The first thing that Enos felt was the feeling of drowning.
He tried to move, but each movement was harder. The liquid itself was viscous in a way that was both familiar and nauseating. It was also hot, not in a burning sensation but in a way that made movement feel more draining.
Badump! Badump! Badump!
His heart rapidly beat within his chest, his lungs began to burn from holding his breath for too long, carbon dioxide filling his lungs.
Eventually his body reacted to the filling of carbon dioxide, forcing him to open his mouth.
The taste hit him like a hammer, Iron, thick, viscous, and warm.
At this time he didn't know why the water tasted like iron, nor did he know the nature of the sludge he was drowning in.
All he knew was that he was drowning in a body of sludge.
Before his lungs were filled with the strange, horrible taste of the mire he was drowning in, something dragged him out of the liquid.
Splash!
Enos broke free from the surface of the thick liquid he almost drowned in, cold air hitting his face as his body immediately vomited the horrible sludge he was force to swallow.
Cough cough cough!
He wretched it out violently, his body tries to get every single liquid that entered his mouth when he was force to take a breath, while at the same time he gasp for air.
Coughing violently to the point his throat begins to ache, he dragged himself away from the body of viscous liquid, his fingers clawing at the ground.
The taste of iron lingers in his tounge despite expelling all the strange liquid from his mouth.
After a few feet, he stopped dragging himself, his hands tired from dragging his full weight as he flip himself over. Wiping the viscous warm liquid off his his eyes, the first thing he saw was the pale moon high above the night sky.
The light from the moon was the only illumination.
Enos's breath came in heavy gasp, his lungs still felt like they were on fire. The cold air that entered his airways help cool his lungs.
Adjusting his body, he forced himself to sit upright despite how his body was telling him to lay down and rest. In his mind, he couldn't rest, not until he saw where he was.
He needed to see where he ended up
The moment Enos sit up right and saw the lake, his eyes widened. Shimmering like a field of ruby under the pale moon light was a enormous lake.
The lake was large, so large it might've been mistaken as an ocean under the pale moon light with the horizon being only darkness.
But it isn't an ocean, nor is it a normal lake.
Because no lake shimmers like the deepest ruby other than Blood.
Seeing the true nature of the lake, it was like seeing an actual monster in real life, tall, imposing, and staring back at you, grinning, exposing its sharp, spike-like teeth for you to see and dread.
It hungers for your fear.
This is how Enos felt when he saw a literal blood lake, a monster he never thought could exist in physical form, being projected in his mind.
His eyes slowly moved down, vision beginning to blur at the threshold when he saw crimson covering his hands.
Warm, viscous, and the stench of iron entering his nose. Blood was everywhere—not just on his hands, but his clothes, his face, his legs, and his hair.
Not one inch of his body had not been touched by the blood, and the worst part is that the blood covering him was still mostly warm.
His breath hitched from the horrific sight and the realization of what covered him and had just entered his mouth. His stomach churned as bile began to rise from his throat.
His head moved before his mind could act, vomiting from his side.
Blergh!
He vomited for a few seconds before his stomach expelled all the contents that he had when having breakfast, settling down when there's no longer any need to expell.
Enos breathe heavily, sweet from his body mixed against the blood of the lake. He feels like he could passed out, but his adrenaline keeping him sharp, even if he felt dizzy.
The adrenaline was keeping him lucid but in all honesty, he really wished he could pass out.
The sight of a literal blood lake, send a dread to his human instinct. He quickly move away from the blood lake, his instinct screaming at him to run.
He stumbled and almost fell, catching himself before he literally ate dirt, adrenaline doing it's magic as Enos push his already exhausted body beyond it's exhaustion as he ran towards the tree line.
He ran as fast as he could, snapping branches, twigs, stepping on dead leaves, mud earth. He wasn't thinking straight, because right now he just wants to move away from the crimson lake.
Paired with how dark the forest were, Enos had his feet hitting against a rock or a vine he could not see and fall to muddy dirt.
Splat!
The cold mud mix against the blood that still cling onto the skin and clothes of Enos. Having been force to stop now, exhaustion finally catches up, forcing him to take a breath.
His lungs burned like they were on fire, so Enos took large gasp, filling his lungs with too much air in an attempt to cool his burning lungs, but this also caused him to feel dizzy.
This force him to take slower breaths as he positioned himself to lay on his side.
"Calm down Enos, your fine! Your absolutely fine!"
He said not to anyone but himself, but it was just a hollow word, he was alone in a middle of nowhere. He tried his best to hold it in but tears begins to trickle down on the side of his face.
"Oh god, oh god... Please... Let this be just a nightmare"
He said as he sob uncontrollably, his face shifting to an ugly expression of terror and sadness.
Enos never really considered himself as a brave person, far from it. He knows he has his own fears, fears that he hides because he has his own pride and didn't want to be seen as a wimp against his peers when he was still back at school.
But he was no longer in his school, but In a middle of nowhere, alone and scared.
