"It is appointed for man to die once… and after that comes judgment."
At least, that's what the preachers used to say.
And the heretics too.
"So why the hell am I still here?"
He opened his eyes to darkness.
Not the darkness of night. Not even the darkness behind closed eyelids.
The darkness felt heavy, like thick fog. It pressed against his ribs, suffocating him, as if countless unseen hands were pushing down.
His hands shot up, inches above his face, and his palm struck wood.
Rough. Dry. Cracked.
Scared, his breath began to quicken.
"No. No no no no no..."
He twisted, but the box was too tight. He slammed his fists against the lid and dirt began to pour in through the cracks, which made him begin to scream.
"HELP!"
"SOMEBODY! PLEASE!"
Only silence answered.
Nothing but the creak of wood and the sound of his own panic echoed back at him.
"Is this hell?"
"What's going on?"
"How did I even get here? Am I dreaming again?"
A memory tried to crawl back: stairs, messages, light, and then darkness.
Now he was here in a coffin. Buried alive, or dead. He didn't even know which was worse.
So, he lay still...until
Thunk, Scrape. Metal biting earth.
His heart began to pound. Was he imagining things?
Again. Thunk, Scrape, Thunk.
Above him. Getting louder, someone was digging.
He held his breath, afraid to hope as the air grew thick with the smell of dirt.
Then came a knock against the lid, a sharper clang; then metal tapping wood.
Followed by murmuring, but he couldn't make out the words.
He pounded weakly on the coffin's ceiling.
"Hey! I'm in here! Help! Please!"
Then came a crack, and cold, pale moonlight flooded his vision as the coffin lid slid open.
Two hooded figures peered down. Their faces were hidden in shadow.
One of them gasped.
"He's… alive?" as the other stumbled back.
"That's no man. It's a ghost, an omen! Close it! We're cursed!"
"Wait, what are you talking about?" the boy let out, trying to rise up out of the coffin. But they were already running, fumbling over headstones and disappearing into the night.
He sat up slowly, muscles trembling, and climbed out of the grave.
The dirt was loose, the wind sharp, his clothes torn and filthy.
Then he looked, and he saw.
An old, cracked gravestone stood at the head of the pit.
Its inscription read: "Here lies the one who would not die."
His strength gave out, and he collapsed as darkness swallowed him once more.
He woke hours later, cold and aching, just beside the filled-in grave.
The tomb was gone and there was no trace of it or the hole not even the gravestone.
He staggered to his feet, every limb aching.
Far in the distance, he saw the faint glow of firelight—a city.
With all the energy he could muster, he began walking towards it.
The road to the city was long and unkind.
He walked for what seemed like hours through fog and dirt, drawn by the glow like a moth to a flame. As he approached, the scene felt more surreal. Stone towers, arched bridges, and dim, flickering lanterns bordered the city.
Yet it was nothing like the cities he knew. It was medieval, yet alive. He saw people in medieval robes and boots. They walked, talked, bought, and shouted. The streets were cobblestone.
No cars. No neon. No skyscrapers. But still… strange tech. Street lamps without wires. A vendor selling what looked like magical radios. One person had a floating compass circling above their shoulder.
"This place..." he whispered, "Where the hell am I?"
He limped into a crowded market.
Help, he thought. Someone will help me.
But the stares came first, as everyone recoiled.
"Get back, wretch!" shouted a man at a food stall.
A child stared and pointed at him and her mother pulled her away.
He tried asking a baker for a piece of bread.
"Sir, could I please get some..."
The man spat at his feet. "Filthy outcast. Get lost."
Nobody helped. Nobody cared.
He stumbled into an alley and fell next to a barrel, hugging himself. All He felt was hopelessness.
"Why is this happening?"
"I've never been this hungry before."
"The guys... they're probably still waiting for me." he chuckled just as his stomach growled again, and he clutched it as tears welled up in his eyes. He bowed his head and closed his eyes.
That's when he heard the cheers.
He looked up from the alley. A crowd had gathered around a stone platform. A man knelt before an executioner dressed in black.
The executioner raised his hand and chanted in a tongue that the boy could not understand.
The kneeling man screamed as his skin turned grey after a while a statue now knelt in his place, eyes wide in terror.
Then CRACK. The executioner brought a massive hammer down, which
shattered the statue.
Dust and silence.
Then came the cheers as the crowd erupted like it was a festival.
Coins flew as vendors laughed.
"What was that, did he just turn into stone?" the boy said as his stomach growled again painfully.
He looked around, and his eyes landed on an apple vendor who was distracted by the spectacle.
He moved fast, snatched two apples, and ran into the alley, panting and laughing.
The weakened boy bit into one like a starving animal, as its juice dripped down his chin.
"So where on Earth am I, and what the hell just happened?
He leaned back against the wall, still laughing as if everything happening was a joke.
Then he saw him.
An old man sat just across the alley, silent, cloaked in a ragged gray robe. His long beard flowed like ash, his eyes milky, and his smile crooked.
"Got a good thief's heart," he rasped in a heavy Scottish accent.
"But you stole from the wrong stall."
The boy froze, mid-bite.
"I...I didn't have a choice," he muttered. "I woke up in a coffin. I don't know where I am. Please, could you help me?"
The old man chuckled low in his throat.
"Come here, lad... let me tell you a little story," he said, his voice thick.
The boy hesitated. But confusion, hunger, and a desperate need for answers outweighed caution. He stepped forward and sat opposite the old man, who leaned against the wall like he'd grown out of it.
The old man's eyes drifted to the glowing lamp just beyond the alley's mouth.
"Before men built these walls, before kings crowned themselves gods… there was only the Word."
