Joey’s unconscious body lay still at the bottom of the hill, half-buried in a patch of leaves and dirt. The world around him was silent, save for the distant rustle of trees swaying in the breeze. Yet within his mind, chaos reigned.
A dream... no, more like a memory, gripped him.
He was standing in nothingness. No walls, no sky, no ground. Just endless, infinite black. He wasn’t alone. There was something or someone there with him. A figure stood in the distance, blurry and indistinct, as though it were made of smoke. Joey squinted, but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t make out any features.
The figure spoke. At first, the words were incomprehensible, like garbled static in his ears. But then they shifted, resolving into a steady rhythm. The voice spoke again, slowly this time, repeating the same phrase.
"Quis es? Quo vadis?"
("Who are you? Where are you going?")
Joey’s mouth opened, but no sound came out. The words echoed again, louder this time. They were strange, foreign, yet familiar enough to stir something deep within him.
"Quis es? Quo vadis?"
Joey’s lips moved of their own accord, forming the shapes of the words. To his shock, his voice came out clear and steady, as though he had always known how to say them.
"Quis… es? Quo… vadis?"
The figure stepped closer, though it remained shrouded. Its voice grew firmer, faster, commanding. Words Joey didn’t understand spilled forth, flooding his mind. At first, it was overwhelming. Like a tidal wave of sounds and syllables but then something clicked. Piece by piece, the language began to make sense. He didn’t just hear the words; he felt their meanings, their weight, as if they were being etched into his very soul.
The figure’s voice softened.
"Intellige… Dic…"
("Understand… Speak…")
And then Joey woke up.
The first thing he noticed was the pain. His body ached all over, and his head throbbed as though someone had hit him with a brick. He groaned, opening his eyes to see the canopy of trees above him, their leaves rustling in the wind. The second thing he noticed was the strange clarity in his mind. It was as if a piece of a puzzle had snapped into place, though he didn’t know why or how.
Joey sat up slowly, wincing as he felt a sharp pain in his side. He glanced around, taking in his surroundings. He was at the bottom of a forested hill, dirt and leaves clinging to his clothes. A distant memory of running, falling, and… the dream. The words from the dream echoed in his head.
"Quis es… Quo vadis…"
The phrase felt so natural now. Without thinking, he muttered it aloud, and to his astonishment, the words rolled off his tongue as if he had spoken them a hundred times before.
“What the hell…?” Joey whispered, his voice trembling. He tried saying something else in the strange language, testing it, and the words came out effortlessly.
His heart raced. This wasn’t normal. Nothing about this was normal.
But there was no time to dwell on it. Suddenly there was a sound in the distance. The rustling of leaves, the faint crunch of footsteps, snapped Joey out of his thoughts. Someone, or something, was approaching.
The rustling of leaves grew louder, and Joey could see a few branches and bushes shifting unnaturally in the distance.
“There’s definitely something out there,” he muttered to himself, his voice trembling. Joey tried to push himself up, but a sharp, stabbing pain coursed through his body. He fell back with a groan, his hands instinctively inspecting his injuries.
His arms looked fine. His upper body seemed intact too. But when his eyes scanned down to his legs, he noticed something different. There was a medium-sized wound on his right leg, bleeding sluggishly, staining the fabric of his pants. It wasn’t life-threatening, but compared to the rest of his body, his legs were in far worse shape. He could still move them, though,thank God. At least he wouldn’t have to deal with paralysis in this strange, unknown world.
The sound of rustling leaves grew louder. Whatever was out there, it was close. Joey’s heart pounded as he braced himself for what might come.
Suddenly, the bushes directly in front of him parted. A man emerged, stepping through the underbrush with the quiet confidence of someone who knew this terrain well. He looked to be in his late twenties, his build strong and powerful.
The man had broad shoulders and muscular arms, his physique clearly shaped by years of physical labor or hunting. His skin was sun-kissed and rough, as though it had weathered countless days under the open sky. A short, trimmed beard framed his square jawline, and his dark eyes gleamed with a mix of caution and curiosity.
He wore a sleeveless tunic made of coarse, earthy fabric, belted at the waist with a strip of leather. A small, sheathed dagger hung from his belt, and in his right hand, he carried a short spear with a sharpened stone tip. On his feet were sturdy leather sandals, strapped tightly around his calves. Over one shoulder, he carried a hunting pouch made from animal hide, its contents hidden except for a few tufts of fur and scraps of leather. A quiver of crude, hand-made arrows was strapped to his back, with a small bow slung diagonally across his torso.
