The subtle sounds of birds chirping echoed throughout the forest, as a person lay next to a giant hole in the ground. A large beam of light broke through the clearing, blanketing everything below in a gold blanket. A small lake glittered, as some of the water occasionally dropped inside the giant hole caused by Lan.

“Hah, hah, I'm already tired.”

Lan's body lacked nutrition, and already lost muscle mass from his lack of a proper diet. Even the amount of energy in his body was minimal. Right now he was lying in exhaustion from overexerting himself.

His eyes remained closed, as his hand tried to block out the sun, after getting used to the darkness for so long, the sun was especially hard on his eyes. His skin was now incredibly pale, and his body was very skinny. While he retained a large mana pool from the past, his endurance, and stamina had pretty much plummeted.

Lan merely lay motionless on the ground, no different than a corpse. No sound was made, no action was taken, and nothing happened. The only movement was the dripping of water, the movement of the lake, and the chirping of birds.

Slowly, but surely the still scenery moved, and Lan got up. He did not take any immediate action, he merely just looked around him. An enclosed forest, with a clear opening in the sky, next to a small lake. It had been so long since he saw any of these things, that his mind became blank.

After a moment of stunned silence did he finally get up, and slowly walk to the lake, his legs ached, and his arms were throbbing. The movements he made before, did not match what his body could handle, causing blood to leak from his arms, and legs. Mana used to reinforce the body had a multiplier effect, the physical body had limits. The limits of his emancipated body were obviously low.

Even if his mana pool was larger than average, his body could not sustain the amount he used for intense physical activity. A strong man, and a weak man could both use mana to accomplish inhuman feats. But the strong man would have a higher upper limit, and also require a higher mana consumption to sustain that upper limit. The same can be said for items as well. If he performed actions that exceeded his limits, he expected his muscles to tear, and his own bones to shatter.

Lan hobbled slowly towards the lake with his aching body, and stared at the glistening water.

“.........”

He saw the image of himself, reflected off the surface.

“I look like a ghost.”

He glanced at his scrawny hands, arms, and bloodied limbs. He sniffed at his arms, and frowned. Then stared back at the water again. Lan put his palm on his head, trying to shake away the cloudiness. After a few sighs he started taking off his clothes, and slowly walked into the water.

The cold water sent shivers in his body, as he wiped away the blood, dust, and dirt. In a way it felt like a cleansing ritual. Lan poured mana into his ears, and skin to sense the vibrations around him. He listened, and felt for any large vibrations, any disturbance in the current rhythm. He felt irregular reactions in the water, several of them that went against the norm. He slowly opened his eyes, revealing a blue right eye, and a red left eye.

He walked out of the water naked, looked around; eventually stopping his gaze at some flowers. Lan plucked several of them, and tore off the petals, and leaves, holding them between his fingers. Then walked back into the lake, and moved farther up. After pouring some mana into the stems, he flung them into the water. Moments later, five small shadows slowly floated upward, revealing five impaled fish.

While walking out of the water with the fish in hand, he began the process of cleaning, and descaling them. Unfortunately Lan did not use elemental magic so had to produce a fire manually. He took his sword, and easily cut a block of wood out.

Using a chunk of the wood, a sharp branch, and some leaves, he started to use friction to form a fire, and use it to grill the fish. Since the algae, and minerals from the lake could be overly metallic, he avoided eating the skin, organs, and brains.

After dousing out the flame, and feeling dry from the sun, did he finally start wearing his clothes.

Instead of moving, and exploring, Lan kept perfectly still, and waited for night to arrive. Not even bothering to venture outside of the area. He held the sword next to his chest, sat down, leaned against a tree, and closed his eyes.

The sky eventually turned dark, and the stars started to appear, Lan immediately opened his eyes, and stared into the sky. Without a single word, he jumped on a tree, and ran upward. The magic circle from his feet clung to the bark. As he silently ran up, eventually he reached the upper branches. There he began jumping quietly, along each one until he reached the top of the tree.

He carefully examined the position of the stars, and tried to remember any constellations he recognized. The residual mana from before already indicated where he should look, so he especially memorized the position of the stars, that led to where Zara disappeared.

After gazing fixedly at the sky, did he look around him, a small frown formed on his lips. Lan leaned against one of the tree branches, and slept.

The next morning, Lan seriously observed from the treetops, and confirmed what he saw before. Aside from a small patch of green where he was, the land around him was scorched black. The trees were without leaves, the grass was non existent, and shadowy creatures were sneaking around in the outskirts.

A small sigh leaked from his lips.

