The wind whistled around Devon, an ironic lullaby of death. He hung, swaying gently over a bottomless chasm, the only things separating him from the void being the leather backpack straps that now bore the entire weight of his existence, impossibly snagged on a twisted tree jutting out from the cliff face. Below him, the fog swallowed everything, concealing the gorge floor and the grim fate of the Human Chimera that had followed him into the fall.
He didn't panic. Panic was a luxury, an inefficient surge of adrenaline that the cold composure of the black ring on his finger had long since eroded. Instead, he simply sighed, a calm puff of air heavy with annoyance. This was a logistical issue. An inconvenience.
"Hah… bothersome," he murmured to the silence, his voice barely audible over the rumble of a distant waterfall.
He began to move, not with the frantic scrambling of a climber, but with the slow, deliberate methodology of someone checking inventory. He patted his hip. The first Magnum pistol was there, its cold grip pressing against his thigh. He leaned slightly, feeling the weight of the second Magnum on his other side. Still present. He shifted his shoulders, feeling the long Karabiner 98k rifle adjust on his back, its cold barrel pressing into his leather jacket. His bag, now his anchor of salvation, felt taut, the straps digging hard into his shoulders. He even took a moment to adjust the black fedora that had been knocked askew during his fall, a small gesture steeped in absurd nonchalance. He wiped a streak of dry blood from his cheek with the back of his gloved hand, not out of disgust, but because it slightly obstructed his vision.
His gear was secure. He was secure, for now.
With his position stabilized, he finally took the time to truly look. And for the first time, he grasped the sheer scale of this world. From his precarious vantage point, suspended mid-cliff, the horizon stretched before him like a colossal painting. The forest below wasn't merely a collection of trees; it was an endless green ocean, its surface rippling with giant canopies that looked like heads of broccoli from this altitude. Far in the distance, jagged mountains pierced the lavender sky, their snow-capped peaks glittering like the broken teeth of a dragon.
"This place is actually much bigger than I thought," he muttered, his analytical eyes scanning the landscape. "I mean, look at it… I can barely see the end."
And there, at the furthest edge of his sight, where sky and earth seemed to merge, he saw it. An infinite blue-silver glint. "Though I do see something that looks like the sea in the far distance."
It was then that his gaze caught a movement. A small black speck in the vast sky, flying against the backdrop of the distant mountains. "What is that… a bird?" he thought, narrowing his eyes, trying to focus. Initially, he paid it little mind. This world was full of bizarre creatures. A bird was just a bird.
But the speck grew larger. Faster than it should have.
The bird drew closer, and Devon realized that what he'd mistaken for sluggish flapping was actually a powerful, majestic sweep of wings, covering an immense distance with each stroke. It looked like an eagle, its silhouette sharp and predatory. And its size… its size was wrong. Terribly wrong.
His previously calm eyes now began to widen, not from fear, but from pure incredulity. The bird was now close enough for him to make out the details. Its feathers were a dark bronze that shimmered in the sunlight, and its hooked beak was dull gold. And its wings… they stretched out, devouring a large portion of the sky, each primary feather as sharp and as large as a sword.
Five meters. His initial estimate was an insult. The wings spanned at least fifteen meters from tip to tip. The creature was a flying fortress forged of feather and fury.
"Oh, no, no…" he whispered, his tone not fear, but the deep annoyance of someone whose party is about to be crashed by an uninvited guest. "Don't come here. Don't come here."
But the creature was coming here. It wasn't flying past; it was descending. With an air-ripping shriek, a sound like tearing metal, the giant bird dove towards Devon. The wind from its massive wings hit him like a gale, making him swing wildly at the end of his backpack. He could feel the air pressure change, hear the deafening 'whoosh' as the creature folded its wings for the final strike.
He didn't have time to draw his weapon. He could only look up as the shadow swallowed him.
Then, the talons came. They weren't bird talons. They were four living anchors of black bone and keratin, each as thick as Devon's arm and tipped with razor-sharp points. Two talons clamped down on his chest, and two more circled his waist.
He wasn't just grasped. He was impaled.
A blinding, explosive pain shot through his body as the four talons pierced his leather jacket, his shirt, and his flesh as if they weren't there. He felt the sickening sensation of the claws scraping his ribs, their sharp points digging deep into muscle and organ. The wet tearing sound of his own body was drowned out by the creature's victorious shriek.
With one powerful yank, his backpack was ripped from the tree branch, and Devon was hoisted into the air. He coughed up blood, a hot crimson spray that erupted from his lips and was immediately snatched away by the wind. He could feel the familiar warmth of the green magic stone necklace on his chest begin to glow, attempting to heal the tremendous damage, but the pain… the pain was a constant, burning hell.
He looked up, fought through the agony, and did the only thing his shocked mind could process: he held onto his hat so it wouldn't fly away.
The bird carried him soaring high above the chasm, taking him across the ocean of green canopy. The world became a blur beneath him, a swirling tapestry. He could see rivers that looked like silver threads and mountains that towered like sleeping gods. He could feel the immense power of his captor, each beat of its wings a burst of force that shook his suspended body.
Their destination was a part of the forest unlike any he had seen. Here, the trees were giants of a primeval age. Their trunks were so massive that Corvus's cabin could fit inside them, soaring to impossible heights. Five hundred meters. Some were even over a thousand, their peaks lost in the clouds. It was a cathedral of nature built on the scale of gods.
And on one of the uppermost branches of the largest tree, a branch as thick as a highway, was a nest. The nest was a fortress of interwoven logs, the giant bones of creatures he didn't recognize, and even fragments of rusted metal.
