12:00 a.m. - At Front Wall Eryndral Village
The fog pressed tight against the front wall like damp cloth, hiding most of the Eryndral Forest behind a heavy, dark veil. The stone under Ryan's hands felt cold and rough. The wind had bite. The quiet night still carried small sounds: a low rustle, a distant owl, a nervous tool clinking against wood. The village behind him was awake and shaking—soft footfalls, hushed voices, the scrape of crates, children trying not to cry.
(Where is this? I don't know where.)
(Okay. Breathe. Think it through.)
He peered through a gap between timbers. Far away, he saw a slow tide of fire. Torches bobbed in long lines across the fields. The Drakensvale army—twenty thousand strong—was on the march, preparing to lay siege. The thought made his stomach twist.
(I'm in a very realistic game. That's the only thing that makes sense. My body feels real. The cold feels real. But this has to be a dream. A simulation. Something.)
He set his backpack down and pulled out his phone and laptop. The small lights on the laptop felt like islands of home in a sea of strange night. He plugged in a tiny speaker he had cobbled together from spare parts. Earlier in the day—out of luck and panic—he had recorded a dragon's roar. He stitched and layered it with simple tools, boosting the low end until it shook his ribs when he tested it.
(If I can't fight, maybe I can trick them. Scare them. Slow them down.)
He glanced back at the villagers. Old men gripped pitchforks white-knuckled. Young women pressed bandages into baskets. A boy carried a stack of arrows that were little more than sharpened sticks. No one here was ready for a real army. No one here could stop twenty thousand trained soldiers. He could not either.
But fear might.
Ryan hunched over the laptop and adjusted the EQ. His fingers stayed steady despite the tightness in his chest. He slid the bass up. He nudged the reverb. He cut highs to add weight to the body of the sound. He layered a slow tail of echo beneath it, so the roar would feel wide, like something rolling in from deep woods.
(Okay. Take what you've got and push it. Move fast.)
Ryan (muttering to himself): "If this is a game, then audio is a mechanic. Fine. Let's mod the boss roar."
He checked the fires again. The army's glow shifted. The line moved nearer—their torches like stars come down to walk.
(This is stupid. But there's no other move. Do it.)
Ryan (low voice, to himself): "Play."
He pressed the key.
The roar thundered out and filled the night, low and long. The wall thrummed with the sound; a loose plank rattled. The air seemed to pulse between each heavy beat. It felt like a storm arriving without wind or rain. Echoes rolled into the trees and back again. Birds lifted somewhere out in the dark.
He watched the far lights. At first, nothing changed. Then movement slowed. Then stopped. Tiny dots separated and milled about like ants after a leaf is lifted.
A soldier's shout drifted across the field, thin with fear.
Drakensvale soldier (shaken): "Did you hear that?"
Ryan's pulse slammed in his ears.
(It's working. Just a bit. Don't get cocky. Press now.)
Villager (urgent, near Ryan): "More!"
Ryan (focus tight): "I'm on it."
He dragged the volume slider higher and stacked another roar on top of the first, offset by a breath so the night wore two voices like a chorus. He added a wobble to the pitch—just enough to feel like many throats hidden in the trees, not one. The sound turned into a broad shadow moving through fog.
The village voices fell quiet. Faces turned toward the forest. Even the mist seemed to listen.
(If they think a dragon is near, they will hesitate. I don't need to win. I just need time.)
Ryan (calling over the wall): "If they think a dragon is coming from the forest, they won't push forward!"
Villager (breathing fast): "Will they run?"
Ryan (eyes on the army lights): "They'll pause first. That's our chance."
He waited as the roar rolled over the fields. Faint sparks flickered among the forward Drakensvale lines—whispered spells, pale runes like blue moths. The fog swallowed most of it.
(I don't know any magic. I can't cast. I can't see my stats. All I have is this noise.)
He added another layer of roar, a shorter burst, rougher, with a crackle at the top end—as if claws scraped stone.
Ryan (to himself, fast): "More body. Make the ground shake."
