Amber eyes awoke to the melody of persecution—screams, wails, and the unmistakable sound of agony. Just outside a mother clutched her child, pleading.
Unintelligible pleas and prayers to some dormant god, begging for salvation.
Her scream gargled with blood… as the fire consumed her, melting flesh from bone.
What was once a swaddle, was now just a charred wad of decay.
Fire raged all around him, blood pounded in his ears; the young man threw himself off of his bed, clad only in satin pajamas.
His shoulder smashed through the old wooden frame of his parents' bedroom, but he was only met with a swirl of sparks and grungy smoke.
-keugh- -keugh-
Wide eyed, he backed away in horror, choking up, the welling tears evaporated instantly.
Desolate— empty.
Fighting the rising bile in his throat, Kai rammed through the front door and hit the ground running.
Scared and alone he ran through the village path: wreckage, carnage, and marred bodies lay alongside their blackened houses.
Eventually his eyes learned to tune out the macabre scene, and the melody, a music one should never hope to hear.
The song of death.
-
He suddenly felt a burning pain on his leg, and ripped the pants off without thinking.
Screaming as they pulled away from raw flesh.
The searing bite in his leg easing off as he continued to run, the satin on his chest causing him to sweat uncomfortably.
An itching burning feeling not only from the stuffy material but the emotional burden and trauma.
He ripped the shirt off, it wasn't doing him any good.
Seconds later, he tumbled on a stone and collapsed into a tree, supporting himself by the arms.
Panting, aching, but alive.
The scene behind him was nothing if not pure chaos.
Even from a few kilometers away the conflagration of smoke and flame billowed up from his desolate village.
Gone were the cries and pleadings— everyone was long dead.
A lone young man leaned against a tree,
Soft in face, paired well with his gentle eyes, amber in color but their soft look had faded, replaced by dull-lifelessness.
A body built off years of labor, lean and hard.
This was Kai, and he was alone.
———————————————————————————
Time passed.
Tired eyes opened as a new day dawned on the quiet forest.
It had been almost 9 hours since the destruction of Kai's village and he was extremely thirsty; the only thing on his mind right now was…
'Water, I need water, where can I find it?'
Chest heavy, the young man rose to his feet, the burn on his leg had calmed down but still ached, charred flesh contrasting to the light skin on the rest of his legs.
He worked on a farm, but his town received frequent rain. It bordered the Country of Water, and storms often came with the winds from the House of Wind.
The lump in his parched throat pulsed with every dry swallow.
Every movement felt like he was wearing a suit of lead; burdensome and painful.
He remembered the creek he used to wash in, and how it ran into a river a few miles north.
Since he was already well on his way to the north, he decided that would be his best bet.
-
It had already been hours. Yes, he had been travelling to the north, as least that's what he thought. But, oftentimes reality can be disappointing… The fire had disoriented him.
His lips were cracked, the iron taste of blood lining his mouth; brow lined with sweat.
It didn't cool him down no— with every passing minute the sweat rolling off his body started to make his skin itch, the burn on his leg growing hot once more.
The embers, once dull and achy, now seared with every step—flaring in sync with his heartbeat.
'water…'
The trees shimmered—not from light, but from the heat radiating off his feverish body.
The journey was rough. The world spun a little too much with every step. The water had to be nearby…
-
The itch had long festered into something akin to a fire raging beneath his skin, embers under a suit of flesh.
The burn had spread through his body, up his leg— it hurt like hellfire.
But then he saw it, like an angel descending from the heavens, a stream, clear and fast, not quite the river he was hoping for but water nonetheless.
His body unfortunately didn't hold the same hope as his mind, his legs collapsing, his chest slamming into the ground.
hhck—hhck—
A sharp wheeze rattling his lungs.
Just as his vision began to blacken, a gust of wind—unnatural, sharp, purposeful—hit him like a wave.
-
A bird sat atop a branch looking at the stupid human beneath it, a scarlet quetzal.
The creature stirred something... curiosity? Pity? The man was strange.
