The storm raged on, ice cracking the cabin's beams, and snow flooding in.
Viktor clutched his manuscript, as if it were a lifeline, a tether to the
world of words he had created. Anna arrived, hauling him to her hut,
where a fire burned bright and warm.
As they sat by the flames, Viktor watched his words blur, the ink
bleeding across the pages like a wound. The metaphor he had penned days
earlier seemed prophetic: "Truth melts in the heat of survival." He felt
a sense of despair, as if his life's work was being consumed by the very
flames that were meant to sustain him.
Anna's face was unreadable, a mask of calm in the midst of chaos. She
saved his manuscript, though Viktor knew it was a futile gesture. The words were lost, consumed by the storm, and he was left with nothing but
the ashes of his own ambition.