The Wastelands were a living nightmare, a realm where the cold was not just a force of nature, but a predator stalking its prey. It watched Jon's every breath, turning each inhalation into a knife that carved ice through his lungs. Sensation became a torment—every nerve screaming with a bone-deep chill that threatened to consume him from within.

"Master, please, I'll freeze to death if I walk any farther."

The wind carried Kalil's desperate plea like a funeral dirge. Kalil was small—not just in stature, but in the way that men become when they lose all hope. Captured recently, he had not yet learned the most crucial lesson of survival: invisibility. To be seen was to be destroyed.

The Iceforged's pace slowed, then stopped. Sargoth was more myth than man. A creature born from the dark margins of legend. He embodied every nighttime story of the Iceforged Clans meant to scare children in bed. Standing 8'5" tall, his body was a landscape of muscle so dense it seemed to defy human anatomy. Muscles strained beneath skin like tectonic plates ready to fracture, a living testament to the savage bloodlines of the Jotun.

He was a predator hiding under human skin.

The Frostspire Tribe was not an army, but a pack, and Sargoth was its most ruthless hunter, wandering Aegisgrad's northern border like an omen of death. He did not kill with purpose, he killed with the same thoughtless enthusiasm a child might crush an insect—a momentary diversion, a fleeting pleasure.

When Sargoth stopped walking, the very air seemed to congeal. His gaze—darker than the endless boreal night—settled on Kalil with a weight that crushed hope itself. Those eyes knew nothing of mercy. They knew only hunger. They wanted only death.

Kalil understood his error instantly. Not in his words, but in drawing attention. In being seen.

"I-I-I am sorry, master," he stammered, each syllable a trembling surrender. "I spoke out of line."

The slaves around Jon transformed. Not men, but shadows. Heads bowed, breaths shallow. In Sargoth's pack, survival was the art of becoming nothing. Of being so small, so insignificant, that death might overlook you.

Sargoth's smile was a dagger more terrible than any blade. It promised pain with the thrill of the hunt. "Oh no..." he whispered, each repetition sinking an invisible blade deeper into Kalils heart. "Oh no, no, no, no, no."

His movement was beautiful, savage. A predator's dance—deliberate, measured. Each step dropping the reapers scythe closer to Kalils neck.

Arms like massive tree trunks—thicker than Kalil's entire body—encircled the smaller man. For one grotesque moment, it seemed as though Sargoth was embracing Kalil. A perverse mockery of comfort. One hand cradled Kalil's head with a mothers kindness, the other locking behind his back in an inescapable grip.

"Please... Master..." Kalil's voice fractured, a futile effort.

Kalil pleaded, desperation hidden behind the façade of calm he attempted to exude. "It was a mistake."

Kalil's face gasped as his vocal cords struggled to create more than a wheeze. His eyes darted around, yet not a single slave returned his gaze. Jon heard everything. The initial intake of breath. The gradual compression. The wet, desperate wheeze as air was systematically pushed from Kalil's lungs. Tears streamed down Kalil's face—not from pain, but from the horrifying recognition of his own imminent extinction.

Sargoth's giggle was a child's laugh, twisted into something monstrous. He was enthralled, intoxicated by the moment of destruction. His thirst for blood was not a hunger. It was a religion. And he had just completed a sacred rite.

He would do this again. And again. And again.

-----

Jon's mind collapsed, crumbling like a castle of sand. The rough hand of a barbarian pressed against the back of his skull, forcing him to witness Kalil's final moment. Blood seeped into the snow—not dramatically, but with a quiet, almost mundane inevitability. Like water slowly staining white cloth.

A month. Just one month since his world had collapsed.

Aegisgrad's Northern Citadel of Arendale was only a memory now—distant and fragile. Once, it had been a beacon of hope, a fortress promising protection against the encroaching darkness. But hope was a luxury Jon could no longer afford.

The Iceforged Clans had been more than an enemy. They were a slow-moving catastrophe, consuming the northern villages like a winter blizzard. Settlements that had stood for generations simply vanished—not with the drama of battle, but with the quiet desperation of abandonment. Homes emptied. Fields left untended. Lives scattered like windblown snow.

Jon had been one of those scattered fragments. His village was gone, and he was the only one left.

A beggar. A shadow. A nothing that wandered the margins of existence, invisible until the moment he wasn't. The Frostspire tribe's raid had not been a sudden violence, but a methodical consumption. They did not just kill. They harvested.

Survival became a currency traded in blood and submission. Each breath was a transaction. Each moment of continued existence, a tax paid to masters who saw him as nothing more than disposable livestock. One part of their ever growing herd.

This was not life. This was a performance of survival so desperate it bordered on obscenity—a daily ritual of becoming less than human, just to remain human at all.

Carry. Endure. Wait.

