Realm Wraith by T. R. Briar Read Free Book Online Page A

before him, a being not human. The hulking beast towered over him, its broad shoulders and pillar-like arms blocking the view of anything past them. Its mottled flesh had the appearance of ancient stone. Though it possessed such a massive height, it bent over like a hunchback, and a small head with matted black hair rested below enormous shoulders. A pair of tiny, empty white eyes stared at Rayne from a brutish face, partly concealed by the mess of hair. All over its body, smaller jaws snapped open and shut, spitting drool everywhere. The creature held a long chain in one hand, and with a grunt, cracked it like a whip right towards him.
    Rayne scrambled out of the way as the chain hit the earth behind him with a loud clank , sending torrents of mud up into the air. He ran before he could be struck by the rusted links. Several times, his foot plunged into the sinkholes that covered the land, but rather than allow himself to be sucked down again he wrenched his feet up and jumped forward. The beast lumbered behind him, throwing the whip with surprising speed, and it was all Rayne could do to dodge its attacks. All around him, he became aware of more of these beasts, also wielding similar metallic whips, and as they became aware of Rayne’s presence they joined in pursuit, lashing their weapons at him.
    In the distance, he saw an outcropping of what looked like rocks, something to break up the featureless slush, and he rushed towards it. To his horror he saw not rocks, but a mass of writhing figures, what had once been people, now naked and bound together in a tortured form. Turning around, he could still see the gargantuan beasts chasing after him, though their large, lumbering bodies slowed their movements. The mud-covered plain slowed Rayne down as well. He dashed closer to the strange formation, which stretched far into the sky as twin columns of twisted beings.
    At the base of one column Rayne saw another figure, and stopped dead in his tracks again. This one didn’t look quite like a brute. Checking behind him, he could still see his pursuers. He turned back to the pillar.
    “Who goes there?!” Rayne cried into the darkness.
    “Stay away!” he heard a voice yell, shaking with fear. A normal, human-sounding voice. Abandoning caution, he approached and, beneath the red light of the sky, he found another man. He looked to be in his late thirties, very haggard with short black hair swept off to one side, rustled and filthy. He wore a suit that must have looked very stylish at one point, now ripped and mud-covered. He looked out over the sludgy plain with immense suspicion clouding murky, haunted, but very alert eyes. He did not even waste a moment to size Rayne up, drawing his fist back and slinging it forward right into Rayne’s face, knocking him back.
    “ I said stay away you goddamn monster! ” the man screamed.
    “ Ow! ” Rayne howled in pain. “Bloody hell! That hurt!”
    The man froze as he realized he’d assaulted a fellow human without thinking. He looked Rayne over, scrunching up his face in thought as he pondered whether or not to trust him.
    “A-are you real?” he asked, shaking.
    “Are you?” Rayne countered back, rubbing the sore spot on his face. The stranger appeared frightened, but he also shook with rage, grasping his arm to restrain himself from acting out again. “You strike real enough.”
    “You’re human,” the man whispered. He composed himself, looking Rayne right in the eye. “Good. Tell me how to get out of here.”
    “I haven’t got time here—”
    The man glanced past Rayne, noticing the pursuing monsters off in the distance. He grabbed Rayne’s hand and led him around the pillar.
    “I’ve encountered those things before. If they lose sight of you long enough, they forget and go back to their tasks.”
    “Tasks?”
    “I’ve seen so much disgusting shit here. There’s lots of creatures. I think some of them are people. But it’s not like I want to know for sure. When