Week 1, Day 0 — Noon.
"Okay, Cealith, are you here on your own, or do you know anybody around?" I asked the white-haired elf, trying to keep my voice steady.
"Not really," he said with a small shrug. "I have not seen a single familiar face so far. I did end up talking to a group of humans, though. What about you, anyone you recognize?"
"Sadly, no," I admitted, rubbing the back of my neck. "You are the first person I have talked to since I landed here."
"If you want, I can introduce you to them," he offered. "I was heading back anyway."
"Thanks, that would help a lot."
"Come on, follow me," he said, and he held out his hand.
I took it, pushed myself up, brushed dirt off my pants, and nodded. Cealith started walking downhill, and I followed close behind him, staying near his shoulder because I did not want to lose him in the crowd.
We left the forest and stepped into a wide open clearing where the trees stopped abruptly. The sunlight hit harder out here. People covered the field in every direction. Humans sat on the ground with blank faces, others argued loudly, and some still screamed for names that never got answered. Elves stood in tighter groups with straight posture, while dwarves moved through the crowd with heavy steps, looking irritated and tense.
As we walked, my mind got stuck on one thing.
How do I introduce myself without sounding weird?
I kept rehearsing lines in my head, then hating them before I even had a chance to say them out loud.
Hi, I am Aleks, nice to meet you.
It sounded empty.
Sorry, I do not really know what to do either.
It sounded pathetic.
I hated that I was thinking about this at all. The world ended, or at least my world did, and I still worried about how awkward I might look.
"We are almost there," Cealith said quietly.
"Yeah," I answered, and my voice came out softer than I wanted.
A few minutes later he slowed down and stopped near the edge of the treeline, far enough away from the center that the noise was not crushing. The shade here made the air feel cooler. Three people sat on the ground in front of a small clearing they had claimed for themselves, two boys and a girl. When they noticed Cealith, all three looked up immediately, and relief showed on their faces because they finally saw someone familiar.
They had built something that barely counted as camp, but it was still more organized than most of the field. A layer of leaves covered the dirt as padding. A ring of stones sat in the middle where a fire could go later. Several piles of sticks and thicker branches were stacked nearby.
"Hey, you are back," one of the boys called. His voice sounded hopeful and nervous at the same time. "Is the water from that stream safe?"
"Seems fine," Cealith replied, wiping his lips with the back of his hand. "I took a few sips. We will know soon enough if it was a mistake."
"That does not really help us," the other boy said. He frowned. "You are an elf. Humans might react differently."
Cealith nodded, then gestured toward me. "I brought someone new. He is human and he drank from the stream too. He can tell you how he feels."
The girl leaned forward, her eyes moving over me quickly. It was not hostile, but it made me feel exposed. She had long black curls, a sharp, slightly long nose, and heavy makeup. She wore baggy jeans and a cropped black top. She looked like she belonged in a city, not in a forest on another world.
She smiled. "Hi. I am Amina. Eighteen. Originally from Morocco. And you?"
I swallowed, then forced the words out before I could overthink them. "I am Aleks. Sixteen. I used to live in Germany. Nice to meet you."
"Okay, so you are the youngest so far," one of the boys said with a short laugh. "Name is Daisuke. Seventeen. Japan. Welcome. Also, we have another German girl with us. She is in the woods gathering firewood. She should come back later."
Daisuke's black hair stuck out in messy spikes. Thick glasses sat on his nose. He was skinny, wearing a plain white T-shirt and black joggers. He looked tired, but his voice stayed steady.
"Nikita," the guy on his left said. His tone was deep and controlled. "Nineteen. Russia."
He did not smile. His arms stayed folded tight. Short pale-blond hair, sharp jawline, tall and built. Leather jacket with a raised collar and dark-blue straight-fit jeans. He looked like someone who had decided fear was a distraction.
I nodded at all of them, then realized I was just standing there. Standing there made me feel useless, so I asked the obvious question. "What do you need help with?"
They were rushing to build a camp before nightfall. Nobody knew how cold it would get, and nobody knew what lived nearby. Even if it stayed warm, sleeping on bare ground surrounded by strangers sounded like a terrible plan.
They put me on shelter duty with Amina, Daisuke, and Cealith. We gathered leaves and moss for padding, then dragged branches together and used thin vines and strips of bark to tie them into a rough frame. Nikita focused on starting a fire. He said his grandpa back in Russia had shown him how to do it with a bow-drill, but it would take time. The German girl's job was hauling fuel, and she had already started earlier.
We moved quickly because the sun was high now, and I did not want to wait until evening to realize we built nothing.
I headed deeper into the woods, scanning the ground for sturdy branches that would not snap the moment we leaned on them. I tried to keep my mind focused on the task because the moment I stopped, my thoughts would go back to Earth, my parents, and the alley.
That was when I saw someone in the distance walking toward me with her arms full of sticks.
