Searing pain rips through your body, spreading from your chest to every limb at once. You grit your teeth, and sharply inhale. You cough as the grains of sand enter your nose. The sea laps at your legs and waist, drenching your clothes. You open your eyes and begin to stand up.

“Wake up, sleepyhead!” an irritating voice calls.

You look ahead of you. Floating in front of your eyes is a small humanoid, fluttering in the air on crystalline wings. She appears to be young, red-haired, and is clad in a small, one-piece dress made from supple green leaves.

“I healed you with my magic,” the fairy continues, “so you should be all right now! My name’s-”

In a flash, you have her in your grasp. Her tiny body feels fragile in your hand, as if you could crush her without any effort. She lies limp from shock, staring you down. Your stomach growls.

You spit the fairy’s dress out, satisfied by the meal. Long has it been since you last nourished yourself; were it not for that tiny being’s “noble sacrifice,” you would surely have perished here on the shore of starvation.

You finally rise fully to your feet, and look down at yourself for the first time since regaining consciousness. You are clad in a fine black trench coat, or what should be a black coat were it not for the numerous crimson stains across the fabric. Beneath the coat, you feel the comfortable fabric of an aristocrat’s attire. Opening up your coat, you are pleased to see a white dress shirt, and a grey pinstripe vest over it and under your coat. A playful red bowtie wraps around your neck. You look down at your pants; a pair of drenched black slacks, and further down at your shoes; a pair of fine black dress shoes. Adorning your waist is a silver chain that stretches from your belt loop to your pocket. Following the chain, you reach into your pocket, and discover a glamorous silver pocketwatch. You open it- the glass of the watch is cracked, and the hands do not move.

You attempt to view yourself in the water of the sea behind you, but the lapping waves and frothing sea foam prevent you from making out any details. All you can tell is that you most certainly do have a head, at least. You look from side to side- it would seem you bear a snout of some kind, a long muzzle of a mouth, though your species and gender remain a mystery.

You wipe the blood dripping from your mouth. You look at the blood on your hand, and feel a sensation within you. As if on instinct, you flick your wrist outwards. The blood spirals outwards and then back in on itself, forming a long bar. The bar of liquid blood quivers, and flows into the shape of a saber, honing itself to an edge and hardening into a crystalline form. You feel yourself smile- this is very, very right.

You turn around to get a bearing of your surroundings. Where you previously lie, there remains the wreckage of a small rowboat- nothing that could sail for very long. Despite that, something within you seems to scream that you are far from home. You gaze along the shoreline in each direction; to your left, you see nothing but the empty expanse of seawater and sand, far into the horizon. To your right, however, you seen the wreckage of a much larger vessel. Perhaps this is what you rode that took you so far away. Turning around, you see the sparse trees of a nearby forest, which grow gradually denser and denser as one would tread deeper and deeper into the forest. Close by, you see what appears to be a path, built from cobblestone, that proceeds deeper into the forest.

You walk to the path, and find that it tunnels so far into the forest that you cannot see its end. You resolve to instead explore the galleon first.

You arrive at the breach of the ship’s hull, where you assume the ship had either run aground or been pierced by unseen rocks, or perhaps even damaged in naval combat. The hole is large, and whatever caused it must certainly been equally massive. You step into the hull of the ship, brandishing your weapon as you do.

You emerge into the brig of the ship, where captives are usually held. You see no one within the cages, only their rotting remains. Though you still yearn for more sustenance, food in such a state is beneath you. You continue through the brig and up the stairs, onto the main deck of the ship.

The top deck was barren, though the occasional splintering plank told you that whatever sunk this ship was quite formidable. Knowing better than to linger, you make immediately for the captain’s cabin. The door to the cabin is locked, and you struggle to open it.

Breaking and Entering: 0

In a fit of rage, you attempt to smash the door open with your bare hands, but the sturdy wood resists your attempts. After a few more bashes, you shrug your shoulders. Clearly, it was not meant to be. You instead decide to make your way down into the ship’s hold, where you discover it too has been severely damaged. The entire back wall of the room has been stripped bare, and the waves lap at the floor and the supplies that lay strewn across it. You step down into the water, and wade through the hold to find anything of value.

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Perception: 10

You find little of value, only food in the form of exotic fruits and pristine vegetables. Nothing remotely appetizing. In your search, however, you do also discover a hidden case of medical supplies, seemingly kept out of sight intentionally. Someone- you assume the captain- seems to have wanted to keep these items for themselves. Since they are most certainly dead by now, you see no reason not to take them for yourself.

