It five months since it happened, when the Tower of Heaven rumbled to life and shone it's light down to his city.
Above, the heavens loomed in thick, oppressive silence, as if ink had been spilled and forgotten. Amidst the smoky clouds, vermilion lightning clawed through the firmament. Thunder followed, slow, heavy, and low, as though the gods had grown weary of wrath, yet struck out of habit.
The rain that fell was dark and heavy.
Dark of sorrow, a melancholy hue, viscous and bitter, bleeding from wounds in the sky.
Beneath it lay a city, or what remained of one. Its name was lost, carried off by the winds, swallowed in fire and thunder and silence.
What persisted was ruin, walls shattered like the ribs of a dead beast, buildings collapsed in on themselves, and streets once crowded with sellers of bread and tailors of fine linen, now buried beneath corpses turned greenish-black by rot and plague.
It was as if time itself had flinched.
No cry of mourning lingered. Only silence. The silence of a city that had not died, it had been unmade.
On the ground lay a old broken table.
Beside the table lay a boy.
He might have been thirteen. Fourteen, if you stretched the years hard enough. His clothes were little more than strips clinging to him, his body thin from hunger, skin marked by dirt and blood. An animal-hide sack was tied at his waist.
He didn't move.
Then the rain kissed his face. He blinked.
His eyes were narrow and sharp, the colour of pale ice. He blinked again, once, then locked his gaze on something farther down the street.
Twenty metres ahead, a snake tugged at the remains of a stray bird. The bird was big, scales twitching nervously as it tore into flesh already spoiled. It would not stay long, everything knew the scent of death, even in a graveyard.
But the boy waited.
His hand moved with slow, practiced movements. From his sack, he drew a black iron disk.
Its flat sharp surface had a cold gleam, dull and honest.
And then, without sound, he moved.
No wasted movement. No shout of resolve. Just speed, sharpened by hunger and despair. The snake sense it too late. It looked up and try to twist away, but the boy was already mid-throw.
The disc sang softly.
A thud. Then silence.
The snake collapsed against the broken cart, its skull caved in. Blood soaked into the table.
The boy walked, collected the disc, and pried it loose from the cart's wood, taking a splinter with it. He pulled the carcass free, slung it over his back, and left.
The wind picked up, cold and without direction. The boy, hunched against it. He hated the cold. In the dark alleys back on Earth, cold was a thief that robbed boys of fingers, of warmth, of sleep just like the gangs that constantly try to kill him.
Still, he walked on, past gutted shops, overturned stalls, shattered buildings. The snake hunt had delayed him. He had another place to be.
Soon, he reached it, a medicine shop, miraculously intact, though stinking of mould and dried blood. The wooden drawers lining the walls groaned with age, some broken open, spilling old pills and withered herbs onto the floor like the brittle bones of monks.
In one corner sat a corpse. An old man, eyes wide, mouth half open as if caught mid-question. His skin, too, was dark and rotted.
The boy searched swiftly. Most herbs were spoiled, leached of life. But one bundle caught his eye, still-green leaves, fragrant, familiar.
When he first opened his eyes to the new world, it was what he found on wounds in his body.
He sat and removed his shirt.
His chest bore a wound, a deep ugly one with its edges darkening. It oozed, thick and slow. He crushed the herb, smeared the paste into the wound. He grunted, once, jaw clenched tight as sweat poured from his brow. The pain was pure.
He leaned against a cabinet, breath ragged. The world spun.
After some minutes, he dressed again. His shirt stuck to the wound. He said nothing.
From his sack, he drew a map. Torn, patched. Lines marked streets, most now scratched out. Only two remained unmarked in the northeast.
The search, at least, was narrowing.
He folded the map, returned it to his sack. His eyes fell upon the corpse in the corner.
The old man.
The boy hesitated. Then moved.
The jerkin was too big, but it was warm. He donned it, then knelt before the corpse. His voice, when it came, was hoarse.
"Rest in peace old man."
He tore a curtain from the wall, draped it over the body, then stepped outside.
There, he saw a puddle. He paused, bent down.
In the mirror, he saw himself.
A boy. Dirty. Hollow-cheeked.
Delicate features marred by grime and despair. But behind his eyes, no fear. No innocence. Only resolve.
He stared for a long time. Then lifted his boot and smashed it on the puddle.
He turned and walked.
But before the puddle splattered, it reflected light, light from the heavens. And above, the gleaming Tower of Heaven that stood like a star of its own.
It was silver and cold.
And beneath that, humanity scurried like insects.
The boy ran faster.
Darkness fell, a curtain of ash and storm. The rain thickened. In the distance, a sound, howling. Not of wolves, nor wind. But something that made him shivered.
The boy's stride quickened.
Ahead, among shattered homes, he saw something impossible that he had to stop running and stare at it wide eye.
Caught in the branches of an old tree was a fruit that gleamed in the night. It gleamed of silver light that gave the feeling of otherworldly.
The boy froze. Breath caught. What Is something like that doing there?
The boy wanted to look longer, but the sky was bleeding darkness, and time was short. The darker it got, the more troublesome things would become.
He memorised the location, then vanished into shadow.
His dwelling was a hollow in the tree, hidden, cramped. Bones littered the floor. The entrance was no larger than a dog's tunnel. Perfect. He squeezed in, blocked the hole with stone and sticks.
Inside he finally felt silence.
The boy didn't sleep.
He held the disc in his hand, eyes alert.
Outside, the howling rose. Some passed close, sniffing, giggling. Monsters, transformed by plague, madness and the insanity of the Tower of Heaven.
They passed.
The boy exhaled.
From the sack around his waist he took out a wooden bottle of water and drank.
Then he bit into the meat of the snake, it as bitter, oily but he chewed it without thought, his stomach rebelling. He ate anyway. Hunger was patient but merciless.
Finished, he sat still. He did not cry. He hadn't in years. Not even back on Earth when police would chase him and gangs would beat him.
He reached into the sack and took out an old book.
In the dark, his fingers traced it and not because he could see it but because he had already memories it's content.
He had read the slip a hundred times. It taught the way of the Magus. Most especially, it focused on the Magus Primaris and the Arcana art he found is called— Hand of the Demon.
He had memorised the breathing, the visualisation.
He breathed.
Power trickled in, mana from the surrounding flowed into him
He kept breathing.
His bones trembled. His chest wound throbbed. Hunger twisted his gut, but something moved within. He felt a light shone inside of him.
He felt stronger.
He hated the cold, but he welcomed the strength that comes with it.
He had no master. No Sanctum. Only the old book and a half-remembered world on Earth where he was killed like a dog, left bleeding on the street.
But he would endure.
For his name was Eldros.
And he was still alive. That was all that matters.