The doors open into what seems to be a bustling third-world town. The buildings are made of rough stone and wood. It seems to be built on the side of a desert? The ground that everything is standing on is dirt, but about a hundred feet away, the dirt and grass quickly disappear and turn into sand.

Then, after a couple dozen feet of sand, the ground sinks down into a pit. Inside the pit are seashells, rocks, and other things you would expect to find on a beach. It looks exactly like if you drained an ocean of all its water. In fact, there are boardwalks stretching out above the pit, held up by large wooden poles.

Going opposite the direction of the sand pit are regular cobblestone roads that lead away in the distance. I can see a small stone wall pretty far away that seems to be lining the border of the town. For some reason, there are small troughs full of dirt that occasionally crop up along the sides of the roads. They look like plant-less flowerpots.

People are walking through the streets, going in and out of the buildings along the sides of them. Some of the buildings have hand-carved signs nailed up against the doors. Some have the same letters on them that I don't recognize, and others simply have carved pictures.

The people walking the streets are wearing strange clothes; maybe they're made of some sort of plant matter? Lots of the clothes are colored a dark brown-ish green, and they certainly do not look clean. In fact, this place smells pretty awful.

But none of that was what confuses me so much. Honestly, I can make sense of a weird city I haven't heard of with some strange desert land formation. I haven't been to school in a long time, and I didn't have much time to keep up with the news when I was out scrounging for my next meal. What confuses- no, what terrifies me, are the monsters roaming the town.

Walking down the road near me are two mutant animals, drawing a cart of what seems to be some strange fruits and vegetables. People are walking by as if nothing is wrong, and the man driving the cart certainly doesn't seem as amazed as one should be when commanding an animal that has never been seen before in the history of humanity.

The creatures are four-legged and a little bigger than your average horse, so they stand about seven feet tall. They're black as charcoal, with occasional faded gray spots about the size of my head fading in and out of their bodies, giving their skin a strange lumpy look.

In fact, their skin actually is lumpy, upon further examination. The uneven texture bumps up and down along their body, getting particularly intense near their stomach and torso. A flat, shovel-like head reaches down to the ground, hovering mere inches away from the stone they walk on, attached to a neck that reaches up to where a horse's neck would attach.

They sort of look like inverted giraffes, with regular-sized bodies, but a long neck that reaches down instead of up. The resulting creature looks unnatural and broken. But it wanders along the city streets like nothing is wrong.

Those animals aren't the only ones, too. I can see a few birds atop the ceilings of buildings. Well, they look like birds at first glance, but really they're something else entirely. There's one standing only about ten feet from the door of the facility, so I can see it quite clearly.

It's much less jarring than the black inverted giraffe/horse things, but it's still incredibly peculiar. It's covered in feathers and has two clawed feet, like you'd expect, but coming off its two wings are what seem to be spikes.

Nail-sized cones poke out of its wings, and seem quite loose at that. As it walks around, I can see them dangling and shaking, like a loose tooth that should have come out days ago, hanging on by a single strand of sinew.

Atop the buildings, these animals stand on the edges of the roofs, surveying the land. The people on the streets give them a cautionary berth, glancing at them as they pass by, like you might avoid a wasp.

There are some insects around the town as well. I can't get a good look at any, but there are a few flying through the hot, humid air and others crawling on the ground. There's one large insect crawling on a wooden post nearby that looks somewhat similar to a beetle, with the hard, shiny shell covering it and a pair of horns coming off the end of its head.

But it isn't without its own differences. A bright green color instead of the normal black, and the horns seem to be serrated on the insides, like they're supposed to hold whatever they come into contact with in place.

I tear my eyes away from the fascinating town to see if there are any of the birds, insects, or other animals flying through the air above the town. Nope, none.

W-wait. In the sky, I see some clouds, a blinding sun, and... four moons. Four small spheres hovering through the air. Differently sized, and going different directions at different speeds, these four seemingly small objects are the finishing blow on my perception of reality. I simply have no possible idea as to what actually has happened to me.

My captors lead me out of the doorway, breaking my train of thought. They take me out onto the city roads and begin leading me aside the small building we came out of. I guess the bulk of the size was all underground.

We turn to go around to the side of the building. As we walk, I notice some of the people giving me weird looks. That could be because of my different skin tone from them, or because I'm a strange nude person being led around by two people.

Once we get around to the side of the facility, I see what is presumably our destination: a small carriage with two more of those black four-legged animals tied up to it. Itor lets go of me when we get there and walks up to one of the animals. He looks at me, smiling, and pats the animal on its back, slowly saying "Skeld." Again, he emphasizes each syllable of the word as he did his name.

Hm. I guess I can assume that's the name of the animal species. He's still looking at me. Does he want me to show him I understand what he's saying? I guess I should cooperate here. I feel like in situations like this, I should probably comply.

This 'Itor' guy seems to have an academic interest in me - considering he's the one leading the effort of communicating with me - so this probably doesn't have any meaning to it other than the simple attempt at seeing if I can be educated.

I point at the same animal.

"Skeld."

He looks pleased with me and says something to Magna while nodding in my direction. I should use this moment to see if that's the name of the species, or just the specific name of that animal. His attitude while telling me his own name was the same, after all.

I point at the second animal and repeat myself in an inquisitive tone. He smiles again, nodding and saying something else to Magna, confirming that "Skeld" is the name of the whole species. Itor's comment to Magna prompts a response from her. It seems to be in some sort of annoyed tone.

I feel like she's much more abrasive than him, and probably sees me as lesser or doesn't believe that I'm intelligent for some reason? He seems to be eagerly reporting his 'findings' on me to her, despite the fact that she's right there, but she doesn't share the same enthusiasm.

In fact, the only time she's directly interacted with me has been when she was prompted by Itor to share her name with me.

After the learning experience, Itor climbs into the driver's seat of the carriage while Magna takes me into the seating area in the back. This area is covered with some sort of rough green-ish cloth - the same type the peoples' clothes were made of.

There are two simple benches on opposite sides of the area. Magna sits me down on one of the benches and rests beside me on the same bench, leaving the other empty. I feel the grooves of the hard wood on my bare skin. Magna never releases her firm grip on my arm. After siting, she says something to Itor.

After responding, Itor grabs some ropes that were in the driver's seat with him. They seem to be tied to the reins on the animals. He makes a motion with them and the Skelds depart from the side of the building, dragging the carriage along as they join the foot traffic on the main road.

Holy shit this is pretty overwhelming. First the underground complex, then the monsters, and now we're going somewhere else. I wonder what other surprises this place has in store.