Amidst the howling winds and the cacophony of steel, roars, and screams, a battlefield raged with an intensity that could shake even the gods.

The battlefield was alive with the thunderous roars of war, a cacophony of death and defiance ringing across the towering walls of the mountain city. Steel clashed against gnashing teeth, arrows rained like a deadly downpour, and the stench of blood mixed with the acrid scent of burning flesh. The walls, ancient and steadfast, loomed above the chaos, their stone foundations shaking under the relentless assault of monstrous abominations.

They came in droves, a never-ending tide of grotesque creatures, their forms twisted beyond recognition. Some were thin and skeletal, darting through the battlefield with terrifying agility, their elongated claws slicing through armor like parchment. Others were lumbering behemoths, their bloated bodies covered in patches of jagged, chitinous plating, absorbing blows like an unstoppable force of nature. And then there were the true horrors—creatures that defied reason, shifting and writhing like the very embodiment of nightmares, their grotesque forms an affront to the natural order.

The towering walls of the mountain city, once a symbol of human resilience, now trembled under the siege of abominable creatures, their grotesque forms clawing, gnashing, and shrieking in a relentless pursuit of destruction.

Among the human defenders, the desperate fight continued. Archers lined the battlements, releasing arrow after arrow, some striking true, piercing the creatures' skulls, dropping them instantly. Others missed their mark, their shots deflected by thick hides or lost in the chaos.

Soldiers with steel in hand engaged in brutal melee combat, their swords cutting down the monstrosities only for more to replace them. Some succeeded, their blades carving through flesh and bone, while others found their fate sealed as fangs and claws tore into them, reducing them to nothing more than bloodstained remnants of battle.

A veteran soldier, his face lined with scars and his blade chipped from countless battles, let out a victorious cry as he cleaved a creature in two. His triumph was short-lived as a massive claw speared through his chest, lifting him off his feet before discarding his lifeless body like refuse. Nearby, a young woman barely past adulthood drove her spear into an abomination's skull, only for another to seize her from behind, its gaping maw closing over her throat, silencing her forever.

This was not war. It was a bloodbath in its truest, most unforgiving form.

Amidst the carnage, a young soldier lay sprawled against the cold stone of the city walls, his body half-mangled, barely clinging to life. Barely more than a teenager, he was sprawled against the cold stone, his breath ragged and wet.

He was far too young to be among these warriors, but in desperate times, even children were forced to fight.

A massive ballista bolt jutted from his neck, the wooden shaft thick with his own blood, draining him of life with every passing moment. His metal gauntlets, crude and battered, bore jagged edges where the knuckles extended outward, formed from the relentless bites of a monster. His armor, barely adequate, had been torn in multiple places, exposing bruised and broken flesh beneath.

His vision blurred, but he could still see the battle raging on. He wanted to fight. He wanted to keep going. But his body refused to obey. He could feel it slipping—his strength, his will, his very existence.

He didn't want to die.

He didn't want to fail. He had so much to live for.

Why was he dying so early in his life?

But his body no longer listened to him. The world around him dimmed, the sounds of battle growing distant, fading into nothingness. His eyes, once brown, dulled as his lids grew heavy, ready to close for the last time.

Then, something changed.

His hair, stained with blood, seemed to drink in the crimson essence, darkening, deepening, shifting into a striking shade of blood red. The wound at his throat, a fatal hole just moments ago, closed with unnatural speed, knitting together like an unseen force had rewritten his very existence. The thick bolt lodged within snapped with a sickening crack, falling away as if rejected by his very being.

Had the other soldiers not been so preoccupied with their own desperate struggles, they might have gone mad witnessing such an impossibility.

A sharp gasp tore through the silence of his mind as his lungs filled with air once more.

Xavier was alive.

His senses returned in an overwhelming flood—his sight, his touch, his sense of self. But everything was wrong. His breathing was erratic, his heart pounding in his chest. He was no longer witnessing a world being written before his eyes; he was here, physically, undeniably present in this place.

The stench of blood, the heat of battle, the deafening cacophony—it was real.

His mind reeled, his thoughts disjointed.

'What the hell just happened?'

Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.

His thoughts scrambled for meaning. The last thing he remembered was that overwhelming voice, the declaration of some trial, the formation of a world beneath him. Had he fallen into it? Was this the trial that it spoke of? More importantly—whose body was this?

'Why am I wearing this?'

Xavier lifted his hands, his fingers flexing within unfamiliar gauntlets, the cold weight of metal pressing against his skin. His arms were covered in worn armor, the kind he'd only seen in medieval history books, dented and cracked but still holding firm. His torso was clad in a breastplate that felt heavy, foreign. He was no knight, no warrior, and yet—

'This is real.'

Panic surged in his chest. He pushed himself up on shaky limbs, his muscles weak but functional. He had to make sense of this. He had to understand.

Xavier blinked as he studied his surroundings, his thoughts in a tangled mess. His gaze instinctively drifted towards the city behind him, the towering mountain stronghold that had stood at the heart of the world's creation.

It was one thing to have watched its birth from above, witnessing words weave the very fabric of its existence, but to stand here now—to feel the rough stone beneath his fingers, to hear the distant toll of warning bells—it was almost too much to process.