Sargoth's satisfaction was flowing out of him like a rive, his excitement ever so close to climax, a hairs breadth away. His eyes landed on Jon, wild and unbridled—a child's excitement wrapped in a monster's skin. Not just eager to kill, but to savor. To consume.

The look said everything: Jon would die today. Not might. Would.

Each of Sargoth's steps was a drum beat, growing louder and louder until Jon could not even hear his own thoughts. The barbarian was ushered away—a mere prop in this theater of terror. Jon was the only stage that mattered now.

"What is your name, little one?" It was only a question, but to Jon it was a death sentence.

"Jon... Master." The words scraped out of his throat, more reflex than speech.

Something ancient and terrible flickered in Sargoth's eyes. "Ahh, a nice name. We had a young boy with that name once, he was... Incredible."

His smile was not human. It was a wound torn into flesh, stretching impossibly wide. Gums bleeding from the stretch, eyes transformed into upside-down crescents of pure, unbridled malevolence. Jon's body understood terror before his mind could process it—legs dissolving, collapsing like a marionette with severed strings.

Sargoth's giggle was the sound of nightmare's purest joy.

The Frostspire tribe lived for moments like these. Moments when the world itself seemed to bend to their savage hunger.

Suddenly, a messenger burst from the treeline, his face transformed by a rapture that was almost religious. "Chieftain! Southerners are approaching. Our Lord has blessed us!"

Blessed. The word was more than language. To the Iceforged it was a promise of carnage.

Joy erupted through the tribe like wildfire. Not the gentle joy of celebration, but a primal, savage ecstasy that spoke to their deranged ritualized violence. Eyes gleamed with a hunger that transcended mere physical desire. This was spiritual. This was purpose, and the greatest way to please their Lord.

They had been waiting. Watching. Hunting.

And now, a sacrifice had willingly walked into their domain.

The southern kingdoms were soft. Weak. They did not understand the brutal game of survival that governed the northern wastes. Each southerner was not just a victim, but an offering. A tribute to their deity that whispered in the wind, that carved meaning into their harsh existence.

Anticipation rippled through them—not as tension, but as pure, savage excitement. An electric current, igniting every nerve in the barbarians.

In the distance, a figure emerged—less a man, more a living shadow given form. Average in size but extraordinary in presence. A short sword in one hand, a gilded gauntlet with fingers like razored claws in the other. Black armor. Hair darker than the void between stars. Skin so pale it was almost translucent. He moved not with human precision, but with the calculated grace of something other.

Step. Step. Step.

Each footfall a promise.

Disappointment crawled across Sargoth's face. One sacrifice? Only one lone figure where he had expected a feast? His excitement curdled, transforming into a rage so pure it threatened to consume him from within.

"Only one?" Sargoth's voice was low, part disappointment, part mounting fury. "How pathetic. You must have come to offer your soul to Karnath. No matter, I am sure our Lord would love to have you."

The stranger's response was a razor of indifference, a confused pause before speaking. "...Who in the name of hell is Karnath? Ahh whatever, who even cares."

Blasphemy, hurled like a casual insult.

"...you would dare mock our Lord? IN FRONT OF ME?"

Sargoth's massive axe materialized, a weapon too large for mortal hands. Each swing was geological—creating craters in the snow, tearing reality itself. The ground wept where he struck, earth and snow alike surrendering before his brutal might.

But the stranger was liquid. Mercurial. Impossible.

Dodging became an art form. A slide here. A twist there. A cut delivered with surgical precision into Sargoth's forearm.

"You can barely even scratch me WORM."

The battle had begun.

The massive axe hung heavy in Sargoth's calloused hands, its weight demanding strength most men couldn't muster. Each swing carved deep gouges into the snow-covered ground, sending chunks of frozen earth flying. The weapon moved with surprising speed for its size, creating a deadly arc that left a wake of destruction.

His opponent, the lone figure, moved differently—not with supernatural grace, but with the tact of a trained fighter. Short, precise steps. Tight body control. Each movement calculated to minimize exposure while maximizing defensive positioning. When Sargoth's axe came down, the stranger didn't dodge, but shifted just enough to make the blow miss.

Sargoth's frustration grew with each missed attack. His tribal warriors watched from the treeline, their calls growing more desperate as their chieftain failed to land a decisive blow. The stranger remained silent, focused—analyzing, waiting for an opening.

Sargoth had not even noticed he was being led away from the clearing his tribe had been in until he cut through a small tree with one of his swings. The lone figure danced deeper into the forest, inviting the barbarian to follow. And Sargoth was all too happy to accept.

A particularly wild swing caught a tree trunk. The impact jarred Sargoth's arms, sending a painful vibration through his muscles. His grip momentarily loosened, and in that instant, the stranger struck. A quick slash opened a shallow but precise cut along Sargoth's forearm.

Blood steamed in the cold air.

