His eyes widening, Christopher hardly managed to push down hard enough to once again remove his face from the warmth of the sand he had lain in. “I can’t… fall… now…” He growled to himself, his clenched teeth and eyes almost feral in nature.

“Such a thing…” He forced himself to lean back onto his bent legs, inhaling sharply as his weight shifted.

“Would be…” He continued the unnecessary monologue simply to keep himself moving. “Pathetic.” He finished; taking his first step out of the imprint he had left on the dry, powdery shore.

He walked like a zombie, constantly twisting his torso to take advantage of a stronger center of gravity whenever he was about to fall down. Behind him dragged a long, sharp scrap of bent metal. He limped down the shores, searching for where he walked into the forest before. “More… mountains?” He mumbled to himself quizzically as he looked up and found numerous mountains that overlooked the entire area. Their gray and white tops pierced the clouds like ruthless spearheads jutting out of the earth, the stone atop them blanketed by thick, powdery sheets of the frozen precipitation.

“Land…?” He became even more confused at the discovery that the island he was on must not have been an island at all. Lush greenery covered the land that was bordered by bright waters of turquoise and green. There was an escape.

Delighted at this prospect, Christopher started to walk faster. He bent forward, began to run despite the ruthless protests of every muscle in his weak body. He dropped the metal sheet and continued forth.

It is a miracle that he didn’t fall as he suddenly stopped, shocked by the appearance of a figure. In the bright sun they were indiscernible as they stepped through shadow, walking slowly towards him.

[…Salvation?] He pondered as he looked on, eyes wide. [Or…] His thoughts trailed as his face contorted in fear of the potential enemy. The figure was definitely feminine, what with its well-defined bust and hips discernible from even such a long distance away. In the end, Christopher was able to do nothing but doubt other humans.

[Wait… what are those?] He pondered as he stared at the top of the figure’s head. Two prominent triangles sat atop her head. […Strange.]

He stared at the figure, not sure how he might respond. He scanned her surroundings, trying to discern what she was doing.

            It didn’t take much to find an answer as she pulled from the undergrowth a large, black figure. It was a fearfully muscular beast, one that he felt an odd familiarity with. “That’s-“

            An enemy. That’s what Christopher saw in the cold-blooded killer of a human in front of him. With his slip of the tongue, he watched as one of those triangular shapes twitched, and she turned towards him. His pupils dilated and air burned his throat as he inhaled sharply, staggering backwards in fear. To him, that figure was the Grim Reaper.

He blacked out for but a second as he watched the figure in the horizon. In just that brief moment, what he saw restored his heart of malice. Within the dark of night, he saw the glint of a recently clean blade stained crimson with sin and hate. The face of insanity stood inches from his vulnerable mind.

Christopher smiled, his chapped and sunburned lips cracking and spouting blood. [There must be just one reason I’m here – otherwise I’d have succumbed to the thousands of reasons I shouldn’t be.] He thought, leaning his body forward so that he could charge forward. He picked up the closest thing he could find to a weapon – a particularly heavy stick. [What’s one more?]

In reality, it wasn’t all that heavy. The weakened and stiff muscles that imprisoned Christopher in his own body made it feel as if it were. The abrasion of it on his frail skin tore it, dyeing the stick in deep red.

Dragging the stick with his one remaining hand, he ran towards the silhouette on the sand, the trail behind him lengthening. The shadow bent her knees and spaced her feet, prepared to respond, but immediately left the position as Christopher tripped. He hit the ground hard (pathetically), and the light that entered his sight through the displaced sand began to flicker and fade, skin on his face scraping. Malaria had taken a serious tax on his unstable body.

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“Eh?” Ilya stared at what had just happened, dumbfounded. Some pale guy had just run across the coast toward her and faceplanted, and still hadn’t gotten up 2 minutes later.

“…” She leaned over his limp body, poking his shoulder curiously. “How does a lone human cross the mountains anyway?”

Ilya flipped him over, assessing him. She put her hand over her eyes to block the sun, wincing as she saw his scratched up face and lost arm. Sighing, she looked over him with sad eyes. “I hope he can still be saved…” Her eyebrows lowered in concern and she lifted him up, leaving the titanic monster behind.

