Chapter 1: Crimson Sleep
The rain had stopped falling hours ago, but the trees still wept. Leaves dripped cold tears down Ren Kaizen's jacket as he knelt in the thick mud, staring at the ancient stone half-buried beneath the earth.
He was supposed to be home by now. His mother would be yelling. His walkman's batteries had died. But none of that mattered anymore.
Because this wasn't just another moss-covered rock in the woods.
It was glowing.
Carved with markings too perfect to be human, too smooth to have aged naturally, the stone pulsed faintly—red, like blood under skin. A strange warmth pulled at him. Like it knew him. Like it had been waiting.
"Just a coincidence," he whispered. "Just old crap."
And yet he couldn't look away.
He reached out with trembling fingers. The moment he touched the stone—
Pain.
A sharp, electric burn spread through his palm, and then—
Darkness.
---
"Time bends. You were chosen. Survive. Listen. Others must awaken."
The voice wasn't human. It echoed through his skull like thunder behind glass. It was emotionless. Timeless.
Ren gasped as he shot upright—lying in a field of silver grass under two moons. The air smelled of lavender and ash. Trees towered like giants, their leaves glowing faint blue in the dark.
His heart pounded. His hand—the mark—still burned faintly. A symbol shaped like an eye surrounded by four lines.
This wasn't Earth.
This wasn't any past he had ever read about.
He stood, shaking. The stars above were wrong. The trees were singing. Far in the distance, a castle of floating spires hovered above a waterfall, surrounded by strange glowing beasts that howled without mouths.
"What the hell…"
The voice returned.
"You have ten days. Find the others. Do not trust the kings. Speak the First Word. Survive."
---