Chains bit into Garfield's wrists, forged of cold iron inscribed with runes that suppressed mana. His body ached from wounds earned in fire and blood, yet his posture remained upright, his eyes as sharp as ever.
The slave caravan trudged north through frost-bitten plains, snow howling against the iron cages. Around him, men and women wept, their spirits broken long before the frost could kill them. Garfield sat in silence, his gaze distant, his mind calculating.
Failure. That was the word the world had written on him. But to Garfield, failure was merely another mask for transformation. If he had fallen, then he would rise again—and this time, higher.
The caravan reached the northern mines, a place where slaves were worked until they were bones. He was thrown into the pits, his chains rattling as guards jeered. Yet even here, in filth and despair, Garfield's presence set him apart.
At night, while others whimpered in their sleep, he pressed his bleeding fingers against the frost-covered stone, carving crude patterns, testing what little mana he could stir despite the shackles. Sparks, faint and fleeting, danced in the dark. Enough to remind him that he was not broken.
The Being's whisper lingered always, a shadow draped across his mind.
"Cold earth. Cold chains. And yet you plan still."
"Yes," Garfield muttered under his breath. "Because chains are only tools in the hands of the patient."
---
Weeks passed. Garfield worked the mines by day, his hands raw, his muscles burning. But at night, he experimented. The mines were not only full of slaves—they were full of monsters. Goblins captured in raids, trolls dragged in chains, beasts too dangerous to roam free. The guards thought them trophies. Garfield saw them as material.
He began small, carving marks on skin, mixing blood with runes stolen from memory. His first attempts were grotesque: slaves twisted into half-broken shells, their screams echoing in the frost. They died quickly, but Garfield did not mourn. He observed, recorded, refined.
Failure was information. Information was progress.
One night, his work bore fruit. A griffon chick, wings clipped, was fused with a dying slave. The result knelt before him, trembling, its body warped, its eyes still faintly human—but obedient.
For the first time in months, Garfield allowed himself a smile. Cold. Thin. Triumphant.
---
But fate shifted once more.
The chains on his wrists were unlocked one morning, and Garfield was dragged before a man draped in velvet, his eyes calculating beneath the shadow of a wide-brimmed hat.
"I am the Earl of Grantham," the noble said. "And you… are interesting."
Garfield said nothing. His silence was answer enough.
The Earl purchased him like livestock. In the Earl's estate, Garfield kept his head bowed, his words minimal. He observed everything: the patrols of guards, the weaknesses in the walls, the routines of servants. He was patient.
Soon, the Earl granted him access to the lower laboratories. Books, tools, and cages filled the chambers beneath the estate. To others, it was a dungeon. To Garfield, it was opportunity.
---
The Earl's son was a boy of fourteen—gifted, reckless, brimming with mana. He was proud, arrogant, untested. Garfield studied him in silence, watching every spell he cast, every careless mistake.
And then, the boy vanished.
The Earl raged, searching the estate, but grief clouded his judgment. He did not see the truth: that beneath his very home, Garfield had birthed a masterpiece.
A dragon whelp, stolen from the Earl's collection, was fused with the boy's body. The hybrid screamed as it drew its first breath, its scales gleaming with fire, its eyes smoldering with human will.
It bowed to Garfield.
That night, the estate burned. Guards fell, walls crumbled, and Garfield walked away from the flames with nothing but the hybrid at his side.
---
He fled into the frostlands, where the ruins of an old temple jutted from the snow like broken teeth. There, among shattered statues and walls carved with forgotten glyphs, he built his new base.
The hybrids grew in number. Goblins for agility, trolls for endurance, void wraiths for unpredictability. Each success fed his hunger, each failure hardened his resolve.
But power does not stay hidden.
Hunters found the ruins. Priests of the holy order declared him an aberration, a heretic. Armies gathered to strike him down.
Garfield fled again, leaving the ruins behind. North, then west, until the fire peaks gave way to the endless sands. The desert welcomed no one—but Garfield was not anyone.
He collapsed beneath a dune, his vision swimming, his lips curling into a whisper:
"Let them chase me. Let them call me monster. They cannot grasp what I am building."
The wind swallowed his words, carrying them across the barren expanse.
"This is not exile," he whispered again, eyes closing, mind already shaping plans. "This is preparation."
And so Garfield Van Turner vanished into the desert, no longer Duke, no longer heir, no longer slave.
Only a shadow sharpening its claws in silence.
---