Through the fog, campfires shifted. Some brightness fell away as torches dropped to dirt. Shields lifted. The line bent and lost perfect shape. The fog pulled the army apart, hiding their faces, turning them into shadows with steel.
Drakensvale soldier (nervous, to his mate): "Be on your guard! The creature is near!"
The villagers around Ryan started to believe. He felt their hope like a warm draft against the cold.
Ryan (steady, louder): "Positions! If they come, you hide and stay put. Don't run."
Villagers pressed tighter behind the wall. Some peeked over. Some could not force themselves to look.
Ryan (to the villagers): "Shout when I say. Let them think we have strength."
A murmur swelled behind him—first thin, then full—rising into a rough chorus that made the wall feel less alone.
Ryan (to himself): "Okay. Push."
He turned the volume to its limit.
The next roar hit hard. It bounced and stacked with earlier layers. For a moment, the night sounded like a deep pit where many beasts breathed and all of them were hungry.
Through the fog, shapes in armor drifted back a pace. A banner slumped. A hand made a broken circle—an old charm against unknown things.
Ryan (shouting): !((If you value your lives, retreat! Face that creature and die, or turn back while there's still time! Choose!))
His words rang, carried by fear more than strength. Villagers grew bold and hurled their own cries into the dark. Torches waved. Shadows jumped across the field.
For a heartbeat, hope made a small home in his chest.
Then the night answered.
It was not his sound.
A low growl came from the forest—not loud, not huge, but deep in a way he felt in his bones. The ground hummed. The hair on his arms rose.
Ryan (a whisper): "God… it's real."
Villager (crying): "No, no, no…"
(That's not mine. That's not from the laptop. That's… something else.)
Ryan (fast, clipped): "Everyone, listen!"
He forced his voice through the panic.
Ryan (commanding): "Do not run—running marks you as prey! Hold the wall. Stay low. Be still."
Young villager (wide-eyed): "But—what are you saying? That thing will eat us!"
Ryan (firm): "It will eat anyone who runs. Villager or soldier. Look at them!"
He pointed beyond the barricade. Even through fog, he saw bodies shift. Tight lines loosened. Some figures stepped back. Others held still only because their feet would not move.
Ryan (lower, to himself): (If I can't control this, none of us walk away.)
An elder near him grabbed the wood with both hands, voice shaking.
Village elder (hoarse): "No… that sound. The Umbrathorax. The Shadow of the Deepwood. The devourer from the old tales."
Young villager (snapping): "Stories to frighten children!"
Village elder (eyes wet): "Stories come from truth."
The forest moved.
Something vast uncoiled and slid between the trunks. The fog made it worse—showing only parts, then hiding them. One moment, a long, terrible outline; the next, a flash of light along chitin plates. Glowing patterns pulsed across its hide in fractal lines, soft gold and blue that smeared through the mist. Its eyes burned like molten metal when they blinked past gaps in the fog. Its wide maw showed a saw of teeth made for cutting, not chewing. Every slow motion carried power and hunger.
Ryan gripped the stone so hard his fingers hurt.
(It's real. I'm in a dream, but this is real.)
(Do not freeze.)
The beast raised its head. Its gaze drifted across the field and over the wall. Ryan felt it land on him like weight. He had to force air into his lungs.
Drakensvale ranks froze, but the fog ate their faces. He saw stiff shoulders, shields held too tight, a banner brushing dirt. He did not see the ones who gave orders. He did not see the big names of the enemy. The fog kept their leaders faceless.
A blade-bright voice cut across the field, made thin by distance and mist.
Unknown commander (commanding): !((Hold the line. Do not break!))
Her words steadied some—shadows drew closer together—but not enough.
The Umbrathorax slid closer. Its tail drew a dark bar across the ground. Its glow grew brighter with each slow breath, as if fed by fear.
Ryan (to the villagers, hard): "Stay down. Keep quiet. Let them take the hit."
Villager (whisper): "Let them? They came to kill us!"
Ryan (flat): "Exactly. Let the monster deal with them."
