The gaunt man opened his eyes and looked around, confused.
"I… am not dead?"
He was laying down on a cold, polished floor, looking upwards at the ceiling. The first thing he noticed was that all of his wounds seemed to disappear. Not only external damages to his body, but also internal damages. He glanced left and right at his arms to confirm this fact. He sat up with ease and took a look around the room, placing his right arm on the floor for balance.
There were many strange things about this place he somehow ended up in. First off, everything was constructed out of some sort of refined black stone. What was strange about the building was the fact that the stone seemed to be one form, rather than multiple bricks of stone put together to create a larger structure. It was unnaturally smooth, but not so smooth to the point where the man could see his own reflection. They reflected a red hue which seemed to come from the center of the room.
Which led to the second thing the gaunt man noticed. There were red lamps, a lot of them. They sat at the bottom of thick pillars that spanned from the bottom of the room to the top, accompanied by masterfully artisaned tan vases. Moving his gaze upwards, the man noticed a dome encompassing the center stage.
'Must be some sort of cathedral… a place of worship? Worshipping something… those lamps probably have something to do with it. They look eerily red.'
Struck by curiosity, the man got up and walked weirdly towards one of the lanterns, still getting used to the fact that his body wasn't mangled. Eventually, he reached the closest lantern to him.
'That is… huge.'
The lantern was way too big to be used as an actual lantern. In fact, it reached halfway up the gaunt man's body, with the place where the handle was supposed to be being at the same level as his waist. The overall design of the lantern didn't have much, its austere surface seemingly being composed of a dark alloyed steel. It was then that the gaunt man noticed a barely noticeable seam on the top of the lantern.
Another worm of curiosity crawled into his thoughts, nagging at him to open the lantern. The smart thing to do would be to leave the lantern alone and continue exploring the rest of the cathedral to figure out how the gaunt man ended up here. But the lamp was just… too tempting. The glowing red substance inside beckoned for him to come closer and open the top of the lantern.
'I shouldn't… but then again what's the worst that could happen? It's just a lamp! Plus, I think I'm already dead, so it couldn't hurt that much to see what's inside.'
Giving in to the worm of curiosity gnawing at his mind, he put his hand on the dark metal of the lantern. The metal felt cold to the touch, just like the floor. In fact, this whole place seemed rather cold. Not even referring to the style of architecture that used a depressing shade of stone to construct the cathedral, but rather the air itself. The gaunt man just hadn't noticed it because he was preoccupied with somehow being in one piece. He tightened his grip on the ring where a handle would be attached and twisted with all his might.
'C'mon! Just gotta get thi-'
Suddenly, the sound of glass shattering reverbed across the cathedral, breaking a seemingly eternal silence that it had been in for a long… long time. The substance gushed out of the now broken lantern, almost touching the gaunt man's feet. He flinched, reeling his foot away from where the substance was and taking a few more steps back. Who knew what that substance could do to him?
But just a moment later, the gaunt man knew exactly what the substance was, or at least what it tried to mimic. The rancid smell of blood assaulted his nostrils, making him scrunch his face.
And then, another lantern shattered, the one closest to where the gaunt man.
Not a moment later, the lantern second closest to the gaunt man shattered, spilling its fetid substance across the pristine floor of the cathedral.
Another lantern shattered.
And then another.
And eventually, every single lantern in the cathedral shattered, their warm red hues that once suffused the grand cathedral was now gone.
And then, the dream ended.
***
The young man's eyes fluttered awake. He laid on the warm wood awash with sunlight. Staring at the azure sky, he immediately went and tried to pinch himself to see if he was dreaming again.
And then, the pain hit him.
This time, it wasn't a sharp, piercing pain, but rather a dull and potent pain that encompassed the whole body.
The man suppressed a scream, letting out a quiet whimper instead. He looked at both of his arms to notice that the holes that were once there were now closed, leaving a scar in their place.
And also the fact that they were tied up.
It seemed that he had been healed by someone, or something. He took a deep, audible breath in, and let out a sigh of relief to find out that his lungs weren't collapsed anymore. He watched his chest rise and fall, glad that his ribs weren't shattered. The pain would pass.
"Sorry, I haven't really been working on my healing mantras as of recently."
The young man jerked upwards, surprised by the sudden voice, the aching pain now just a fraction of what it was a few dozen seconds ago. A quick look of his surroundings told him that he and this person were on a boat sailing somewhere.
"But luckily, your little blood ability did a lot of the work for me."
The young man instinctively turned his head to see who was talking to him, but froze when cold metal touched the back of his neck.
"So tell me, how in the depths did you learn to do that, and who taught you?"
End of Chapter 3: Crimson