Void, not darkness, not light, not sound.

  Only a relentless emptiness. Nothingness.

  And then pain.

  It wasn’t a sharp cut or spike. No, this was all of me being torn apart at once.

  Every fiber, every nerve, shredded instantaneously. Every thought, every fragment of who or what I was pulled and split apart, twisted into shapes and figures that were almost human, almost me, but never whole—I screamed, but nothing happened, it was lost to the black. Memories surfaced, bright and fleeting. Hands that had held mine, gentle and steady. Whispers telling me it would be okay. Telling me I would heal and wake up. I reached for them desperately, but the fragments slipped through my fingers, ripped away before I could grasp them. Each memory tore away from me, leaving cracks and emptiness where they had been. All that was left and all that was there was pure blank void.

  It lasted for an eternity. Long enough that fear turned into exhaustion. Long enough that pain stopped being sharp and became constant. Too long to be a moment. I had no body, no thought, no feeling. But yet, I did.

  An unknown amount of time passed in this emptiness until something changed.

  Suddenly I was dragged out of this space and feeling slammed into me like knives. My lungs screamed as I gasped for air. My back pressed against something hard. Every inch of my body protested, every movement sent ripples of fire burning through my bones. I tried to lift my head, but I couldn’t. My hands scratched against the ground, digging into the mud. My hands shook so badly I could barely feel them.

  I forced myself upright and leaned against a nearby tree, my legs trembling like I had never walked before. Every breath ripped my chest apart. Every heartbeat pounded in my temples. I moved my gaze to the grey sky, it was raining. I blinked, trying to make sense of the shapes around me. The tall dark trunks, the tangle of branches and underbrush. Nothing felt familiar. I couldn’t remember my own name, who I was, where I had come from. I only remember existing? My memories were jumbled, but I could recall a feeling of being in an emptiness until I wasn’t? It was unexplainable. There were no words, no thoughts, that could explain what I experienced and felt. I’m only able to recall it now…I don’t remember experiencing it. What the hell is going on? To keep my sanity, I shoved those thoughts and feelings deep into the recesses of my mind.

  I looked down and stared at my clothes. I had on a light brown tunic, black faded pants, and a pair of brown boots. I don’t remember ever putting them on or where I got them. They were covered in dried blood and had holes poked all throughout them.What happened to me?

  I moved my hand to brush away my hair and froze.

  My hair is pure white. Not the color it had been. I think. Not the brown I thought I remembered. It clung to my face, soaked and tangled with rain and mud. I touched it slowly, hesitantly, running my fingers through the strands again and again, trying to make it real, trying to find an anchor to hold onto, but it only reminded me of everything I had lost.

  Something had changed.

  I am the same as before but…not.

  This place is…different.

  Every small movement I made was agony, but I couldn’t lie there forever, I had a feeling that I had to move, somehow. I looked around and surveyed my surroundings. The forest I found myself in was thick and dense with towering trees and tangles of underbrush. The branches were covered in small wet needles, dripping water to the forest floor below. The ground was made up of dark mud, dead needles, and wet moss covered branches.

  I tried to stand and managed to unsteadily get up.

  My body protested violently, almost passing out, but step by step, I started to slowly walk.

  The forest had plants and critters that felt familiar like they belonged to another place, but it also had things that I didn't recognize. Occasionally, I would pass a plant that felt different, they felt like they were glowing but didn’t emit light. There were no words to explain the feeling. I bent down to pick one of them up. It was a blue flower with a stem and no leaves. I plucked a petal off of it and clenched it in my hand, blue liquid dripped out of my fist. The liquid felt so…energizing, so…safe.

  I lifted it to my mouth and squeezed a drop onto my tongue. I swallowed and instantly regretted it. It felt like fire. Burning white hot flames cascading down my throat and into my esophagus. I instantly passed out.

  When I woke up, I lay for a while. I had to remember this moment. This world was not for the carefree. I needed to be careful or I would end up dead.

  I touched my throat. Oddly though, it felt fine. Like nothing happened.

  I moved to stand up and paused, I could have sworn my legs had felt like agony to use. They felt a little better now. I could actually move around, still painful, but not crippling.

  How long was I asleep?

  The sun had barely moved from its previous position, so it couldn’t have been more than a few minutes. I looked at my arms which had been covered in scratches from walking through brush and leaning against trees.

  They looked slightly healed.

  That's not possible though. Right?

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  I jumped up to my feet and walked a few paces and walked back. It felt like my body had recovered slightly.

  This is…good? I suppose there were trade offs. Immense pain in order to be healed. It was a comedic irony. At least, that's what I told myself.

  I grabbed another petal. I had to test it. I knew what to expect now, I could withstand it.

  My hands shook as I held the pedal above my mouth.

  I squeezed out a drop and swallowed. Instantly my throat lit up and burned. My eyes watered and my legs buckled. I lay on the ground writhing in agony. My vision swam. My body tried to shut down but I didn’t let it, I couldn’t let it. I felt every nerve in my body light up in pain. I could withstand it. I have withstood it. This was nothing.

