Ritual

What he saw was a scene that came straight from a horror movie.

The lukewarm glow that emanated from the moon reveals a terrifying sight of hundred pale corpses stacked together into a wall. Fortunately, Jack was lying down in the periphery of those mountains of corpses. If not, he would already be squashed flat by the weight of all those dead bodies.

As Jack crawls away in terror, he spews everything his stomach lugs bit by bit. But the pain tells him that there's nothing inside but warm and acidic liquid.

Jack wanted to run, but suddenly both of his legs turned limp and cannot be moved at all. So he had no choice but to crawl with his hands. All he cares about is to flee from those places as fast as possible.

Along the way, he noticed that there is a strange symbol written with blood and arranged neatly inside a curved line on the ground surface. If Jack could see all of them in their complete form, he will surely recognize them.

Auuuuuuuuw!

Suddenly, a long howl from a ferocious beast resounds in the forest surrounding him.

"Sh*t!" Jack cursed in a low voice when aware that the howling sound doesn't seem too far away. He tried to move faster. However, one of his legs suddenly ceased to move before immense pain aroused right at its shin.

Jack growled softly before checking what's wrong with his legs. He wondered what could cause such intense pain when nothing he can think of occurred.

He felt his leg like being hit by a burning steel hammer before stabbed by a thousand needles. Painfully hot with some pricking sensation in a random place.

It turns out there is a gruesome wound on his shinbone that seems to be caused by a blunt object. That wound is so horrifying that it made him wonder how could a person with such grievous wounds still be alive?

Not only fresh blood that keeps flowing out from the wound. But also a green puss and some black substance that smells like a rotting carcass. Jack tried to cover it with both of his hands to stop the bleeding while trying to endure the stinging pain. But no matter how hard he pressed it, the blood kept leaking out.

When looking around to find what caused his legs to look like that, Jack found that the blood trail just started about a meter behind him.

What does this mean?

Did the wound reopen in that place? But how?

Nothing could cause such an injury at that place. After all, it looked as if it had been there for several days already. Now it was more like those of a zombie.

Thankfully, a few moments later, Jack felt that the pain in his leg had lessened at a pace that he can perceive. Rather than feeling the burning sensation like previously, it turned to an itch as if thousands of ants are crawling around it.

After a few rounds of inspection, he realized that apart from the original bloodstain, no more liquid was flowing out of the bizarre wound. It appeared like it had received an advanced healing spell from a high-level priest. Before he knew it, his leg had returned to what it was.

Jack heaved a sigh of relief before putting both of his hands in each knee. But before standing up, another terrifying howl that sounded once more reminded Jack that he must flee from those places as quickly as possible.

Using his already healed leg, Jack walks briskly toward the direction where he could find fewer corpses. During the trip, he felt the countless gaze of soulless eyes that seemed to follow him wherever he went.

Thousands of questions filled his head. Questions about the place he was in, what the hell happened, and how he ends up getting stranded in this fu*ked place.

He didn't want to wait for those wolves to come and find him look yummy while drenched in blood. Or until the crazy bastard that commit this genocide to return and discover that one of his victims was still alive. In short, he wants to get out of this horrible place as soon as possible.

When he reached the boundary of fields full of corpses, he found another set of strange symbols written in blood that separated it from a dark, spooky forest. A few of those symbols are strung together into a word that is arranged neatly inside a curved line. Unconsciously, he turns his head over and finds out that the place he was standing at is a perfectly round open space in the middle of a forest.

When Jack took a closer look realized that he was standing on top of a magic circle that seemed to be used to perform a dark and bloody ritual. Judging from the state of the corpses lying around, He estimates that the rite took place a few days ago.

Jack shuddered in fear when conceiving that he was one of the thousands of people who had sacrificed in that ritual. Without hesitating any further, he hurriedly left the magic circle and dashed toward the pitch-black forest.

But before going too deep into the forest. Jack turned his face toward the sky to see a beautiful moon carrying a silhouette of a woman on its surface. Its size was twice as big as the moon on Earth and radiated a calm blue light that somehow made his heart feel at ease amid the calamity he just went through.

The peculiar phenomenon that he just glanced upon made him realize that he was not on Earth anymore.

"Looks like I really have transmigrated to another world," Jack muttered before frowned, thinking about what really happened and what caused it. He tried to figure out the answer. But after a while, he gave up because no realistic explanation came to his mind.

After looking at the blue moon once more, Jack turns around and walks away, swallowed by the blackness of Shadowless Forest.