I was breathing heavily, more so to stop me from hurling my guts up when I realised it was dry grass underneath my palms as I braced myself.
That didn’t make sense to me as I was in my office just a few moments ago. I opened my eyes to see that I wasn’t imagining it, although blurred I could clearly see a patch of grass where I was now kneeling.
“That’s not possible” I said aloud as my brain furiously tried to process what had just happened.
As I stood up the world around me rocked and swayed as if I had spent a month on the deck of a ship in rough waters.
Another wave of nausea hit me that I could no longer keep surpressed and a large gurgling sound forced its way from my belly right upto my throat. Leaning forward I slapped my hands on my knees to brace myself and threw up in the grass. Bile burned the back of my throat as I continued to vomit until there was nothing left, leaving nothing but a witching sound leaving my mouth.
When I stood up again the sun beamed harshly on me, to a point where I could feel its heat against my skin. I had no clue where I was but it could not have been any further away from my office.
The dried grass passed around me but staring out ahead of me all I could see was sand, like a but ton of sand piling up in the distance to form large hills. They went on as far as I could see, the air felt still and warm to breath in, like I could feel the warmth of the air in my lungs. When I spun around, my immediate surroundings were surrounded by pine trees, like some form of oasis in the middle of a desert.
Am I dreaming? I thought as confusion continued to fog my thoughts. Had a fallen? Passed out? Had a heart attack?
Am I dead? My next thought rocked me, had I had an aneurysm and this place was some form of pergatory?
You have watched too much tv I told myself as I continued to look around at my surroundings, simply unable to draw any kind of conclusion as to what the hell was going on.
My options being walking into a Barron desert or towards the trees it felt like a simple choice. I literally had nothing on me other than my wallet and keys and of course I had left my phone in my desk by my computer.
Other than the trees I couldn’t see anything or hear anything, which told me I couldn’t be sure if it was or wasn’t safe but giving a glance a the desert on the other side and the harsh sun above it seemed like the more more sensible option.
“Holy shit is that?” I had to double take to check that I wasn’t still suffering from the bends of landing where ever this was but there were two suns in the sky. I rubbed the back of me head, checking for any lumps because I must have hit my head real hard.
I avoided staring into the to suns for longer than I should and turned my head away, with two bright spots now in my vision for a few seconds. Then something appeared at the top right of my vision and I shook my head in disbelief.
It was like having a transparent TV screen, it popped up like I was wearing some kind off VR headset. Except I wasn’t. The screen remained fuzzy like it was out of tune as I naturally found myself drawn to it. I closed my eyes and it vanished but as soon as I opened them again it was like it was part of my vision.
Instinctively I reached my hand out to see if I could touch it, I couldn’t and I was grateful no one was around to see me grasping at thin air. I could however see my hand behind the translucent screen.
“Is anyone there?” A young woman’s voice said, the screen in the top right of my vision flickered into life. “Is anyone there?”
“H, hello?” I stammered still wondering what the hell was going on.
“It worked!” The voice said excitedly, “It actually worked.”
“W, worked?” I asked, “Who are you and where am I?”
The screen continued to flicker but slowly a the shape of a face and head became visible, the screen was still like something from the 70s or 80s as it still continued to flicker as it focussed.
The face was full of dark red fur with blackened jowls, hanging low on each side of its mouth, it had a somewhat humanist shape to its face but there was no mistaking that it looked like it was some form of boxer-
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“A dog?” I said out loud, puzzled and confused, its focus was frantic as it searched around the screen as if it was looking for someone beyond me.
“How dare you,” she scoffed, her voice clear as if she was stood right in front of me, say for a slight crackle like white noise. “I am not some neanderthal dog, I certainly will not sit here wagging my tail, waiting for you to pat me on the head.” There was an assertive nature to her voice that made me feel like a kid being scolded by a teacher.
“Wh, what are you?” I asked, if there was anything to solidify that this was just one fucked up dream then this moment was it, a talking half boxer dog, half human hybrid. Someone had taken the term doggy style way too seriously where I was.
The dog lady sighed, her jowells flapping with her deep exhale of breath.
