He drifted.
There was no direction, no ground, no breath. Just him, suspended in cold ink, floating endlessly through a silence that felt... ancient.
Then came the whispers.
Not sound pressure.
"...v'ssēth…"
"...rih-nor val'seuun…"
"...ka'thur il'mekh..."
The voices didn't speak in any known tongue. They warped syllables, like wind trying to form words but never quite managing. Each whisper was both distant and buried in his skull, clawing at some part of him he didn't yet understand.
He wasn't afraid. Not really.
But something inside him recoiled. A primal part.
Then
A sound like thunder tearing through steel.
A pull. Violent and inevitable.
And the void shattered.
---
Elias crashed into reality.
His back slammed into wet rock, rolled down a slope, and landed in a sprawl of leaves and cold mud. He choked on air, gasping as the shock of sensation returned rain, cold, the stench of damp soil.
Pain.
He pushed himself up, muscles trembling, blood humming. He was naked. Bare, cut, bruised and alive. More alive than he should've been.
Then came voices. Shouting something foreign.
"Va'sheran! Ha'drel kora'neth!"
"Draelik! Falth un'reh!"
"Juh'ketra! Juh'ketra-nai!"
Figures emerged through the trees cloaked and armored, soaked in rain. Crossbows raised. Steel drawn. Seven of them. Maybe more.
Elias staggered back, holding up his hands.
"I'm not a threat! I don't know where I "
"Zhei on'tar ven? Kotha-nai?"
"Hah rethil kova'da!"
None of them understood him. Not English. Not Russian. Not German or French. Nothing clicked.
"Please…" he tried, quieter this time.
"Tov ek'hal... sharn'thel var."
"Heh. Looka sheth zhan rei'tok."
They laughed not mocking, but curious. One of them, a younger man with a crooked grin and short black hair, tossed something at Elias's feet. A coarse cloak.
Tentatively, Elias wrapped it around himself. The fabric was scratchy and smelled like damp goat, but it was better than nothing.
The mercenaries shared looks. They didn't lower their weapons entirely, but their postures relaxed. Tension softened into wary amusement.
Elias stood still, heart thundering. The rain fell harder.
---
Later that Night Their camp was a scattered ring of tents and canvas overhangs, built between tall evergreens. A fire crackled in the center. The smell of wet smoke and roasting meat filled the air.
Elias sat slightly apart, the heavy cloak still draped around him. A wooden bowl of rabbit stew was placed beside him by the young man from earlier Toma, he'd heard them call him. Toma had smiled, tapped his chest, and said:
" Toh-mah. Zhai rek'eth."
A name. That much was clear.
But everything else? Still gibberish.
They talked in a blur of sounds rough, rhythmic, sometimes melodic, sometimes harsh. Elias tried to catch patterns, but they slipped away like fish in a current. The only word he recognized after hours of hearing it repeated was:
"Shirah" spoken when pointing at him, laughing, or shaking their heads.
Was it there nickname for me?
He tried to speak. To explain. To ask where he was. But the more he tried, the more he realized how futile it was
They handed him a stew but He didn't eat the stew. Because He couldn't. Not because he wasn't hungry he was starving. But not for this.
The smell made his stomach turn. His throat felt tight, like something was coiled there. A whisper. A warning.
This food would not sustain him.
So he sat in silence, watching the flames flicker in the hollow of the night.
And finally, with the mercenaries laughing and drinking behind him, he began to think.
Really think.
---
By the fire, he pulled the cloak tighter and watched the way the flames danced on the rim of a nearby pot.
He still had a reflection.
So, not the fairytale kind of vampire.
But what else made sense?
Shot. Dead. Woke up in a forest. Blood on his lips. That crushing hunger that only blood had satisfied.
He'd fed. Back in the other world. On a deer. Then on a man.
He hadn't questioned it then because it was survival. A blur of instinct and fear.
But now that he had time to sit still?
"I died… and came back."
"I fed on blood."
"I can't eat normal food."
He rubbed his eyes, forehead tight with dread.
He didn't want to say the word. Not because he feared it he didn't believe in monsters.
But this world didn't care what he believed.
"I'm a vampire."
He said it softly. Like a curse.
And something inside him whispered:
Yes.
---
Later, Alone in the Forest
When most of the camp had gone quiet, Elias wandered into the trees.
The leaves had begun to fall in earnest. Crimson, gold, and brown carpeted the forest floor like bloodless autumn fire. The wind had a bite now not quite winter, but close.
He found a hollow near a brook and crouched beside the water.
The moon hung low. Pale. Indifferent.
He looked at his reflection same face, same tired eyes. But something had changed. Beneath the surface, beneath the skin, something watched. Something waited.
Still a man.
But only just.
"I'm a vampire," he said again. This time not like a confession but like a verdict.
It wasn't power. It wasn't fantasy.
Just hunger. Silence. And the slow, creeping erosion of self.
He pressed a hand to his chest.
No heartbeat.
No warmth.
Just stillness.
He closed his eyes and breathed in the night air, and found no comfort in it. The scent of leaves and dirt and woodsmoke meant nothing. What he needed wasn't here. What he needed was warm. Crimson.
And far more human than he was now.
---
Back at Camp
When he returned, the fire was nearly ash.
Toma lay curled in a threadbare blanket, sword resting beside him. Others were wrapped in sleep, snoring or muttering in strange tongues.
Elias sat in silence, folding the coarse cloak tighter around himself.
He didn't know who had whispered in the void.
Didn't know how he got here.
Didn't know what he was becoming.
But he was alive.
He was hungry.
And for now… that was enough.