The silence of the forest was a different kind of violence.
For Fredrik, noise was life. Noise was the data that told him where the enemy hid, how far the mortars were ranging, and which direction the wind would carry the gas. This new world, however, was wrapped in a suffocating, emerald quiet.
He lay on the moss for what felt like hours, his lungs drawing in air that felt too pure, too thin. It didn't burn. It didn't taste of sulfur. It tasted of life, and that terrified him.
His first coherent thought was a tactical assessment. He rolled onto his stomach, ignoring the strange lightness in his limbs, and performed a systematic check.
Status: No visible trauma. No shrapnel wounds. Ribs, previously shattered by the concussive wave, felt seamless and strong.
Gear: Standard-issue charcoal-gray fatigues. Clean. Too clean. The grease from the tank treads he'd climbed, the dried spray of the sergeant's blood—all gone.
Weaponry: Missing.
The realization hit him like a physical blow. He reached for his hip, his fingers grasping at an empty holster. He checked his shoulder; the familiar weight of his bolt-action rifle was gone. He was a predator without teeth, a soldier without a soul.
"Where..." he whispered. His voice was a dry rasp that seemed to offend the stillness of the trees.
He scrambled to his feet, his heart hammering a frantic, uncontrolled rhythm. He spun in a circle, his eyes darting across the clearing. The trees were titans, their trunks wider than the bunkers of the Hindenburg Line, their leaves pulsing with a faint, rhythmic silver light.
"Where is the regiment?" he barked, louder this time. "Sergeant! Miller! Anyone!"
Only the chittering of a six-winged bird answered him.
The panic came then, cold and oily. It was the "after-action letdown"—the moment the adrenaline masks drop and the mind realizes the world has changed. He slumped against a tree, his hands shaking so violently he had to tuck them into his armpits. He thought of the artillery flash. He remembered the feeling of his body being torn away from the earth.
He should be a smear of red in a muddy crater. Instead, he was here.
"Emotional settlement," he muttered to himself. "Settle. Ground. Observe."
He forced himself to breathe—four counts in, four counts out. He focused on the texture of the bark against his spine. It was warm, almost feverish. He focused on the scent of the air—crushed mint and something like ozone. He focused on the fact that he was alive.
It took twenty minutes for the soldier to suppress the man. When Fredrik finally stood up, his eyes were no longer wide with fear; they were narrowed, calculating.
Mission: Reconnaissance. Objective: Gear recovery and threat assessment.
He began to move. He didn't walk; he stalked. He kept to the shadows of the massive trunks, his boots making no sound on the thick, mossy carpet. He navigated by the silver-veined leaves, marking his path with small piles of stones—a habit from the forests of his youth.
The deeper he went, the more the "magic" of the world revealed itself. He saw a stream where the water flowed in a spiral, defying the slope of the land. He saw a clearing where the grass turned from emerald to deep violet as he stepped on it.
Then, he found the tracks.
Fredrik froze, dropping to one knee instantly. His eyes scanned the perimeter before he looked down at the soft earth.
He had tracked wolves in the Black Forest and men in the Argonne, but he had never seen a signature like this. The footprint was massive, easily the size of a man's torso. It had four primary toes, each ending in a jagged, crystalline claw that had sliced through the moss like a bayonet. But it was the gait that bothered him. The spacing was irregular, suggesting a creature that was quadrupedal but capable of terrifying, lunging bursts of speed.
Beside the print lay a smear of blue, viscous liquid that hummed with a low-frequency vibration. He touched it. It was cold. It felt like a mild electric shock.
"Not a wolf," he muttered, his jaw tightening. "Not a man."
He stood up, his hand reflexively going to his empty hip. He was unarmed in a territory that clearly belonged to a high-tier predator. Every instinct told him to retreat, to find high ground, but there was nowhere to go. The forest stretched on infinitely in every direction, a beautiful, silver-veined cage.
He kept walking, slower now, his senses dialed to their absolute limit.
The air grew heavy. The scent of ozone intensified, replaced by the acrid smell of burnt hair and old copper. He reached a clearing where the trees were scarred, their white bark gouged by deep, glowing gashes.
A twig snapped behind him.
Fredrik didn't turn his head; he listened. The sound was heavy—a wet, rhythmic thud of weight hitting the moss. One... two... three... four.
He began to turn, but the predator was already in motion.
Out of the bioluminescent shadows, it lunged. It was a nightmare of obsidian and violet light—a sleek, hairless quadruped with six legs and a head that split open into four petal-like mandibles. Its skin was translucent, showing a skeleton made of pulsing, purple crystal. It didn't roar; it hissed, a sound like steam escaping a pressurized valve.
It cleared twenty feet in a single, blurring leap, its front talons extended to rip through Fredrik's chest.
Fredrik's training took over. There was no time to think, only to react. He threw his weight to the right, tucking his shoulder and rolling across the soft moss.
The creature's claws whistled through the air where his head had been a millisecond before, slamming into the earth with the force of a falling sledgehammer. Fredrik came out of the roll on one knee, his hand reaching into his boot for the only thing he had left: a six-inch combat knife.
The beast skidded, its six legs digging into the violet grass as it pivoted to face him. Its mandibles flared, revealing rows of needle-thin teeth that glowed with a hungry, electrical light.
Fredrik gripped the knife, his heart finally finding the rhythm of the hunt.
"Alright," he whispered, staring into the creature's void-like eyes. "Let's see what you're made of."