I was born a second time in the arms of monsters. And somehow… it was the warmest embrace I'd ever known.
Not after the betrayal. Not after the pain. Not after dying like a dog in the rain, choking on my own blood and curses. I'd thought it was the end. But death, it seems, had other plans for me.
I woke up screaming in a body not my own—small, fragile, and wrong. My limbs felt thin, barely holding together, my breath came in rasps, and my soul felt like shattered glass jammed into a new vessel. And I was alone.
Because of course I was.
I'd been reborn as a demon child. And not just any demon—but into one of the lowest-ranked tribes, abandoned in the woods by my so-called parents. Cast aside. A waste of flesh. Something not worth feeding.
I saw my own parents abandoning me yet again, in this different world too. From what I can tell, they weren't happy to give birth to me and left me in a forest to rot.
I waited for death. Starvation. A beast. A cold night too long. I didn't care which came first.
Then she found me.
Her name was Maava. A kind of Dryads —one of those forest-dwelling healer races, part plant, part spirit. Skin of living bark. Eyes like golden sunbeams through leaves.
She looked at me like like she knows everything about me. Like I wasn't disposable.
"You poor thing," she murmured, her voice like rain on leaves. "So small and yet, you look so tired… Come. You're not alone anymore."
And just like that… she became my mother.
She fed me. Held me when I cried through memories not even mine anymore. Sang lullabies in a tongue I didn't know, and yet… understood.
She didn't care about who I am. Only who I could become.
Do you know what that feels like? To be wanted? To be held like you matter?
Not by humans. Not by saints. But by monsters.
Maava took me to her home deep in the Ebonshade Forest. A village hidden beneath layers of enchantments and thick, ancient roots—alive and pulsing with quiet magic. It wasn't much—wooden homes tangled with vines, glowing crystal lanterns, and whispers of old protection wards.
But it was safe. It was mine.
There were only a few of us—thirty, maybe forty in total. Different kinds of beasts and half-beasts. Horned, scaled, clawed. All the ones the world called monsters. All the ones it wanted dead.
And yet, they lived.
Drogun, Maava's mate—my new father—looked like a boulder sculpted into a man. His skin was rough stone, cracked with glowing lines of molten red. Intimidating to the point of terror… but he taught me how to walk again, how to stand.
He never raised his voice, but every word carried weight.
"You're not weak, boy. Just unshaped. I'll forge you right."
He trained me, not to harm, but to protect.
"Strength isn't to dominate. It's to shield. To carry those who can't."
I wanted to believe him. And, over time, I did.
Then there was Karn. My brother, not by blood—but by every fight, every bruise, every laugh.
A Lizardman, all lean muscle and sharp edges. He was faster than me, stronger than me, better at everything. But he never looked down on me. He grinned when I fell, helped me up when I bled, and mocked me just enough to keep me going.
"Twig," he called me. "You'll catch up one day. When you do, I'll be proud to say I helped shape the storm."
Even when I cursed the pain, he pushed me harder. Because that's what brothers do.
We weren't blood. But we were family.
And for a while… I was happy.
I trained. I learned. I healed a lot from my trauma.
Avera—quiet winged girl who could mend bones with a single feather. Rhuz—the horned brute who slept more than he fought. They were friends. Real ones.
And under the silver moonlight, beneath the thick canopies, we danced. We laughed.
We lived.
It was peace. The kind of peace I didn't think existed. Four years passed by just like that.
But peace… It never lasts.
They arrived two weeks before the end.
The flames hadn't started yet. But the smoke was already in the air.