Ch.01: Where am I?

Bright light is already creeping amongst the cluster of trees as Juan tries to open his eyes while trying to push his weight up from what he can concieve as the ground. Juan can still smell the fresh morning dew permeating from the grass where his face was previously planted as his eyes slowly adjusted from the alien scenery sorrounding him.

"Tang'na! Where am I?"

Juan tries to recall what happen to him the night before as his memory is a bit hazy together with the headache from his hang over after consuming a number of Red Horse Beer from his room.

Juancho as his parents call and Juan to his friends is a man in his 30's, fairly light skinned as reminiscent from his grandfather being a 'Mestizo' thus the name Juancho which his name was taken from.

Juan is a typical guy of his age who still loves playing online and offline fantasy games from which his generation grew up with playing Diablo, Neverwinter Nights, Ragnarok, and etc.

Lately for most of his days he's been holed up in his room as he tries to escape the sad reality that he's been through.

Juan lost his job being a PO1 ranked Policeman despite his age which he is supposed to be another ranked higher due to his happy-go-lucky nature and being known as a ladies man to which he's friends and colleagues blames him why an administrative case was filed against him in the first place as they suspected him of an affair with the wife of a high ranking officer in the force to which Juan clearly denies.

Juan looks around as he still struggles to stand up and tries to familiarize himself with his sorroundings.

"What place is this? How did I get here?"

these are the words that he tries to speak out but his parch throat is keeping him from expressing and thinking more of his current state.

Juan's instinct is pushing him to look for a water source and to relieve himself of the throbbing headache from those bottles of Red Horse Beer he consumed the night before.

"Water.. wa..ter..." he murmurs as he tries to focus if there is any possibility of a water source nearby when he faintly hears a crystal like sound flow of a creek nearby.

Juan rushed to where the sound is coming from not minding the cuts he got from thickets and shrubs he plowed through just to get through.

His eyes widens with delight as got to the source to which he quickly scoops a handful of water completely forgetting his jungle survival training during his early years in the bootcamp.

After realizing his mistake from drinking at an unknown water source he suddenly stop and looked around his sorroundings trying to determined if what he just drank from is clearly safe from any waterborne diseases as he clearly understood that he may be further away from any civilization and acquiring cholera is a bad way to die if that is the case.

"I don't want people finding me dead from shitting myself to death" as Juan jokingly muttered in his head.

"Nevertheless, it seems like the water is ok as I don't see any visible indicator that I am drinking from a contaminated water source", "Surprisingly this water taste pretty delicious as if there is a tinge of a fruity taste I can't seem to point my finger on"

Juan is busy contemplating on his current state and did not notice a silhouette of a person staring at him from behind a tree as he tries to scoop another mouthful of the mysterious water.

As Juan lowers his head, he secretly picks up a stone from his free hand and with a sudden burst of speed he aim and threw the stone at the shadow halfly hiding about 4 meters from him.

(Tok!!) "Aaaaawwwwww!.."

Juan rushed to where the sound came from while picking up a fallen branch along the way "Better to have this as a weapon rather than none"

arriving at the trees, Juan already have his armed stretched up and about to whack whoever is stalking him when he suddenly realize the person sitting on the ground clutching her head in pain.

"Ah.. A.. girl?!.."