“I am a drogue, surely you must have met my kind before?”
“A drogue?” I repeated back slowly as I formed the words, they seemed as alien to me as this world. “Sorry, no I’ve never seen anything like you before.”
“Anything?” She snapped,
“Anyone,” I corrected myself quickly, not meaning to offend her.
“How curious, just where are you from?”
“Erm, earth?”
“Never heard of it? Are you human?” She said as she pressed her eyes closer to the screen, “you certainly look human, a scrawny one at best too. I asked for a champion to save us, why would they send me such a weak one? A human one too.” She continued to fire out inadvertent insults about my less than impressive physique, shaggy brown hair and small arms for longer than I was comfortable with.
“I am still here,” I said, interrupting her monologue which was turning into more of a rant at someone that wasn’t present rather than myself.
Her focus snapped back to me, “I am sorry, I was just expecting someone,” her face looked me up and down before saying “Stronger,”
Well at least there is one consistency here as there is at home, and that is how I am seen to be weak.
“Tell me what is your name?” She asked me, hastily like I was about to take some form of exam.
An air of defiance, surged in me the dog lady had been damn right rude to me, why should I share anything with her. “Why should I tell you? You have done nothing but slam my appearance since you started talking to me.”
“Well if you are the champion I pleaded for, that I spent the last of my magic summoning, I thought I might get something a little more capable.” She looked to the side, revealing her elongated snout, her eyes continuing to dart around as she traced her thoughts. “Perhaps this is a test in itself, if he is the champion, if he is the one to destroy Belzebere and bring stability to the fallen kingdoms, well I have known the gods to put forward such tests.”
There was so much in her words that I needed to take a moment to decipher and process, had she just spoken about magic? And me being a champion and gods?
“We need to act quickly, you need my help and I need yours, so as I asked, what is your name?” She said as if she was rushing.
“Silas,” I replied hesitantly. “And you are?”
“My friends, they called me Fidget,” her tone and expression changed to one of sadness. “But they are gone now,”
“Why would I need your help?” I asked while also asking myself why I would help her.
“Because this world is dangerous, beyond your comprehension, creatures and monsters roam this world that are probably beyond your realms of imagination.”
There we go again, I thought another insult.
“First things first we need to figure out where you are, can you describe your surroundings?”
I spend the next few moments describing to Fidget the desert plains as far as my eyes could see and that I had just stepped into the forrest which was more like a silent oasis.
“Havela?” She said, “Why would Verensar summon a champion and place them so far away?” Again she spoke aloud but not as if she was speaking to me.
“You need to listen to me, it is not safe,” the screen flickered as if the signal was being disrupted. “There is so much that I need to go through with you but I need to recharge my mana, to maintain this connection with you.”
“Wait I have so many questions I need to ask, like where the fuck am I? And how is all of this possible?”
Fidget sighed again and shook her head, “Because it’s not like I have already explained all of this,” she muttered under her breath as if doing so would prevent me from hearing her, her tone was more adolescent like and it made me wonder just how old was she. “Verensar is really testing me huh!”
The screen flickered again this time barely keeping Fidget on the screen as her image started to distort and her words jerked and faded in and out.
“Head north west until you reach a small hut near a waterfall, when you get there tell S,” The name she said crackled meaning I couldn’t make out what she said, “that Fidget sent you. By the time you reach him, I should have enough mana to reach out to you again, use the sun above you as a compass for now, we will figure a map out later. If you head roughly in the direction between the suns this is north west, I dont know how long it will take you but you need to get to S,” her voice cracked again distorting the name, “He will help you get set up here, we need to find the fragments of the Chaos Blade ” Fidgets face looked like one filled with concern. “Stay safe Silas of earth, you are our only hope.”
With that the Fidget’s image vanished and within a moment the screen blinked away leaving me with my full vision once again. Just like that I was alone, in a place I knew nothing about with the only detail being that it was dangerous. If it was dangerous just how was I meant to be capable of surviving it, how am I meant to be the champion that Fidget had spoken of. My only hope for now was to do what Fidget had told me to and head deeper into the forrest, to find a hut by a waterfall.