Aros stood upon the rim of a broken cliff, where the wind sang in tongues unknown to his world.
Beneath him sprawled the human lands—rolling fields painted in the silver wash of dawn, rivers that bled light, and towns pulsing with fragile warmth. He breathed in deeply.
The air was thin here, untainted, shimmering with mana that hummed like a heartbeat beneath the soil. It was different. Pure. Almost too pure.
So this was the human world.
He had only ever heard of it through fragments—tales whispered by dying elves and roaring dragons, by soldiers who had crossed the veiled thresholds during the War of Convergence.
Back then, he had been a child watching the sky torn apart by color and fire. He remembered the cries of his kin, the songs of the dying, the taste of lightning.
When the gates had opened in their realm, every race had clawed for dominion. Elves seeking glory. Dragons seeking vengeance. And the humans—those small, brittle things—seeking survival.
