The transition was not a gentle landing. It was a violent re-entry, the kind that leaves the soul feeling two inches to the left of the body. Leon's eyes snapped open, but instead of the suffocating brown silt of the Agno River, he was blinded by a sky so blue it looked painted.
He gasped, his lungs expanding with air that tasted of crushed jasmine and wild, untamed ozone. He wasn't drowning. He was alive.
"Ugh... my head," he groaned, rolling onto his side.
He was lying in a field of Cogon grass—tall, razor-edged stalks that swayed in a rhythmic dance, reaching higher than his head. The sun was a fierce, golden coin overhead, significantly larger and more radiant than the sun he remembered from Pangasinan.
Leon sat up, wincing as a sharp pain flared in his ribs—the phantom memory of the log that had killed him. He looked down at his chest. His neon-orange responder vest was gone. In its place was a simple, sleeveless tunic of coarse, undyed hemp and trousers bound at the ankles with leather cord. Around his neck hung a strange pendant: a small, wooden carving of a sun with seven rays, pulsing with a faint, rhythmic amber light.
[ SYSTEM CALIBRATING... ][ LOCATION: THE WHISPERING JUNGLES - OUTER RIM. ][ STATUS: WEAKENED / MALNOURISHED. ][ LEVEL: 1 ][ HP: 45 / 100 ][ SP: 10 / 50 ]
The translucent blue screen hovered in his peripheral vision, stubbornly refusing to vanish when he blinked.
"So, it wasn't a hallucination," Leon muttered, his voice raspy. "Bathala. The Rogue God. The System. It's all... real."
He stood up, his legs shaking. The Cogon grass hissed as it brushed against his skin. Back home, this grass was a nuisance; here, it felt like it was whispering. The sound wasn't just wind; it was a low, undulating murmur, like a thousand voices gossiping just out of earshot.
"Okay, Leon. Protocol," he whispered to himself, a habit from his training. "Assess the situation. Secure the perimeter. Find water."
He turned in a slow circle, trying to find a landmark. To the North, massive, jagged mountains pierced the clouds, their peaks shimmering with what looked like violet snow. To the South, the grass gave way to a dark, impenetrable wall of ancient trees—the jungle.
Suddenly, the whispering of the grass stopped.
The silence that followed was absolute, the kind of silence that usually preceded a predator's strike. Leon's hair stood on end. He felt a gaze on the back of his neck—a cold, oily sensation that made his skin crawl.
[ ALERT: HOSTILE PRESENCE DETECTED. ][ ENEMY: SIGBIN (SCOUT CLASS) ][ THREAT LEVEL: LOW (LETHAL FOR UNARMED USERS) ]
"Sigbin?" Leon's blood ran cold.
In the stories his grandmother told him in the province, Sigbins were the shadows of the night—beasts that looked like hornless goats with backward-facing glowing eyes, creatures that could drain a man's blood before he could scream.
He heard it then: a wet, rhythmic clicking sound. Click-clack. Click-clack.
The grass twenty feet away began to part, not by the wind, but by something heavy moving through it. A foul stench wafted toward him—the smell of rotting meat and stagnant swamp water.
Leon looked around frantically. He was in the middle of a field with no cover and no weapon. His first responder training kicked in—he didn't panic; he searched for a tool. His eyes landed on a fallen branch of Kamagong wood, dark and heavy as iron, half-buried in the dirt near his feet.
He lunged for it just as a shadow leaped from the Cogon.
The creature was a nightmare made flesh. It was the size of a large dog, but its hind legs were grotesquely long, its head tucked between its forelegs as it hopped toward him with terrifying speed. Its eyes were two glowing, amber slits, and its mouth was a mass of needle-like teeth dripping with black ichor.
[ TUTORIAL MISSION TRIGGERED: SURVIVE THE FIRST HUNT. ][ REWARD: ANCESTRAL BOLO (FRAGMENTED). ]
"Stay back!" Leon roared, swinging the Kamagong branch with a desperate, two-handed grip.
The Sigbin hissed, a sound like steam escaping a pipe, and coiled its powerful legs for a second leap. Leon's heart hammered against his ribs. He was weak, he was outmatched, and he was in a world that wanted him dead.
But as the beast launched itself into the air, Leon didn't see a monster. He saw a threat to a civilian—himself. And a first responder never backed down from a rescue.