The man stopped a few paces from Joey, his sharp gaze taking in the injured stranger before him. His grip on the spear tightened slightly, though he made no immediate move to attack. For a moment, there was only silence, the tension in the air palpable.
The man, who looked every bit the hunter, locked eyes with Joey. For a moment, the forest was filled only with the soft rustling of leaves and the distant chirping of birds. Then, after the tense silence, the man spoke.
“Who are you, and what happened?”
Joey stared at him, utterly bewildered. His mind raced. Not just because, minutes after waking up in the dirt, he was suddenly face-to-face with a stranger but because he could understand him. He could understand the words. Unlike the chaotic babble of the merchant earlier, this man’s speech was clear. Comprehensible.
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“Hello? Do you understand me?” the man repeated, his voice firm yet edged with curiosity.
Snapped back to reality, Joey blinked and looked up at him. He hesitated. Just because he could understand the words didn’t mean he could speak the same language fluently, did it? What if he fumbled?
“H-He… Hello,” Joey stammered.
As soon as the word left his lips, he froze. That wasn’t English. It was Latin, or whatever language this was supposed to be. The realization hit him like a punch to the gut.
The hunter tilted his head slightly, his expression a mix of confusion and mild amusement. He thought to himself,
"Hello? That’s it? Is this guy dazed, or did he hit his head harder than I thought?"
Another brief but uncomfortable silence fell between them.
The man finally shifted his stance, lowering his spear slightly and relaxing his posture. He seemed to decide Joey wasn’t a threat.
“All right,” the man said, his tone softening, “I don’t think you have any bad intentions. And if you do, you’re not in much of a position to act on them, judging by the state of your leg.”
He gestured toward Joey’s injured leg with the tip of his spear. Blood was still seeping from the wound, staining the ground beneath it.
“That looks bad,” the man continued. “What you’re wearing looks… strange. But it’s so torn up, you probably don’t need it anymore. Take it off, I’ll use it to bandage your leg. After that, you’ll tell me who you are and what you’re doing in this forest.”
Joey nodded hesitantly. He reached down and peeled off his shredded T-shirt, wincing as the motion sent a sharp pain through his body. His shorts weren’t in much better condition either. They looked like they’d been through an explosion.
“This might hurt a bit,” the man warned.
The hunter tore the least-damaged part of Joey’s shirt and flipped it inside-out, revealing the cleaner inner side. He wrapped the fabric tightly around the wound, making sure to cover it completely, and then without warning yanked it tight and tied a thick knot to secure it.
The sudden, intense pain ripped through Joey like fire.
“AHHHHHH!” Joey screamed, his voice echoing through the trees. The pain caught him completely off guard. In fairness, he still wasn’t entirely in his right mind, whether from the fall, the injury or simply not processing the insane events unfolding around him.
“Goddammit, that hurts!” Joey shouted, his voice strained. He wasn’t addressing anyone in particular, his eyes were fixed on the sky above the trees, staring at the vast expanse of blue above.
“When will it end?” was his last coherent thought before the pain, exhaustion, and sheer mental overload became too much. His vision blurred, his head fell back, and once again, Joey slipped into unconsciousness.
Joey’s mind stirred, pulling him back from the darkness of unconsciousness. But instead of waking up in the forest where he had collapsed, he found himself in that strange place again. He stood, or floated, in a space with no walls, no ground, no sky. It wasn’t empty exactly; a faint shimmer of mist or light surrounded him, shifting and swirling without form.
And then, there it was again... the figure.
Still blurry, still indistinct. Like smoke trying to take the shape of a person but never fully forming. Its voice cut through the silence.
“There you are again. Can you understand me now?”
Joey’s heart skipped a beat. He felt like his brain was fraying at the edges. Where was he? Was he even alive? Was he dreaming? Or was he... something else entirely? He couldn’t trust his senses anymore.
“Y-yes, I can understand you,” Joey stammered, his voice trembling.
The figure tilted its head slightly, as though amused.
“Ah, the gentleman can speak now. What a surprise,” it said, its tone dripping with sarcasm.
