The landscape was vast, and unbelievably dead. No flora, no fauna, just monsters and travelers. As well as the occasional lost hero. That is the purpose of the World of Ruin, to reap discord from heroes, effectively chewing them up and spitting them out.
Take the heroic demigod son of Poseidon, Percy Jackson, who wonders the Crystal Wastelands as we speak. He trudged through the landscape, the stones doing no favors for his aching feet. He spotted a pond at the foot of a crystal formation.
"Fresh water," he rasped, collapsing to his hands and knees. "Finally."
Wasting no time, he dunked his head in, gulping as much water as he could. He didn't necessarily need to come up for air, but he chose to anyway. This place is full of monsters, drowning may not be a problem for him, but prowling predators certainly were.
He threw his head back and stared at the sky. He couldn't tell where he was. He could be in the underworld, but he was pretty sure the underworld didn't have clouds drifting overhead against a purple sky. He was aware of other mythos existing in the world, like Egyptian Magicians and Norse gods, but this place didn't add up with anything he was aware of. These wastes… he could be anywhere.
He'd been gone for at least a day, of that much he was certain, but he wasn't sure how he got here. He tried to remember the events that lead him here, but couldn't. It was like he blinked while looking in his fridge and suddenly he was here.
He took a minute to check his pockets. His wallet was brought with him, which has been useless so far, and he's had his magic Pen; which uncapped turned into the legendary sword Excalibur.
He wasn't sure why he was making jokes, least of all to himself, but it made him chuckle nonetheless. If he met a new kid at camp, he should pull that trick, just to see if they had been paying attention at all that day.
"Review," Percy told himself. "If nothing else for the sake of sanity. My name is Percy Jackson. I am the Son of Poseidon. Annabeth Chase is my girlfriend. My sword is named Riptide. My home is Manhattan, and Camp Half Blood."
He was about to go back to dunking his head into the water to clear it, when he heard a scream. There are actually other human beings here, and they're close by, and they're in trouble!
He got up and scrambled to the sound of the scream. He went around the crystal formation to see a girl facing a giant beast. It was on four legs, was six foot at the shoulder, and loomed like a giant wolf. Its head looked like a horse's skull with four curling horns, and green spit dripped out of its mouth.
The girl backed away slowly, she was cornered against the wall; defenseless. Percy checked around him and spotted something that's helped him earlier.
"Hey! Ugly!" He called out.
The beast turned, apparently insulted. Its horns scraped the wall around the girl and forced her to crouch and curl into a ball.
"Yeah, you heard me," Percy taunted it, placing himself exactly where he needed to be. "What are you going to do about it, big guy?"
The beast snarled and charged him, his feet pounding against the flat stone surface. At the last possible second, Percy rolled out of the way, with the creature snapping its teeth at his feet. Just like Percy had planned it, the creature barreled past him at full speed, charging head first into a black, bubbling tar pit. Percy watched as it fought and thrashed and cried out in desperation.
"Wow," Percy said, as the thing slowly became swallowed by the black goop. "When was the last time I had an easy encounter?" He didn't even need to bring out his sword for this one.
He sighed in relief and looked over to the girl in question. She stared at him, in a state of shock. The girl had short black hair, with two tails hanging of the sides. She had her left arm covered in bandages. Her clothes screamed "school uniform," though Percy couldn't guess from what kind of school they might be from. The girl had a bright blue eye, but the right eye had a patch over it.
Percy walked over to the stunned girl, she looked to be around high school age, but he tried to be reassuring anyways.
"You okay?" he offered a hand.
She eagerly took it and helped herself up. "Th-thank you," she said, "The Tyrant's Eye has been rendered useless here."
"Oh," Percy wasn't sure what she was referring to, but the girl didn't seem up for an interrogation. "You're the first person I've seen all day. How'd you wind up here?"
She held unto his arm tightly and leaned against him for support. "I was walking to my primary base of operations from my secondary base of operations, hidden at the school, along with my comrade; the Dark Flame Master. We were walking and suddenly…"
"You blinked," Percy guessed, "And you wound up here?"
He could feel the girl nodding. She was shaking. She looked up at him with a watery eye. "I'm not dreaming, am I? Am I dead?"
