The pain never came.
That was the first thing Lyren realized as his consciousness drifted. There was no crushing agony, no shattered bones screaming for attention—only a strange, floating sensation, as though his body had forgotten how heavy it was supposed to be.
The impact he had been certain would end his life simply… didn't.
Then came the cold.
Not the bite of mountain air or the damp chill of the forest floor, but something deeper—ancient, suffocating, and wrong. Lyren's eyes blurred as darkness swallowed his vision whole.
He was falling.
***
"Haha…"
"Then promise to work hard."
"I will be strong and kill beasts just like Dad."
"Don't venture far inside, alright?"
One could hear two distinct voices, one being a lady's. The young and enthusiastic voice with a strong will was almost melodical to listen to. A brief silence ensued, then a thought, thin and distant as his own echo came through :
"What is wrong with me? Am I dead?"
It was all dark he assumed he had died. It took several minutes for his mind to clear. Lyren's eyes suddenly shot open. But all was a blur to him, and as his sight cleared, so did his memory.
Then it all came to him in waves, overwhelming him with a splitting headache that prevented him from sitting down.
He recalled what had happened—how he was starving and how he was rushing.
"Why was I rushing? Argh, so I crashed into that tree and died… No. No… I can't be dead. I am breathing, wait—I am breathing! I am not hungry. Did someone feed me? No, there is no one in this place. It's too damp…"
Lyren's thoughts trailed as he started to feel his surroundings. Just from the first glance, he could tell that no one lived here and no one had been here in a while. How he was still alive was still a mystery, but he could vividly recall that sudden urge…
The urge… He was being called to come here. At that moment, when he stood up and started running, he could not stop. He thought he had lost all strength, but when his mother disappeared, he was slightly rejuvenated and he knew that whatever had saved him was in here.
He had rushed into that entrance with all he had, and he had ended up here. Now that he was here, what was in store for him? He licked his lips but spat and cursed.
"Damn leaves."
His lips had leaves sticking to them. He remembered falling face first and guessed that was when it had happened. He recalled his forehead and wiped off some dry leaves. He grunted, realizing that his hair certainly had leaves latched on it.
His headache stopped as his thoughts came to a still. He sat up slowly and stood up, but his world started spinning again and he almost fell back, though he was able to hold his ground. He was about to take a step forward when he stopped.
He froze. Lyren closed his eyes and focused. The faint sensation he had struggled to grasp for months now pressed against him from all directions, clear, vivid, and impossible to ignore.
Elyria? It was everywhere.
His breathing quickened. Never before had he been able to sense it so distinctly. The air itself felt heavy and saturated with energy. Could this be the reason he had survived?
Hope stirred within him as he thought. If Elyria was truly this dense here, then even someone like him, still stuck in the early stages, might advance. He sat down immediately and closed his eyes as he tried to draw the Elyria into his body.
Nothing happened.
His brows furrowed as he tried again.
Still, there was nothing.
He could clearly sense the Elyria in the air and its reaction to his presence, as though it was waiting for him to guide it, yet all his attempts were thwarted.
This made each attempt to guide the energy into his body even more difficult. Lyren's excitement faded, replaced by unease.
Even here… even with this big chance… he still could not do it.
Lyren sighed as he opened his eyes. He was mad, but he still stood up and took a better look at his surroundings. The lighting made it appear as though it was dusk. At least, he could see.
He first looked up, and he was shocked when he could not see the ceiling. But his worries were far from over as he looked back and could not see the entrance. He was glad he was alive, but it appeared that he had just stumbled into a prison. He pushed these thoughts to the back of his mind for the moment.
The ground had some moisture on it, but it was smoothed out as though it was a floor once upon a time. It was flat, and since he could not see further away, he decided to continue forward.
The further he moved, the more he felt Elyria pressing on him from all directions. It was as though his body was an empty vessel and the energy was a dense liquid trying to pour in and fill him up. He sat down once again and closed his eyes.
This might work.
Lyren felt the smooth caress of Elyria as he tried to guide it into his body. This time, he was able to feel like he had touched it, and when he tried to move it, he felt it suddenly slip away.
"Runnng away already? Definitely not giving up!"
He jested in his mind as he reached for the energy again and again, but this time, he could not even feel its caress.
"Kinda weird…"
Lyren thought as he stood up, giving up. Just how difficult was this supposed to be?
He moved ahead, and after a while, there were changes on the ground. He could see rock debris all over. At first, there were only a few shards, but now there was a rock about his size.
"Some destroyed institute? Academy? What happened here?" He wondered.
Lyren went on ahead and saw signs on tiles on the ground. He could see several broken statue heads and some cracked tiles. He looked ahead of him, and what stood before him was beyond imagination.
There, a huge colossal structure loomed before him. It was a vast hall, its roof having long collapsed. The walls soared almost thirty meters high. It stretched outwards in the darkness for what might have been 100 meters, and for the length, he could not tell. He tripped on something and cursed angrily.
He looked down and saw a statue's head the size of a football and angrily kicked it again.
"The hell!"
Of course, he ended up hurting himself, but he bent down and picked the head and glared at it. He was shocked when he saw patterns on the scalp. The patterns were so intricate that his eyes ended up hurting after trying to look at them for a long time. He was about to drop the head, but he saw words written behind it.
"Too bad I can't read it. To hell with your old language."
Lyren dropped the statue face-first and started looking around. He saw several more statues like that but he stopped abruptly the next second as he saw a golden glow coming from his feet where he had just dropped the statue…