It was pitch black. Roy could barely see two feet in front of him. The sun had set hours ago, and the dense canopy of the forest above him blotted out any moonlight that may have been helpful for his sight. He didn’t think to stop earlier to build a fire. Roy didn’t think much, if at all, but he told himself that he would sit down and try to make a fire tomorrow. He didn’t consider how difficult it would be without tools or actual, fundamental survival knowledge, nor did he take into account the rigorous and time-consuming trial and error that went into it. Still, if his cavemen ancestors could figure it out, he assumed he wasn’t too far behind.

The air was cold and carried with it the scent of decay. Roy had seen and, more recently, stumbled over a few half-eaten animal carcasses as he blindly continued forward. However, it’d be wrong to say he continued forward, seeing that he had long since strayed off the beaten path before the sun even fully set. Roy simply walked, unthinking. He paid no heed to the rustling of the foliage around him or how it seemed to get louder by the minute. He enjoyed the low, cool hoots of the surrounding owls far more than the crunch of detritus beneath his sneakers or the irritating scratching of the bushes that seemed to get closer.

And closer.

Closer still…

The owls fell silent. Roy froze. He held his breath. All he could hear now was the slow beating in his ears. He dared not make a sound. Roy didn’t want to miss the owls again. He found their hoots very pleasing. After a time, when it was clear that the owls would remain silent, he wistfully trudged on.

“I thought I heard the old man say: ‘Leave her, Johnny, leave her’,” Roy started to sing to himself, wanting to fill the mind-numbing ambience of the forest with some of his favourite music. “Tomorrow, you will get your pay, and it’s time for us to leave her.” He continued the sea shanty, significantly improving his mood and putting a hop in his step. In the pitch-black of the midnight forest, he sang and strolled, blind to his surroundings and oblivious to the malevolent creatures stalking him through the undergrowth. Not once did he break his pace. He bumped into trees, stumbled over rotten logs, and even walked through cobwebs. Through it all, he kept a consistent pace. Until something shiny caught his eye.

“Oh, leave her, Johnny, leave her. For the voyage is long, and the winds don’t blow, and it’s- wait, what’s that?”

Roy spotted a green, fluorescent glow from the corner of his eye. He swivelled his head, immediately falling silent and focusing on the light. He changed course, curiously walking towards the sickly green glow beyond the trees. Parting some branches and stepping through a series of bushes, Roy came upon a large, open cavern. Stepping into the cave’s maw, he saw that the light was a bioluminescent moss. Patches of it covered the walls and ceiling of the cave and seemed to grow larger in number and frequency deeper into the cave. The glow was dim but provided enough light to illuminate Roy’s surroundings. He just stood still, entranced.

“So pretty,” he said to himself. “Could I eat this?”

It was clear to the four goblins stalking him that he lacked any sense of awareness and self-preservation instinct.

They suspected as much at first but decided to err on the side of caution when shadowing the human. After trailing him for fifteen minutes, they started second-guessing their target. Was he bait? Were there other humans watching them, waiting for them to pounce? This hunt was too easy. Indeed, no human could be so mindless as be unarmed and unarmored in these woods. They played it safe. Even when the human seemingly had his guard down and started singing, they watched. Things didn’t add up. He displayed no sign of wariness. He often stood and froze for no apparent reason. His singing alerted his presence to any nearby predators. He tripped and frequently fell when he moved.

But for some reason, though the goblins couldn’t quite put their gnarled finger on it, he seemed dangerous. He rolled when he fell, recovering cleanly, efficiently, and instantly. He didn’t even stop singing. He walked fast and never once slowed as he did. He never seemed tired or exhausted despite the pace he was travelling at. He clearly had some skill – some level of experience that could pose a threat, and yet… he was so utterly vulnerable. They couldn’t spend all their time following this boy with nothing to show for it. They were hungry. So, when the boy froze right outside of the cave, the goblins knew they had to act. The ogre that holed itself up there would surely kill him before they did.

They readied their scimitars. One goblin, more desperate than the others, rushed out first. The three others quickly followed. They abandoned stealth, instead opting to jump the human and drag his corpse away from the ogre’s hideout. Roy turned at the sound of the rushed rustling. He immediately locked eyes with the thing. A small humanoid, no bigger than four feet tall, with gangrenous green skin. Then he saw a flash of silver. He leaned back.

The goblin saw a thin line of blood appear from the human’s neck. It wasn’t nearly as deep as it wanted the slash to be. He regretted it immediately as the human gripped its neck and wrenched the scimitar from his hand with strength unbefitting of a human his size. He looked into the human's lustreless brown eyes. The dopey and aloof look he saw on it from afar was now one of stoic determination and complete focus. He felt a deep, searing slash across his stomach as the human cast him aside like a gutted fish and shifted focus.

Of the three remaining goblins, only one stopped dead in their tracks as he saw his friend get disembowelled. He watched in horror as the human made quick work of his friends. They both jumped him at the same time. With the scimitar it stole held in its right hand, it parried and drove his foot into the gut of one goblin, making some distance. It couldn’t avoid the goblin on its left. He swung downward at the human with every intent of burying the weapon in its neck. The human raised its left arm to block. As the sword was about to cut into the human’s forearm, the human lowered its elbow, tilting and redirecting the sword to the ground as it sheared flesh. As soon as the scimitar hit the ground, the human brandished its sword and separated the goblin's head from his body. Not missing a beat, the human slashed at the other goblin, who was still staggering from the kick. It cut deep into his throat and through bone, almost decapitating him entirely.