"No," Percy answered, "You're not dreaming. And… I'm pretty sure we're not dead."
Those answers didn't seem to comfort her any more than leaving them be. She buried her head into Percy's shirt, stifling tears.
"Hey," Percy tried, "Let's get away from the danger-murder beast, just… you know… to get away from the smell, at least."
The girl complied without question. They walked a couple paces and spotted an abandoned hiking pack. Probably from another sorry adventurer that didn't make it.
"Someone must have dropped it," Percy said, trying to keep an optimistic tone. The girl said nothing. "Look," he pointed out, "Looks like someone made camp over there. We can rest up there."
They walked over to the open area. Some elongated crystals were laid on their sides around a campfire, like sitting logs. The blackened sticks in the fire pit were ice cold, as well as the ready-to-be-burned pile next to it, but at least they were dry. Percy was curious as to where they found the wood, but he wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth.
"Almost like it's made for us, huh?" Percy looked back to the girl, who remained quiet. "All we need now are some marshmallows."
"Hotdogs," the girl spoke, clarifying her preference.
"That too," Percy agreed. He sat down and started opening up the pack.
"Who are you?"
Percy's shoulder's tensed, and he froze in place. "What do you mean?"
"You're not like the other mortal…" she paused. "You're not like normal people."
Percy didn't really know this girl, but he got the sense that she was just a normal teenage girl. She put up a "Tyrant's Eye" act earlier, but he suspected that that's all that was. Why would she be playing pretend like that at her age?
"My friends call me Percy," Percy dodged the question. "What do they call you?"
She finally walked over and sat across from him. "What does it matter?" she said.
She tore off her eyepatch and took a minute to take out the yellow contact lens in it. She then unwrapped the bandages on her arm and threw them into the unlit fire pit.
"Here," she said, "You can use that for the fire. I don't need it anymore."
Percy wondered what was wrong. As the girl wiped a marker smudge off her arm, Percy fetched the bandages out of the fire pit.
"Well," Percy tried, "I should probably know your name in case…like, if we're in danger again. I don't want to run around shouting "Girl!" and getting everyone's hopes up. What do your friends call you?"
She sat forward with her elbows on her knees, staring into the fire pit miserably. "Rikka," she answered.
"Where do you live?" Percy tried.
The girl looked at him with emotionless eyes, "Japan. You're American, aren't you?"
"Well," Percy wasn't sure how to take that. "Yes?"
"You're Japanese is really good," Rikka commented, "You sound like you were born into it."
Percy blinked and was about to comment that he was very much speaking English and did not know a lick of Japanese, but he decided against it. In his time here, he deduced that a third party had brought them here; some kind of being or force of nature. The same party, if not a different one altogether, was now translating what they were saying. And it was increasingly clear that any magic Rikka was putting up was fake. So explaining all of this to her would only serve to scare and unsettle Rikka even more so.
A couple of moments of silence passed before Rikka spoke again. "Is there anything in the bag?"
Percy blinked and stammered. "Uh…Yeah. Uh…There's some canned food in here, a frying pan, a sleeping bag."
"Just one?" Rikka sounded slightly distressed.
"Don't worry," He said, "It's yours. I think it's too small for me anyway." That was a disturbing fact to Percy. He didn't want to think about who the original owner of this pack might be.
Or rather, who they might have been.
"Percy," Rikka said. Percy thought she might have been trying to argue.
"It's not a big deal," Percy waved it off, placing the sleeping bag aside.
"Percy," Rikka sounded more urgent.
"What?" Percy didn't understand what was happening. Then he noticed how tense Rikka looked and Percy looked over his shoulder.
The beast had crawled its way out of the tar pit. Black goo dripped off of its fur in clumps, staining the ground. One of its horns was missing, and it seemed to be gurgling something other than the acidic spit it had earlier.
"Oh great," Percy complained under his breath, "I should have known it wouldn't have been that easy."
The creature staggered forward, hissing at them. Percy pulled the pen out of his pocket and uncapped it. When Riptide sprang to life in his hand, Rikka sounded shocked.
"What-? How-?" she stammered.
Thinking quickly, Percy answered, "I found it. Earlier. Before I met you."
