerged.
The figure was tall, draped in a dark cloak, but Haruma caught glimpses of armor peeking out from beneath the fabric, the flash of steel at her hip. A warrior.
Neither one spoke for a moment.
Then there was a voice — cold, sharp, and unmistakably female.
"You're alive. That complicates things."
Haruma didn't move. He couldn't.
The woman loomed as though smothering.
In the dim light, he could still make her out clearly — a warrior cloaked in dark, the glimmer of steel beneath. Her stance was stiff, and deep, like the kind of people trained to kill on impulse.
And yet she hadn't pulled her weapon.
That was almost worse.
"Who are you?" he asked, his voice hoarse.
The woman fell silent for a moment. She did not answer, instead taking a careful step into the clearing, her thick-soled boots silently pressing against the damp earth of the forest floor.
"More importantly," she said, her voice steady, too soothing, "whose blood is that?"
Haruma tried to speak, but he was unable to get any words out.
He didn't know.
His memory was empty, a blank where memories could have reached. All he knew for sure was that this blood wasn't his.
The woman looked at him for a long moment. Her eyes — inscrutable, chill — were scrabbling for something.
Then she sprang into action, in one jump.
A blur of motion.
The moonlight flashed off of steel.
Before Haruma had the chance to react, a blade was against his throat.
He froze as cold metal bit against his skin.
"You smell not like them," she said in a whisper.
"Them?" His voice came close to breaking.
The woman didn't answer. Instead, she cocked her head, as if deciding whether to kill him or let him live.
"You're not a soldier. You're not armed. But you reek of blood. Why?"
Haruma swallowed and his pulse pounded against the edge of her blade.
"I don't know."
It was the truth.
There was something in her eyes, a flicker, but it disappeared before he could put a finger on it. Doubt? Disgust? Pity?
The pressure on his throat released — but only just.
"Liar."
Haruma clenched his jaw.
"I swear to you, I have no idea how I got. I just woke up in this forest, with blood all over me. That's all I remember."
A pause extended between them. The woman's gaze didn't waver, didn't flinch.
Then — without a warning — she put her sword away.
"If that's true," she said, facing him, "then you're an even bigger problem than I thought."
Haruma exhaled gently, his muscles still tense.
"A problem?"
"Yes." She looked back at him over her shoulder. "Because if you don't know whose blood that is… you don't know who's chasing you."
A chill ran through him.
He hadn't considered that.
If this blood belonged to another person, and if that other person was missing —or dead— then that meant someone, somewhere, was looking for him.
And in a world he did not comprehend, that was the best situation.
"Can you stand?" she asked.
Haruma hesitated. His ribs were still on fire, but he made himself stand straight despite the pain.
"I can manage."
She nodded once, her eyes unreadable.
"Then you're coming with me."
Haruma tensed. "Why?"
Stepping further out of the light of the moon, the woman adjusted her cloak.
"Because if you're telling the truth, out here alone, you won't make it. And if you're lying —"* She never finished the sentence. She didn't need to.
Haruma exhaled.
But he had no reason to trust her. But in this strange world, bleeding and alone, what other choice was there?
And so, with no better option, he followed.
Into the unknown.