Sargoth's roar ripped through the dense forest, a primal sound that was equal parts fury and agony. Spittle flew from his lips as he snarled, "You think that matters?" His massive hands, scarred from countless deathmatches, readjusted their grip on his axe.

Seething with contempt for the silent opponent before him, Sargoth swung with the unbridled fury of a storm. His blow carried the raw, crushing might of a Stonehorn—fierce beasts from far south, a force capable of splintering mountain rock and felling ancient trees. But something was wrong. The tree he had struck remained standing, unyielding, while vibrations screamed through his hands, numbing them to the bone. His axe, an instrument of devastating destruction, was now lodged deep within the trunk, latching onto Sargoth with it.

Momentarily bewildered by this unexpected resistance, Sargoth lost sight of the stranger. A razor-sharp pain erupted in his legs, sending him crashing to the forest floor with the thunderous impact of a fallen titan. Snow and dirt exploded around him as he collapsed.

The stranger stood above him, an embodiment of cold, surgical violence. His face was a mask of absolute indifference, porcelain skin carved from marble and tempered by countless battles. The sword in his hand gleamed with an almost surgical precision, poised mere inches from Sargoth's exposed throat.

Sargoth dashed to get up, but could not beat the stranger. The sword plunged forward, a fatal whisper that elicited only a low, gurgling sound from Sargoth's punctured throat. His eyes, once blazing with barbarian defiance, began to dim, shock and confusion evident in his eyes.

But the killing stroke was not yet complete. With utter disregard to the barbarian, the pale man's gilded gauntlet—its intricate claws drove forward. They pierced through Sargoth's eyes and drove deep into the soft tissue of his brain, felling the chieftain once and for all.

Death had claimed Sargoth, and Karnath's halls would soon be filled with the souls of another Iceforged Clan.

-----

Jon stood frozen, his muscles locked in place as the scene unfolded before him. The Frostspire tribesmen clustered together in shocked silence, their eyes wide with disbelief as their chieftain Sargoth lay dead. The stranger who had killed Sargoth withdrew his bloodied sword and claws, turning his gaze towards the stunned crowd. From the dense forest behind him, a second figure emerged, moving with the same grace the stranger had originally approached them with.

As the pair approached, the tribesmen's shock transformed into pure, unbridled rage. They charged forward with a collective roar, their grief and fury propelling them into battle. Their leader had been robbed of the ability to gift their Lord even bloodier deaths, and they demanded retribution.

Jon was star struck, and his captors had just abandoned him and the other salves. Looking around, many of them had realized it as well and seized the opportunity. With the first to run, all others followed, fleeing into the woods. Only Jon was left to witness the ensuing battle. He understood their desperation better than anyone, but he had been with the tribe the longest. The slaves would never make it to the Northern Citadel, the Demon of Pestilence had unleashed a horror on the Wastelands that only the Iceforged Clans could survive. Sargoth's tribe were the only reason he was still alive, and the only hope for his continued survival.

So, he sat down and waited. 

Jon's mind raced as he tried to grasp the impossible, watching the ensuing chaos. The battle before him was a grotesque dance of death, with tribesmen falling one by one. Yet, it was not the visible attacks that were causing the casualties. The duo, despite their prowess, had not landed a single blow that Jon could see. It was as though the air itself was turning against the barbarians, each death a silent, invisible strike.

Every time a tribesman fell, Jon's eyes darted around in frantic search for any clue, any sign of the attacker. His gaze settled on the movement in the periphery, shadows that seemed to twist and blur in the corner of his vision. Each time he tried to focus, the shadowy figure vanished, only to reappear elsewhere, its presence fleeting yet deadly. The shadows moved with a predatory grace, slipping through the melee with an eerie fluidity that defied natural movement.

As the shadowy figure reappeared to slit another tribesman's throat, Jon's breath caught in his chest. The figure was shrouded in darkness, barely discernible against the snow and the night, moving with a precision that was almost supernatural. It was as if the very darkness had taken shape and was striking with a vengeance. Jon struggled to understand how something so elusive could wreak such havoc.

The unsettling reality of the shadow's existence made Jon's skin crawl. Each time it struck, it left behind a trail of silent death, the tribesmen collapsing before they even knew they were in danger. Jon felt a deep, primal fear, a sense that he was witnessing something beyond the realm of the ordinary. The shadow seemed to be a force of nature itself, a living embodiment of death that lurked just beyond comprehension.

A chill ran down his spine as a voice broke the tense silence.

"Well hello there little buddy, having fun?"

Jon looked up to find a Diu elf standing over him, wearing a disturbingly friendly smile. The elf's casual demeanor was unnerving when paired with the brutal massacre unfolding around them. His calm was more terrifying than the violence itself.

"I think I'll join in on the fun too," the elf continued, his smile widening. "Care to join me?"