Joey squinted, trying to make out the figure’s details, but it was impossible. The figure remained shrouded, its edges constantly shifting, almost vibrating. It was like looking through a fogged-up window that refused to clear. Whatever it was, it clearly didn’t want to be fully seen, or perhaps Joey’s mind simply couldn’t comprehend its true form.
“Where am I?” Joey asked, his voice cracking. “And who… who are you?”
The figure’s tone grew sharper, almost playful.
“That’s what I should be asking you. What in the world are you doing here in this… well, let’s call it the Void, for lack of a better term.”
Joey blinked, his mind spinning.
“The Void?” he repeated. “What does that even mean? Am I dead? What’s going on?”
The figure laughed softly, a sound that echoed unnaturally in the space around him.
“You’re not dead. At least, not yet. But you are… misplaced. Out of sync. You shouldn’t be here, Joey.”
Joey’s stomach churned at the mention of his name. How did this thing know who he was?
Joey stood in the Void, an endless, undefined expanse with no walls, no floor, no sky. It was as if he floated, yet somehow he felt anchored to a single spot. In front of him appeared the figure again, hazy and indistinct, as if made of swirling smoke and light. Every time he tried to focus on it, the details blurred, like a face glimpsed through frosted glass.
The figure spoke, its voice echoing unnaturally in the empty space:
“Do you even know who you are?”
Joey blinked, stunned. The question hit him harder than he expected. What kind of question was that? Of course, he knew who he was… didn’t he? His mind reeled for a moment, grasping at pieces of himself, his identity, his life.
"I’m 20 years old," he thought. "I live in New Zealand. I’m in my fourth semester studying business administration. I graduated high school during COVID and started university right after. I love fitness, video games like Total War and strategy games. Those games… they got me through tough times and my childhood. Maybe that’s why I recognized those clothes and that language earlier—they’ve always been in those games to make things feel authentic."
Joey’s mind wandered further. His parents worked hard, always traveling for business. Since he was 15, they’d agreed together, that it was okay for them to focus on their careers again. They still cared for him deeply, even if they weren’t around much. And Joey was fine with it. They had a good relationship, and he respected their choices. He was an only child with little connection to extended family, but that didn’t bother him. He enjoyed solitude.
He thought of the hobbies he dabbled in: playing guitar and piano every few months, progressing just enough to impress himself before he set them aside again. He wasn’t lost. He knew who he was.
Or did he?
In his current state, confused and overwhelmed, Joey couldn’t blame anyone for questioning everything, including himself. But as the figure’s question lingered, something about it irritated him. Finally, he snapped.
“Who am I? I’m me,” he said, his voice firm despite his confusion.
For a split second, Joey thought he saw a flicker of something in the figure’s form—a brief moment of happiness, maybe even satisfaction. It was so quick he couldn’t be sure, but something felt different. Not bad, just… odd.
The figure’s laugh broke the silence. It echoed around him, bouncing in strange, distorted tones. It didn’t feel like a real laugh, it was almost artificial, as though the Void itself amplified and twisted the sound. Joey’s brain tried to make sense of it, applying patterns like it always did, trying to process the unprocessable.
“Good answer,” the figure said, amusement lacing its voice. “I like it. Let’s hope it stays that way.”
Joey frowned, annoyed now. “Why did you bring me here? What am I doing in this place?”
The figure tilted its head. “That’s a question only you can answer.”
Joey clenched his fists, irritation bubbling up. “Yeah, great. Thanks for nothing. Fuck you, too,” he muttered angrily.
The figure laughed again, this time louder. “Don’t lose yourself, Joey. You’ll find your path.” Its voice echoed unnaturally, the laughter resonating even as the figure began to fade. It became lighter, less distinct, until it was nothing more than a wisp of smoke.
“What the—hey, don’t disappear on me! What the hell is this cliffhanger bullshit? Come back here!” Joey shouted, furious.
Another laugh, faint and distant, echoed one last time before everything went silent.
From above, at least from Joey’s perspective in the void, a golden orb of light began to descend. It was small, glowing softly, with a faint radiance that pulsed like a heartbeat. Joey instinctively reached out and touched it. The moment his fingers made contact, words filled his mind, clear and unwavering.
"The Seed of Memory".
The Seed of Memory grants the bearer enhanced recall of past and future events, encompassing thoughts, movements, and learned skills. The strength of the memory varies based on the bearer’s existing knowledge and understanding. For example, one cannot draw a world map without first studying cartography.
“What the hell…” Joey muttered.