Chapter 1: Chapter 1: Moist Beginnings

His entire body wrapped in blood thick enough to be mistaken for clothes in the dim light, Donovan began the difficult task of clambering out of whatever god-forsaken creature had cushioned his fall... only cushioned. No matter how large the creature, falling into it at terminal velocity wouldn't be pretty however you spin it. Especially given that, well, corpses aren't known for being pretty.

It was soft enough, however, and he only came out of it heavily bruised and covered in blood... "...better than being dead..." He thought absentmindedly, contemplating exactly what he had fallen into. He turned to look upwards, and it seemed like the fleshy walls reached at least three times his height. It was high, but not too high, he reasoned, inspecting them for footholds.

Unlike humans, there were two sets of ribs, the second larger than the first. What he found to be the most odd, however, was the fact that he was looking at a caved-in spinal column- not some soft belly- with the bottom separated from the top through sheer savagery. Whatever had killed this thing burrowed in and ate them from the inside-out, leaving only the bones and the tougher flesh lining the skin. "At least it came with a built-in ladder…"

He grabbed a hold of the nearest, lowest rib, twice the width of his head and a little taller than he was. He pulled himself just high enough to get both arms on it, almost dangling over the other side. He then swung one leg over the top of it, skidding off the first time, but then finding purchase on the second attempt. When he had gotten the second leg over the top and tried to stand up, however, it shook and he felt something crack, breaking off the part he had grabbed onto.

This then led to a cascade of events in which he toppled over along with part of the corpse, falling, sliding, and eventually tumbling out of the side where he had attempted to climb out of. Completely naked the whole time, mind you. His weight had apparently been the last straw, causing a good portion of it's side to break open like a dam where he was just along for the ride.

~

When he opened his eyes, he was met by red-tinted, mid-afternoon light.

So, good news, he wasn't in some massive dead guy’s chest cavity anymore. Bad news, Donovan somehow found a way to even more thoroughly soak himself in blood, the filth finally making him feel like he was going to vomit. Which he promptly did once he realized it had gotten in his mouth.

~

One puke break later, he wiped his mouth- still stained with blood, as was his hand- and glanced over at the corpse. His eyes were drawn to an obnoxiously large rupture, still slowly spewing a growing puddle of blood, where several ribs had fallen or tilted over due to the stress. Whatever he did, it did significant damage to the corpse. Decidedly, he walked closer to it, to get a better look at it. 

Facing down into the rocky soil, it was large and humanoid, with dark gray skin wherever it wasn't covered in clothing or open wounds. He wasn't sure if this was because it was its actual skin, or because it was a rotting, putrid, desiccating corpse. As for what it wore, it was hard to tell past the blood that soaked the entire front… no, back of its body, but it was some kind of black leather, with a simple tunic underneath. The pants were made of the same fabric.

He supposed he could tear some off of it later to make clothing, but first things first; he would have to identify what it was for sure, as in, look at it’s face. From where he was standing, it was wearing some kind of turban made from scraps of cloth. Unlike the clothing, which was patched together in place, the turban was, blood aside, considerably well-kept. It was entirely a light-green color, wrapped around the entirety of it’s head, presumably to keep away the sun. He contemplated using the large, hand-width strips as clothing, but decided against doing it immediately. “First things first, finding out what poor sod I fell into.”

Looking around before getting closer to its face, he spotted something a couple meters away from the corpse. It was a massive, bone-carved club nearly the length of a telephone pole, covered in dried, purplish blood. It didn't match the red that he was, in fact, currently covered in, so it was likely some kind of other creature.

‘First things first’ quickly forgotten, upon closer inspection, it was rather ornate and even had strange sigils that looked to be burnt into it, probably by a branding rod. “Maybe not?” His mind, of course, immediately jumped to magic, as the sigils were far too uniformly indented into the club to be caused by a branding rod. He didn’t want to jump to conclusions, though, due to what that would suggest. He gave it a pull, and although it was lighter than he had first thought it would be, it was only enough for him to drag it along minimally, even with the utmost effort.

The head seemed intact enough, thankfully. Once he was done with his cursory scan, he walked around to the other side of the corpse, a bloody trail following him. To his surprise, this wasn't even a giant of some kind; it was a cyclops. A massive, balding cyclops. With a singular, , beady, tire-sized eye.

