The cold crept into Kaen's lungs as he opened his eyes.
Not the cold of winter or wind... but the hollow chill of confusion — of waking up somewhere you shouldn't exist anymore.
He lay on his back, staring at a sky muted by overcast clouds. The earth beneath him felt dry, unmoving. There was no sound. No screams. No pain. Just silence.
He sat up slowly, his limbs moving as if they weren't his own.
No blood. No chains. No burning light carving through him.
He was alive.
But how?
His heart beat steady — stronger than he remembered. He touched his chest out of instinct. The mark was still there — the same twisted symbol burned into his skin since the age of eighteen. It hadn't faded with death. It hadn't changed. Still pulsing faintly, like something ancient and watching.
But now... there was more.
He rolled up his sleeves.
Symbols.
Twisted runes — unlike anything he had ever seen. Black, angular, crawling across his forearms like curses written in a language too old to remember. They weren't drawn. They were part of him.
His breath caught in his throat.
He wasn't just alive.
He was changed.
Kaen stood, dirt and ash falling from his clothes. The landscape around him slowly came into focus — trees bending with wind, hills sloping into a valley.
He knew this place.
His heart stilled.
It was the woods near his village.
Somehow, impossibly, he was home.
⸻
He walked without urgency, like a shadow drawn forward by instinct. The path through the trees hadn't changed, yet each step felt heavier. The forest held its breath, as if recognizing him — but refusing to speak.
When the trees thinned, and the valley opened into view, his village stood there — exactly as it had years ago.
Except... quieter.
No laughter. No children running between homes. Just stillness.
Kaen's eyes didn't scan for faces. He didn't expect anyone to recognize him. Or welcome him. He wasn't sure what he even looked like anymore.
He headed toward his house.
Or what remained of it.
The wooden frame still stood, but it was blackened by fire. The roof had caved in. The windows shattered. Smoke stains trailed upward like ghosts fleeing from the wreckage.
Kaen stepped through the collapsed doorway.
Ash greeted him like an old friend.
He walked into what was left of the main room. Charred beams. Cracked stone hearth. A broken table leg jutting from the rubble like a snapped bone.
He didn't speak.
Didn't cry.
But something sank inside him.
"They left."
"Burned it all."
"Guess I was nothing worth remembering."
He walked deeper in, until he stood in what used to be his bedroom. His sanctuary. His corner of light.
Now — dust and darkness.
In the far corner, among collapsed wood and glass, a shard of a mirror caught his eye. Burnt around the edges, but still intact enough to reflect.
He leaned forward.
The person looking back was not the boy who once lived here.
White hair. Skin pale like frost. Crimson eyes. Runes stretching from wrists to elbows, pulsing faintly under the skin.
He stared at himself for a long time.
"This is what's left."
"Not even a grave for the person I used to be."
"Hey! What are you doing in there?"
The voice struck like an arrow through silence.
Kaen turned sharply.
A girl stood at the edge of the ruins, hand resting on the hilt of a curved blade at her side, a long steel-tipped spear strapped to her back. Her eyes — sharp, amber, watchful — studied him with the caution of someone used to danger.
She looked about his age, maybe a little older, with shoulder-length blonde hair, slightly tousled and tied back into a loose braid. Her armor was piecemeal — worn leather layered with cloth, bearing the wear of long travel. A blood-red scarf was wrapped around her neck, slightly frayed at the ends...
"I said," she repeated, "what are you doing in there?"
Kaen didn't answer.
She stepped forward, stopping just outside the burned structure.
"That place's supposed to be cursed," she said. "Locals say some dangerous mage lived here. Dark user, I think."
Kaen didn't move.
Her eyes fell to his forearms, where the edge of one rune peeked out beneath his sleeve.
"Those are... unusual markings," she said carefully. "You get them around here?"
Kaen lowered his arms, tugging his sleeves down.
"Something like that."
"Didn't mean to pry," she said. "It's not every day I find someone wandering out of a ruin like that."
She extended a gloved hand. "Name's Riven. Adventurer."
He stared at the hand, then shook it briefly.
"...Kaen."
She didn't press further.
Instead, she looked toward the woods. "You from around here?"
"I was," he said. "Long time ago."
She nodded slowly. "Didn't think anyone still lived in this valley."
"They don't."
Silence passed.
Then she said, "You heading anywhere?"
"No."
"Well... I'm on my way to Asheron. Town's not far from here. Big adventurer's guild. Decent food. Trouble if you're looking for it."
Kaen didn't respond.
Riven raised an eyebrow.
"You look like someone who can hold their own," she said. "Or someone who's survived something ugly. Either way, I'm short on numbers. Need someone to fill a spot in my party."
"I'm not an adventurer."
She smirked. "Yet."
Kaen hesitated.
Then asked, "Why ask me?"
"Because you're alive," she said bluntly. "In a place where nobody should be. And I've learned to trust the kind of people who don't die when they're supposed to."
Her words stirred something faint in him.
Not hope.
But... curiosity.
"What kind of magic do you use?" she asked.
Kaen paused.
He couldn't say dark. Couldn't reveal what he didn't understand.
Then his mind flashed back — the red mist, the screams, the lava burning around a headache .and instinctively ,
"...Fire," he said.
Riven nodded. "Good. We can use a fire user."
She turned and started walking. "Come on. I'll help get you registered and evaluated. They'll assign you a class and rank."
Kaen looked one last time at the wreckage of his home.
He didn't know if his parents had abandoned it willingly.
Or if something had happened to them.
But either way...
They didn't wait for him.
Didn't look for him.
Didn't care enough to bury what was left.
He clenched his fists.
Then followed .