This had to be the German girl they mentioned.
I jogged over. "Hey, do you need help carrying that? I am new here. They said you were on firewood duty. Those branches look heavy."
The girl stopped so fast that the sticks slipped from her arms and fell to the ground.
"Aleks?" she said, and her voice sounded tight. "Is that you?"
I froze.
My brain recognized her before I fully accepted it.
Carmen.
The Carmen from the supermarket. Brad's girlfriend. My childhood friend.
Her face was pale. Her eyes were swollen and red, and she looked like she had been crying for hours. She stared at me as if she was afraid I might disappear if she blinked.
For a second, something in my chest loosened.
So not everyone I knew was dead.
Then a second thought came immediately after.
Where is Brad?
Before I could say anything, Carmen rushed forward and wrapped her arms around my torso. It was not a gentle hug. She held on tight, shaking. Her sweater felt soft. She smelled faintly of rain and vanilla shampoo. My body went still for a moment because it had been so long since someone touched me without trying to hurt me or mock me.
Then she spoke.
"It killed him, Aleks," she said. Her voice broke. "That creature. Right in front of me."
My hands lifted slowly and rested on her back. I felt her breathing speed up, and her shoulders tremble.
Brad was gone.
Relief hit me first, fast and ugly, and my stomach tightened with guilt right after it. I hated myself for feeling it. I did not even want to admit it inside my own head. I should have been horrified for her. I should have felt only pity. Instead I felt relief, shame, and something cold that I could not name.
I was not a good person. I had known that for a long time. This just confirmed it.
"It is going to be okay," I whispered, even though I had no idea if it would.
Carmen pulled back just enough to look at me. Her lips trembled. Her eyes searched my face.
"How did you survive if Brad did not?" she asked.
The question stopped me.
I had no clean answer. I had fragments. The creature in the alley. The spear. The wings. The voice saying my name. Then falling and waking up under a bright sky. None of it sounded believable, even to me.
I stepped back and forced my face into something calmer. "Let us go back to the others first, okay? We should not stay out here alone."
She nodded, wiped her face quickly, then started picking up the dropped firewood. I helped her gather the sticks, and we started walking back.
We did not talk much. She kept swallowing, trying to keep herself together. I kept thinking about the store, about Brad laughing, about Carmen looking away from me, then her hugging me now like I mattered. My head could not handle how quickly everything flipped.
Halfway back, we stopped again.
Something stood between the trees.
A doorway-shaped arch of polished black stone, taller than me, with spiraling patterns carved across it. The surface looked clean, not weathered, not cracked, and the carved lines were sharp. It did not look like a random rock formation. It looked placed there.
"What is that?" I muttered.
Carmen stared at it, eyes wide. "I do not know," she said quietly. "But it looks built."
I took a careful step closer and kept my hands to myself. The patterns were deliberate. The stone did not have dirt stuck in the grooves. Even the edges looked smooth.
"We need to warn the others," Carmen said.
"Yeah," I answered. "We should not go inside. Not until we at least have basic gear."
We backed away and headed to camp.
When we arrived, everyone looked up. Amina noticed Carmen's face immediately.
"Looks like you two know each other," she said, and her voice softened.
"Yeah," Carmen said, then her expression hardened again because she remembered why she was here. "Listen. Aleks and I found something in the woods. A stone structure. It looks like an entrance."
Cealith stepped closer. His eyes narrowed slightly, focused. "An entrance," he repeated. "Do you mean it leads somewhere, or do you mean it is just a marker?"
"It looks like a doorway," Carmen said. "I do not know if it opens, but it is shaped like it is meant to."
I dropped the firewood to the ground. "It does not look natural. Someone built it."
Daisuke stared at me. "You want to go check it out right now?"
"Not right now," I said, rubbing the back of my neck. "But I do not want to ignore it either. If it is dangerous, I would rather know where it is than wake up and find it right next to our camp. We should make basic gear first, then decide what to do."
Amina sat down on a fallen log, staring at the ground. "What is this place," she whispered. "What did we get dropped into."
Nikita stayed silent, but he looked toward the trees with the kind of focus that made me think he was already preparing for an attack.
Then the sky roared.
The sound was so loud and so sudden that I clapped my hands over my ears instantly. Pain shot through my head. For a second I thought my eardrums would burst.
Everyone looked up.
A massive creature flew overhead. Its wings were wider than a house. Its body was scaled. Its tail cut through the air behind it. The wind from it hit the clearing hard enough to throw dust and leaves everywhere.
My mind supplied the word without permission.
Dragon.
It disappeared into the distance quickly, swallowed by clouds, but nobody moved after it was gone. Even Nikita's expression cracked, and I saw fear there before he forced his face back into stone.
I exhaled and sat down on the grass because my legs stopped cooperating.
"Holy shit," I whispered, staring at the sky where it had been.