Rikka seemed incredulous, but didn't call him out on it. Percy charged forward. The beast seemed to be on his last leg, and although it snapped in his direction, it should be an easy kill. Percy jumped, and sank the sword into the monster's forehead.
The monster gave out a final cry and collapsed, blood oozing from its new wound. Percy retrieved his sword and flicked the blood off of it. When he returned to the campsite, Rikka stared at him skeptically.
"It's okay," Percy assured her, "its dead."
Rikka stared at him for another moment before looking back to the eye patch and bandages that she had set aside. "I used to dream of a world like this," she confessed, "monsters, magic, powers. Now that I'm trapped here, with someone like you… I'm just…"
"Hey, look," Percy could guess where this was going. "I'm the freak here. There's nothing wrong with-"
"I'm fifteen!" she exclaimed, "I shouldn't be acting like I'm you! Like I'm…something special."
Percy blinked. "Rikka…"
Just then, a loud snarl took Percy by surprise, as a wall of force slammed into his shoulder, knocking him off his feet.
Percy skidded away across the ground and his sword was knocked out of his hand. Percy was aware of Rikka shouting in surprise.
His vision had blurred, but as he fought to get his senses back, the creature that refused to die was standing over him already, and roared in his face. It planted one paw into Percy's chest, its claws digging into his skin, and he thought that this was it. This was the end. This is how he finally died, but he was saved at the last second.
Rikka had snatched up his sword and stabbed it into the neck of the beast. She pushed, plunging the sword deeper into the monster's flesh. It staggered away, moving off of Percy, and allowing him to breathe again. He quickly got up and reached around Rikka.
"Allow me," he offered. As Rikka moved out of his way, he shoved the beast to its side and ripped the sword outward, ripping out the beast's neck. Blood spewed and gushed as the creature whined. Percy stabbed it in its side, aiming for the heart, to try and put it out of its misery. It let out a final cry, before becoming still once more. Percy withdrew the blade and stepped back, not letting his guard down for a few minutes.
Eventually, there was a pool of blood that had gathered at the two's feet.
"Well," Percy said, huffing in relief, "That was…needlessly violent."
Rikka nodded, and then shook her head. "It's not like in the video games."
"Never is," Percy agreed, now huffing in exhaustion.
Just then, a warmth spread to Percy's back, like sunlight on a summer day at the beach. He turned and saw a swirling vortex that had appeared from nowhere. Looking into it, there was a street and sidewalk of an unfamiliar city. There was a building…a school, of some sort.
"That's…" Rikka stared in wonder. "That's my home town. That's my school…"
She stared at it in wonder, but didn't move.
"You should go," Percy told her, "Before it closes."
Rikka seemed to snap out of her trance and look at Percy.
"W-what?" she seemed shocked. The eyepatch was still in her hand. "A-and leave you? Here? With things like that?" She pointed to the dead monster accusingly. "You can come with me! We can get you home! If you don't live in Japan, then we can arrange a flight for you! Just-"
Percy held up his hand. He didn't know how he knows this, but a feeling in his gut told him that that would not work.
"I know you're worried," he told her, "But I can take care of myself. This is your ticket home. We don't know when this opportunity will happen again."
She looked at him stubbornly. She stamped her foot. "No!" she declared. "If you're staying, I'm staying with you!"
Percy looked her dead in the eye. She may be mortal, but she is certainly a brave mortal. He sighed and walked over to her. He placed his hands on her shoulders and gave her a sorry smile. "Your right," he said, "I can't survive out here for too long by myself."
Rikka lowered her guard, relaxing a bit.
Percy then turned serious. "But I'm not willing to risk your safety."
He picked her up by the shoulders. She yelped and immediately started flailing. He tossed her through the vortex, where she landed on the other side on her butt. There was enough time to see a betrayed look on her face before the vortex surged, and collapsed into fading glitter.
"Sorry, Rikka," Percy sighed to the empty air. "It's better this way."
He hoped that somewhere out there, wherever she is, she'd forgive him.
Little does he know that, in accordance with the laws of this world; really, with this universe, Rikka had already forgotten the experience with Percy Jackson, and is already meeting with her friends to walk home with.
Yes, this world is crueler than most, but it still needs the young Percy Jackson, and those like him, to save it.