Verd opened his eyes. There was no pain, no dizziness—just a strange, unnatural coldness surrounding him. He was no longer in the desert.

  Above him stretched a blood-red sky, heavy black clouds swirling as if ready to collapse at any moment. The air was thick, saturated with the scent of rust and rotting flesh. The ground beneath his feet was neither sand nor ordinary stone—it was something else… something wrong. It felt like a mass of shattered bones fused together.

  Verd took a quick look around. He stood in a narrow valley, enclosed by jagged black stone walls. In the distance, the ruins of an ancient city loomed—crumbling pillars, decayed structures, remnants of a civilization swallowed by time.

  "This world..."

  It resembled nothing he had ever seen before.

  Yet, there was no time for awe.

  A distant scream, sharp and muffled, pierced the silence. Verd immediately turned toward the source, his golden eyes narrowing in caution. He wasn't alone here. And he wasn’t the first to enter.

  He moved quickly, his steps soundless as he approached the voices, his hand resting on the hilt of his sword, ready for whatever lurked in the shadows.

  The First Corpses

  At the entrance to the city, three bodies lay motionless on the ground.

  There was no blood, but their bodies were torn apart, their lifeless eyes frozen in terror—as if they had witnessed something beyond comprehension before death claimed them.

  Verd knelt beside one of them, inspecting their condition. Their armor remained mostly intact, no signs of any weapons piercing their flesh. But something was off... their skin was pale gray, as if every drop of blood had been drained from their bodies.

  "What killed you?" he muttered under his breath.

  Before he could find an answer, he felt it.

  A shift in the air.

  A presence behind him.

  A swift movement. The sharp sound of something slicing through the wind. An immediate sense of danger.

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  Verd didn't think—he simply reacted.

  He leaped to the side, just in time.

  Something massive crashed into the ground where he had stood, shattering the stone beneath it with terrifying force. When Verd turned to look, he saw it.

  The Black Hunter

  It was tall—far taller than any human—its frame thin yet unnaturally elongated, covered in glossy black flesh, a grotesque blend of organic armor and rotting muscle. It had no face, only a void-like cavity where its head should be, shifting and distorting as if trying to form something.

  "So... this is their killer."

  Verd tightened his grip on his sword, the cold steel humming softly in his hand.

  This wasn’t the first monster he had faced. But he knew—this world was different. One mistake here meant death.

  The creature moved first.

  In an instant, it vanished.

  Verd barely caught the movement, but his instincts saved him. He raised his sword just in time, meeting a set of razor-sharp claws mid-swing.

  The impact was brutal. The force of it sent Verd skidding backward, his feet grinding against the bone-like ground. But he did not fall.

  "Strong..."

  But strength alone wasn’t enough to decide a fight.

  Before the beast could strike again, Verd lunged forward, using the momentum to slash at an unexpected angle. The sword sliced through the air, aimed directly at the creature’s neck.

  But the black thing wasn’t slow.

  Its body twisted unnaturally, as if it had no bones, bending out of the sword’s path with disturbing ease.

  Then, without warning, its claw lashed out.

  This time, Verd couldn’t dodge completely.

  The black talon grazed his shoulder, carving a deep wound into his flesh. Pain erupted, sharp and immediate. Yet Verd did not retreat.

  Instead… he smiled.

  "Time to begin."

  The familiar sensation began to rise within him.

  Not heat—but something far more dangerous.

  A power that burned without flames, not in his body, but in his very soul. He knew the price. He knew that every time he used it, a part of him disappeared forever.

  But he had no other choice.

  In a single moment, the air around him shifted.

  A faint dark mist began to rise from his skin, not smoke, but shadows leaking from his very being. His golden eyes blazed, shining like embers ignited from within.

  The creature froze for a brief moment—as if sensing something that hadn’t been there before.

  Verd didn’t wait.

  He moved.

  Faster than before.

  Before the beast could react, he was already in front of it, his sword swinging in a devastating arc.

  This time, there was no time to dodge.

  The blade cut cleanly through the creature’s torso—not just piercing its flesh, but ripping through the dark energy that bound it together.

  There was a sound, something deeper than mere flesh tearing—like a soul being shredded apart.

  The monster did not scream. It did not resist.

  In a single moment, it froze, then collapsed, its body crumbling into black ash, fading into nothing.

  Verd stood still, his dark hair swaying in the eerie winds of this cursed world, while the lingering shadows of his power slowly faded.

  He took a deep breath, then looked at his hand.

  His skin remained intact… but he knew.

  "I’m weaker than before."

  A piece of his soul was gone.

  "How much do I have left?"

  A question without an answer.

  But he had no time to dwell on it.

  Raising his gaze, he looked toward the ruined city ahead—where more hunters awaited.

  Where more secrets lay buried.

  And as always…

  He had no intention of stopping.

  End of Chapter 3.