He couldn't move. His head was so heavy, like a car had been hung from his forehead. Something held his limbs in a vise-like grip. Something else burned through his blood.
He tried to move. Whatever held his limbs kept him in place. His body felt strange, like it wasn't all there. I t seemed... stretched out... or maybe in pieces.
A silent voice screamed from the back of his mind. He was in danger, he had to be! He wasn't asleep and this was no dream! He had to fight back and stay alive!
He tried to make a noise. Silence. He tried to move. Stillness.
The burning in his blood died down. Slowly but surely, his body knit back together. Something sharp prodded at his throat. The same something drew its edge across, nicking his skin. Tidal waves of unhindered hatred washed over him.
The silent voice was right. He was in danger. Memory was coming back to him. He was fighting! He had to win! If he died, it would all be over!
He moved. His limbs protested as joints stretched beyond intention. The sharp something poked his exposed chest. What breath he had hitched. He couldn't move. He was strung up by his arms and legs with something deadly close by.
His head was so heavy. If only he could see, figure out where he was and what held him.
He paused and listened. If he couldn't see, what else was there? He curled his hand up, knuckles brushing against metal. Chains? They had to be, their tremors sent pain prodding through the clamp on his arm. He squirmed, the rest of his body proving unhindered. So it was just his limbs restrained, then. But by what? Where was he? Who or what put him here?
He stilled. He listened. Silence, for a while, then the creak of stiff joints and skin brushing against itself. Something whistled as it moved through the air.
There was something with him. Something that, from the sound of it, was exceptionally larger than him. It leaned some part of itself close to his head.
Something snapped. It sounded like a bone in the maw of a dog. Another snap. Then a crack. Bone splintered against itself to give way to a gaping, slimy void.
Air colder than death burned his shoulder and chest as his captor exhaled. The action brought every missing piece of information flooding back to him.
His name was Norman Polk. He was trapped, but by who? And how did he survive the Husk?
He heard a whistle through the air. An instant later, his head returned to its normal weight. Norman snapped his lens open and looked up.
The Demon King's shattered grin and gaping maw filled his view.
He didn't scream. Every fiber of his being insisted he do so, but he didn't.
The Demon King stepped back, its mouth closing and teeth melting back together into a seamless, static grin. It moved unnaturally, every gesture and motion so fluid it made Norman dizzy. Eventually, it stilled and regarded him. It stood tall and calm, almost regal.
Norman found it in himself to speak, "What are you going to do with me?" he asked.
The Demon King froze so completely it might as well have been stone. Then its head tilted backward and it laughed a sound not unlike a million claws scraping across hundreds of hell's chalkboards.
Just when Norman thought his head would shatter from the noise, the Demon King lunged forward and stabbed its finger and thumb through his chest. There was no pain, but he felt very motion of the monster's claws as it pinched something around his very core and drew it outward. As its hand pulled away, Norman's vision blurred and doubled. He could have sworn he saw the Demon King holding something attached to him....
The Demon King's other hand struck him, snapping the chains off his limbs. Norman plunged downward into an endless abyss, seeing only blackness and a single gold thread.