His mind snapped back to the present, finally registering the overwhelming noise of the battle raging before him. The metallic clash of swords and flesh, the twang of bowstrings, and the gut-wrenching screams of soldiers filled the air, all interwoven with the deafening roars of monstrous creatures.

His head jerked toward the battlefield. What he saw sent a cold chill racing down his spine.

A sea of nightmarish figures clawed their way up the walls, grotesque and unrelenting. They climbed over each other in their mindless frenzy, a grotesque tide seeking to spill over the walls and consume everything within.

Xavier barely breathed as his eyes dropped to the ground near his feet, catching sight of something that made his stomach twist. A broken bolt—its shaft slick with blood—lay uselessly on the stone floor. It wasn't just any random weapon. It was the same one that had been impaled through his neck when he had first arrived.

He hadn't felt the pain of that moment, but as he entered, he remembered his final moments, or rather whoever he had become's final moment.

His fingers twitched. 'I or the person I currently am had been dead. Now I am here, whole, uninjured. Why? How?'

'Why was there a bolt in my neck if I was on the side fighting those abominations?'

'Was I even actually fighting them?'

'What gave me that idea?'

'Why am I acting like it's even me?'

'Is it because of the feelings of the person who died?'

He didn't even know what was going on as his mind spiraled with questions, each one met with frustrating silence.

A low, guttural growl interrupted his thoughts.

Xavier stiffened.

Slowly, he turned his head. His breath caught in his throat.

A creature stood just a few feet away, its gaunt frame hunched over the body of a fallen soldier. The corpse was still fresh, its armor torn open like paper, blood pooling beneath it. The monster's snout was stained red, thick strands of flesh clinging to its fangs. Its eyes—sunken, hungry—locked onto him, and in that moment, Xavier felt something gnawing at his gut.

Fear.

Real, raw, animalistic fear.

His muscles coiled instinctively. He could run. He should run. But would it matter? The beast looked like it was built for speed; turning his back on it was practically inviting death. The moment stretched thin, tension winding tighter and tighter until—

It moved.

Xavier barely had time to react before it lunged, its limbs snapping forward in a blur of movement. His body acted on impulse—he fell back straight onto the cold stone floor. A moment of weightlessness followed as the monster, mid-leap, realized its target had disappeared from view. It crashed full-force into the wall behind him with a sickening thud.

Pain exploded through Xavier's back as he hit the ground, but there was no time to think about that. The beast had fallen right on top of him, its considerable weight pinning him down.

"Shit!" Xavier spat, arms flailing as he struggled against the heavy, still-dazed creature. Its breath was hot and rancid, its claws twitching as it began to recover.

'Move...Move now!'

The monster thrashed atop Xavier, its jaw snapping hungrily, just inches away from his throat. Its breath reeked of decay, hot and sticky against his skin, but its own body was a hindrance, preventing it from biting him outright.

Xavier's mind raced, his breath coming in ragged gasps. His fingers scraped against the stone floor, searching—grasping—for anything. His eyes darted, and there it was—the bolt that had once been buried in his neck. He stretched an arm towards it, his fingertips brushing against the broken shaft.

The monster realized its mistake. A guttural snarl tore from its throat as it heaved itself up, throwing Xavier aside like a ragdoll. He crashed into the wall's edge, his ribs screaming in agony as his vision blurred from the impact. The world spun, and suddenly, he was teetering on the precipice of the battlements. Just beyond, an ocean of writhing monstrosities clawed at the walls, their shrieks and howls blending into a single, deafening cacophony.

Panic surged through him. He scrambled, gripping onto the rough stone to keep from plummeting. But the monster was already upon him again, its elongated limbs carrying it with horrifying speed. He barely had time to turn before it lunged, its powerful maw snapping shut around his torso.

Pain exploded through his body as razor-sharp teeth clamped down, biting through layers of armor and pressing into his flesh. A deep, primal groan of agony tore from his lips, but he refused to scream. He refused to give this thing the satisfaction.

His arms were pinned, his movements sluggish beneath the weight of his battered armor. He cursed inwardly—damn this metal coffin! If he didn't act fast, he'd be ripped in half. His fingers twitched, groping for anything—anything!—that could save him. Then his eyes locked onto the abomination's mouth, and an idea—insane, desperate—flashed through his mind.

Without hesitation, he twisted his arm just enough to ball his fist and slammed it into the monster's tongue. The thick muscle recoiled, but he didn't stop. Again and again, he drove his knuckles up into the soft tissue, the jagged metal splinters of his broken gauntlet tearing into the flesh like makeshift claws as black blood sprayed.

The effect was immediate.

The creature let out a pained yelp, its jaw snapping open as it recoiled in agony. Xavier tumbled to the ground, gasping for breath, pain lancing through his ribs where the monster's teeth had nearly crushed him. He wasted no time—he bolted, diving toward the broken bolt.

His fingers wrapped around the it. The weight felt foreign in his grip, unbalanced and unwieldy, but there was no time for hesitation. He spun around, chest heaving, just in time to see the monster licking at its wounded mouth, its elongated, twitching limbs tensing for another lunge.

His mind screamed at him for a plan. He had no plan. He had nothing but a pointy stick and a body that was in searing pain. The creature growled low, preparing to strike.

Then, suddenly—

A voice, loud and commanding, cut through the battlefield. "DUCK!"