Life had always been tranquil for Silva, almost too tranquil.
Growing up in Favorville, a hidden settlement nestled deep within a sprawling, magically-protected valley, Silva knew little of the dangers lurking beyond the shimmering barrier. The valley was an oasis amid the wasteland—a lush paradise shielded from the arcane devastation that had shattered the rest of the world. Towering trees stretched skyward, their leaves glowing faintly with residual magic. Rivers shimmered like liquid crystal, and the air hummed softly with the protective wards that encased the valley.

In Favorville, life was predictable, even stagnant. Raiders, monsters, and mutated beasts roamed the world outside, but they never troubled the valley. The arcane wards, remnants of a long-forgotten civilization, kept the settlement safe, isolated from the chaos beyond. The residents of Favorville lived in peaceful ignorance, shielded from the world’s ruin by a curtain of magic. Silva had grown up hearing stories of the wasteland—tales of endless deserts, ruined cities, and arcane storms that twisted the landscape itself—but to him, they were nothing more than legends.

His days were spent in quiet routine, helping his family tend to the crops that grew abundantly in the valley’s fertile soil, the monotony of each day blurring into the next. He often found himself standing at the edge of the valley, staring out at the shimmering horizon where the magic barrier rippled against the harsh, unknown world beyond, yearning for something more. Favorville was safe, but safety came at a cost—boredom, confinement, and the absence of adventure.

But that all changed on his 20th birthday, the day he was finally allowed to leave.

The Day Everything Changed:

The valley’s protective barrier was shimmering faintly in the early morning light as Silva stepped through it for the first time, heart racing with anticipation. The air outside the valley felt different—sharper, colder, and thick with tension. His breath quickened, excitement bubbling within him as he gazed at the expanse of land before him.

The wasteland stretched out for miles, but it wasn’t the barren hellscape the stories had described—at least not here. The land just beyond the valley brimmed with life, in its own strange way. Fields of tall, iridescent grasses swayed gently in the wind, each blade glowing faintly with a soft, magical light. Wildflowers bloomed in unnatural colors, their petals shifting and changing hues as they caught the light. Off in the distance, Silva could see strange shapes moving—creatures too far away to make out, but alien and unfamiliar. It was beautiful, wild, and untamed, and it called to him in a way he had never felt before.

His heart pounded with excitement. This was what he had waited for—freedom, adventure, the chance to finally explore the world that had always been hidden from him. He took his first step forward, eager to dive into the unknown.

That’s when he heard it—a loud, metallic click.
For a moment, time seemed to freeze. Silva glanced down, and the ground beneath him glinted in the sunlight. A small, circular device sat nestled in the dirt—rusted, ancient, and forgotten. A landmine.

The realization hit him just before the explosion did.

The world erupted into fire, light, and pain. A thunderous boom echoed across the fields as arcane energy surged through the air, turning the serene landscape into a violent maelstrom of destruction. Silva’s body was engulfed in flames, but this was no ordinary fire. It burned hotter than anything he had ever felt, but it wasn’t just heat—it was magic, raw and untamed, coursing through his veins, twisting his body and soul in ways he couldn’t comprehend.

Agony wracked his form—a searing, tearing pain that felt as if his very essence was being ripped apart and rebuilt all at once. His skin burned, his bones cracked, and his muscles spasmed uncontrollably as his body began to change, fusing with something primal, something alien. His vision blurred, darkened, and finally faded into nothingness.

The Awakening:

Cold.
That was the first thing Silva felt when consciousness returned, a deep, bone-chilling cold that seemed to seep into his very core. His mind was foggy, struggling to grasp what had happened, where he was. He rubbed his shoulders, trying to shake off the numbness.

As his eyes fluttered open, the world around him came into terrifying focus.

He was lying in the center of a scorched wasteland, the once-lush fields now nothing more than blackened earth and ash. The ground around him crackled and smoked, tendrils of blue, glowing mana rising from the scorched soil, twisting and dissipating into the air. Two charred bodies lay nearby—twisted, disfigured, and barely recognizable as human. They leaked streams of that same glowing mana, their life forces spent, their bodies half-disintegrated by the blast.

Silva gasped, his breath catching in his throat, but the sound that emerged wasn’t his own. It was a deep, guttural growl that reverberated through his chest, a sound so alien and monstrous that it filled him with dread.

Panic set in as he looked down at his hands—or what used to be his hands. They were massive, scaled claws now, black and gnarled, with talons that glinted like obsidian in the sunlight. His heart raced in his chest, but it wasn’t the heart of a man anymore. He felt his face—snout, sharp teeth, horns. A roar erupted from his throat, involuntary and full of anguish.

Before he could process what had happened, there was movement on the horizon. His people—those from the valley—had come, but they weren’t there to save him. They had seen the explosion and the carnage, and to them, Silva was no longer one of their own. He was a monster.

A bullet zipped past his head, followed by shouts and curses as the valley’s people charged toward him, weapons drawn. There was no reasoning with them, no explaining what had happened. All Silva could do was run.

Years Later:

Now, Silva was a ghost, wandering the desolate ruins of the wasteland, forever hunted by those who once called him one of their own. His monstrous form was a constant reminder of what he had lost, of the life that had been torn away from him.

The cave he had stumbled upon was dark, cold, and damp—an old raider camp, long abandoned but still littered with the remnants of those who had once lived there. Bones and rusted metal were scattered across the floor, a grim reminder of the brutal world he now called home. He rummaged through the debris, searching for anything he could use. His last set of clothes had been torn apart in the latest mana storm, leaving his scaled body exposed to the elements.

He shuddered at the memory of that storm, the way the clouds had glowed with ethereal light, drawing him in like a moth to a flame. He had never seen anything like it in the valley, and his curiosity had led him straight into its heart. The air had crackled with energy, and each breath had felt like fire in his lungs, the mana searing his flesh and leaving him gasping for days afterward.

Finally, Silva found a tattered robe among the remains, draping it over his massive frame. It barely fit, but it was something. He gave a sigh of relief as the fabric shielded him from the cold, if only for a moment.

Hunger gnawed at him—a constant, insatiable hunger that never left, no matter how much he ate. It was a cruel side effect of the transformation, one that left him forever starving, forever searching for something to fill the void.

His eyes fell on a half-decayed corpse, recently dead, untouched by boneworms. Without hesitation, he tore into the flesh, devouring it with a ravenous hunger. The taste was foul, but it was sustenance.

As he finished, wiping the blood from his snout, a single thought crossed his mind: There must be a cure. Somewhere out there. There had to be.

Silva wiped his hands on the ragged robe, his clawed fingers tearing into the fabric as he pushed away the guilt gnawing at him. He couldn’t stay here much longer. There were places in the wasteland even raiders avoided—towns with whispered rumors of strange healers, sorcerers, and those who had dabbled in forbidden magic. Maybe one of them could help him. Maybe someone could undo the horror that had fused his soul to this monstrous form.

But finding these people meant venturing into places he had been avoiding—the fringes of the wasteland, the lawless territories where arcane storms raged constantly and the air was thick with lethal magic. It was dangerous, but so was staying in one place for too long.

With a low growl of determination, Silva pulled the hood of his robe over his head, concealing his horns and features as best he could. His eyes flicked toward the distant lights of a settlement barely visible through the swirling dust and mana