This interlude follows an unnamed man from a small town who chose a life at sea for the freedom it offered. One dark, stormy night, his ship travels through treacherous waters near Obitraes—a curved strip of land called Nyaxia's Hook, notorious for ensnaring human sailors. The ship, too small for such a perilous journey, smashes upon the rocks. Most of the crew are killed instantly, drowned or broken against the rocks and wreckage.

The man, however, is a fighter. At thirty-two years old and refusing to die, he swims to shore despite his mercilessly shattered body. Dragging himself onto the beach, he looks up to see a breathtaking city of ivory curves and moon-cold light—a sight unlike anything he has ever witnessed. He crawls further inland, feeling death closing in with every bloody breath, his earlier sense of bravery dissolving in the face of an untimely end.

Fate—or luck—intervenes. A king, described as one in the habit of collecting souls, happens upon the dying man at exactly the right moment. The king flips the half-conscious man over, assesses him, and asks a single question: "Do you want to live?" The man, thinking of his youth, his family, and the decades he believes still await him, desperately begs to be saved. The king smiles and lowers his mouth to the man's throat, Turning him into a vampire. The narration notes that the man will spend the rest of an endless life replaying this moment, hating himself for begging so pathetically for what he will come to view as his own damnation.