He was in a bit of a daze after seeing the cyclops, but as soon as he had regathered himself, this struck him as very odd; if this corpse wasn't fresh- and complete lack of, you know, organs certainly suggested that- then the eyes would have been plucked away along with the them, especially given it's juicy size. So, why are the eyes- or in this case, eye- here? Even if it was harder to see than the innards, one would think something might have taken a bite by now. He didn’t remember seeing any birds while he fell, nor has he seen any since his dramatic exit from the corpse. Are there simply no birds, here?

In a moment of inspiration, however, he recalled something- a memory that he couldn't place the origin of, but one that proved useful. He searched for a means to do it in this low-tech environment, and his eyes soon fell upon the clothing that remained. Tearing off two thick pieces of leather, he began vigorously rubbing them together. He wasn't sure if this would work, but after a few minutes of rubbing these two thick sheets of fabric that were half the width of his arm, he could feel the static clinging to his skin. Now, where does he test this? He needs a sensitive muscle that will give him some kind of reaction, especially given the size of this creature.

He had already settled on the fingers, hidden under the corpse. The only problem was getting to one of the hands. He was just able to reach out to touch them with both hands, and, to his amazement, it gave a very, very small reaction, almost too small to notice if he wasn't looking so intently.

What this told him was that this corpse hadn't been dead for at least six hours. For a larger creature? He could estimate it to be double that, maybe more; he wasn't an expert at this. Either way, he was looking at a creature that had much of it's spinal column caved in within a day of it being dead, perhaps even the reason for it's death, which was much, much more recent than what he was led to believe.

Was it really a coincidence he fell directly into the corpse? It was large enough that he could've easily fell into it on purpose, but he wasn't even able to notice it before it would've been too late. It was by a stroke of luck that the corpse didn't give him a reverse spinal tap to the head as he fell. It was food for thought, at least; what would be better was actual food.

Turning away from the forensic scene, he had a couple options; live inside the corpse, and possibly subsist off of it, or leave to avoid any other predators. He wasn't too concerned about the filth, nor that whatever had torn a hole in the corpse would come back; it had made off with what it wanted and if it was smart, wouldn't try eating any more of the rotting corpse. In fact, it might help against larger predators, given how undesirable this corpse was.

What did concern him was what might come to eat the remaining flesh on the corpse, namely, the massive eye. He wasn't sure if it would be the normal size, or if it would be up-to-scale with the cyclops here. It might see him as a cherry on top to this carrion buffet, and wouldn't have trouble clawing through the corpse to get to him. If they were small enough, he could even hope to hunt them.

He was, however, also concerned with the two most important facets of survival in this situation; shelter and water. He could last without food, especially if he quickly found a place to stay out of the sun. The blood was better than nothing, especially if it didn't have as much time to rot as what he originally thought, and he was looking at a decently-sized shelter. Behind that was food, and he could possibly use something of the cyclops' for kindling, and, if things were really dire, even eat the corpse. Although most of the innards were vacated, bits of flesh remained. He was looking at a most gruesome yet effective survival shelter, ready for the taking. 

The only question was; stay and face ensured safety and danger, or explore the unknown? The blood would only last him a little bit before it rotted too much to be anything but diminishing returns, and he didn't know if he could fend off whatever came after him.  Would he face a danger he somewhat knew, or risk the chance of finding a better opportunity that lies beyond?

Given the options, however, his decision was obvious; stay, and subsist off of the corpse. He hadn't even had the chance to see what else the corpse had, so he would have to do that anyways. Doing one more cursory scan of the corpse, he realized why the corpse was facing down, with their hands under them; they were tightly clutching some kind of flat leather bag that was hard to make out in the darkness underneath the corpse. He tried to reach out to it from the side that hadn't ruptured, but it was too far, and it was too risky to crawl underneath. He did, however, get a tad closer to better identify it; it was a massive bag the size of a small car.

"I suppose that discounts foul play, here..." The blood-soaked Donovan thought out loud. If someone killed this cyclops, they would've at least turned the corpse over to take the bag. No, it was likely some kind of animal that he shuddered to think could predate something this massive. Instead of crawling underneath, he had a different idea. Looking inside the corpse through the side passage he "created", there was a lump near the middle of the cavity; directly under which was the bag. He immediately thought about cutting it open, but he would need some kind of tool first. Looking to the bone that had split in his attempt to clamber out, he grabbed a decently-sized fragment and began sharpening it against one of the ribcages in the wall. He didn't have to do a perfect job, just enough to make it a little less blunt. 

