In the deepest fold of the Northern wildlands of World Twelve, beneath the endless haze of cerulean storms and deathly winds, a child was born under no one's watchful eyes—no midwife, no parent, no cradle. He emerged not into warmth, but onto frozen soil—alone.
He cried, but the world did not listen.
Year 0 – The First Breath
Kaen's first moments were a dance between death and instinct. Wrapped in a shallow pool of faintly glowing moss, which absorbed the cold enough to prevent immediate death, the newborn's survival could only be called miraculous. The winds howled like predators, and the sky threatened to shatter above.
Nearby, a scavenger-beast sniffed the wind, creeping close. A creature resembling a cross between a scaled weasel and a blind mole, its hide shimmered with latent qi—barely intelligent, but instinctually hungry. It moved toward the child, saliva dripping.
But as fate or perhaps design would have it, the moss released a pungent burst of spores, irritating the beast, causing it to hiss and retreat. Kaen's first protector was not a parent, but a plant.
That day, he survived the first test. The world had noticed his existence.
Year 1 – Crawling Through Ash
Kaen crawled before he learned to sit. The wind would slap his bare skin and cover him in soot, but the infant had already begun showing signs of uncanny resilience. Somehow, his body adjusted—not strong, not immune, but enduring.
He began to gnaw at the bark of a particular silver tree that grew near a rock den he found. The taste was bitter, but it provided some warmth, some illusion of fullness. His infant mind associated survival with this tree. He crawled to it daily, dragging himself with pitiful strength, eating and sleeping curled beneath its roots.
Sometimes, a nearby lake would freeze so violently it echoed like thunder. Once, the ice cracked open and an eyeless fish creature leapt onto the shore. Kaen, unable to comprehend its nature, dragged it to his den. It rotted before he understood food and decay.
He chewed frozen meat, spat it out, fell sick, healed. His body remembered.
Year 2 – Standing Among Ruins
At two, Kaen stood.
Wobbly legs, arms scratched and torn from shrub thorns and sharp grasses, he walked along forgotten trails carved by beasts long gone. He found bones of a massive creature embedded in earth. He would sleep near its ribcage, tracing the curving lines of its fossilized remains.
When a shadow-beast came sniffing one night—a massive, dog-headed creature with thick, smoke-like fur—Kaen stayed still. It sniffed him, growled low, then left. It recognized no qi in him. No threat. No value. Nothing to kill.
He lived because he was beneath notice.
Year 3 to 5 – Fire and Mind
By now, Kaen could understand patterns.
He learned which branches burned longer in fire and which sparked too quickly. He didn't know "fire," but when lightning struck a tree, he watched how it danced and consumed. He replicated it once, rubbing stones, striking dry bark. It took months, but one day, fire bloomed in his hands.
He shrieked with joy and fear. Fire meant warmth. Fire meant cooked food. Fire meant the monsters didn't come near as often.
Kaen learned to dry meat over it. He watched steam rise from leaves and wondered what "change" meant. He didn't have words yet, but he had thoughts.
And from thought came a tiny awareness.
Some days, he sat for hours staring at water, wondering why it rippled when he breathed near it. He noticed the wind carried heat some days and cold on others. His eyes began to sharpen—not in strength, but in understanding.
He was not growing in power.
He was growing in mind.
Year 6 to 7 – Lessons of the Hunt
Kaen learned pain.
A winged serpent stung him while he scavenged for mushrooms. His vision blurred. Fever burned him for three days. He could have died, but a faint blue moss he had once avoided called to his memory. He chewed it, vomited, chewed again.
The toxin passed.
That year, he began to set crude traps. Pitfalls, sharpened sticks, nets made of vine. Not all worked. He failed. Failed again. Learned.
When he caught his first live prey—a deer-like creature with barklike skin—he didn't kill it immediately. He watched it. Learned its breathing, its habits, its fear.
Then, with tears and apology whispered to a sky that never spoke back, he killed it.
The meat fed him for weeks.
And he buried the bones.
He was no longer surviving.
He was living.
Year 8 to 9 – The Quiet Hours
Kaen began drawing.
Lines scratched into rock with bone, depicting skies, beasts, rivers. He drew a spiral that resembled a breath. He didn't know why. It felt right. The rhythm of life.
He began mimicking beast breathing—slower, faster, deeper. Sometimes, his body felt strange when he did that. Warmer. Focused. But he couldn't explain it.
Some nights, the world whispered.
He'd dream of floating lights.
Of stars.
Of a flame beating in his chest.
In truth, something within him had awakened. Not a grand power. Not a divine spark. But a vein—subtle and quiet. Like a bud of cultivation. Untrained. Unknown. But undeniably there.
He began sitting still, breathing deep, trying to feel that pulse again.
He didn't know it yet, but he was touching qi.
His body was still ordinary.
But his spirit? Stirring.
Year 10 – The Tenth Winter
The tenth winter was cruel.
The sky remained dark for days. Beasts migrated. Prey vanished. The lake froze entirely. Even the wind carried death.
Kaen nearly died three times.
Once, he slipped into the frozen river while chasing a snow hare. He dragged himself out, teeth clattering, fingers blue.
Another time, he ate a wrong root and couldn't stand for days.
The final time, he was chased by a horned predator. Only his familiarity with the terrain—jumping into a deep crevice—saved him.
He returned to his den shivering, hungry, bleeding.
He looked up at the sky and screamed—not in anger, but in existence.
And the world... echoed back.
A faint glow pulsed from the earth. A resonance. From within the soil under his feet, something responded to him. Not power, not miracle.
Recognition.
The world had acknowledged him.
---
Far above, beyond stars and logic, the god who had made this world watched. Not amused. Not entertained.
But curious.
"Ten winters," the god whispered. "Still he stands. No special gift. No divine heritage. No monstrous bloodline. Just a will that refuses to break. A slow, stubborn spark that refuses to be extinguished."
"Perhaps that's all it takes."
He watched Kaen place his hand on the stone wall and begin carving again.
A new symbol. A spiral surrounded by flame.
A beginning.