A rare bird with an unusual dual affinity for wind and fire—right now, the human beneath it looked so pitiful... and not at all tasty.
It was sort of, crawling, struggling like a chick climbing out of the nest for the first time, but clearly this human was no chick… shouldn't it know how to use its legs?
The magical bird snorted through the small holes in its beak before flapping its wings, sending a rushing wave of wind towards the man, dispelling the fire mana that ate away under his skin like a flaming infection.
-
It was all too sudden really, one second he was struggling, aching, dying, and the next he was sent tumbling across the grass, splashing headlong into the freezing water.
'What the—'
His leg no longer hurt! It felt like he had the weight of a thousand pounds lifted off him.
Face dropping under the frigid liquid he drank greedily.
Water flowing down his throat, quenching the dryness and renewing his body with strength.
He dragged himself up to the bank and collapsed again.
Not in pain this time, but exhaustion.
-
Midday.
Eventually, Kai spotted a large cave entrance and cautiously approached. Inside, a trail of blood dotted the stone floor. He followed it, tense, until it led him to two corpses.
One was a man.
The other, a large, furry beast.
The beast bore a deep, jagged slash down its side. The hunter's chest had been crushed.
"Looks like they fought—and the beast won."
He rolled his eyes.
"Obviously. But it must've bled out after dragging the man's body here."
He whistled as his eyes scanned the carnage.
"That wound is nasty."
Turning to the man's corpse, he frowned.
"Is it wrong to steal from a corpse? Morals say yes, logic says… free cool stuff!"
Kai knelt and retrieved the knife from the hunter's belt. After a moment of thought, he took the man's black leather boots, too.
"Real shame to let them go to waste, right? I mean, sorry if I'm causing you to go barefoot in the afterlife... but I need these in this life!"
Slipping them on, he sighed.
"Perfect."
Then he turned to the beast. It was massive, its hide thick, but eventually he carved into its chest with the knife and extracted several strips of tough meat.
"This should last at least a few days—"
His blade struck something hard.
Frowning, Kai reached in and pulled out a lustrous green crystal, glowing faintly from within.
"I wonder if this has any use..."
He pocketed it and kept working. After gathering the meat, he turned to the hunter again to offer a final nod of thanks.
Then something else caught his eye—a white crystal ring etched with strange runes on the man's hand.
He plucked it off, then noticed the shattered remains of a bow nearby.
"Aw, pity."
Days passed.
Each morning, light filtered into the cave through a crack in the rocks. Kai pushed himself outside to scout the area. He refused to go idle. He built himself a routine.
Patrol the perimeter. Stretch. Train with the knife.
He kept himself sharp. Slowly, his slashes grew cleaner, his stabs more precise.
Until the third night.
Everything changed.
Kai's eyes flew open.
He sat up, heart hammering, and pressed his back against the cave wall. Knife drawn.
Silence.
Something, something was amiss.
The air felt too stale, he couldn't feel the usual draft in the cave.
Nothing was there… Was he paranoid?
'Am I going schizophrenic!'
But— it couldn't be right… Something was definitely off.
Very off, very WRONG!
-
There it was.
Ragged breathing. Claws scraping softly against stone.
He held his breath, straining to listen. The air felt sharp, dense.
He crept backward into the cavern, knife trembling in his grip.
Then he saw them—two crimson eyes gleaming in the dark.
His breath caught.
The creature moved with slow, feline grace—calm, assured.
In contrast, Kai's hands were shaking.
"What have I gotten myself into… idiot!"
He bit down on his cheek. Hard.
The pain snapped him into focus.
"What to do… Big kitty. Mean kitty. No way out."
He edged sideways along the wall, never turning his back. His shoulder hit a jagged rock, and he froze.
The blood-colored eyes stared at him.
He breathed raggedly. Mind spinning.
He didn't want to die.
"Is this how it ends?"
"No."
The young man had not suffered and kept going through all this pain— endured everything he had, to be beaten into submission by an over-sized house cat.
His breath steadied. His muscles tensed. His heartbeat quickened.
He was ready.
It pounced.