John woke choking on air, coughing until his chest burned as he forced himself to sit. He groaned in pain. His body felt heavy, as if someone had dropped him from a height.
Then noise hit him. Metal clashed. Men screamed.
Something howled, a sound he never heard before.
His eyes burned as he opened it, his vision swimming until shapes bled into focus.
He almost wished they had not.
A man wrestled against something that might once have been a deer. Its antlers twisted at unnatural angles, branching like rusted pipes. Strips of fur clung to gray flesh that looked half melted, and the creature's eyes were a milky film over black pits.
John stared, frozen.
It felt distant, like watching a movie he had not agreed to be in.
The screams, the ringing metal, and the stink of blood folded together into one unreal noise. His mind refused to process what his eyes were showing him.
Then the thing lunged. One antler punched through the man's chest, and the body went limp before the scream could finish. The sound that followed, a wet grind of bone, snapped John out of his daze.
He stumbled back, breath shaking, bile burning his throat.
His brain finally caught up, and one terrified thought pushed through the fog.
What the fuck was that?
Another shriek tore the air beside him. He whipped his head toward the sound and froze.
Less than ten meters away, a hulking shape burst through the smoke.
The thing was a boar, enormous and wet-looking.
Around it, men in full armor with real armor, the kind he had only ever seen in medieval movies. Their blades glinted dull under the pale light, clashing against the creature's tusks with a sound that made his teeth ache.
Its body looked swollen under the skin, each breath puffing thick black sludge from its nostrils. Plates of hardened flesh clung to its shoulders like cracked armor, and where fur should have been, its hide shimmered with oil and blood. Its tusks were not ivory but twisted bone, blackened at the tips as if scorched in fire.
The boar crashed into the men. Their shields splintered under its weight, and the men were thrown aside like broken dolls.
John's chest seized. He tried to scream, but terror locked his throat.
Was this a dream? No. This looked like hell.
A man in armor then stumbled in front of him blocking the view of carnage, half his face slick with blood. His golden hair was clotted and red, his pale skin streaked with mud. His green eyes met John's, and for a second he thought he is going to cry.
"Your Highness," the man rasped. "Why…?" He coughed, voice cracking. "You must flee. Take the horse."
John froze. Who was this guy talking to?
He looked behind him, half expecting someone else. No one. The soldier's wide, bloodshot eyes stayed locked on him.
John pointed at himself. "Me?"
The man's brow furrowed, panic and disbelief tightening his face. "Yes, your highness," he said, voice hoarse with urgency, as if John had lost his mind at the worst time.
John blinked through the chaos. "My name is John."
But the sound that came out was not his voice. It was deeper, steadier, and too sharp, as if it belonged to someone trained to command. His skin crawled hearing it.
He quickly looked down. His arms were thicker, steadier, and wrong. Gone was the tanned skin he had earned from years of hard labor; what he saw now was pale, almost creamy white, smooth where calluses should have been.
Panic surged again. He swung his right arm across his body, trying to shake off the dread crawling up his spine.
The air quivered where his hand passed, a pulse of pressure brushing against his skin as if he had swung through water instead of wind. Sparks of faint light scattered outward before freezing midair.
Then…
A spread of cards appeared, floating and fanned in the air.
John's pulse hammered. "What the hell… what are these?"
The Ace and Two of Flowers glowed face up, their surfaces etched with shifting runes that crawled like firelight, while the others hovered facedown, black backed and humming faintly in the air.
The soldier followed his line of sight, saw nothing, and frowned. "Your Highness, did you hit your head?" he asked, his voice caught between concern and disbelief. Shaking it off, he grabbed John's arm. "Never mind. You need to move."
He yanked John to his feet.
"Wait."
John's sleeve brushed the hovering Ace.
The card flared white hot. Light speared through his skull, and his knees nearly gave out. A single word burned across his thoughts, louder than the screams around him.
Boost.
Boost what? His pulse hammered, the world tipping for a moment, sound thinning into a shrill ring.
The man drew a knife from his belt and slashed the straps clean.
"Here," he said through his teeth, hauling the reins free.
"Take this one. It can still run." The man's voice broke through the noise, dragging him back to the present. He pressed the reins into John's hands, his eyes raw with urgency. "Please, Your Highness. Go while you still can. We will hold them here."
John barely heard him.
The heat from the card still pulsed under his skin, crawling up his arm like liquid fire, but the man's grip on his sleeve anchored him to the mud and blood and noise. Two instincts warred in his chest run, or figure out what the hell had just happened inside his head.
But the next roar decided for him.
The man stepped back, already turning toward the sounds of those monsters, his sword rising again.
"Your Highness, the horse," the man barked.