He raised a trembling hand.
"The All-Father spoke—and the world listened. Light came. Stone moved. Water obeyed."
The boy frowned. "What does that have to do with anything?"
"Everything," the man said. "See, around here, words don't just mean something. They do something. When spoken with Breath, they carry weight. The kind of weight that cracks mountains."
"Breath?" the boy echoed.
"Aye. Not the stuff in your lungs. Real Breath. The thread between your soul and the world. Everyone has some. But only a few ever learn to use it."
He tapped the boy's chest.
"That's what it is, lad. Breath is your soul trying to be heard."
The boy's hands clenched around the apple.
"So… what, people use it?"
"They shape with it, Heralds they're called. If they study long enough, train hard enough, some learn to issue Orders, fragments of the First Speech. They speak, and the world obeys. Wind stills. Fire stops. Time forgets."
He smiled grimly.
"But it takes Breath to speak. And Breath burns. The more you use, the faster you hollow. Lose too much, and your throat tears. Your soul thins. You go quiet… forever."
The boy stayed silent.
"That's why we used to say: Guard your breath, or die voiceless."
The old man pulled something from his robes—a small, cracked leather book. Strange symbols traced the cover, like forgotten scars.
"This belonged to a friend. A good one. Listened to the wind too long and tried to echo it back."
He held it out.
The boy took it slowly, hands shaking from cold and awe. "What is this?"
"Call it a diary. A compass. Maybe a warning. It won't save you, but it might help you scream a little louder before the world swallows you."
The boy looked up. "What's your name old man?"
The old man smiled as he stood,
"Names are like flames. Burn bright, then vanish. But around here… I'm just the one who remembers."
The boy stood too, shaky on his feet.
"And mine's Marcus."
The man gave a slow nod.
"Well then, Marcus… welcome to Endor."
He gestured beyond the alley.
"This place? The city's called Everborn. A strange one, always has been. You'll see things that feel old and new all at once. That's cause of the Lost. Folk like you. Strangers from the far lands. No one knows how you get here. Some say you fall, others say you're chosen."
The boy blinked. "Wait. Others like me?"
"Aye. We call you the Lost."
Marcus hesitated. "Do they ever get home?"
The old man gave a sad chuckle.
"Maybe once, maybe twice. But I've met a dozen in my years. They either change everything... or get changed. None of 'em stayed the same. And none went back."
He started to walk away, voice dropping lower.
"But you… you're something else. Something worse… or better. I don't know yet."
Marcus' mouth was dry. "And what happens to the Lost?"
The man turned, looking down the alley as if staring into a memory.
"They become myths… or monsters. But never nothing."
He took a few steps, then paused.
"You'll meet a Dominion or two if you're unlucky. Power made flesh. The world's leftover bruises from when the heavens broke."
The boy's brow furrowed. "Dominions... are they the strongest?"
The man shook his head. "They're loud. But there are older things out there. Quieter. And they're watching."
He didn't wait for more questions.
"And why are you helping me?" Marcu called after him.
The old man grinned, half over his shoulder.
"I believe you'll be something great… or something terrible," the old man whispered. "And I want to say I was there at the start."
He turned to leave, his tattered cloak fluttering slightly in the wind.
"Oh," he added, glancing over his shoulder with a crooked grin, "and watch out for Profanities and avoid' going Yonder..."
Then he disappeared into the night.
Marcus blinked. "Wait, what's a Profanity?" he called after him yet here was no reply. Only the wind and the distant murmur of the city.
He looked down at the small leather book in his hands, its cover engraved with strange symbols.
"Hm… so what's this diary about?" he muttered, slowly opening the first page.
Marcus looked back up again, but this time and the alley was gone.
Now he stood in a corridor that didn't feel real.
The stone walls stretched far in every direction, repeating with no end. Torches flickered with cold, colorless flame, but yet, they cast no warmth. The ceiling was too high to see, the floor echoed with every step like he was the only person left in the world.
No doors, no windows, just stone, silence, and shadows.
"What… the hell," Marcus muttered.
He walked slowly, each breath tasting like dust sealed in a tomb. The air felt old, older than anything he knew. Like it hadn't moved since the beginning of time.
All of a sudden, he could hear something..., groaning. A low, distorted, unnatural sound echoing from a nearby passage.
He stopped..., then he turned, facing the darkness.
From that darkness, something emerged.
A tall, inhuman shape. Humanoid, but wrong.
Its arms too long, its skin as dark as coal. Its hands dragged against the floor. And its gait—off-balance, lurching forward like it was drunk or dreaming.
Marcus's body moved on instinct, he looked up, beginning to trace the creature's form toward its...
"Aloh!" a voice rang out like a whip crack in the air.
Marcus froze. He couldn't move.
Not an inch.
The creature halted. It tilted its head slightly, and then it kept walking. Slowly. Wobbling forward in heavy, clumsy steps. But it never looked down at him.
His heart pounded like thunder in his ears. His eyes stayed locked on the floor.
Another whisper cut through the air.
"It will kill you if you look at its face," the voice said.
The creature passed him. Its steps faded.
Then: "Voil." His limbs unlocked.
He staggered back, gasping, and turned towards the direction the voice came from.
A girl stood there, pretty, sharp-eyed. Dressed in a mix of clean traveler's gear and an odd cloak. Her hair was tied back. She looked amused but also cautious.
"Never look at the face of the Unseen," she said, brushing something off her sleeve.
"Looks like this is your first time in Yonder, right?"
He nodded slowly, still shaken.
She smiled. "Name's Ella. What's yours?"
He hesitated.
"It's…Marcus."