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For about a quarter of an hour, he rubbed it against the end of one of the downward-facing ribs. Now that he was inspecting the inside closer, he realized why he had so easily broken the side; the huge rupture of the back of the corpse had cut the spinal column into two halves and that brought instability with it. It was unusual, however, to see two sets of ribs coming out from the corpse. He didn't have much to do while performing this task so all the entertainment he had was pondering what an anatomical chart of this creature might look like.

Once it had been sharpened to be a little better than a blunt instrument, he began sawing away with the goal of making a hole twice his width. This would unfortunately stain the backpack, but it had to be done to reach it past the arms and the heavy corpse.. Even in it's post-mortem state, the skin was incredibly thick and resistant to his best efforts, likely being the reason why it was left alone instead of eaten.

Ten minutes of straining his muscles to saw away at it yielded about a fifth of the circumference being cut away, which only bummed him out a little bit before he resumed his efforts. The thick bone of the makeshift knife didn't dull, thankfully, as he cut away. The dankness of the meat cave cooled him down, but even through it, he was sweating profusely and his arms were incredibly tired out. To alleviate this, halfway in, he took a break and checked to see if there was anything new around him, but all he confirmed was how barren the landscape was.

By the time he had severed the last bit of the flesh, causing it to slide away, down and past the backpack. The arms still held the weight, but the corpse shook a little from the shifted weight of the backpack, which was now just visible through the hole he had made.

Donovan nearly slipped because of this, but managed to grab onto one of the lower ribs to keep his balance. After an hour of effort, he had finally been able to access the backpack!. Now, he could loot the corpse. "Is this desecration? I mean, the corpse was already desecrated when I got here!" He said out loud into the empty landscape, chuckling to himself.

He then paused briefly, “I’m not going insane already, am I?” Even the most solitary hermit is, as a human, a social creature, it isn’t good for your health to stay away from others for too long. The prospect of slowly deluding himself out here in this godforsaken desert troubled him, but for now he just decided to delight in his newfound treasure.

The backpack itself, now that he got a better look at it, was more like a roughly-woven set of bags and pockets than a true backpack, with numerous pockets and a massive cyclops-sized bedroll attached to the top. At first, he attempted to drag it out through the hole, long-ways, yet it was much too large to fit, considerably larger than its circumference. Leaving that aside, he went rifling through the pockets to find something of value, a little difficult to go through past the hole.

He spent an hour going through this ungodly-large backpack, and even then he wasn't sure that he found everything valuable. That’s not to say he wasn’t having a field day with what he did find, though; two large canteens half his height, with one full of alcohol and the other full of water, a jug his full height filled with blood, remarkably well preserved for some reason, a bone knife seemingly designed for carving meat that was the size of a Greatsword, twice his bodyweight in jerky, a strangely-smelling wad of what appeared to be soap, gallon-sized bags of numerous strange plants, powders, and even minerals, a whetstone that was the same color as the few rocks he could see, with numerous knick-knacks such as a bone necklace and a crude carving of a humanoid here and there. There was also a massive, leather-bound book that seemed to have been used recently. But what shocked him the most?

What he thought at first was an undoubtedly large, modified sextant far too heavy for him to take into the corpse. He however realized that it was an octant, because it had marks at one-eighth, and not one-sixth of a circle. It was strange, this feeling of remembering something but not where he learned it from, but he pushed it aside with sheer curiosity. It was half the size of a ballista, and was made mainly of bone. He was soon filled with the innate desire to use it, but he quickly realized he didn't actually remember how to use it. He could recall that it could tell him where he was, and even the difference between a sextant and an octant, but he was ignorant as to how to actually do that. 

What he could glean from it, however, was numbers; there were strange characters carved into the octant, which he could guess represented angles. They were strict, thick lines of varying shapes, but the precision of the instrument was likely only due to its size; the characters were crudely implemented, with only the lines themselves indicating the angle being carefully inscribed. Frustrated that he couldn't figure out how to use it, he swore under his breath. "Fuck..." He racked his brain to see if he could piece together how it worked, but he once again came up empty. 

He looked up from the bag to realize that it was getting late. He had estimated it was about 5pm when he first came to his senses, and now it was about... 7pm? That couldn't be right, he spent around 3 hours trying to get to the bag and sort out the contents... could wherever he be have some kind of different day/night cycle? That would put the day/night cycle at being roughly 50% longer than Earth's 24 hours, with correction. "There goes any doubts that this place is on Earth..." Thinking about it, he still couldn't remember anything related to who he was. This made his own innate connection to that planet feel rather cold. Whatever friends and family he has there, he can't recall a single one.

