It was late at night. In the small room, lit only by the flickering light of an old lamp, a young man worked without rest.
The table before him was covered with metal parts, wires, and empty flasks.
His reddened eyes and heavy breathing revealed how drugged he was.
"These damn materials are getting in the way…" Tyler grumbled, hurling a wrench against the wall.
The weapon before him was still incomplete, but his mind burned with purpose.
He planned to use it — and the target, well, it was no small one.
"They'll regret kicking me out of the project…"
Then, a strange sound echoed. The object on the table began to tremble, emitting an unstable, growing light.
"Shit!" Tyler shouted, backing away.
He tried to throw it against the wall, but it was too late.
A deafening explosion filled the room, swallowing everything in a blinding white flash.
When he opened his eyes, everything was on fire.
But it wasn't his room.
Trees burned around him, the air heavy with smoke, and the distant sound of screams echoed through the flames. It was a forest at war.
Among the fire, he saw strange figures — people with pointed ears, shining armor, and desperate expressions.
"Where am I…? Who are these people…? I've never seen anything like this before."
Tyler tried to get up, but something was wrong. His body wouldn't respond.
Heart racing, he looked down… and froze.
His body was far too small.
His hands — tiny.
— Wha… what…? — he mumbled, but only a faint sound escaped his lips.
It was the cry of a baby.
"Whatever's happening… I'm screwed. In the middle of these flames, trapped in this tiny body… I don't know if this is a dream or straight-up hell."
He let out a weak laugh, even though he didn't understand a thing.
Then, through the fire and smoke, a woman appeared, running.
She was bleeding heavily — missing an arm — and her armor was in tatters.
Even so, she still wore a fierce expression… and pointed ears.
"I think I'm gonna die… at least she's hot, even half mangled."
Tyler thought, laughing internally at his own misery.
The woman rushed closer.
To his surprise, instead of leaving him there to die, she scooped him up into her arms and kept running, panting, as the fire devoured everything around them.
That's when Tyler saw something that changed everything.
An old man was chasing her — fast, far faster than any old man should be.
Another man, up ahead, shouted something Tyler couldn't understand:
— Run! Protect the baby!
A colossal burst of flame shot from his hand, exploding against the ground and rising into a wall of fire between them and the old man.
Tyler stared, speechless.
Where had that fire come from?
He looked around, stunned. There was no device, no spark, nothing that could explain it. It was impossible.
"That… was magic?"
The thought sounded ridiculous, but no other word made sense.
The ground shook with the next explosion. The woman — bloodied, limping, but still determined — held him tightly against her chest and kept running.
Tyler could only hear his own heart pounding, fast and uneven. He tried to move his arms, but the small body wouldn't respond.
"Magic doesn't exist… right?"
The sentence echoed in his mind, without a shred of conviction.
The air was hot, thick with smoke. Above him, the red sky pulsed as if it were alive.
For an instant, Tyler perceived every detail with terrifying clarity — the smell of burning wood, the metallic taste of her blood, the distant echo of screams. Everything was far too real to be a dream.
And in that moment, doubt turned into certainty:
He was no longer in his world.