Snow had fallen as I made my way through the endless eastern Highland plains behind me, having blurred now into a landscape of endless darkness. The bitter cold had ceased, the grass here was lifeless, blades standing still without a hint of breeze blowing across, eerie silence the accompaniment to any sounds I made as I traipsed along. I’d crossed the threshold into Vanguarde. Aimless in my direction, bereft of belonging to anything or anywhere, I simply kept going.

A day ago, perhaps, I’d stopped for water by a lake along the frigid cold plains of the Norselands, east of the ridge by that tree I saw before. The rope still remained by it. As the thought of it lingered a bit while I drew my hands into the lake water, my hands creating steam as I dipped them into the nearly-frozen surface, the cold didn’t bother me in the least. My face was itching, the patches of facial scruff had started emerging as I’d not attended to it in some time, ever since my capture. I hated the way it itched like that. Claiming a sword from one of my previous captor’s corpse, I gazed into this mirror lake surface and took deliberate strokes with the edge of this sword along my neck, first. It itched the most, and I figured, if worse came to it and I accidentally slit my own throat, I wouldn’t care all that much. I had nothing to live for, really. I just kept carrying on out of habit, or instinct, or something else.

Staring at my reflection in that moment as the small strands of hair fell onto this surface, the Norse wind blowing them away, I then started along my cheeks and my upper lip. As I removed my spectacles, intending to get closer to my ears, my sword’s edge went up a bit too high by accident. Wanting to even out the other side of my head now, it bothered me for some reason. Strange. I care not for anything, but yet still want to look at least presentable. Perhaps I was still desperate for acceptance. Or perhaps that was habit, instinct, or something else, too.

Evening out the sides didn’t work. I then dipped the sword into the frigid water, ripples distorted my reflection, rendering it useless to my efforts now, but it didn’t matter. Taking it carefully to my head, I started cutting it all off, running the edge of my blade over my skull. As the water resumed its unbothered state, I continued along until all trace of hair was gone on my skull, only my eyebrows remained. Placing my glasses back on, I finally saw myself again, now.

I didn’t recognize myself anymore. Perhaps I wanted desperately to escape from recognizing the monster that I am, as being me. I wanted to pretend this horrific human being was someone else. I then tossed this sword into the lake, removed my Highland tunic altogether, my muscles were finally starting to form a bit from my time of service in the military, but nowhere near the others. I was still rather meagerly built. Walking now shirtless, carrying on in this frozen land, I harnessed the mana and emitted a circumference of fire before me, warming me as I traveled.

That was then.

Now, this endless expanse of darkness lay before me. I’d be able to light my path if I chose, the magic lay inside the tome that I read before. I’d read it in its entirety, multiple times. It was simple magic. I didn’t care to do so. The darkness made me feel at home; this was where I belonged. The dark, twisted, cursed realm I found myself in was the shadow where the demon hid, not even stars could break through the sky. Devoid of sustenance, I paced myself along, not giving a second thought to death as it stared me in the face with each dehydrated and malnourished step of my body.

A distorted being approached me, having long fangs along his upper teeth, veiled in a dark cloak. No armament at this being’s side, I saw other hazy figures of this same species appear as well, in circumference to where I stood. As smiles emerged from their faces, I recognized the vampiric beings, their tattered clothes being woven from clothes from a time long ago, not faded from sunlight, still showing color to them, but still being woven of darker thread. The colors among them were of blacks and browns, dark grays and such, their skin was pale white, some showing signs of decay among them, like their skulls had withered, and only the curse of their affliction is what moved them along, now. No semblance remained of intelligence from their former existence. As they moved in closer, a fearsome rasp from their throats sounded, looking to sink their teeth into my flesh and drink of my blood, or perhaps doom me to their cursed half-life along with them. Annoyed, I simply went through the motions of defending myself.

Commanding fire to expand outward from my location, some of them successfully evaded my efforts while the others burned to cinders. One of them moved with great speed towards me, I’d heard of how quickly they can move; they were mentioned in this book I read. Vampire demons were creatures of the night, fated to roam the ever-darkened lands of Umbra. Not guardians or of any noble designation, they were a creation by Velbyx, long ago. Designed to simply be a blight to the mortal races, a curse to spread and claim more souls to the ranks of the wrathful, it meant an endless torture to be claimed by them. I’d not mind dying; I didn’t want to be undead.

Summoning a strong gale to aid me, I was able to slow down their effort of reaching me to claim me. As they were held in place a moment, I kept the gale moving faster, raising me up off of the ground itself as the vortex swirled now with increased intensity. Standing at its center, I put more deliberate effort into it, and as I heard their agonized wails from the force of this wind now shifting into multiple directions at my command, overlapping gales of great force pulling them in multiple ways, the anger in me surged at their effort to condemn me to a worse fate than I was willing to lose myself to. Their torture was satisfying to me, these twisted, soulless beings, and as the gales began to tear them with increasing intensity, I watched as the force under my command ripped limbs and heads apart from their own bodies, parts of these creatures being pulverized by the conflicting gales pulling at them from all directions. The gales subsided at their deaths, and I fell to the ground. Panting, I had lost my energy, demanding a great deal of mana for me to do this all, I needed rest. The silence took hold of my location again, all that remained around me were some subtle traces of these demonic corpses in the form of bent limbs, a finger here or there, or part of a head or a lower jaw.

Catching my breath, my eyes went to the sight of something before me, a remnant of one of these night-creatures: a black hooded robe. Deciding to place it over me, it being somehow miraculously intact still, it fit me. Having traces of blood red to it in some spots, a vertical line that went along the front flap of it up to the nape of where it went to the collar, I paid it no further mind and traveled further along, pulling the cowl up over my head, obscuring me further.

My steps became more difficult, exhaustion claiming me now as my exerted energy now finally took its hold. Collapsing, a distant image filled my eyes, the spectacles remaining over my line of sight. Garbed in darker colors, the thought of them being more of these night-creatures worried me a moment. Seeing them on horseback, however, I knew that it was no undead ranks approaching…