"What about the sun?" He pondered. Donovan once again stepped out of his corpse-home and took a closer look at the sun, red streaks appearing as he stepped. He didn't look at it directly of course, but he identified that it was a slightly brighter yellow, nearing the horizon. It was only a small difference, but he wondered what consequences that may have. Whether or not this did, however, he would have to figure out his sleeping situation. He had a large stockpile of food and water, even alcohol which would last better in these conditions, and also shelter to live in. Now, he just needs to drag out the massive bedroll that's on top of the backpack. 

Once again, he couldn't drag it through the side, but it was too thick to fit through the hole he had already made, even if he pushed the backpack to get a better angle. "Should I make it bigger?" He thought about this, but it taken far too long for him to do it the first time. He had a new idea, however, which would take less time. Instead of cutting in a circle, he simply cut out a line stemming from the existing one, taking him about half an hour to get one that doubled the width of the current circle. Now, he could just push aside the flabs of belly skin and slowly, but surely, tug the bedroll up.

Although it was very large, it wasn't too heavy compared to, say, the club lying outside. It was still heavy, and took his full effort to pull up through the hole and into the corpse. He had to turn the bedroll and discovered it to be wider than the width of the cavity, giving him a whole new problem.

In the end, instead of laying it out inside the spinal cavity, he dragged it out of the corpse, and after another half-hour of strenuous lifting and pulling, had it draped over the back of the corpse, patching up the hole in the top and making a "door" to be pulled aside. He cut a few slats into fabric in the top to let some sunlight filter through, but now he had to find another solution to his sleeping problem, and dusk was fast approaching. Fortunately, most of the leather and fabric for the clothing of the giant was intact, and he could find plenty of it attached to the cyclops. 

The bone-tired Donovan swore heavily when he faced yet another setback. The dark leather he assumed would be easier to cut than the cyclops' hide wasn't even able to be penetrated by his crude bone instrument, and he didn't have the strength to properly use the massive bone knife. Worst case, he would drop it on his foot, so he didn't risk that.

As a result, he had to scavenge for parts that had already been torn away or damaged during the scuffle, dragging what he could into his shelter and placing them throughout as a makeshift flooring. Then, he cut away at the comparably malleable fabric to create a makeshift carpet, not placing it on top of the inner flesh directly to avoid molding due to staining the fabric. He tied together some fabric to make a makeshift pillow with some twine to go with his blanket, but now that he was finished, there was one last thing to do. 

Bathe. 

Even if the giant-sized "bar" of "soap" was crude and smelled almost as bad as the corpse, he delighted in scrubbing away all the blood, filth and grime he was now covered in, with the help of a little bit of alcohol. The alcohol in question smelled like literal shit, which was quite telling of where it came from, but it worked just as well as normal alcohol to get rid of germs. He was careful to not get it in his mouth, nose, or eyes as he scrubbed himself clean.

In the process, however, he discovered he didn't have much in the way of hair left. His eyebrows and, unfortunately, ass hair remained, but for some reason he was hairless everywhere else, and was nearly bald. There was minimal amounts of hair there, barely better than a pearly head. His nails were, additionally, finely trimmed.

He took some of the fabric and used it to wipe the rest of himself dry, before throwing it into a pile. He would have to deal with his garbage this way, for now. One more thing he feared was how to deal with toiletries, as he might not be able to wipe with fabric forever, nor could he waste water to wash it. For now, though? He was exhausted. He had fallen from the sky, survived, and had to create a survival shelter. He had patched the hole in the bottom with leather, covered the top with the bedroll, and had cleaned himself. Anything else could wait for tomorrow. 

He was uneasy, however, simply going to sleep like this. He wanted to do one more thing before going to sleep; with a couple minutes of tugging, the club, which was a few meters away, had been dragged in front of the corpse. Although it was heavy, it was a short distance and it didn't have to be lifted at an awkward angle. He leaned it against the "door" halfway, so that if someone tried to come in, it would lose balance and the handle would crash to the ground. This would alert him to any intruders, so he could at least defend himself. 

Once he carefully slipped inside as to avoid tripping his own alarm, he tucked himself in the blanket he had made, and slept like an infant in his sheer exhaustion. Sunlight no longer filtered through the slats he made in the hole of the “roof”, a sign of the passing dusk. Night soon fell on the wasteland he had found himself stranded in, and so passed his first day in this world. What came next? He left it for tomorrow...

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