Items Received:

Antidote 1x

This bottle of swirling black liquid holds a putrid smell, but a smell many a forest hunter have come to trust. Cures the body of poisons.

Bandages 1x

A roll of medical gauze. Stops bleeding

Healing Injection 1x

A small vial of crimson red liquid, often mistaken for blood. When injected into the bloodstream, this miraculous substance becomes just that- quickly replenishing the blood in the user’s body.

You smile to yourself upon pulling the Healing Injection from the case. Something about this item is familiar to you, though you can’t exactly place what it is. Of course, everybody around the world is familiar with the notion of the Healing Injection, and the way the lifesaving injection revolutionized medical science, but to you this connection feels more… personal. For now, at least, this recollection will remain fleeting, and you are content to leave it that way. You fashion a makeshift bag from the rags of a bed in the crew’s quarters- which you found to be disappointingly empty of survivors- and stow your newfound items in the bag.

Inventory: 3/10

Looks like you won’t be able to carry much more.

You step out from the boat, and back onto the shore. As the waves lap against your ankles (your pants thankfully dried at last), the emptiness of this shoreline finally grips you. You and that piece of food were the only living things around, for miles potentially. As you gaze towards the forest, you wonder where the tiny being had come from. Perhaps she originated from these nearby woods? Perhaps there were more like her? You salivate at the thought, but catch yourself. Worst case scenario, they may have seen your act and fled already.

You look at the cobblestone path that leads further into the forest. There really is no other way of knowing, is there?

You follow the forest path for nearly ten minutes, as it crisses and crosses through the deep woods. To your disappointment, not a single living thing appeared for the whole of the journey- not one squirrel, elk, or wolf. Nothing at all… as if something had evacuated them all.

At long last, you arrive at the end of the path. Before you stands a great and imposing wall of wooden beams, embedded below in a knee-high wall of stone. The wall stretches upwards to nearly twice your height, and out far enough that you lose sight of it in the woods. At the top of the wall, two guards bear down on you, clad in shoddy armor with crossbows drawn and pointed at you. Between the two of them, a shimmering golden light flutters in the air- and upon closer inspection, you can see the faint outline of a tiny person within the light. Before you, the doors into this garrison remain closed, and as you try them from below the guards’ watchful aim, they refuse to budge even slightly.

Bolts whizz by behind your head as the guards open fire, shouting obscenities your way. You smile, and manifest your weapon once again. You stab it into the wood, feeling it resist but give way after a mild push. Using the blade in the wall, you vault up the distance, and land between the two guards, who scramble backwards as they attempt to reload their crossbows.

You smile, slicing through the air and cleaving the left guard’s crossbow in two, and then make a lunge at the man. Your blade cleaves straight through the man’s torso, splitting his stomach open. He falls to his knees, his guts falling out of him. A bolt embeds itself into your left shoulder, clearly aiming for your heart, but you feel no pain.

You wheel around, dashing at the other guard, and reaching out to catch the fairy as well. It escapes, but the guard does not, he throws his crossbow to the ground and reaches for his sword, but not nearly in time. You impale him upon your blade, and he falls limp onto your shoulders.

You lick your lips, and bite into his neck before the warmth leaves his body. You rip out part of his throat, and swallow it down. You feel the flesh in your shoulder quiver, and the bolt that was stuck in it be pushed out as your flesh knits back together. You rub the wound- not a trace of it remains.

You stand at the top of the wall, gazing out over the remainder of the fort.The fort is built in the shape of a square- four sides of wooden walls- and these walls surround a large open area at its heart. It is a small fort, to be sure, and clearly very little effort is put into maintaining it. But something has stirred the men here, and they are more alert than usual. In the open area, numerous small beasts and game seem to have been gathered, and a number of small flickering motes of gold dash around, keeping them from panicking. You smile to yourself, but know better than to leap into combat so one-sided. Perhaps next time.

You turn your attention to the top of the walls, and to the nearby ladder that leads deeper into the fort. You gaze down the ladder, and a guard gazes back up at you.

“Uh… lovely weather today, aye?” He stutters.

You drop down onto the soldier, impaling him on your blade as you fall and crushing his body beneath you when you land. What a kind soul, to cushion your fall for you. In the room you have now entered, there sits six men, in various states of clad in armor and wielding various amounts of weapons, who all stare at you in shock. You withdraw your weapon, and smile.