"So this is Seattle."
Mark stood at the edge of the city, or what was left of it anyway. The road beneath his feet had cracks running through it, weeds pushing up through the concrete like they owned the place. He'd been walking for three days straight, sleeping in ditches and abandoned gas stations, eating whatever he could find or afford. His boots were holding up, barely. The cardboard he'd stuffed in the soles two weeks ago was pretty much gone now.
He was lean, the kind of lean that comes from not eating regular. But there was muscle underneath, built from years of moving, carrying, surviving. Average height, maybe five-eight or nine, with shoulders that said he could handle himself if he had to. His skin had this warm brown tone that caught the light when he turned, like there was something underneath glowing. Black hair, tight curls, cut short because long hair was just something else to grab in a fight. His face was sharp, alert, with a jaw that looked carved and cheekbones that stood out when he was thinking hard. Dark brown eyes that didn't miss much.
Mark Coleman. That was his name. The Colemans took him in when he was a baby, never made him feel like he wasn't theirs. David and Sarah Coleman, good people, salt of the earth type. David was a carpenter, taught Mark how to handle tools, how to measure twice and cut once, how to be patient. Sarah ran a little general store, always had a hot meal waiting when he got home from school. Emma was the older sister, five years up, protective and sharp-tongued and the first person who ever had his back. Ben was the little one, two years younger, always following Mark around, always wanting to be like him.
David died two years ago. Heart attack, just like that, gone. Sarah tried to keep things together but the store failed, money got tight, Emma started working two jobs and put off college, Ben's shoes had holes. Mark watched it happen and made a choice. He was sixteen, old enough to work, old enough to leave. He told Sarah he was going to find something, make some money, send it back. She cried. Emma called him an idiot. Ben just hugged him and pressed something into his palm, a little wooden monkey he'd carved himself.
Mark still had it. In his pocket, right next to the photo of the family at the county fair.
That was three months ago. He'd worked his way west, did odd jobs, slept rough, kept moving. Seattle was supposed to have opportunities. People said you could make a living here, especially if you were willing to go into the gates.
Gates. That was the thing now. The thing that changed everything.
---
Sixty years ago the world went crazy.
People called it the Great Catastrophe, the Awakening, the Break. Different names for the same event. One day things were normal, the next day the sky ripped open in a thousand places and everything changed.
Gates appeared everywhere. Floating rifts in the air, shimmering gold and black, some small as doors and some big as stadiums. Nobody knew where they came from or why. They just showed up, and through them came things that shouldn't exist.
Monsters. Real ones. Not the kind in stories.
Creatures from myth started pouring out. Ogres, trolls, dragons, things without names that killed whole towns before anyone could react. Animals outside the gates started changing too, mutating, growing, becoming something else. Plants too. Trees that moved on their own, flowers that made you see things, grass that cut like glass.
But that wasn't all.
Something else came through. Energy. They called it legacy energy later, after they figured out what it did. It spread through the world like wildfire, and a third of the human population woke up different.
Systems appeared in their heads. Interfaces, like something out of a game, telling them they were connected to old heroes, gods, legends. They got powers. Real powers. Strength, speed, magic, stuff that shouldn't be possible.
They called them Inheritors.
Turns out the energy connected you to stories, old ones, deep ones. The bigger the story, the stronger the power. Common tier was for local legends, folk heroes, people nobody heard of outside their region. Elite was for figures with real reach, historical names. Epic was for major myths, the ones everyone knew. Legendary was for gods, major pantheon figures, beings worshipped by millions. Mythic was the top, elder gods, creators, the ones at the very top of the cosmic food chain.
One inheritor per legend, at least at the higher tiers. Epic and above, only one person could carry that name at a time. When they died, the legacy moved on, found someone else.
The world fell apart fast. Governments collapsed. Borders didn't matter when one person could level a city. New powers rose, new alliances, new wars. It took decades to build something stable.
The old structure died. A new one took its place. Compacts, federations, councils. People grouped up, made rules, tried to keep the chaos contained. It worked, mostly.
At the top were the Legendary inheritors. They ran things, made the big decisions. The Mythics were there too but nobody really knew them. They kept to themselves, stayed hidden, only showed up when things got really bad. Everyone knew they existed but nobody knew who they were or where they lived.
The most powerful Legendary couple in North America was the Thornes. Alexander Thorne and Elara Thorne. He was a Solomon inheritor, wisdom and judgment, could see through any lie, commanded spirits, built things that lasted. She was something else, a Yemoja inheritor, Yoruba goddess of the sea, mother of waters, protector of children. She could heal anything, control oceans, calm storms, give life where there was none.
Together they built the North American Legacy Compact. They held it together for decades, kept the peace, made things work. People looked up to them. Trusted them. They were proof that Inheritors could be more than warlords.
They died on December 31st, 2059.
That was all anyone knew. The official story said they died defending the Compact from something, but the details were classified. Nobody talked about it. The Thornes were gone and their daughter, born that same night, grew up to become a Mythic inheritor herself. One of the hidden ones. Nobody knew her name or where she was.
Mark didn't know any of that. Not the part about the Thornes, not about the daughter. He knew the basics, the stuff everyone knew. Gates, monsters, Inheritors, the way the world worked now. He'd heard stories about the Thornes, same as everyone. But they were legends, figures from history. Had nothing to do with him.
He was just a kid from a small town trying to make some money.
Seattle spread out below him, a mess of broken towers and overgrown streets. The edge of the city was no man's land, too dangerous for normal people, too close to the gate that had been active here for forty years. But there were settlements deeper in, places where people lived and worked, where a guy could find a job if he was willing to take risks.
Mark adjusted his pack, felt the weight of David's knife at his back, the wooden monkey in his pocket.
Time to go find out if Seattle had what he needed.