Day I: Wake Up

"You judge people not by their actions, but by their heart."

The words echoed, hollow and mocking, as I tore through the night.

The bike's engine roared, a feral scream swallowed by the wind. I twisted the throttle harder, the road a blur of streaking lights and ghostly lane markers. My knuckles gleamed white against the handlebars, stiff and unyielding. No helmet—just the raw, biting air clawing at my face, stinging my eyes. I didn't blink. I wanted to feel every shred of it.

The asphalt shimmered, slick with forgotten rain, tires trembling beneath me. My breath came in jagged gasps, guilt coiling around my chest like barbed wire. Flashes hit me—not the road, but *her*. A whisper, a reaching hand, the light in her eyes snuffed out too fast. It wasn't supposed to end like that.

I gritted my teeth, choking down bile. The bike wobbled as I took a curve too sharp, fear sparking through me like a live wire. I could end it. Right here. Let it all go.

The world flipped. Asphalt rushed up like a fist, and the crash wasn't pain—it was sound. Metal shrieked, bones snapped, flesh met pavement in a wet crunch. The sky spun, then went black.

I jolted awake, gasping, fists clenched, the phantom wind still burning my skin. My heart hammered, relentless, the guilt heavier than ever. A dream. A memory. One year ago, I'd chased death down that road and somehow cheated it.

But this time, something was wrong.

I wasn't in my bed. Cold, jagged stone dug into my back, darkness pressing in thick and absolute. A faint glow seeped from one side—a cave. I scrambled up, confusion buzzing through me. *Kidnapped? A prank?* No cameras, no footsteps. Just silence and the ache in my bones.

I stumbled toward the light. Twin moons hung in the sky—one massive, icy blue, the other a smaller, gray shadow peeking out behind. They bathed a forest of towering trees in an unearthly glow, the cave nestled at the base of a lone, steep mountain. My pajama shorts felt absurdly thin against the chill.

Where the hell was I?

The forest swallowed sound—no crickets, no wind, just the thud of my pulse in my ears. Dread coiled tight in my gut. I stepped forward, half-asleep, half-terrified, like some horror movie idiot too dumb to turn back. The stillness was wrong. I was wrong, barefoot and exposed in this alien place.

Then—footsteps. Rapid, frantic, from my left. Before I could turn, something slammed me down. A gnarled, green-skinned thing straddled me, squealing, spit dripping from jagged teeth. Humanoid, but twisted—clawing, punching, pinning me. I gripped its slimy neck, shoving back.

More steps. Pain exploded in my knee as a second creature swung a crude club. I snarled, adrenaline surging. Fight, not flight—that's what I learned in that moment.

I yanked the first goblin—it had to be a goblin—aside while holding his neck, rolling free as the club smashed the dirt beside me. I pinned it down while being on top of it, slamming my fist into its jaw, then an elbow. It thrashed, clutching at me. I quickly got off and up. A third tackled me from behind, driving me down to the ground, again.

While wrestling this third one, I twisted to roll further away, which enabled me to dodge another club strike. Thud echoed where my head had been. Now I was atop the third, pummeling its face—fist, elbow, fist—until it went limp. My muscles were tensed and tired already. I staggered up, only to catch a club to the gut. I hit the ground hard, breath gone.

Three goblins loomed as I looked up, two bloodied and staggering, the third hefting its weapon in front of me. "You fuckers!" I rasped, forcing myself to one knee. The closest swung overhead, and I launched forward, tackling it down. The club clattered free. I swung—four brutal punches—and it stopped moving.

One grabbed the club. Another leapt onto my back, teeth sinking into my shoulder. I roared, slamming backward onto a rock. A sickening crunch, and it went still. Blood—mine, theirs—slicked my skin.

The last goblin faced me, one eye a ruined mess. I lunged from its blind side, a full-force punch to its temple dropping it cold.

Panting, I scanned the shadows. No more came. My neck throbbed—two shallow punctures in my right trap, not fatal. My knee screamed in pain, hands raw and swelling. I grabbed the club, using it to hobble upright because my knee was fucked. The goblins' bodies sprawled in the moonlight, half my size, clad in filthy loincloths. Two still breathed.

My stomach twisted, but I raised the club. A few wet thuds later, their skulls were pulp. I retched against a tree—not from guilt, but the stench, the gore. Blood coated me, warm and reeking.

Lost, I limped through the trees, the club my crutch. My knee burned, but I kept moving, circling back to the cave by dumb luck. I slipped inside, the passage narrowing to a dead end ten meters in. Collapsing against the stone, exhaustion swallowed me.

I'd survived. Killed. And now, in this cold, alien dark, fear clawed deeper than ever. Those twin moons haunted me, their light a promise of something worse to come.

Sleep took me anyway—a battered, bloodied fool on a cave floor. Day one, if you could call it that, was over. That night, I killed three strange creatures.