Later that day, Lan spent most of his time gathering food, and nothing but food. A week later, after doing nothing but conserve energy, and eating, did he finally began to move out. The small forest was extremely thick, and only small wildlife existed, nothing larger then a rabbit. It only took an hour before the greenery disappeared, and only the black earth encompassed his view.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Lan could feel a persistent miasma permeating from the soil, and the stench of decay.

While walking forward, from the corner of his eye he would occasionally catch sight of shadowy creatures dodging in, and out of the shadows. He could here whispers carried by the wind, and feel gazes digging into him.

Lan completely ignored them, and continued walking. His eyes looked somewhat lazy, and his expression was pretty much blank. The sky still shined brightly, and occasionally he would see a giant bird flying in the distance above. He took minimal useless actions, and tried in every way to conserve energy. Eventually he came upon a small gathering of boulders, and decided to brake camp there.

He rationed the water, and took a few concentrated meals. The whispers carried along the winds grew more varied, and numerous. Lan could feel the number of shadows following him had just increased, instead of preparing defensive magic formations, or keeping alert, her merely went atop a boulder, and slept.

The creatures materialized from the shadows, underneath the boulder, around him, beside him, and in front of him. The whispers grew louder, and more intense as they reached their hands out. Lan's eye shot open, and stared at the nearest shadow. Psychic images assailed the target causing it to mentally collapse.

A ball of transparent white mist slowly fluctuated in his hand, the energy started to condense, and gain physical form, he crushed it with his hands, releasing an expanding wave of energy. The wave targeted their minds, causing the shadows to tremble in agony before collapsing their form.

Lan exhaled slowly, with a dead pan expression.

“Haah, I can finally rest peacefully, luring those things, and killing them in one go was best. Good thing these guys have a weak mind.”

Lan did not question what they were, or why they followed him, it simply did not matter. There existed too many annoying things in the world to worry about, if one worried about every little thing, they would go nowhere, except find new things to worry about. It would simply be an inescapable loop.

He observed the stars once more, to assure himself of the direction, before going back to sleep.

The very next morning, Lan continued his journey in a single direction. The black view, and featureless land, was both boring, and mind numbing. The bright side was that the shadows no longer followed him, and the annoying whispers stopped. While slowly walking forward Lan halted, and titled his head.

He could hear something distant, and loud. The ground rumbled, and thousands of vibrations were transmitted to the earth. Dust was being kicked up in the distance, and it extended far, and wide.

“Tch.”

He stretched out his hands, and began to chant a spell, the magic circle extended to several meters around him, eventually Lan disappeared from view. From the distance, thousands, upon thousands of creatures were marching along the lands. They had thick grey skin, powerful muscles, small tusks, and humanoid faces. Towering hairy Goliaths over a hundred meters tall, were being ridden by those things, and were marching along in a giant procession.

They carried primitive weapons, and carried flags with them. One glance, and you could tell it was a massive army. Some of them pulled wagons, rode atop giant black beasts, and one eyed towering monsters wrapped in chains, were being led along the way. In the skies lizard creatures with wings, were being ridden like mounts, overseeing the massive army. A conservative estimate put them at over ten thousand strong. The dust being kicked up was so strong it practically became a giant fog of dirt.

After many hours, the army eventually passed by, the area where Lan disappeared started to distort, and rumble before it collapsed, revealing a dozen dead corpses, and Lan. When the army passed, Lan had created a small pocket dimension, occasionally opened, and closed it, letting some of them into his dimension, and killing them.

His main prize was a black mount resembling a large deer, the rider was impaled in the chest laying dead on the ground. He touched some of their minds to gather information, and images. The only thing that came to mind was that these creatures attack, and kill one another looking for slave labour, and prizes to pillage.

“Basically warlords.” From what he gathered they were primitive, and aggressive creatures, that lack the ability on the finer points of magic.”

Normally a competent army would easily expose Lan, but then again they were only a primitive race. The plus side was that he now had a fairly well trained mount, the downside was that he had never needed to ride a mount in his entire life, and therefore did not know how.

The two meter tall deer, just eyed Lan in curiosity but didn't react much at all, or even run away when it's master died. Lan searched the corpses, revealing packs of dried foods, and some crude knives. The deer could be used as a mount, and worst case scenario used for food.

It took about ten tries before he could get on that things back. Trying to get it to move forward, with words did not work, only after accidentally hitting it did the thing move. It was an awkward ride, with a hard to control deer that didn't run very far, and Lan gradually experienced what it was like to feel pain in his neck, spine, glutes, and legs, all from just riding.

While the speed of travel improved, so did the pain in many areas. After several hours, he pulled the deer to a stop, and staggered off. He lay on the dirt, and didn't bother to move, staring into the sky. The deer walked up to where he was lying, and just gazed at him.

Lan gazed at the deer as well. No words were spoken as they looked at one another silently.

Eventually the next morning came.