The morning didn't break with gentle warmth, but with a sharp, crystalline edge. The air, thin and frigid on the rooftop, bit at him with a clean sting, banishing the last vestiges of sleep from Devon's mind. Beneath him, the log cabin stood firm, an anchor he'd wrestled free from time's relentless rot. The hammer's ring was the sole intrusion on the forest's majestic hush, each blow a rhythmic, resolute statement. THWACK! Iron bit into fresh-cut shingle. THWACK! A fragment of a broken world, pieced whole again by his hand.
He labored with quiet efficiency, muscles in his back and arms singing with satisfying pain. Not the agony of wound or assault, but the clean burn of labor, of creation. He ripped away the rotting planks, their sodden fibers crumbling in his grip, exposing the roof's skeleton, ribs laid bare. Then, with new boards he'd wrestled from fallen trees nearby, he patched the gaps, rebuilding his fortress, nail by nail. It was more than shelter now. It was a project. It was home.
His work complete, the final gap sealed, the roof once more a solid shield above, Devon sat on the ridge, legs dangling. Sweat plastered his black t-shirt to his skin in the cool morning air. He exhaled, a plume of white vapor blooming from his lips. From here, he was king of a silent, boundless realm. He could see everything. To the west, the Silver Forest stretched like a sea of emerald and argent, its shimmering birches catching the first rays of the rising sun. To the east, the contrast was a gash upon the landscape: the Monster Forest, the Gloomfang Wood, a twisted, malevolent tangle of charcoal trees shrouded in a thin, corpse-purple mist that seemed to defy the dawn.
"Hehehe... turned into a carpenter," he muttered to himself, a dry, humorless chuckle escaping his lips. It sounded foreign, devoid of mirth, more an acknowledgement of the absurdity of his situation.
He reached for the metal mug he'd brought up with him. Inside was coffee—a thick, black sludge he'd found in a tin in Corvus's kitchen. It tasted bitter, strong, and earthy, devoid of any sweetness. It was coffee brewed not for enjoyment, but for function, fuel for a machine that refused to quit. He took a long pull, the scalding warmth spreading through his chest. Morning coffee while surveying the forest and the sunrise. In his old world, this would have been the highlight of some overpriced camping trip. Here, it was a reward earned in blood and pain.
"Needs a smoke," he said again, an echo of a phrase his uncle used to say. A ghost of another life.
As if in answer to his thought, a memory surfaced. He reached into one of the cargo pockets of his pants and pulled out a slim, rectangular wooden box. It was made of dark wood, polished to a gleam, with tiny silver hinges. On the lid was carved a raven in flight—Corvus's symbol. He flipped it open. Inside, nestled neatly on a bed of faded crimson velvet, were five thick, dark-brown cigars. Their aroma was rich and intoxicating, a blend of tobacco, leather, and something sweet like spice.
"Back in my old world, this would get me in trouble," he thought, a faint smile touching his lips. He could picture his mother's face, her disappointed gaze. "But hey... who's gonna scold me here?"
He picked up one of the cigars, turning it between his fingers. It felt dense and oily. He placed the end in his mouth, then raised his right hand. He didn't need a lighter. He focused his will, a process that now felt as natural as breathing. He felt the familiar warmth of the red magic stone in his pocket, and from the tip of his index finger, a tiny spark appeared, then blossomed into a small, steady orange flame, dancing quietly in the morning air. He touched the flame to the end of the cigar. The tobacco began to smolder, releasing a thin, fragrant plume of blue smoke.
He took his first puff. And his world exploded in a violent coughing fit.
This was no mild cigarette smoke. It was thick, heavy, and acrid, filling his unprepared lungs with a burning sensation that made him choke. He coughed and wheezed, his eyes watering, his body convulsing. The bitter taste of burning tobacco coated his tongue and throat. He almost dropped the cigar. Yes, that's generally how a beginner reacts.
But then, something cool and soothing coursed through him from the black ring on his finger. The panic subsided. The pain in his throat became less sharp. He straightened up, gasping, but more in control. He stared at the burning cigar in his hand. He wouldn't be defeated by a roll of leaves.
He took another puff, this time slower, more carefully. The smoke was still harsh, but he held it in, letting it fill his mouth before exhaling slowly. A thick cloud of grey smoke billowed into the clear air, carrying with it a rich, complex aroma. He was getting used to it. He sipped his bitter coffee, then took another drag from the cigar. The combination of the coffee's bitterness and the tobacco's rich spice created a strange, adult harmony on his tongue.
He leaned back against the roof, one hand holding the mug, the other the cigar, and gazed out at his kingdom. Wow, this is a pretty great life. Peaceful. Quiet. No worries.
The thought was so startling in its simplicity that it made him pause. Peaceful? How could that be? He was in a world that had tried to kill him in every way imaginable. He lived on the edge of a literal hellscape. He was a murderer, a torturer of himself, and a grave robber. And yet, here, sitting on the roof of a legendary psychopath's cabin, smoking his cigar and drinking his coffee, he felt... peaceful.