The Umbrathorax surged. It moved with a strange grace for such size—smooth, like water stepping down a hidden stone. It opened its mouth and roared. The sound shook the trees. Small branches fell like dry rain.
The front broke.
Panic ran like a wave through shadow ranks. Shields came up late. Spears wobbled. Horses screamed. The beast struck, and men vanished into fog. Armor crumpled. Blood sprayed. The smell of iron and smoke hit the wall a heartbeat later, hot and sharp.
Ryan stared. He couldn't look away. He wished he could.
(You wanted fear. You got horror.)
A voice tried to pull order out of the white noise of screams.
Drakensvale officer (yelling): "Retreat! Retreat!"
Too late.
The Umbrathorax tore a path like a plow through mud—except the mud was men and wood and bone. The glowing lines across its hide flared brighter after each kill, then dimmed.
Then Ryan saw something worse.
Where fire had bit deep into the beast's flank, where spearheads had cracked plates, the damage did not stay. The chitin rippled, as if made of shadow putty. Hairline seams pulled together. Soft gold light flowed along the breaks and stitched them closed. Flesh knitted beneath with a wet, crawling hum. A bent plate straightened. A gash sealed into a bruise of light and then faded.
Ryan (a breath, to himself): "Oh, come on… you have a healing factor?"
The Umbrathorax's glow pulsed slow and smug. It fed on fear, on flesh, and on something else he could not name—and it mended itself with it.
Ryan leaned over the wall and swallowed hard. Vomit came without warning, bitter and awful. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and fought for breath.
(You wanted to live. You wanted them to stop. This is the cost.)
The fog rolled low, then lifted in shreds. In one gap, Ryan saw her—the only enemy face the night let him have.
A single figure stood out from the blur. Long dark braid snapping with her turn. Blue eyes sharp as ice. A rune-etched halberd raised high, each rune lighting one by one like small stars. She moved clean and fast, mind and body in one line.
Lyscia (leadership): "Stay sharp, everyone. Remember, tactical advantage comes from the elements we control."
She swung. A crescent of hot flame leapt from the arc and struck the beast's flank. The Umbrathorax roared and the trees trembled. It was hurt, but not for long. The char hardened black, then cracked, then drew shut under a slow skin of light. The scorch line healed to a stain and then to nothing.
Lyscia (determined): "Again! Concentrate fire!"
Around her, only shapes moved—shields, spears, a line of sparks where metal struck chitin. The fog swallowed faces and names. Ryan did not see other leaders. He did not see any famous figures he would remember later. He saw only chaos and ruin, and one woman cutting order into it with fire.
A deeper voice drove a phalanx forward. Ryan could not see the owner in the fog, but he heard the command roll like a drum. The note of it had the gravity of iron.
Varrik (commanding): !((Shields—advance! Pin its legs!))
Another voice, close under the roar, answered with raw belief.
Drakensvale soldier (to his line): "General Varrik commands the host! Twenty thousand! Hold with him!"
Locked shields rose. A mass hit the beast's limb in time with Lyscia's sweep. Splinters flew when its weight slammed into the wall of iron.
Varrik (instructive): "Listen well! Step as one! Brace!"
For a breath, the monster's limb bent and staggered. Spearpoints found joints. The line held like a door shoved by a storm.
Another shape—a fast, sure form—vaulted up onto the beast's limb. Twin blades flashed silver for a heartbeat before fog folded over them again. Each stroke found a thin seam. Each cut drew a hot line across chitin.
Drakensvale officer (rallying cry): "For Drakensvale!"
Some soldiers cheered through fear. They pressed in where they could, stabbing at openings. Hope flickered and went out and flickered again.
Near the ground, flashes of red fire cut under the beast's head, fast and angry. The wielder stayed hidden by fog and distance. Ryan heard a woman's hoarse command, pain in it, fierce and clear.
Unknown commander (furious command): !((Fall back to the perimeter! Stand!))
The Umbrathorax roared again. Its tail lashed. Men flew like rag dolls and vanished into mist. The ground split along a cracked line under the force.
The blade dancer climbed higher. A knife drove under a plate near the neck and twisted.
