Page 4 of The Orc Outcast's Miracle

She breathed in deeply. She sucked in the pungent aroma of the world around her into her sinuses. The real world. The world her body was truly in right now.

Faeda.

Rich pine, crisp frost, and decomposing leaves.

“What is wrong with you!? I told you she had to drink it.”

Her ears burned and her mind felt muddled. She tried to rise to her knees but couldn’t manage it.

“Be quiet.”

There were people here. She was not in a vault. Not in a vent.

She was not on Earth.

“She’s fine. Just pick her up and carry her back to the hall like we planned.”

The hall. That sounded familiar.

Miranda tried to open her eyes then. The vent faded.

She parted her eyelids. As she focused on what was around her, everything blurred and swirled until she felt sick. She squeezed her eyes shut and took gulping gasps through her mouth to keep from vomiting.

“She’s coming to! You said it would last.”

“I said she was supposed to drink it, you fool!”

“But she didn’t drink anything in the hall! What were we supposed to do?”

The hall. The hall of Rove Wood Clan.

Where Govek was.

Govek’s words thumped with every beat of her heart, soaking into her veins. “You are not in a vault. You are safe. In the woods of Faeda. With me.”

She managed, “G-Govek?—”

A hand slapped over her mouth as another gripped her arm. The sensation struck the confusion from her mind. The crisp scent of frost and clean air, the icy night breeze. She blinked rapidly. The ground below her was covered in blurry leaves and pine needles.

“Let her go, you fool!” The hands left her cold. It was cold.

It hadn’t been cold in the vent.

She was so dizzy. Why was she so dizzy? And why were things blurry? What had these males tried to make her drink?

They’d gotten it in her mouth. “Y-you poisoned me?”

At Miranda’s words, the two voices went silent.

She became acutely aware of the wetness on her top and chin. She scrubbed at her mouth with her dirty hands. The gritty mud was foul, but it covered the scent of the bitter liquid, and her mind cleared a little more.

“Let’s go.” One of the voices hissed, distorted by the hushed tone. She heard the stomping of their feet retreating into the brush, growing quieter with each passing second.

“You’re just going to leave me here?” She tried to sit up, but she was still too damn dizzy. “Help me!”

She put her forehead to the cold, damp dirt, taking deep breaths. “Govek! Please... you said you’d be able to hear me.”

What in the hell was going on? The disorientation was so sharp she wondered if she was in the woods at all, but one thing was very clear: she was not in a vault. She was not trapped in a vent.

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