Another roar shook the ground. The massive boar turned, sludge dripping from its tusks. Its eyes locked on them.
Panic replaced reason. John hauled himself onto the horse's back. There was no saddle or stirrups, just raw fear and clenched fists in its mane. The mare jerked beneath him, frantic and confused.
He tried tugging its mane like a joystick, but the beast only thrashed harder. Whether it was terrified of the monsters or of him, he did not know and did not care.
"Come on, move!" he shouted, his voice cracking. "Just go!"
The horse jerked and stamped, eyes rolling white, breath coming out in sharp, frantic bursts. He clung to its mane, praying it would bolt before the monsters come after them.
Another roar tore through the noise. The mare reared, screamed, and threw him off.
He hit the ground hard, pain sparking up his spine as the horse bolted into the chaos.
For a moment, he could only lie there, dazed, breath scraping his throat. That damned horse.
Then movement flashed in the corner of his eye.
The boar burst through the men fighting it, its mouth split wide, tusks tearing furrows through the mud. Instinct jerked him upright before thought could stop him.
His legs moved on their own, planting him back on his feet.
The man with the golden hair turned at the sound and froze. For a heartbeat, disbelief crossed his face, followed by something rawer—gratitude.
"Your Highness," he said quietly, almost as if he could not believe it. "You stayed."
John stared back, breath shallow. Stayed? He hadn't stayed. The damn horse had bolted without him. He wanted to say that, but the words caught in his throat. The boar's eyes were still on him, burning and fixed, as if it understood exactly who it wanted.
His gut turned to stone. Move. Run. But his body would not listen.
The soldier stepped in front of him, sword raised, planting his feet in the mud.
"Stay behind me," he said, his voice steady even as the ground shook.
The beast scraped its tusks together, a low growl rumbling through its chest, and began to charge.
The man sprinted forward and swung with everything he had. The blade struck true, but the steel barely bit through the hide. It scraped off with a dull clang, leaving only a thin line across the creature's flesh.
The boar bellowed, its tail whipping out like a battering ram. The strike caught him square in the chest.
The man hit the ground hard, air bursting from his lungs in a choked cough as mud splattered across his armor.
John's stomach dropped. Fuck that.
Every instinct screamed at him to run, but his legs refused.
The boar's burning eyes were still locked on him, its nostrils flaring, breath steaming like smoke. He stood frozen, lungs burning, knowing that if everything he had ever watched on those wildlife shows was right, the second he moved, it would charge.
A shout broke through the noise. Another soldier, younger and smaller, ran past them. "Your Highness, run!" he yelled before charging at the creature.
John's heart hammered. His legs refused, but instinct finally forced them to move. He stumbled backward and threw himself behind a shallow crater where the ground had been torn apart by the earlier fight. His boots slid in the mud.
He pressed himself low, chest heaving, and his hand brushed against something cold. A shield lay half buried beside him, dented but whole.
He grabbed it, fingers slick with dirt. The metal felt heavy and useless. This would not do anything.
He had seen how the boar's hide barely scratched even under a full swing. But this is better than nothing.
Peering over the edge, he trembled as he watched the two men fight. Steel flashed against the creature's flanks. Their movements were frantic, driven by desperation rather than hope. His legs shook so hard he thought they might give out.
God, they were going to die. If this was a dream, he wanted to wake up now.
He forced himself to look again. The younger man was no longer standing. His body hit the ground and stayed there. The soldier with golden hair was still moving, striking again and again, and for the first time John saw someone who looked like he might actually be able to fight it.
John's pulse hammered. The golden-haired soldier was still fighting, his sword cutting shallow lines that barely slowed the monster. John knew he should help, but instinct screamed at him to get as far away as possible.
He crouched low and started to circle around the crater, mud sucking at his boots. If he could just stay quiet, if he could just get out of sight, maybe it would lose interest.
He took one step too far into open ground.
The boar's head jerked toward him. Its eyes burned hotter, locking on him with the focus of something that understood what it wanted.
"Oh, you've got to be kidding me," he muttered, throat dry.
The creature roared and thundered toward him. Ignoring the frantic attack of the man.
John's mind went blank. There was no plan, no thought, only the raw need to not die. His body moved on its own, panic driving every muscle. He brought the shield up and swung, wild and clumsy, the motion more flinch than strike.
The impact cracked through the air, metal slamming against bone. The force jolted up his arms, so heavy it felt like his bones would split. The boar lurched sideways and crashed into the dirt with a thud that rattled the ground.
John froze, chest heaving. His hands still clutched the shield, knuckles white. The monster lay half-still, sides twitching in the muck.
"What the fuck," he said under his breath.
He looked up. The golden-haired soldier had stopped mid-step, sword hanging loose at his side, staring at him like the world had just turned upside down.