3. A Walm Welcome from Arenigard

Sin's eyes slowly flickered open as he quickly adjusted himself to the darkness of the cramped windowless room he found himself standing in.

The layers of dust combined with the smell of rotting wood drifted through the air leaving behind a thick metallic taste to stick to his tongue.

Sin let out a small cough as he squinted and wiped at the air before him, agitating the dormant dust particles.

'Where am I?' Sin glanced around, his eyes suddenly locking onto 5 vague strangely shaped objects lying on the ground around him.

"This-" He murmured with a frown, the fragile ground creaking beneath him with every step.

Kneeling down and carefully reaching his hand forward, he touched the rough battered black cloth wrapping around the object and quickly tugged it off, revealing the body of a pale, breathless blond-haired boy. Blood trailed from his purple lips as a palm-sized obsidian black dagger remain embedded into his abdomen.

Sin squinted his eyes as he slowly glanced at the other 4 almost identical objects scattered around the room, his hand slowly covering the corpse back with the cloth as he hurried over and tugged the old black cover from the remaining bodies, and sure enough, they were all young children in their teens. All of them killed the exact same way - A single black ominous dagger thrusted into their abdomen.

"Lloryn! Hurry up, we need to bring the next batch over," A distant hushed shout cut Sin from his thoughts as he glanced up towards the direction of the voice,

"I know, I know. Stop rushing me already." A lazied reply responded followed by a ground-shaking slam; cutting off the voices completely.

Slowly standing up and taking a good look around for a way out, Sin finally caught the glimpse of what seemed like the silhouette of a flight of stairs a few dozen meters away.

Feeling his way through the pitch darkness, Sin felt the grimy rotten walls on the tips of his fingers, the uncomfortable touch of cobwebs occasionally landing on his arms as he felt the sudden change from the vertical plank-like material to a more grainy stone-like texture; the flight of stairs stood right before him.

With each step, the loud groan of the decade-old makeshift wooden staircase echoed under his weight before a hint of sunlight shone down upon him.

Sin hurriedly placed a hand over his eyes as he slowly uncovered it to observe his surroundings, and to his surprise, a few dozen long dark rows of wooden seats were the first thing entering his vision, followed by the bright colorful mosaic windows which were directing the ray of sunlight to exactly where he currently stood. However, the one consistent element to the room he was in previously and the larger and brighter room he was now, was the bountiful amount of dust and the extremely unkept and abandoned state of everything.

A thick layer of dust and cobwebs covered every surface from the seats to the giant chandelier on the ceiling.

Finally locking his eyes onto the large double door opposite him, Sin quickly covered his nose and mouth with one hand and hurried toward the door, placing a palm onto the door and pushed with all his might, generating a low growling creak as it slowly swung open, basking the inside of the abandoned church with long-awaited sunlight.

Closing his eyes and feeling the warm sun upon his skin, Sin raised an arm above his eyes and waited for his eyes to adjust once more before squinting and looking around.

All around him was a vast hilly green plain. The azure sky scattered with cotton candy-like clouds above his head and a gentle breeze welcomed him to the outside world.

In the distant, a soft clacking and a quiet cry of a horse slowly disappeared from view while a few meters down in the valley of the hill he stood upon, a moderately large medieval-styled civilization captured Sin's attention.

With nothing but the clothes he wore, Sin slowly took a step onto the soft emerald grass before coming to an immediate halt. Something was amiss.

Rising his hand into view and flipping them slowly, a frown arose from Sin's forehead as he hurriedly made his way to a window.

His reflection peering back at him, but not really.

Instead of the usual short almond hair and pale skin staring back at him, a slightly tanned black-haired boy took its place. His delicate dark brown pupils and triangular-shaped face mimicked every moment he made.

"This body…" Sin tilted his head in multiple different angles, closely examining his new features, "It isn't too bad,"

He gave himself a small nod as he placed a finger on his chin, doing a small pose before pulling himself back to focus on the main task.

——

Up close, the carefully-made giant timber-framed buildings loomed over his head as his entire figure became encased within its shadow.

All around him, dozens of people roamed the gravelly streets; all giving him a quick glance before nervously looking away and going on about their day.

However, even more strange were the hovering numbers above their heads.

Every person he had come across so far had a green percentage number hovering above their head ranging from 5% to 30%.

With a brisk look around, Sin found himself staring at the hill where he had descended, the huge church building he had come from staring back at him, the eerie stone walls and haunting vibes causing a shiver to run down his back.

"Excuse me, ma'am," Sin quickly glanced behind him and noticed an elderly woman slowly shuffling past him before giving her a light tap on the shoulder, "Ma'am, if I may have a little bit of your time. I have a quick question regarding that building there," He pointed towards the church.

The elderly lady slowly turned around and gave Sin a close look before her eyes widened and she hurriedly looked around before tossing a thin scarf over Sin's head, gripping tightly onto his arm, and began shuffling towards a small alleyway as fast as she could.

"Hide, boy, hide." She said urgently, dragging him to follow her, "Don't let them find you. Don't let them find you, boy." She tightened the scarf around Sin's face as she peeked a glance outside the alley with a scared expression.

"Ma'am, what's going on?" Sin tilted his head in confusion as he followed behind,

"That church," She raised her hand towards the church building in the distance, her elderly arms trembling as she pointed, "20 years ago, that used to be the Holy Church, but now…"

She slowly shook her head, "It's been destroyed and abandoned. Now it's the gathering place for those cultists,"

"Cultist?" Sin raised an eyebrow as he looked over to the building,

The elderly woman gave a rapid nod of affirmation, "They take all the young boys and girls from the town. They take them from the streets, never to return. You must hide your face or they will take you too! Now quickly leave here before it's too late,"

The elderly waved a shooing motion towards Sin as he slowly backed away from the alley and back into the crowd,

"Hurry and get out of here," The elderly woman warned him one last time as he found himself back on the street, even more confused than before.