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The goblin standing at the back was frozen. His heart was gripped with fear. Blood sprayed and poured from his fallen friends. It was all over in five seconds. Two were dead, and one was beyond saving. The human just stared at him, cold and unfeeling. It didn’t react to the wound on its bloodied arm that now hung limp by its side. The goblin, cutting his loss, fled in terror.

He didn’t make it far before he was grabbed by a monstrous palm.

Roy stood and watched as the fleeing goblin was snatched up by something big. The goblin cried and begged as it was lifted ten feet into the air. The beast opened its foul maw. It lowered the goblin to its mouth and crunched. It was swallowed whole in two bites. The large, bloated humanoid licked its tusked lips in a cruel smile as it stomped over to Roy, dragging a bloodied oversized wooden club behind it.

Roy thought two things as he watched the ogre lumber towards him: “Wow, that’s a big boy,” as it trudged towards him and “Oh, I should probably dodge,” as it swung its club. Roy jumped backwards and further into the cave as he avoided the ogre’s lousy swing. It chuckled, clearly enjoying playing with its food. Roy played on the defensive as the ogre swung his club at him, driving further back into the cave. He was getting lightheaded. One slip-up later, he fails to weave correctly. The club makes brutal contact with his left side. Roy flies, hitting the cave wall and ricocheting like a pinball onto the ground.

The ogre guffaws at the sight. It enjoyed watching it all. The grimace of the human’s mouth when its blow landed. The shock in his eyes as they slowly stretch wide. The dilation of his pupils. The sickening crack of the bones in his arm. The clattering of the scimitar as it falls out of his grasp. The impact with the wall. The bounces off the floor. The wobble of his head as it rebounds off the stone. The sudden slackening of facial muscles. The blanking loss of expression as he blacks out. The stillness.

The ogre chuckled and approached the fallen boy. Then, it gasps in pleasant surprise.

Roy’s eyes blink open.

He doesn’t realise where he is for a moment. He doesn’t realise what’s going on.

Roy, broken beyond all reasonable help, gazed up at the cold, bioluminescent moss on the cave ceiling. He thought it was pretty. Wondered if it was edible. His brief moment of calm was rudely interrupted when he felt the ogre's gargantuan palm grab his left wrist. He’s lifted off the ground, face to face with the grinning ogre. Every fractured bone and tear in Roy’s body screams as he hangs, swaying. He coughs out blood from between his torn lips.

Roy did not want to make this easy.

He lashes out with his right fist, launching a desperate counterattack into the ogre's left eye. His fist breaches the ogre’s skull with the sickening squelch of its eye being squished, and he scoops out its remains as he retracts his fist. The ogre roars in rage as it flings its prey away from it. As the ogre swings, Roy can feel the muscles in his left arm stretch.

And stretch.

There’s a horrible, burning tearing as flesh is pulled from flesh and bone from bone. Tendons and ligaments stretch, tear, and rip. The force of the ogre’s swing rips Roy’s arm straight from his socket as he’s hurled across the dark, dingy cavern. He hits the ground, skidding across jagged rock before coming to a halt. The ringing in his ears almost drowns out the ogre’s agonising wailing. He didn’t realise right away that he lost a limb. He was mostly numb. Realising the state he was currently in took time, and the information came to him slowly. Lying on his side, he grunts as he rolls over to his front. He attempted to put his hands on the ground and push himself up. He only felt control of his right arm. He assumed he no longer had a left arm, so trying to use it was pointless. He didn’t need to think about it any more than that. Slowly, painfully, he makes it to his hand and knees.

He miraculously rises to a knee when the rampaging ogre’s club catches him. The thunderous upward blow breaks some of his ribs and sends him up into the air. Roy, wobbling and off balance, manages to catch himself on his feet. He was thankful for the ogre’s help in that regard. The ogre descends upon him again, hand over his bleeding eyesocket, blinded by bloodlust. Roy clumsily stumbles out of a downward swing, but he gets nicked across his temple by the ogre’s backhand. He stumbles. He catches himself before falling.

It’s not good enough. A second blow lands, breaking Roy’s left thigh. From there, the ogre starts to bludgeon Roy, beating him repeatedly like a rented mule.

There is no longer any joy in this for the ogre.

A third blow crushes his other collarbone.

A fourth pulverises his right ankle.

A fifth ruptures both of his lungs.

The last blow strikes the left half of his face. Roy twists his head as it collides, and the club destroys the cave floor. But the damage was still devastating. It shatters his jaw. It caves in his face just enough that his eye gets shot out of its socket and splatters on the ground. The skin on his face, from brow to chin, was flayed loose. It flutters back, sticking to his face like a slack mask. The ground before Roy collapses under the ogre's brutal swing and opens up beneath him. He falls through. His free fall lasted just short of eight seconds. It was plenty of enough time for him to find amusement in the ogre’s infuriated roar up above. He could tell it really wanted to kill him. But now gravity would steal the satisfaction of turning Roy into a mangled corpse.

Roy crashed into an underground lake. For the first time in several millennia, the still water was disturbed. And for the first time in several millennia, something on the lakebed stirred.