Northern Frontier, Glacier Territory – Age: 21 to 27
Hell had changed its shape, but not its soul.
For six long years, Desmond did not live.
He endured.
The cold no longer stung him — it had seeped into his flesh, lodged deep in the marrow, and frozen the heart that beat within.
The white mountains, the barren valleys, the sleepless nights… these were his kingdoms.
Winter after winter, they forged him into something more than a man.
A phantom in the snow.
A predator of the high passes, forged of discipline and danger.
They named him The Gray Wolf. Others, The Arctic Wolf.
It was not a title of endearment.
It was a warning.
He did not need to shout.
One glance, one motion of his hand, and orders were carried out with a precision born of fear — and later, of loyalty.
Those who had once dreaded his presence came to follow him with near-religious devotion. No one dared to challenge him — not because he demanded obedience, but because he earned it, in the way he thought, fought, and survived.
Always the first into the fray, and the last to leave it.
The young soldiers whispered about him: A noble monster.
Swift. Exact. Unshakable. His silence struck harder than most men's war cries, his gaze cut sharper than steel. Even the way he bled was disciplined.
He learned to stitch his own wounds without flinching, to walk days without water, to read the forest as if it spoke in open sentences.
He could smell ambushes, shadow enemies for miles, pull shattered men back from the brink, and send them charging into battle like living weapons on a chessboard.
His name spread during the Eastern Winter Campaign, when insurgent lines crumbled under his command. The capitals received letters praising "a leader of steel," "a tactician both ruthless and precise," "a mind that calculates… and a soul none can read."
At twenty-seven, with no outward scars but a heart cold as the ice he ruled, Desmond Fontclair was summoned to receive the rank of Commander of High Military Honor.
The ceremony was brief, silent. He was given golden insignia, a black cloak stitched with white silk, and a sword that bore his name:
Desmond Fontclair Richardson.
And in that moment, the wolf bowed to no one.