Ciri awakens injured in a scorching, rocky desert. Her head is stuck to a boulder by dried blood; pulling away tears open her temple wound. She assesses her injuries and finds severe bruising, a painful knee, and stabbing pain in her ribs but determines that nothing is broken. Overcome by dizziness and nausea, she crawls to the limited shade of a mushroom-shaped rock.

As heat intensifies, she realizes that she is severely dehydrated. She recalls losing her canteen during her chaotic escape through the portal at Tor Lara, which ejected her midair into this wasteland. Despite injuries, she decides to walk west toward distant mountains or die trying.

Using supplies from Yennefer’s pouch, she repairs her shoe and protects her wounds. As night falls and bitter cold sets in, she draws magical energy from underground water veins to create warmth and conjure a light sphere. After hours, the sphere fades with her exhaustion. She realizes with horror that she has walked east all night instead of west.

At dawn, she desperately licks dew from rocks and her dagger. Driven by starvation, she devours lizard eggs and then weeps at memories of her refined upbringing. She marches for days in brutal cycles of heat and cold, navigating by a star she names the Eye and surviving on insects and sparse moisture.