For one heartbeat, cheers rose.
Then the monster bucked like a wave. The figure flipped—brief and broken against torch-glow—then vanished into the maw. The sound of jaws snapping cut through screams and steel.
A scream answered—raw, full of grief and rage—somewhere inside the fog. Ryan could not see who cried out. He could only feel the pain in that voice. It burned.
Unknown commander (broken cry): "No!"
Fire surged brighter in that direction. Strikes came fast—one, two, ten—but the fog hid the hand that delivered them. Every hit was a wordless oath. Every hit cost strength.
Ryan stared, caught between awe and dread.
(Whoever you are, you're terrifying. And you're breaking.)
Lyscia did not slow. She timed her next arc to the beat of the monster's movements.
Lyscia (cautious): "Let's consider every angle before we move. We mustn't allow impulsiveness to lead us into danger."
She pointed, counted the beats between tail and claw, and filled the gaps with guided flame. Each time her arc struck and burned, the wound tried to hold. Each time, the Umbrathorax's light ran like liquid through cracks and sealed them again. Not perfect—thin, tender places remained—but enough to punish hope.
Varrik's deep voice steadied the line, even as men died under the tail's sweep.
Varrik (resolute): "Every battle is a chance to adjust our course. We must learn from our missteps!"
They hit like hammer and anvil at once. The beast gave a grudging step.
Ryan used the breath that gave him.
Ryan (to the villagers): "Listen to me!"
He set his voice like a stake in the ground.
Ryan (commanding): !((The beast isn't ours to fight—but the soldiers are! They're broken—strike while they falter! Aim at the army, not the monster! Loose arrows! Throw stones! Drive them back from our homes!))
Villagers looked at each other and moved. Some shot crude arrows. Some hurled torches. Flames arced and sparked wherever they fell. The Drakensvale line, already torn, twisted further as panic spread.
A few in the front saw the torches and thought it new magic. They flinched. Lines bent to avoid stray flame. The tightness that had been Drakensvale's pride loosened another notch.
Lyscia kept carving fire lanes, mind cold even with heat in her hands.
Lyscia (strategic): "Tail sweeps left after the jaw reels—aim for the joint when it plants!"
Her people did as she said, and a few lived because they did.
But the Umbrathorax healed as it fought. A spear that pierced a seam left a hole for a breath. Then gold light stitched it shut. A halberd cut through a plate and drew a long burn. The char peeled like bark and closed. The beast shook and mended and came on.
Ryan's throat felt dry as dust.
(I don't have magic. I don't have power. I have sound and a stupid plan and a stomach that won't stop turning.)
He gripped the wall and forced himself to keep watching.
The world narrowed: fog, flame, shadow, blood. He did not see banners clearly. He did not see faces. He did not see the famous ones of the enemy; only the ruin they tried to hold back, and Lyscia's runes burning steady as a metronome in hell.
The night itself began to change. Thin silver lines drew along the far horizon. Dawn crept like breath under a door. The fog clung low, heavy, but the light above it grew.
The Umbrathorax felt it.
The glow across its body flickered out of rhythm. It paused in the middle of rage, head tilted, listening to a law deeper than war.
Ryan saw it. The beast did too.
(You're bound to night. Day pushes you back.)
The Umbrathorax let out a roar that sounded like hunger and anger and something left unfinished. It turned. It slid into the trees. Its glow faded between the trunks and went out. The last branch it brushed swung for a long time, a slow pendulum over fresh ruin.
Silence rolled over the field—then the sounds of after. Groans. Sobs. Armor clattering down. Flames crackled where torches had fallen. Horses cried. The smell of blood and smoke and crushed plants soaked the air.
Varrik tried to pull the remains of his army back in order. He did not retreat like a rout; he forced a staggered fold.
Varrik (serious): "Rear ranks—cover the wounded! Shields, turn! Fall back by files!"
A runner's voice cracked, raw with smoke.
Drakensvale runner (hoarse): "General Varrik! The host is cut! We need a lane!"
Another voice, ragged and fierce, cut through from the fog's heart.
