The Boy from the Outlands

The Outlands were a place the rest of the kingdom had forgotten.

Beyond the borders of grand cities and protected enclaves of high sorcery, the Outlands stretched like a scar across the western horizon—barren, rugged, and teeming with creatures twisted by wild magic. The people here didn't speak of kings or councils. They spoke of surviving the night.

Kael grew up amid the ruins of Elden Hollow, a village carved into the cliffs overlooking the shattered coast. He had never known his parents. Rumors said his mother had been a drifter, a flame-haired sorceress who had crossed the Forbidden Vale and vanished beneath a red sky. His only memory of her was the pendant she’d left behind: a crude disc of copper etched with a burning eye.

He never knew what it meant.

At sixteen, Kael had grown tall and wiry, hardened by hunger and storms. He spent his days hunting direhares, collecting storm glass, and helping the village elder tend to the sick with meager poultices. Magic was a word people whispered like a curse. The only spellcaster Kael had ever seen was a hedge witch who’d once wandered into town and lit her pipe with her fingertip. She’d vanished the next day.

But on that night—the night everything changed—Kael learned that magic wasn’t something distant and mysterious. It was inside him. It had always been.

The raid began with a thunderclap that wasn’t thunder. A blinding flash of red lit up the cliffs, and screams followed. Armed riders—mercenaries in dark cloaks and metal masks—stormed through the village, setting fire to huts and dragging people from their homes.

Kael was in the cellar when it happened, hiding beneath the floorboards of the healer’s hut, clutching his pendant so hard it dug into his palm. He heard the door slam open. Boots stomped above. Then came a shout—an old man’s voice—cut short by steel.

Something inside him cracked.

The air grew thick, heavy. He couldn’t breathe. His chest felt like it was burning from the inside. Suddenly, the floor splintered as if a giant hand had crushed it, and Kael was thrown into the open.

The mercenary saw him. Raised his blade.

Kael didn’t think. He screamed.

And the storm answered.

A vortex of wind erupted from his body, flinging the attacker backward like a ragdoll. Kael stood, arms outstretched, eyes glowing faintly. Fire licked the edges of his fingertips. The air shimmered around him. And then—without understanding how—he willed the flames forward.

The raiders burned.

A wild, untamed storm howled through the village, scattering the invaders like dry leaves. Lightning surged down from a clear sky, striking the black-cloaked leader as he fled. The remaining men screamed and ran.

And then there was silence.

Kael dropped to his knees, drained. The wind died. The fires burned low.

He thought he might die there—alone, spent, surrounded by ruin. But fate had other plans.

A figure emerged from the smoke, tall and robed in crimson and gold. His beard was braided with silver threads, and his staff glowed faintly with runes older than the mountains.

The man knelt beside Kael, studying him with eyes like starlight.

"You called the storm,” the stranger said. “You are touched by the Source.”

Kael blinked, still dazed. “What… what did I do?”

“You awakened,” the man said simply. “And now, you must come with me. The Grand Arcanum summons you.”

“The… what?”

“It is where sorcerers are made and judged. Where the path to the Wizard King begins.”

Kael didn’t understand. But deep inside him, something ancient stirred. A spark. A hunger.

“I don’t want to be a sorcerer,” he said. “I want to be stronger than all of them.”

The stranger smiled.

“Then let your journey begin.”

And so it did.

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