1 Prologue

Walking to his car Qwen breathed a sigh of relief at finishing another unfulfilled work day but silenly enjoy the noise of the noises of the nearby wood line surround the 9 story building where he worked. By this point and time the moon was high in the sky and late shift were normal and highly encouraged by the CEO. He was glad to finally be off his job at research and software development firm in a somewhat isolated location. Qwen received the job from a family friend of a CEO with the company. Once Qwen finished college he actually had a job waiting on him. Its usually 'who you know, not what you know' in Florida like it is anywhere else when it comes to job connections. The firm was known for creating some of the worlds most cutting edge technology that was supposed to revolutionize one industry or another. Or so the marketing pitch was. Most companies usually fell short of the desired goal and had to be sold in some form to cut any losses but Qwens jib wasn't one of them. The companies owner was actually competent. This night Qwen was working late again. He was getting off at 10 P.M. despite having been awake since 5 A.M. He was completely exausted after six months of the monotonous home-to-work life. He sighed, followed by a massive yawn to himself on the elevator headed from the ground level to the parking lot. Qwen had to finish a late project deadline again. It was always meeting one deadline after another. Qwen didn't even know what project he was working on anymore. He simply did what was requested. At one time, he cared but now. He just couldn't find himself to be able to. Qwen worked in coding and had to pull an all nighter to meet each weeks deadline and it was always a challenge. A few minutes later, his coworker stepped of the 2nd elevator door behind him. "Hey Qwen hold up!" A tall dark muscular brown skinned handsome man waved at Qwen. Qwen waved back at his co-worker Terrell. He'd worked with Terrell for a six years now. For some reason even though Qwen would only makes small talk, Terrell never would never let a day go by that he didn't try to hold a conversation with Qwen. He seemingly didn't even care if he usually didn't receive much a big response other then a few one-liners. Over time Qwen could help but finally responding to the talkative man. Of course with his antisocial behavior no real friendship could ever panned out to between the two men. Qwen had worked at the lab for 9 years and had risen to the head of the coding department so, he was a bit of veteran and coding superstar. "Man you killed the deadline this week, your section of the coding platform was prestine. Your really are god at programming man. I dont think I ever could've finished so soon. We all have a few days of downtime because of you! I had to catch up to you to say thanks man!" Qwen just blushed smiled and nodded quietly. "Yeah thanks." Terrell just continued rambling on. "Shaunie would have had handed me my resignation letter already if it were up to me finishing so soon. Hey man do you want to go out for some drinks? I know a really cool laid back spot that we can hang at. There's are plenty of ladies too if you're down to go?" Terrell wasn't the prototypical office worker physically and exercised regularly and drove a nice car so, he was a ladies man easily. Qwen just smiled and shook his head. "Thanks man, sorry I gotta go home, I'm really beat. Maybe next time." Terrell just smiled liked he wasn't rejected. "Always only one for the small talk. Well anyways see you Monday man. Don't hesitate to call if you change you mind. I have a couple of ladies we can meet up with if your down! He laughed and waves to Qwen as he went to his car door. "Hopefully you wanna go next time!" Terrell waved to Qwen and jumped in his fancy car and sped off. "Yeah...next time." Qwen responded dejectedly. Qwen was average looking so it would be easy to pass him on the street and not look his way twice. He was almost 6 feet tall, slightly tanned skin, brown hair and brown eyes. From the clothes he wore when he left his house, a person would think that he lived an average life. He had no love life to speak of only passing relationships that never lasted. Qwen was too emotionally unavailable for anyone to truely love him long term. At least that's what Qwen thought to himself. He drove the same car for 9 years. His fashion sense was atrocious and nonexistent and he didn't speak to anyone outside of his forced interaction at work. Qwen had no family left that kept in communication with him. His mother had passed and his father was non existent since the passing. His only brother was half a country away and although Qwen loved him, they both had grown apart over the years since the passing of their parents. Damien lived in secluded house on the outskirts of the humid city in central Florida. It was the middle of summer so the heat was especially bad this year. On occasion, the temperature would reach over 112°F for a week straight. His home was actul down a rural country road that hadn't even been paved yet and look like the scene from a horror moving yet the dirt road would suddenly turned into into a paved cobblestone driveway. His 2 story country home was spacious and inviting yet to Qwen it was just home. It was very plain and no decorations on the wall except a few family photos. He could afford to live in such a place due to saving up 9 years of wages living secluded. So money for the things he needed in his life, was mostly a non issue for Qwen. Qwen was used to being alone. Outside of work he had very little human interaction. He was sure his co worker was just some kind of human abnormality. No one else cared to talk to Qwen much either. Finally home, Qwen went into the kitchen to poured himself a stiff drink and putting the TV dinner into the microwave responding to his growling stomach. Turning on the news the TV anchor was speaking on strange local electrical disturbances in the area causing