The wilderness was endless.
Twisted trees rose like the bones of giants, their roots knotting across the ground, their branches clawing at the sky. Mists drifted between the trunks, heavy with the scent of damp soil and rot. The air here was thick, not with the breath of life, but with the weight of things long buried. Every step the boy took sank into silence, as though the forest itself was swallowing his presence.
He walked without pause. His bare feet pressed against thorns, jagged stones, brittle bones half-buried in the soil—yet he felt no pain. No wince touched his pale face. His black eyes, empty and bottomless, flicked across the world without recognition. He did not marvel at the vast trees. He did not fear the shifting shadows. He only walked, as if pulled forward by a path only he could sense.
And the beasts watched.
From the shadows, countless eyes glimmered. Shapes moved between the trees, circling, stalking. Their instincts screamed of weakness, of prey. What stood before them was nothing but a child, fragile and small, a body unfit for survival in this land of predators.
Yet none struck.
One beast did step closer.
It was a wolf, its hide dark, fur bristling with patches of bone-like plating. Its fangs dripped venom, saliva hissing as it hit the soil. Hunger gleamed in its eyes as it slunk closer, muscles tightening beneath its skin. It crept forward silently, its breath shallow, its tail low, as if it had already chosen where it would tear into the boy's flesh.
The boy stopped walking. Slowly, he turned his head.
Black eyes met the beast's.
The wolf froze.
No growl left its throat, no attack followed. It trembled, claws digging into the soil, hackles rising in terror. Its body wanted to leap, but its soul recoiled. In those empty eyes it saw no struggle, no resistance, no fear. It saw… nothing. And the nothing was worse than any strength.
The boy stared.
In his mind there was no name for the creature. It was simply there—something that breathed, something that moved. But as his gaze lingered, something stirred within the void of him. A whisper, faint but sharp.
Kill it.
His head tilted faintly, almost curious. His small hands flexed once at his sides. He did not understand why the whisper was there, why it pressed so insistently against the hollowness of his being. It was not hunger, for he did not feel hunger. It was not anger, for he did not feel rage.
It was something older. Something deeper. A weight, a grief, a darkness that had seeped into him before his vessel was ever formed.
His eyes lingered longer. The whisper grew louder.
Kill it. Crush it. Tear it apart.
The wolf whimpered, lowering itself to the ground. Its legs shook violently. Its tail curled tight between its hind legs. Slowly, step by step, it began to back away, eyes never leaving the boy's.
The boy did not move.
The beast fled.
It vanished into the trees with a desperate scramble, leaving only claw marks gouged into the dirt.
The boy lowered his gaze again. The whisper faded into silence. He did not understand what it was, nor why it left a faint ache within his chest, as though the emptiness had cracked slightly. He did not think of it further. He simply walked on.
The forest deepened.
The trees grew thicker, the air heavier. Faint roars echoed from the distance, and the ground trembled as colossal shapes shifted far beyond sight. The boy walked through it all, untouched, unharmed, his pale figure swallowed by mist and shadow.
Then—
A hiss.
It cut through the silence, sharp and venomous, slithering across the trees like the whisper of death. The boy stopped mid-step.
For the first time since his hatching, his expression changed.
His eyes widened.
The sound came again, louder, closer, filled with hunger and malice. The mist stirred, thickening around the trunks. The earth shifted beneath him as something vast moved just out of sight.
The boy stood still, black eyes wide, staring into the darkness where the hiss coiled.