The giant bird slowed, hovered over the nest for a moment, then released its grip.
Devon fell about ten meters, landing with a wet 'CRUNCH' in the middle of the nest. He landed on a pile of broken bones and decaying remains. He lay there, gasping, blood pooling around him. The green necklace on his chest glowed brightly beneath his torn shirt, its healing light frantically working to knit his ravaged body back together. The giant bird circled once overhead, gave one last ear-splitting shriek, then flew away, disappearing amongst the pillars of the colossal trees.
Just as the worst of the pain began to subside, replaced by a strange healing hum, Devon heard a new sound. Loud, hungry squawks.
He pushed himself to sit up and saw that he was not alone in the nest. Three ugly heads, each the size of his own, emerged from the pile of feathers and twigs. They were the bird's chicks. But they weren't cute. They were horrifying little monsters.
Their large, round bodies were covered in dirty, messy gray down. Their beaks were already immense and sharp, and their black, greedy eyes stared at Devon as if he were the most delicious worm they had ever seen.
One of them, the boldest, hopped forward and pecked him.
It wasn't a playful peck. It felt like being struck by a sharp sledgehammer. The beak slammed into his shoulder, snapping his newly-healed collarbone with a loud 'CRACK!'
Something in Devon broke. Not bone. Something else. His patience. The limit of his indifference. This was too much.
He didn't scream. He didn't snarl. He simply moved.
As the second chick leaned in to peck, Devon punched it. His fist, encased in a Corvus leather glove, hit the creature's upper beak with full force. There was a sickening snapping sound, like ceramic plate shattering. The beak crumbled, and the chick staggered back, letting out a high-pitched shriek of pain.
The third chick attacked from the side. Devon drew the hatchet from his belt. He didn't swing it. He stabbed it. He tore through the chick's lower beak, the hatchet blade sinking deep into its throat. Hot, thick fluid sprayed onto Devon's face.
Then, the slaughter began.
He leapt onto the first injured chick. He didn't kill it quickly. He tore it apart. He ripped one of its undeveloped wings from the joint, the creature screaming as muscle and tendon snapped. He used his hatchet to cleave open its chest, its soft bones breaking like twigs.
He dropped the hatchet and reached into the warm, pulsing chest cavity with his bare hand. He felt the slick, beating internal organs. He grasped the heart—a football-sized mass of muscle still frantically twitching in his grip—and ripped it out.
He held the bloody heart high, then, driven by a cold, curious, primal instinct, he bit into it.
The taste was… horrible. The chewy, fibrous meat was like rubber. The warm, metallic blood filled his mouth.
"Ptui… disgusting," he said, after one chew. He spat it out and tossed the heart aside in disgust.
He turned toward the other two chicks, who were now cowering in the corner of the nest. But it was too late for fear. He was a storm. He was the retribution for a very, very bad day. He massacred them with grisly efficiency, his hatchet a blur of steel and blood.
When it was finished, he stood in the middle of the nest, panting, his body coated in the blood and entrails of the little monsters. A silence descended, broken only by the rustling wind in the giant treetops.
He swept the blood-matted hair from his face, revealing his two eyes for the first time. The same eyes that once regarded the world with a reader's curiosity now stared with the cold, empty tranquility of a killer.
"Now…" he whispered, "where is your mother?"
He took the Kar98k rifle from his back. He chambered a single round—a large, 5cm-long bullet, clearly a Corvus modification. He raised the rifle to his shoulder, searching for his target. But the bird was too far, too small. He didn't have a telescopic sight.
It was then that the black ring on his finger felt ice-cold.
His right eye began to change. A piercing coldness spread from the ring, through his arm, to his shoulder, and straight into his optic nerve. He felt a strange burning sensation behind his eyeball.
If someone could see him up close, they would see his right eye was no longer normal. His brown iris had vanished, replaced by total darkness, and from the center of that darkness, a faint red light pulsed, like an ember at the bottom of a pit. Thin black smoke that smelled of rotten meat and ozone began to curl from the corner of his eye.
The world through that eye changed. Everything became monochrome, but life glowed with a pulsating red aura. He could see the body heat of small creatures in the forest below. He could see the heat trail the giant bird had left in the air. His eye was no longer a telescope. It was a predator's sensor.
He moved his head, his right eye scanning the sky. He saw it. Far in the distance, a pulsing red dot, circling above one of the more distant treetops.
"Got you."
He no longer needed to aim. His eye and the rifle had become one. He held his breath. He squeezed the trigger.
CRACK!
The sound of the shot was small amid the vastness of the sky. Far in the distance, the pulsating red dot exploded in a brief flash of light, then vanished. A second later, the echo of the creature's abruptly cut-off final shriek reached the nest. Headshot.
Devon lowered the rifle, his right eye returning to normal. He stared down at the forest floor, a thousand meters below.
"Alright," he said to himself. "Now how do I get down? Should I jump?"
It was then that his eyes fell upon the only object in the nest he hadn't destroyed. In a corner, wrapped in a thick layer of down, was an egg. It was enormous, reaching his waist in height, its shell a pale blue with bronze speckles.
A cold, practical thought entered his mind. "Tonight's dinner… egg."
He pulled a coil of sturdy rope from his backpack. Carefully, he lashed the giant egg to his back. The weight nearly toppled him. Then, he looked for a way down. There were no stairs. But there were giant roots and vines, as thick as his arm, dangling from the branch beneath the nest.
He tested one, pulling on it with his full weight. It was strong.
With the giant egg strapped to his back, a rifle in one hand, and a blood-splattered face, Devon began his descent, disappearing into the green ocean below, leaving the nest of carnage in silence.