  I looked at my arms. I felt and saw the scratches close up little by little. Finally, after endless minutes of agony, the pain faded away as if it had never been there.

  I stood up. My body felt better, not fully healed but I knew I could run if I needed to.

  I wrapped a bunch of those petals up in large leaves, tied them up with vines, and shoved them into my pockets. It would be worth carrying these flowers with me. I didn’t know if I would find more of them, so I grabbed as many as I could.

  Now that I was less distracted by pain, I noticed how hungry I was. I needed to find some food soon, but I had to be careful, I couldn’t eat something and be out of commission again or worse, dead.

  Moving through the forest felt like a breeze compared to before, I could concentrate so much more on staying quiet and being more aware of my surroundings.

  Just then, I heard something and froze.

  What was that? I could have sworn I heard a branch break.

  Before discovering the blue flowers, I could have passed that off as a coincidence, but now I knew the real danger of my situation. Nothing was what it seemed.

  I immediately took cover and hid behind a tree while searching for something that could pass as a weapon. I slowly bent down and grabbed a nearby sharp rock and a thick stick with a sharp broken end.

  I looked around the tree and froze in terror. Blood drained out of my face and my legs started to shake. The monster was huge. It looked like a huge wolf with six eyes and a long snarling tongue snaking out of its mouth. It had huge fangs and its mouth was matted with black and red gunk. Its fur looked coarse and rough.

  I'm going to die.

  The monster was around 200 yards away and sniffing on the ground looking for something. Looking for me.

  I desperately tried to think of a way out. I looked closer at the beast. There! It was limping, on its rear hind leg was an open wound covered in green mucus. It looked badly infected or poisoned. If I could find a way to leverage this, I might be able to get away.

  It suddenly looked up and stared deep into my eyes. I was paralyzed in fear. I couldn’t move.

  It started running at me at full sprint ignoring its wounded leg. Foam dripped out of its mouth. Its eyes were crazed and bloodshot.

  MOVE! I shouted at myself in my head. If I don’t move I die. I bit my tongue hard and the pain woke me up.

  I wasn’t going to be able to get out of this situation unscathed. Thinking quickly, I took some of the blue flower petals out, rolled them into balls, and wrapped them up in leaves so they were sealed.

  I looked at the monster sprinting towards me. I was out of time. I shoved two of the balls into my pockets and put one of them into my mouth. I grabbed the thick stick and jammed one end of it into the dirt with the broken point facing the monster. I only had one shot at this.

  When the monster was close enough that I could see the whites of its eyes, I tensed and braced myself.

  The monster made contact with the stick and instead of driving itself into the stick, it shattered it to pieces.

  What the hell? I hadn’t expected for the monster's fur to be so damn impenetrable.

  The wolf’s momentum being halted by the stick caused it to tumble over and roll across the ground. But not before reaching out its huge claw and smashing it across my chest and shoulder, sending me tumbling away.

  Dammit. I looked down at my body and grimaced in pain. The whole upper left side of my chest and shoulder looked bad. I was losing blood fast.

  I bit down on the petals I had stored inside my mouth.

  I groaned, feeling the now familiar sense of my throat and nerves on fire. My mind was clouded over from the damage and healing, but I stayed conscious enough to look over at the monster.

  Although there was less damage than I thought there would be, the stick had done its job, parts of it had shattered and impaled itself inside of the wolf's shoulder. Both legs on the same side of its body were now wounded and the wolf had a hard time struggling to its feet. It got up and as soon as it put weight on its legs, it crashed right back down into the ground.

  This is my chance.

  While still holding the rock, I stumbled and crawled towards the six eyed wolf which was still trying to get up.

  As I got closer, it snarled and swiped at me. Doing so, however, put it off balance and before it could recover, I lunged towards it and holding my rock with two hands, I drove it into the creature's skull over and over again. Although the rock didn’t even get close to piercing its thick fur, I could tell it was doing damage. The monster flailed around snarling. Trying to reach me. But it couldn’t see anymore and was too dazed to do anything.

  Finally, after a number of hits, it finally succumbed to its injuries and lay still.

  I released a breath I hadn’t realized I'd been holding and collapsed to the ground, spent. I laid there for a while and soon felt the adrenaline give way to pain. Looking down at my body, I noticed that I had been sliced up and had cuts all over. Groaning, I shakily reached into my pocket and grabbed out two healing petals. Putting them into my mouth, I bit down into them and swallowed the liquid inside. My body fought desperately to shut itself down, but before I let it, I noticed something through my blurry fading eyes.

  There were 4 men approaching me warily from a distance. They wore metal armor and had weapons at the ready. From how they were positioned, it seemed that they were trained soldiers. They were formed up in a diamond formation with the man in front holding a shield and the man in the back holding a bow. The other two men on either side held swords.

  What the… Was all I could think before passing out.