In a forest spanning kilometre upon kilometre of nothing but green stood a singular building. it was riddled with cracks and missing chunks, the building once seemingly held great importance to whoever had built it.

Statues or at least what's left of them toppled to the ground and covered in the slithering roots of trees. The building now leaning forward almost as if saddened at its loss of importance of the long dead people that walked its once mighty halls.

Within the great ruin was the sound of a water flowing and if one looked deeper they would find a small waterfall and a pool that was quite deep seeing as the bottom couldn't be seen, only inky blackness.

The depth of the pool however did not scare away the animals that would take refuge within the ruin, some even calling it home. One such occupant being a adolescent fire lizard.

It was new to the ruin and while it would've been happy to kick every being here, but it was much to young to be considered threat enough for it to rule over its own territory while older and stronger monsters roam.

The fire lizard dropped its prey before taking a look around. One could never be to careful, thieving claws an talons were never to far, a lesson well learned.

It took a drink from the pool and just before it could react something burst out of the water.

It took a steps back to assess what it could be facing.

COUGH!! COUGH!!

What it saw was a tall man with a light grey skin, white hair and red eyes coughing out water.

'A human?' it thought as it remembered a short description given to him by his mother before throwing him out the nest. While he never has seen one the man standing in front of him just matched the description of the invasive and bloodthirsty species.

It opened its maw and flames began to form, preparing to attack while the man isn't focused.

But just as he fully charged his breath the man seemed to have snapped awake and rush towards him at a fast speed. In his panic, the fire lizard shot his breath. the flames washed over everything in front of him, covering a 50 metre distance.

He shut his mouth with a fiendish grin.

'So much for invasi...'

Before he could finish his thought, a foot appeared out of nowhere and slammed his skull into the ground.

The grey man took a deep breathe as smoke was emanating from his body as some burns were healing at a quick rate.

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'A rank 1 beast for sure' The man or Altar as he was better known as thought was inspecting his body. 

He punched and kicked the air a few times.

'I don't have any of my sources of power, annoying to say the least' he thought.

He picked up the fire lizards body and unceremoniously took a bite. Surprisingly his teeth didn't shatter at taking a bite out of its tough hide, but rather then bite a chunk the fire lizards body started losing its colour and becoming thinner. He threw it to the floor and all that was left was skin and bones.

He sat down as his whole body was covered in black energy. He took a deep breath and all the blood he just consumed was converted into black energy gathered to a white orb next to his heart, turning it a slight darker colour. The black energy moved through his body, his bones cracked and muscles rippled as it seemed to reconstruct his anatomy.

When it stopped he stood up and stretched.

He looked around for a possible exit and went the direction he felt wind flowing in.

Altar got outside and looked up at the night sky. He jumped onto a tree for a clearer look.

'I don't recognise the stars here. Was put on a whole new planet?' he thought. He looked around to see if there was any sign of civilisation, but just outside his sight range he noticed smoke.

'That's at least 2000 kilometres, should be about a days trip' he thought jumping down the tree.

Just as he touched down he shot towards the smokes direction like a rocket, leaving a small crater behind.

As he ran he sensed something coming towards him at a fast pace. He jumped into the air and in his place a brown blur flew past and crashed into a tree.

Altar landed on a tree branch and saw a wolf growling at him. Altar jumped towards it fists clenched surrounded by black energy. The wolf didn't back down and charged at him ready for battle. It snapped its jaws at him, but Altar dodged low and countered with an right hook to its side, sending it flying away. He chased after the air born wolf and followed up with a roundhouse kick to the same side, sending it crashing into the ground.

The wolf could do nothing but yelp in pain at this combination of strikes. It struggled to stand up without leaning more on its right. Altar ran at it and it tried to take up a more defensive stance, but it obvious injury and Altars speed didn't allow it. He threw a flurry of punches and kicks that the wolf couldn't dream of dodging. Altar beat it to death and promptly began to skin it manipulating the black energy to mimic a sharp claw on his finger. In a matter of moments the wolfs fur was skinned, cleaned and wrapped around his midsection. The blood was drained from it and converted into black energy.

He threw a few punches and kicks to get used to his new strength, minute as it might be it would do better to know what he is fully working with in certain moments. After the check, he bolted towards the direction of the smoke.

'I lost a few minutes, but that shouldn't be a problem' 

A few hours passed and as he got closer to the smoke the temperature seemed to drop by a large margin, while it didn't affect him that much he still had much sense to see if anything could be causing this change. Altar found what looked like the remnants of a battle and stopped to inspect it. he could smell a heavy scent of blood and from his experience, the amount here didn't equal what he was smelling.

'A bunch of murders, probably raiders or bandits'

He saw shards of ice sticking into the ground and some broken into pieces. he touched the ice and his body felt a little cold.

'A magi, are they with the bandits or were they getting attacked as well? I need to keep my eyes peeled in case they are hiding in the forest, or worse...' he finished his thought looking at the smoke that he was heading towards.

To Be Continued...