Unknown commander (serious): "Make no mistake; every life lost weighs heavily upon us all. We fight not just for victory but for those we stand beside."
Her words held a promise and a weight. Men lifted heads that had sagged. They tried to move.
They did not get far.
From behind the Drakensvale lines—on the far side of the fields, beyond where Ryan could see well—horns sounded. Not the low, disciplined note of an imperial call. Wild. Short. Many. Arrows hissed in a swarm from an unseen hedge line. Dark fletching fell among torches and men. Shapes shifted at the edge of the fog. No banners showed. No colors. Only a press of new motion where retreat should have been.
Drakensvale soldier (panicked): "Rear attack! From the west—who—?"
Another cried out with a sound like someone griping at fate.
Drakensvale soldier (furious): "We're flanked! Move! Move!"
The unknown force did not need numbers. It needed timing. It struck the rear as the front reeled, and the retreat folded into itself.
Varrik's voice came like a bell hit with a hammer.
Varrik (commanding): !((Hold your nerve! Rear ranks, wheel left! First files, form a back shield!))
Men obeyed where they could. Many could not.
Ryan could not see who had come. He saw only arrows planted in mud and in men, shafts with no mark he could name. He heard only the horn echoes and the scrape of feet trying to change direction in chaos. The unknown force did not press near the wall. It harried the back edge, turned an ordered fall-back into a knot.
Villager (whisper, shocked): "Who is that? Are they with us?"
Ryan (flat, honest): "I don't know."
He saw a few Drakensvale officers trying to signal through the mess—arms raised, swords flashing. The fog swallowed gestures. Messages broke apart between bodies. The army became many small islands trying not to sink.
That made it worse for everyone.
A wounded knight, half-armored and smeared with soot and blood, dragged himself toward the village wall. He used the confusion like a cloak. He crawled with the messy strength of the half-dead, eyes wild. There was no plan there. Only raw survival.
Ryan pulled himself back a step as he saw the man's shape climbing. His heartbeat spiked.
(Shit.)
The knight hooked a knee over the edge and heaved himself up. He came forward at Ryan with a sloppy arc of a blade fueled by panic. There was no finesse. Just hate and fear and a will not to die alone.
Ryan threw up his arms too late.
Steel flashed. Pain burned white from his left shoulder to his spine. Blood ran hot down his chest. His left arm went cold and then was not there at all. It felt like the world had been cut and some part removed.
Ryan (scream): "Ah—!"
Sound shrank to an empty ring. His vision pulsed black at the edges. He stumbled. His hands—one hand—clutched at ruin. His fingers slid in blood.
The knight staggered for a second strike, mouth open, breath sour.
A gaunt villager lunged from the side, mud on his face, eyes huge. He carried a broken spear haft like a stake.
Villager (desperate cry): "Haaah!"
He drove the blunt end into the knight's side. It slid between dented plates and found flesh. The soldier spasmed. His blade fell from his hand and clanged against stone. He toppled over the wall and vanished into fog.
Ryan fell too. His legs folded under him. The stone met his back hard. Cold crept in. He pressed his right hand to the stump where his left should be. The heat there was wrong and scary and wet. His breath came fast and shallow. Each inhale felt like sipping air through a straw.
He stared upward. The sky, beyond the lifting fog, was pale with early light. It felt strange and cruel that a new day should be born here.
Faces blurred in and out above him. Someone shouted for cloth. Someone sobbed. Someone prayed.
Ryan (thin, inside his head): (I don't know where. I don't know how to live here. I don't know any skill, status, magic, ability. This is a game. This is a dream. Please let it be a dream.)
Beyond the wall, the field was a wreck. Bodies lay everywhere. The ground wore a long, dark stain where the beast had passed. In the distance, horn calls still twisted through fog. The unknown force did not press toward the wall, but its pressure kept the Drakensvale retreat tangled and slow. Men tried to carry their wounded and were forced to drop them to lift shields against arrows that came from no flag. Varrik's orders beat like drum strokes, hard and plain, but the air itself seemed to resist shape.
