Stale grass snapped underfoot as the young man stumbled through the mist shrouded desolation of the Barren. Above him, the faint silhouettes of the three moons shone through the cowl of moisture that suffocated him. Tears cascaded from his eyes. His shoulders shuddered with sobs.

The young man gripped his forearm, in a feeble attempt to stop the blood from flowing out of the gash that stretched up the length of his forearm. Thick, oozing purple blood seeped through his trembling fingers. Black, bulging veins snaked up around the gash, pulsing and throbbing with manifested malice. His knees buckled, exhausted from days of running, hiding and fighting. He couldn’t remember a time when his face was clean, and his hair was golden. In fact, he could no longer remember his face at all. He could no longer remember himself or who he had once been. There was nothing left. Nothing but tremors of anguish, like the aftershocks of an earthquake caused by the physical force of pure loss. Fear. Terror. Hatred.

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But they were all leaving him. Seeping out his arm along with his blood. The blood that was no longer red.

He collapsed to the ground, defeated. He slammed his bloody fist into the dirt, tilted his head back and thrashed. “Damn you! Damn you Uthroldran!” But his screams came out tangled and distorted from the knot in his throat. He rasped deep lungfuls of the wet, sickly sweet air around him. The tangy scent of the creatures that plagued this cursed place flooded his nostrils.

Then his head cocked, and he listened. In the distance, was the cry of… a human. Or an elemni. He was unsure. Either way, it must’ve been his friends. They were the only ones that would be anywhere near him. The only ones brave enough to enter such a place. That meant that they were looking for him, which was why he needed to run.