As soon as I turned, I knew it was a mistake. Whenever I saw other people in the quiet realm they were soft glowy things. When they began to die, it was as if the core of them grew more dull and the glow separated and began to dissipate into the ether.

But what I saw in front of me was something else. It was as if thousands of forms had merged into one. It was so bright that I was immediately blinded. It felt as if my eyes had been burned into my skull. The feeling was like looking at the sun, but if the sun were made of a man.

A part of me wanted to crush that light, to snuff it out and make it disappear. But even as I thought it, something else in my mind seemed to awaken. It was the part of me that remained from the living world. The coward. The part of me didn't want to find out what would happen if the light touched me.

I wasn't sure if anything could hurt me in the quiet world, but the light seemed to be moving towards me. As the glowing form got closer, my skin began to grow cold. Struggling against the growing pain, I averted my eyes, covered them with my arms, and strained to feel again. I pulled and pulled and focused my thoughts to leave the quiet world.

When I entered the quiet world, it was like going to sleep without letting my mind rest, but when I left it, it was akin to leaving a dream. I focused on what I had felt before I had entered it, but a rising panic made it hard to concentrate as the horrible brightness drew closer and closer.

Suddenly, life flooded around me—colors, smells, the feel of the air—and the sideways grin of an old man. There he was again, the man from the clearing.

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I stumbled back, still afraid of the glowing form that seemed to burn my eyes. It was strange seeing him again; he was so old, but like before, he had a frightening manic energy about him that belied his age.

“My oh my, what you have done my boy!” The old man gestured around the clearing, and I looked to see what he meant. Across from us, one of the men hung from a thick branch that stuck out through his stomach. He hung from the branch, and blood dripped down to the floor. It was then that I realized I was sitting in something wet, and as I looked down, I saw more blood. Only a few feet away, there was a corpse, but it looked withered and decayed as if it had been burned but left to rot for weeks.

My stomach reacted before my mind could, and I retched on the ground. But it had been some time since I had eaten, and nothing came out. I struggled to my feet, trying to get away from the blood, and then I saw Clidale. He lay on the ground crying, with a hand to his face. It was covered in blood, and he looked at me with his one eye, and I could see that my friend was in terrible pain.

“Can you help him?” I turned to the old man.

He looked at me with a curious smile and shrugged. Then he waddled over to Clidale and kneeled down. He reached a gnarled finger down. “Move your hands, boy, and I’ll do what I can.”

Clidale’s hand shook as he removed it, and the old man moved his finger closer. Then there was a bright flash, and Clidale screamed. The stench of burning flesh filled the air, and as the old man stood up, I could see that the wound had been burned. Half of Clidale’s face was a mess of burned tissue.

“It’ll hurt, and he’ll be ugly, but he will live.” The old man looked around the clearing. “Wasn’t there one more of you? Ah yes, speaking of ugly!”

I turned to look at what he meant, and Rebert climbed into view. His face was a myriad of scratches and cuts, and one of his eyes was shut with a horrible bruise. He looked around the clearing at all of the dead corpses and smiled thinly.

“You did good, lad.” Then he nodded as if satisfied, and collapsed to the floor.