He curled into a fetal position, shivering both from the coldness of the night wind, and the rustling leaves that brush against the wind, giving an eerie atmosphere that terrifies enos due to the sound.
The blood had already begin to dry out to the harsh element of the wind, though only in the skin that the blood that clings to Enos dry out, but the ones on his clothes.
In his jacket, shirt, pants, underwear and socks.
The blood was still wet, becoming more sticky and uncomfortable to move in. The pungent taste and smell of blood didn't help as it affected him even further.
Enos cried harder feeling like the world was feeling especially cruel on him at this moment as all he could think about is.
What did he do to deserve this?
There was none that can answer, so religion is the only thing he could turn to at this moment because right now, he felt like a kid.
No
He'd always been a kid, even if he's over 16 years old, he'd always been a scared little kid.
****
Time had passed since he emerged from the crimson lake and stayed In a fetal position after he run into the forest. The sun rose from the east, illuminating the world in golden rays of light.
For the entire night, Enos had fallen asleep in the mud when exhaustion hit him after crying for so long. The blood that clings to him had already dried up, becoming nothing but a stain on his clothes but due to the cold winds the blood and cold mud mix together?
He slept the entire night shivering.
When the rays of warm sunlight hit his body, Enos stopped shivering when he felt the warmth of the sun gracing his cold uncomfortable body.
His eyes lids flutter from the movement of his eyes, slowly lifting them up and the first thing Enos saw was the head of a spider with it's many eyes looking at him curiously.
For a moment, Enos was processing before something click on his mind.
A spider was staring back at him, not only that but tiny critters were crawling all over his body and he felt it. In an instant Enos shot up from the mud, quickly patting the insects that were crawling around his body, outside and inside of his clothes.
"Fuck! Fuck fuck fuck fuck!"
He patted all the insects that got inside of his clothes shuddering as he watch the insects scurrying away from him into the grasses. The insects ranges from ants, small spiders, small cockroaches, grass hoppers and centipedes.
Seeing the centipede crawling away, Enos felt his adrenaline shot up as he quickly looked around his body for any bite marks.
When he saw no bite mark, he let out a sigh of relief that he didn't get bitten.
Enos then looks around, saw that he was deep into the forest. His heart sank that what he just experience wasn't a dream.
He bit his lower lips, frustration building up. He really wanted it to be just a nightmare, but it seems reality wasn't going to give him that.
With no other choice, Enos decided to just walk back towards the blood lake, not that the wanted to but because he doesn't know where he was, moving through the forest without a clear way is tantamount of being suicidal.
Trudging back to where the blood lake was located, was easy in on itself since all he had to do was follow his shoe steps. After trudging through the dense flora Enos can already see the shimmering crimson lake through the trees.
The sight of it made him grimace and just as he was about to move pass the trees, he saw people on the shoreline of the blood lake.
Enos's first instinct was to hide, he didn't know why but his instinct was telling him to his, to use the dense flora as a cover.
He peered through the leaves and saw there were two people, one was dressed in some kind of white armor, while other dressed in robes. Enos couldn't tell who theyw ere or why they were wearing such elaborate clothing.
He tried to listen what hey were talking but couldn't due to how far they were.
Enos felt something was wrong here, so just a s he was about to leave, his shoe stepped on a twig causing small snapping sound.
He froze mid step, feeling his blood ran cold as his eyes drifted towards the two people was, only to find the armored one missing.
Before he can even react, he felt a sharp pain occuring on his side, launching him out in the opened as something hard hit him.
Enos stumbled across gravel, coughing hard as he felt that air knocked out of him. He clutched his side, his expression pained and terrified.
"Well what do we have here"
A feminine voice said, two footsteps moving closer to him.
When Enos opened his eyes, his vision filled with tears saw the same people that he saw mere moments ago in the shoreline of the blood lake.
One was a knight, their face revealed to be a woman in her late 20's scarred face with a cold battled harden look. She looked down at Enos, both literally and metaphorically as she judged him base on appearance.
And she wasn't impressed.
"A kid, in the middle of an uncharted area of the land of corpses wearing strange clothes stained with dry blood, suspicious don't you think"
The woman said her voice stern and cold that it made Enos shudder in fear, especially when her hand rest against the pommel of her sword.
"Indeed, the kid is quite suspicious"
A different voice said, a man slightly older than the woman and from what Enos can tell, the clothes that man was wearing give off an air of wizardr.
"Then should we kill the boy" Said the woman, her hand tightly gripping the pommel of her sword.
Fearing death, Enos struggled to crawl away, but the crack bones of his side and the swelling beneath his stained clothes was too painful for him to even move.
Just as thought of death was going to be upon him, the man interjected
"Killing the boy is a waste of time, better to put the boy into slavery, the kingdom needs laborers"
The female knight paused, looked at the man then sighed, taking a step back as the man raised a hand, point towards the fearful expression of Enos.
The last thing the enos saw was the strange light that emitted from he man's hand before blacking out.