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“NOTHING?” Bellowed a mountain of a man who stood over Ilya.

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“Well, yes, but…” She dodged his infuriated gaze, and it was now that he finally noticed the figure in her arms.

“You DO realize we don’t eat humans, right?” The growling, gruff man looked down his nose at her. “Though I can see that you’re airheaded enough to make such a mistake.”

“Of course we don’t, but he’s hardly hanging on to life!” Ilya cried out in frustration at the man’s density. “We have to help him. How can we not?”

“This is how: refused. We don’t need another one of his kind mucking up our home. Get rid of him before I kill him myself.” The man’s nostrils flared and he picked up a butcher’s knife that would be proportional to the body of nobody smaller than himself.

“But-“ She tried to protest, but was immediately cut off by the man unwilling to negotiate.

“No buts. Get out, we don’t have enough food for one more.” He spat the words out at her, his eyebrows lowering on his fierce expression, blowing black hair out of one of his eyes.

His cooling body still in her arms, Ilya shoved open the noisy wooden door and ran down the makeshift stairs of stones into the alley behind a particularly prominent building in the shade of the tall, thick canopy that covered the settlement. Sweat dripped from her fair skin as she pushed open the surprisingly silent back door. She was greeted by a young girl with the same pointy ears that held the silver color of her hair that lay on her shoulders. Her plain white toga extended down her tall, slender figure, dragging slightly along the ground and giving an impression of a poor fit.

“Good evening, Ilya. For what purpose have you come here?” She spoke with a peaceful, reserved smile, little emotion showing in her professional voice.

“It’s great to see you again, Caltha, but about that whole boulderling inci-“ Ilya attempted to bring up a topic that was immediately shot down by the priestess.

“You need help with something?” Her unmoving smile didn’t include her eyes, causing Ilya to shiver slightly.

“Yes, please!” She piped up and spoke far more loudly than she had before, causing Caltha to recoil slightly in surprise. Looking down, she saw Christopher’s marred face, covered in cracks and blood, unmoving. Hardly any heat still emanated from his desiccated body.

“Resurrection is impossible. You of all people should know that, Ilya.” Caltha responded, looking reluctantly upon the young man. “How did you get him all the way here unnoticed, anyway?”

“Don’t ask unnecessary questions. He’s not dead, and I, no, he needs your help.” Ilya’s voice lost its emotion, became ice-cold. The only thing that Caltha could feel was the impending doom set upon her.

Stepping back slightly, her expression faltered and arms rose slightly before she consented. “Right this way, but… does your father know?”

“…Nope.” She spoke with a poker face as she scanned the white halls. Ornate pillars marked the corners of the pristine walls, no apparent light sources in the room that remained yet bright, especially compared to the perpetual twilight of the forests the small city situated itself in.

The two passed through a tall door, at least twice the height of the already relatively tall Ilya. The room they passed into was a long rectangular room with a large block of what looked like marble at the center. The block was rectangular, with no apparent flaws on its surface. The base of it was surrounded by a small reservoir of crystal-clear water. The floor was covered in tasseled silver and blue mats.

“Lay him upon the-“ Caltha attempted to instruct Ilya, only to be immediately interrupted.

“Yes, I get it.” She responded, rushing over to put him on the cold stone. He still had yet to move.

“The ritual will soon begin. We ask that you do not linger, for reasons we’re sure you already know.” As soon as she was in the room, her personality had changed. Caltha had straightened her spine and half-closed her eyes, her speech more disconnected. Despite being far shorter than Ilya, she seemed far more mature, holding her hands over her abdomen and speaking more seriously. Several others, who likely overheard her, entered the room, kneeling on the mats. “Leave.” She finished sternly, and Ilya turned away and walked out without another word.

Out of the tall building, Ilya shivered, a tired expression on her face. “So scary…” She remarked before running back up the hill, towards the building she had just been in. “Gotta distract him somehow…”

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Author’s Note: Not sure about this chapter, honestly. I could have done it better. Maybe I’ll rewrite when I hit some big mark and want to make this actually decent.

Anyway, thanks a ton for reading! Next chapter will be some time in the next week, and I should be able to get another one that week as well. 2/week sounds pretty good if it doesn’t kill my grades.