Varrik (resolute): "Rear guard—hold! Center, step back! Do not run!"
Lyscia's halberd burned one last line of fire to push a lane open. Her voice cut even in the after-noise.
Lyscia (leadership): "Stay sharp! We clear our people first—eyes up!"
Her rune-light flickered as her breath hitched. She did not stop.
From somewhere deeper in the fog, that unseen, hoarse woman spoke again. The edge of grief had not left her voice, but iron had joined it.
Unknown commander (encouraging): "We'll get through this, together."
Ryan thought he heard people answer her—not with words he could make out, but with the gravity of motion that follows a leader. He could not see her face. He could not see their banners. He could only feel the shape of will in the noise.
He shut his eyes, then forced them open. He could not afford the dark yet.
He thought of his small room back home. The glow of a monitor. The quiet hum at 10 p.m. The way his phone felt safe in his hand. It seemed absurd against blood and fog and the taste of iron.
Ryan (hoarse whisper to himself): "If there's a cosmic programmer out there, they need better QA."
His lips pulled in a weak, hurt laugh that shook his whole body. It hurt more than it helped.
He blinked. The world pulled away.
Darkness came as if someone turned a page.
Some time earlier in that same night, before the beast came but after the first roar, Ryan felt alone despite the crowd below. In those small breaths between actions, he muttered to himself—the habit of an introvert who hates to speak to many people but talks when no one is listening.
Ryan (to himself, under his breath): "Okay. You got thrown into a world that makes no sense. You don't know where you are. No map. No tutorial. You can't pull up skills. You can't check status. You have a phone and a laptop. That's it."
He adjusted knobs and kept his fingers from shaking.
Ryan (quiet joke to himself): "If there's a cosmic programmer out there, they need better QA."
He checked the line of fires again.
Ryan (to himself): "I need them to stop. I need them to slow. I can't fight twenty thousand. I can't fight one trained knight. I can barely fight a flight of stairs."
He shook his head and took a breath.
Ryan (steadying himself): "We'll figure this out. Debug life, one bug at a time."
When villagers looked at him for answers, he swallowed hard.
Ryan (to himself): (I don't want to talk to a crowd. I don't do speeches. My chest is tight. My mouth is dry. But if I don't speak now, we die.)
So he spoke, because he had to, and the fog carried his voice farther than he liked.
Ryan (calling): !((Shout! Show no weakness! Let them think we will not break!))
The villagers' voices rose with his. For a few breaths, the wall felt taller.
As the Umbrathorax tore the field, officers tried to anchor the army again, but Ryan could not see them. He saw only what the fog allowed—Lyscia's runes burning steady, her halberd drawing lines of fire; the deep roll of Varrik's commands; shapes of shields pushing together; sparks of impact; men falling and not rising.
Lyscia counted breaths between each beast strike and filled the gaps with ordered flame.
Lyscia (strategic): "Let's analyze the movement—tail sweeps left after it reels from the jaw. Aim for the joint when it plants!"
Her people did as she said, and a few lived because they did.
Varrik set himself where the fear was worst and spoke like a wall.
Varrik (cautious): "Do not underestimate our foe. Brace every step."
Somewhere in the fog, another woman—hoarse, serious—spoke to those near her, words full of weight and care. Ryan could not see her face.
Unknown commander (serious): "Make no mistake; every life lost weighs heavily upon us all. We fight not just for victory but for those we stand beside."
Then dawn crept close—but was not here yet—and the beast left, and the cost of living another hour lay everywhere. The unknown force struck the rear like a knife in a crowd. And the retreat of the Drakensvale host, commanded by General Varrik, turned from a plan into a struggle against hands Ryan could not name.
Ryan heard one last voice before the dark took him. It might have been real, dream, game, or just inside his skull.
Villager (soft, near his ear): "Stay with us, lad. Stay."
Ryan wanted to answer, to say any small thing—something brave or clever or simple. He tried to say, "Okay." He tried to say, "I'm here."
No sound came out.
He fell into the quiet that waits when a night ends and a new day begins, not knowing if he would see that day at all.