Head north from the country of Vastos, an adventurer would find a country made of ice. No matter the season, whether spring or summer, this country would continue to snow. Cold summers and even colder winters.
However, the inhabitants of this land were strong and mighty. They could face and live in these harsh conditions. Both men and women born in this country were nothing if not strong; they fashioned themselves with woolly leather boots and coats covered with fur hunted from bears and such.
"At night the stars shined brighter than any other country"
Famously said by one of the very first people, who had pioneered and discovered this land of ice, now known as Coldera.
This country, over time, had rapidly become more populated and, as expected, more advanced. Even becoming so great as to rival the country of Vastos. People born in this land had a high aptitude for ice or wind magic. Yet, one boy named Shun hadn't been born with the same strength as the others. Born without any ability to manipulate either wind or ice. Soon in his life, he would learn what it felt like to be alone. Isolated and outcasted by his own people. The inhabitants of Coldera were proud. Both their savagery and arrogance knew no bounds!
"He can't even make a breeze! How pathetic!"
"I'm disappointed in ever having a son like you. It would've been better if I never had a son."
"Why did I ever give birth to you?"
"A person of Coldera who can't manipulate ice...truly a disgrace."
Unloved by his parents. Mocked by the village he was born in. Abused ever since he could remember. Shun, every day, had ended up with new wounds to his body. Whether it be bruises or deep, infected cuts there was nobody who cared for him. Shun was born with black hair; however, now he has white hair. It turned white by the time he was six. He experienced the pain of an average person's life span in only a few years. Suffering every day. Eight years of suffering.
Shun's anger only grew in the face of despair.
"I'll kill every last one of you!" He clung to this thought that he held for as long as he knew the pain brought to him by others, hoping one day he'd be strong. Strong enough to kill. One night, he tucked away with the village's dogs; he was dirty and filthy, and the rags he wore were tattered.
He was tired and hurting, as he was stoned by kids his age. His skin was white and pale. His face was sunken, and you could see the outline of his skeleton. Starved and hungry, he was fed worse than the dogs he slept by.
The villagers had only decided to just about keep him alive to teach the other children about weakness and how truly disgusting it is to be weak. Shun was that example. He was mocked and ridiculed by every single villager. Tears had soon come out, but they became stuck to his cheek. Frozen by the cold night he slept in every day.
"Today feels colder than most nights." Shun thought to himself, curled up as his whole body shivered.
"?htgnerts rof hsiw υoγ oႧ"
Shun heard a quiet, distorted sound. He sat up and looked around for a bit, only to see the dogs soundly asleep.
"Do you wish for strength?"
The voice had become coherent yet louder and ear-piercing. "Goddamit, who said that?!" Shun shouted, sealing his ears with both his hands. However, the voice only grew louder no matter how hard Shun pressed his ears.
"GAHH!" Shun soon fell flat on his back, his head feeling heavy as the voice grew more deafening. Soon his body became unable to move, and his vision grew darker.
The voice then stopped. Everything became quiet once again. Yet, his body was still unable to move and his vision became completely dark.
"I see...I must be dying. This is how it feels to die...so cold..."
"Do you wish for strength?"
"Do you wish for power?"
"Do you wish for strength?"
"Do you wish for power?"
"Do you wish for strength?"
"Say it and it shall be yours!"
Shun mustered every last bit of strength that his frail body could, these are the last words he would ever speak.
"I wish for power!" Shun raised and clenched his fist tightly into the air. His vision had become completely blackened. Then he felt a warmth of some kind. A strange and unfamiliar warmth he had never ever felt before. This sensation of feeling warm was a first for Shun.
The dogs woke up, turning their heads all towards Shun, and soon they began to growl and bark. Those barks soon became whimpers, they burnt until their bones had turned to ash. Shun's parents had woken up from the cries of the dogs. They came running out of their home only to find a ferocious flame enveloping the village, continuing to spread in the middle of this cold night. Soon all the villagers woke up; they acted quickly by surrounding the village with walls of ice to keep the fire from spreading any further.
However, all the attempts to stop this rampaging flame were melted away instantly. It grew hotter and hotter, unfamiliar to the people of Coldera. This ferocious flame carried apparent anger, and as it grew hotter, the people of Coldera began to sweat profusely. Scorching their clothes.
The flames began enclosing further, leaving less and less space, bunching up the villagers in one small confined space surrounded by an inferno.
"Shit...my throat feels dry."
"Are we going to die?!"
"Who the hell is causing all this?!!"
The villagers began to panic and cry out in fear. One villager pointed out a silhouette in the fire of a child.
"There's someone in the fire!"
That child in the fire was Shun, and the blazing fire grew closer and closer to the bunched-up villagers, indiscriminately burning and melting them one after the other.
One after the other the screams of the villagers began to cry out and then cease. Soon, no life was left, only the burnt corpses stacked on top of one another. At the age of eight, Shun had killed a village full of Colderians. He stood atop the pile of corpses in a night filled with warmth.
His eyes turned from yellow to red. His voice had completely gone. Even still, he found himself feeling no remorse. Shun had found warmth for the first time in his life.