CANADA. Year three thousand fifty-four.
The dawn wind whistled through the pines as Noah opened the window of his small apartment in the town of Yellowknife. It was early winter, yet the cold wasn't the same as usual. He watched the sunrise and stretched his arm out the window; he felt as if the wind caressed him, as if it recognized his blood.
"Easy," he murmured to himself, extending his hand as if trying to hold something in his palm.
Particles of frost formed on his palm, swirling silver patterns that floated above his skin. It was a simple trick, basic for anyone in the ÓBroin family. But Noah is the only one who lives in Canada... and the only one who has never wanted to take on his family's responsibilities.
He sighed and let the ice vanish. His cell phone rang and vibrated on the table. His Aunt Maeve was calling from Ireland, where the rest of the family lives.
He picked up his phone and said:
"Hello, Aunt. How have you been? Did you feel the disturbance this morning?"
"If you did, don't ignore it," his aunt said, almost shouting. "I think the seal is weakening."
Noah frowned. He had felt something, like a shockwave in the air, but he thought it was due to a detonation at the mine, since it wasn't far from the apartment complex where the workers lived.
"Not again," he grumbled as he grabbed his jacket. He lived trying to be normal: he worked at the mine, he took night classes, he kept his distance from his family (the same family responsible for guarding the history between the current world and the ancient world so that the terrible war fought millennia ago wouldn't be discovered, and who also carried a much greater responsibility).
He thought for a moment and replied to his aunt:
"—Are you sure?"
"—Yes," his aunt said in a very serious voice, "it's been twelve years since they sacrificed themselves to reactivate the seal."
"—I just want to live like a normal young man."
"—You know that can't be," his aunt replied. "You should go back to Ireland. If you're with us, we can protect you and, in the worst-case scenario, help you escape."
Noah replied:
"—I'll think about it, and now I have to go, I have to go to work."
His aunt said goodbye, and that's how their conversation ended.
Noah put on his jacket, grabbed his thermos, which was already full of coffee, and headed, as he did every day, to his workplace. As he walked towards the station to catch the bus that takes them to the mine, he thought: Why do descendants have to bear the responsibilities of their ancestors?
Many people have to live a miserable life because of their family history and surname. I never wanted to have this responsibility on my shoulders.
The office and the parking lot where the workers board the buses that transport them to the mine entrance is about ten minutes from his apartment. Noah was used to walking that distance every day.
When he was about to arrive, he noticed something strange. His colleagues were walking without a care in the world, but he felt a strange vibration under the ground. A pulsation that, in turn, seemed like an echo. It was the same feeling he felt on that fateful day.
Then he saw it.
In front of him, a gray creature appeared, looking him directly in the eyes. Its presence intimidated him. It had a human form, but its eyes had no pupils, only a bright white. Upon seeing its eyes, his body froze; he felt every muscle in his body tense up. At the same time, a shiver ran down his spine, and a great pain invaded his chest!
The creature looked at him and showed him a sinister smile; then the air around him felt much colder. A dark crack opened up behind him.
Noah said to himself, "It can't be, someone tried to break the seal again." He felt his pulse quicken. The creature took a step forward. It wasn't human; he could sense something slithering beneath its skin. Two tentacle-like things emerged from its back.
Noah took a couple of steps back and raised his right hand. A beam of ice shot out from his hand; it looked like electricity. The beam struck the ground between them, forming a line that glowed so intensely that the creature had to close its eyes. In an instant, the blue line rose, forming a wall of ice that separated them.
The creature opened its eyes again, looked at the ice wall, and said in a sinister voice:
"Found," followed by a growl that made his eardrums ache.
The other workers around him neither saw nor heard anything.
They only saw a frightened young man staring into the air. No one saw the ice, no one heard those growls, nor did they see the tentacle-like shadows on its back or its eyeless face. Suddenly, there was a sound like thousands of pieces of glass shattering, and a wind, with the force of a tornado, began to lash everything around them.
"This can't be happening," Noah said, completely terrified. The shield that kept this world separate from the dimension where those things were imprisoned had been broken.
At the same time the ice wall formed, Noah started running. He ran as fast as he could; he felt his breathing quicken. He knew his life was in great danger! If that thing had found him, it only meant that the seal had been destroyed and the Kartnod family had been released from their confinement.
As he ran towards his apartment, his cell phone rang again. He took it out with trembling hands; it was his aunt calling again.
"Noah, listen carefully, you're no longer safe. The seal is broken, and the Kartnod family is about to be released." "I already know, I'm escaping from a Claimoor."
His aunt shouted at him:
"You must escape no matter what, you have to get to that place no matter how you do it, and remember that no matter what or who you sacrifice, they must never catch you. You are our last hope."
"Right now our entire family is being attacked."
Noah shouted:
"This means that the world as we know it will cease to exist!"
"You have to survive no matter what," his aunt repeated, but at that moment the call was cut off.