outages all over. Qwen was hardly listening. Qwen was stuck in his almost autonomous thoughts. It was like his life was stuck on autopilot. The same thing week in and week out. Qwen felt like he had no control over his life. It seemed like everyday of his life was already prewrittened and destined to be ordinary. Qwen felt like a puppet with strings. Even now in the middle of his current anxiety attack he needed to spend the weekend coding for hours until he fell asleep. That was the only way one man could meet this impossible dead line was literally not having. Like the type of tired existence that Qwen lived. No family, friends, or real relationships. No social life. Even his social media had no friends. Qwen struggled to hold any real conversations. The only person in the world that understood was his brother but he was long gone. He stared at the phone his finger over the call button to his brother. He felt like he should say something, but things might be too difficult if he did. On the outside Qwen was expressionless but his his brain was was filled with chaotic thoughts. He walked over to the table with a fork and steak knife and slowly ate. His thoughts slowly descending into further destruction as he ascended on feeling like this was some kind of last meal. While eating he cut his hand with the steak knife but kept eating. Then he looked down and see a small pool of blood that filled his TV dinner. He had eaten bloody food and didn't even notice. Staring at the blood. He thought, 'who would care?' He slowly drew the knife closer to his wrist. 'Really? Who would care?' Qwen thought, slowly dawing the knife closer to his wrist. He was about to draw blood when suddenly the lights went out startling him out of his thoughts. Everything was suddenly dead silent. A slight but strange pressure fell over Qwen and he froze and looked around. 'Was that his imagination? He felt...something right?' Qwen wasn't sure. It was hard to question sanity when no ones around to ask the question. Especially, in his current state of mind. He didn't know if hes not beyond hallucinations at this point. Standing up from his table he walked into hall and then downstairs into the basement to turn on the circuit breaker. He went down to the circuit breaker and flicked it on and off a few times then nothing. That was very strange and Qwen knew something was off. He had back up generators installed in case of power outages from storms, so it should never be completely dark. Something just felt well off to Qwen. His whole being was screaming at him to be wary. He knew that SOMETHING wasn't right. He heard a sound of something scraping upstairs. Instantly this sent goosebumps on Qwens arms and a massive chill filled his spine. He quickly grabbed a machete he had bought a while back from a hardware store. Qwen lived in wooded rural Florida so that meant anything from bears, panther, deer or various poisonous snakes among other things could appear any time in rural areas. Some form of protection was needed. Qwen very slowly walked upstairs from the basement. He flinched at every sound made by his movements. Finally arriving at the top stairs, he walked back into his kitchen and froze. In front of him was a 7 and a half foot green oily skinned man with the muscles of a world class body builder. It had scars all over its body and tribal markings that looked like they were burned into its skin. Around it's waist was a large lion cloth and nothing else. It was currently sniffing around like it was searching for something until it stopped sniffing and growled. Then it spoke in a deep baritone voice and a cruel smile began to form on its hedioisbfsce. It turned its head and had two tusks protruding from its large jaw line. *sniff* *sniff* "mmmm... HUUUMAANN!" It turned around slowly. Drool spilling from its mouth growling hungrily. It took slow steps towards Qwen, who was currently frozen in fear. It enjoyed playing with its meals and didn't take Qwen seriously at all. This could be seen by the mocking gleam in it's eyes. It could hardly wait to peel the humans flesh. Qwen was standing at the far end of his fair long hall way that was a lareft size for himself but for a large 7 foot man there wasn't much room to move. He could not believe his eyes or his mind for that matter. It couldn't be a orc, could it? Not a living breathing orc from the movies and computer games! He had to be going crazy but the question was if he willing to bet his life on it. Qwen didn't have time to make a decision before the monster and bounded for Qwen in only a five year steps. How could something so large move this fast? Qwen made for the machete at the same time that was next to his basement door from when he went into the wood some times for jogging on nature trails. He's was could barely get his fingers around the handle when his vision blurred. Quen could only get his arms up in defense as a large fist came into view. A loud cracking and squelching sound was followed by another loud crash. Qwens body was sent flying and impacted the wall at the end of the hall. Qwens body was a mess. He felt like he got hit by a car. The monster's body felt like steel. Bones were definitely broken and everything hurt. Qwen laid on the ground wincing in pain and horror but still was able to look up. He could see the monster stumbling forward with a anger and humiliation etched on its face for being mortally wounded by a weak level 0 human! The machete Qwen previously held was by some miracle lodged in the orc's chest. Blood dripped from the beasts mouth but it still stepped forward slowly with murderous hate in its eyes. It finally stopped in front of Qwen reaching its massive hands out to crush the human that dared to harm it. The orc threw up a massive amount of bright red blood before its eyes went lifeless and it succumbed to its wounds. Of course not before falling on top of Qwen and knocking him unconscious and darkness over took him.

Next chapter