The lights were off in the dorm.
Kael sat on the edge of his bed, shirt tossed aside, a roll of gauze in one hand, antiseptic in the other. His fingers moved in silence, cleaning the fresh bruise along his ribs from the last sparring match — but what he kept tracing wasn't new.
A scar, thin but deep, curved near the base of his ribcage. Years old. The kind that stayed long after the bleeding stopped.
He stared at it for a moment.
The academy taught anatomy, Rift clearance, Desyre control.
But pain? That was something else. That was earned before all this.
Outside the window, the city hummed. Floodlights blinked across the dome. Somewhere, someone was laughing in the hallway. Kael didn't move.
His thumb passed over the scar again.
And suddenly—
Flash...
Tondo, Manila – Year: Late 2027
Kael , Age: 9
It started like any other day.
The market street was packed, noisy and warm, smells of fish, smoke, and street food mixing in the air. Vendors shouted prices, tricycles honked.
Kael walked close to his mother, her hand firm around his wrist as they moved through the crowd.
She was smiling. Talking about dinner. Fried eggplant and garlic rice for tonight if you behave." He rolled his eyes, smiling.
She always smiled, even when they had nothing.
Then—
The sky tore open.
A sound like the world ripping in half cracked across the clouds.
People stopped. Looked up.
its a Rift.
Then something fell from it
Riftspawn
Not just one.
Dozens.
Each one shaped wrong. Some ran like beasts, covered in armored plates and bone spikes. Others slithered like serpents with arms, trailing acidic slime that melted carts and stone. One had no legs — it floated, cloaked in smoke, its arms like blades.
They scattered in all directions.
People screamed. Stampeded. A vendor flipped his table and ran. A child tripped. Another Riftspawn — thin and spider-like — pounced and crushed them before anyone could react.
Kael couldn't move.
The noise vanished from his ears, replaced by a high ring of terror. He gripped his mother's hand tighter. She pulled him fast into the side alley, behind a wall of stacked crates.
"Stay here," she whispered. "Don't move. No matter what."
She turned, shielding him with her body.
A shadow crossed the alley entrance.
One of the Riftspawn spotted them. It wasn't the biggest — but fast, low-slung, and snarling like a wild dog starved for days. Its claws scraped the ground. Black spit hissed from its mouth.
Kael's mother raised her arms.
"No! Over here! Come here, you monster!"
The Riftspawn lunged.
Kael never forgot the sound her body made when it hit the wall.
The impact snapped her backward. She crashed into the concrete — hard — then fell over him like a shield. Her body heavy. Silent.
And then the warmth.
Blood soaked his shirt. His face.
Her scream had stopped mid-breath.
He opened his eyes.
She wasn't moving.
Just red.
Everywhere.
The Riftspawn hissed once, then darted away chasing louder sounds. It didn't care about him. None of them did. The monsters didn't think. Didn't spare. They just killed.
And Kael?
He didn't scream.
Didn't run.
He just knelt there.
Frozen. Shaking.
a child under his mother's body staring into the dark
No one came.
Not yet.
When the WAA squad finally arrived, the Rift had already closed.
The Riftspawn were gone.
The street was quiet.
But so was everything else
Back in the present...
Kael stared at the scar on his ribs.
No Desyre had awakened back then. Just pain.
He was too weak.
Too slow.
Too small to protect her.
Too helpless to stop anything.
That's why she died.
That's why the people around them — the vendors, the children, the ones who screamed and ran were torn apart before help ever came.
Because he couldn't do anything.
Because he was nothing.
The Rift closed.
And he was still alive.
"That's when I stopped waiting for heroes," Kael thought.
"That's when I decided to become something else