Long ago, humans and animals shared an unbreakable bond. Unlike today's world, where technology widened the gap between species, ancient humans lived alongside creatures of all kinds. Their connection ran so deep that over centuries, something changed.

The first signs were subtle—hunters with sharper eyes than eagles, warriors with the strength of bears, and swimmers who moved through water like dolphins. Over generations, this bond mutated their very DNA. Soon, people could transform, their bodies adopting the strengths of the animals they cherished. Some gained enhanced abilities, while others could shift into beastly forms at will.

This was the birth of the Beastborne, a race of humans gifted with animalistic traits.

Some believed these abilities were a blessing. Others feared them. And then there were those who, like Kieran Vale, wished they had never been born into this world at all.

Kieran Vale stood on the edge of the research station, staring into the endless white wasteland.

"Another day in this frozen hell," he muttered.

The wind howled against his thick winter jacket, but he barely felt it. After three years of working as a weather forecaster in Antarctica, he had gotten used to the cold. Not that it made his life any better.

He checked his tablet—more data on wind speeds, temperature shifts, and climate reports. Useless. The higher-ups barely cared about his reports, and the isolation was slowly eating him alive.

"Why the hell did I take this job?" he groaned.

Three years ago, Kieran had been just another nobody. No Beastborne powers, no special skills—just a guy trying to escape his past. When the Antarctic Research Program accepted him, he thought running to the coldest place on Earth would give him peace. He was wrong.

The loneliness was unbearable. Days blurred together. The only excitement came from the occasional radio call from the mainland—but even that had become routine.

"I need to get out of here," he muttered.

Kieran sighed, kicking a chunk of ice with his boot. As he turned back toward the station, something caught his eye.

A mosquito.

His breath hitched. That made no sense. Mosquitoes couldn't survive in Antarctica. Not in this climate. And yet, there it was—floating lazily in the air, its long, thin body strangely large for an insect.

"What the hell…?"

Something about it felt wrong. Its body shimmered slightly in the weak sunlight, its wings buzzing with an unnatural rhythm.

Before he realized what he was doing, Kieran followed it.

The mosquito drifted away from the station, weaving through jagged ice formations. Kieran trudged after it, his boots crunching against the snow. Every logical part of his brain screamed at him to turn back, but something pulled him forward.

Then—

The ground trembled.

A deafening crack echoed through the air as the ice beneath him collapsed.

"SHIT!"

The world tilted. Kieran barely had time to see the mosquito get swept into the abyss before he plummeted into darkness. The last thing he felt was the ice closing around him, freezing his body in place.

And then, silence.

The world had changed.

Global warming had accelerated, melting ice shelves at a rapid pace. What was once an eternal frozen wasteland was now a cracked, unstable battlefield between ice and water.

Beneath the shifting glaciers, something stirred.

A deep rumble shook the ground as the ice fractured, sending shards flying into the sky. A massive fissure split open, revealing a dark chasm hidden beneath the frozen wasteland for decades.

Then—

A hand burst from the ice.

Fingers, pale and trembling, clawed their way to the surface. A body followed, steam rising off his skin as he sucked in his first breath of warm air in twenty-five years.

Kieran Vale collapsed onto the snow, his heart pounding like a beast trapped in a cage.

Something was wrong. His body felt different—stronger, heavier, unnatural. His skin prickled with energy, his muscles tensed like coiled steel. And then there was his hunger—a deep, primal craving that burned in his veins.

He lifted his shaking hands. His nails had darkened, sharpened into claws. His breath misted unnaturally in the air, carrying a scent that wasn't his own. Something inside him had changed.

Memories of the mosquito flashed in his mind. The prehistoric blood trapped inside it. The frozen years. The merging of something ancient and powerful with his own DNA.

He wasn't just human anymore.

As he stared at his reflection in a shattered ice fragment, his pupils slit like a predator's, glowing faintly in the dim light.

Kieran Vale had returned to a world that had forgotten him. But he was no longer the same man who had disappeared.

He was something else.

Something prehistoric.