Kael awoke gasping, eyes snapping open to a sky bruised with ash-colored clouds. His body felt raw, yet intact. He pressed hands to arms, chest, legs—there were no wounds. Only his pulse, wild and unsteady.
Before him stretched a city that was both ruined and alive in its decay. Buildings crumbled into jagged skeletons of stone and metal, streets split with fissures, and the air carried the metallic tang of blood and ash. Corpses lay in disarray, some skeletal, others freshly fallen. The stench of decay clawed at Kael's throat, and nausea hit him like a wave, forcing him to retch against a broken wall
Is this the first world? Or another entirely? he wondered. Clothes on the corpses were unfamiliar, architecture slightly off. The river of destruction did not match the industrial city he had known. Confusion twisted his mind. Panic clawed at him
Kael stumbled forward, vomiting intermittently, trying to comprehend the ruins. Memories of the old man, the betrayal, his meaningless death, and the pangs of hunger merged into a haze of terror. How many times have I died? How many worlds have I seen? His mind reeled.
He wondered "What is it ? Am I switching the world's or traveling in time , F*ck ,I was living better live on earth .Wait ,since I am getting transferred or travel so what is the trigger for it ,is it my death ?" He thought.
"Since I arrived here after death . No , I can't arrived on that conclusion so soon .Anyway now is not the time for that ,I should first find my fellow human beings ,No I need to find supplies first."
Cautiously, he explored the streets, trying to find water, shelter, or signs of life. He found broken wagons, tattered books, tools scattered amid the wreckage. Nothing moved, but shadows and wind seemed to whisper, hinting at unseen presences.
Kael tentatively named this world Ashfall, both to give himself a point of reference and as a fragile attempt to assert control over the chaos. He survived by scavenging water from cracked barrels and eating spoiled rations. Sleep came fitfully, always with one eye open, as if the ruins themselves could reach out to him in the night.
Days blurred into one another. Fear became constant, bile rising in his throat with every sudden sound. He explored cautiously, marking landmarks in his mind. Every turn revealed more corpses, more skeletal reminders of sudden catastrophe, perhaps within the last month. The city smelled of ash, rot, and iron, a scent that would never leave him.
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