"Wonder why I can be so peaceful like this, huh," he mumbled, smoke swirling around his words. He knew the answer, of course. He glanced down at the black ring on his finger. The crystal seemed to absorb the morning light, reflecting nothing. The ring was a damper. An emotional suppressant. It didn't erase the memory of trauma; it just sanded down the sharp edges, leaving behind cold, sterile facts. Fear, guilt, loneliness—all of it had been archived, stored away in a mental filing cabinet he could no longer fully access. All that remained was a cold tranquility. The calm of a predator resting in its den.
He thought back to the Gloomsmile from yesterday. The creature that had tried to tear his mind apart with illusions of his friends. He tried to recapture the sting of that terror, that crippling guilt. Nothing. All that remained was a dismissive analysis.
"Hah, what was that Gloomsmile even about," he thought, a small, humorless laugh escaping his nose. "Such an unclear creature. It's black, and the smile, ugh... hehehe." The laugh sounded hollow to his own ears. He wasn't making a joke. He was stating a fact from his new perspective: a creature that relied on fear was powerless against someone who could no longer feel it.
Just then, the silence was shattered by a loud rustling from the bushes at the edge of the meadow below. It wasn't the sound of a small animal. It was the sound of something large moving with deliberate grace.
Devon didn't flinch. He didn't feel threatened. He simply became alert. He set down his coffee mug, but kept the cigar between his lips. He watched, his eyes narrowed.
From the bushes with their copper-colored leaves, a figure stepped out into the open. It was a stag. But it was more than just a deer. The creature was an embodiment of the forest's majesty itself. It was enormous, its shoulders as high as Devon's chest. Its coat was a rich, reddish-brown, gleaming like silk in the sunlight. And its antlers... its antlers were a crown of living wood, branching into dozens of sharp tines, so wide they seemed impossible to carry. White vapor billowed from its nostrils in the cold air, and its large, dark eyes stared with a calm, ancient intelligence.
The old Devon would have been awestruck. He would have held his breath in wonder, marveling at beauty so pure and wild.
The new Devon had only one thought, cold and pragmatic as steel. Food.
"Should just shoot it, huh," he whispered to himself. The words were so casual, so nonchalant, as if he were deciding whether to change the television channel.
He didn't move from his relaxed position, still sitting on the roof. He simply placed the cigar between his teeth. He raised his right hand, the same hand that moments ago had held the coffee mug. He gripped the firestone in his pocket, feeling its pulsing warmth. He didn't form a fist. He shaped his hand into the form of a pistol, with his index finger extended and his thumb cocked back like a hammer.
This was an experiment. An evolution. He was no longer simply touching the stone. He was beginning to shape his will, to mold the magic into something more specific, more deadly.
He felt the energy from the stone flow into his arm, not as a spreading wave of heat, but as a concentrated stream. The air around the tip of his index finger began to shimmer. The magic circle that formed there was not large and stable like the ones he used to light fires. This circle was small, dense, and spinning with furious speed, a vortex of fire and runes, colored red-orange, hissing like a burning fuse. It was a barrel made of pure magic.
The stag raised its head, its large ears twitching towards the cabin, perhaps sensing something amiss. Its dark eyes met Devon's. For a moment, there was a connection—a hunter and its prey.
Devon didn't hesitate. His mind was empty of all things except trajectory and target.
BOOM.
There was no loud gunshot like Corvus's pistol. Instead, there was a deep, muffled FWOOMP, like the sound of air suddenly combusting and compressing. From the tip of his finger, not a bullet, but a small projectile of condensed fire shot out. It left a faint trail of smoke in the air, moving with terrifying speed.
The world seemed to move in slow motion. Devon watched the magic projectile cross the fifty meters in the blink of an eye. He saw the stag just begin to turn to flee.
Then the projectile hit.
Right in the head.
The impact didn't just penetrate. The impact detonated.
There was no scream. No gush of blood at first. There was only a blinding flash of white-orange light and a wave of heat that Devon could feel even from the roof. The stag's magnificent head, along with its crown of majestic antlers, vanished in an instant. Gone. Not shattered into pieces. Erased from existence, vaporized by heat so intense it tore apart the molecules.
The neck, now ending in a charred and smoking stump, erupted in a fountain of blood and boiling spinal fluid, painting a gruesome arc of crimson across the peaceful green grass. The massive, headless body remained standing for an impossible second, its muscles still twitching with the last commands from a brain that no longer existed, before finally collapsing to the side with a heavy, final thud.
Silence returned, broken only by the hissing of the burning neck stump and the sickening smell of scorched hair, cooked meat, and vaporized blood.
Devon lowered his hand. The magic circle at the tip of his finger vanished. He took the cigar from his lips and exhaled the last of the smoke slowly.
"That's dinner for later," he said, his voice flat, devoid of emotion.
He gazed down at the gruesome carcass, a source of meat for the weeks to come. Then he raised his gaze. He looked towards the green and vibrant Silver Forest, where beauty like the stag came from. Then he looked towards the dark and decaying Monster Forest, where horrors like the Gloomsmile crept out. Two worlds, side by side.
A small, cold, and utterly joyless laugh escaped his lips as he took one last swallow of his now-cold coffee.
"Wow, what an eyesore... hahahah."