CHAPTER 1 — Arrival in the Forest of Wrath

  Darkness thinned into color.

  Yuu opened his eyes to the sound of rustling leaves and distant, alien cries echoing between the trees. The air tasted strange—rich, heavy, and thrumming with an energy he had never known. He pushed himself upright, breath trembling.

  Where… am I?

  Colossal trees surrounded him—trunks wide as towers, branches spiraling toward a canopy that shimmered faintly as if dusted with light. Nothing this enormous existed on Earth.

  He inhaled again—and stopped.

  The air didn’t simply fill his lungs. It surged into him, thick and potent, flooding every cell with a strange vitality. His muscles tightened, responding as though waking from a long sleep.

  “This air… it’s so dense I can barely breathe—yet it feels like power. These trees too. It’s almost as if I’m in a completely different world.”

  He tried to remember anything of how he arrived here—faces, voices, a moment before the darkness—but the memories scattered like sand sliding through his fingers. A sharp pain stabbed behind his eyes. He clutched his head.

  “My memories… they’re all fractured. No—focus. I need to stay alive first.”

  The forest around him was silent. No paths. No human presence. Only the distant hum of unseen creatures.

  And then—

  A low growl rolled through the underbrush.

  Yuu froze as a massive wolf stepped out from behind the bushes. Its shoulders reached his chest, its black fur rippling with contained power.

  But what held him in place were its fangs and claws—jagged, crystalline, and coated in a thin layer of frost.

  With each slow breath, cold vapor drifted from its fangs as if winter lived inside its jaws.

  “That’s… not a normal wolf.”

  Its eyes glowed with unnatural intensity. Dirt cracked beneath its claws.

  It’s hostile.

  “Stay back!” Yuu shouted instinctively.

  The wolf didn’t hesitate.

  It lunged.

  The first strike hit like a truck. Its claws tore across his shoulder, and a thin layer of ice instantly formed along the wound—sharp, burning cold spreading over his skin. He staggered, breath knocked out of him, warm blood mixing with frost.

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  The wolf didn’t even react to the injury it caused itself. In its reckless frenzy, it missed its next swipe and slammed shoulder-first into a tree—bark exploding outward, its shoulder tearing open as flesh split and dark blood spilled freely.

  Yuu saw it happen.

  Frost crept over the torn muscle. The bleeding stopped. The wound pulled together and vanished beneath ice as if it had never been there.

  His breath hitched.

  “…It healed instantly—how is that possible?”

  The wolf turned back toward him, unfazed.

  I can’t outrun it. It’s too fast.

  I have to fight—or I die.

  Instinct took over. Yuu threw himself forward and punched the wolf’s jaw.

  The hit barely slowed it, but it gave him a second—just one.

  The wolf’s breath sharpened. Cold rushed outward.

  Frost crawled across the grass and leaves, spreading from its paws like living veins.

  Crystalline ice formed along its fangs and claws—sharper, thicker, deadly.

  “Did it just… get stronger?”

  Before he could move, the wolf vanished in a blur due to its extreme speed.

  “—!!”

  A split second later, the impact slammed into him. Yuu flew back and crashed into a tree. His vision blurred. His left arm went numb instantly—completely frozen from the ice.

  Move… move!

  There was no caution in its movements.

  To it, he wasn’t prey—

  he was nothing.

  Fear shot up his spine. His chest tightened. His fingers shook. He couldn’t feel his left arm at all.

  The wolf charged.

  He ducked just in time. The wolf’s claws missed his head by a hair and smashed into the tree behind him with reckless force, cutting deep grooves into the trunk—but the beast didn’t even slow. Frost spread across Yuu’s side as the shockwave hit him.

  Yuu threw a desperate punch, but the wolf twisted mid-air and kicked him in the ribs.

  CRACK.

  Cold spread instantly—thin ice crawling across the bruised skin where its hind leg had struck.

  A scream tore from his throat as he hit the ground. His vision pulsed black. He could barely breathe.

  If this keeps going… I’ll die.

  “No!”

  His voice tore out of him before he realized he’d spoken.

  He forced himself up, legs shaking.

  The wolf didn’t wait.

  It lunged straight for his skull with a speed he thought impossible.

  Only his right arm could move. Only one chance.

  Yuu stepped forward, going into the attack blindly instead of away.

  He had no time to think.

  He stepped into the wolf’s charge, putting every last shred of strength and fear into one final move. His right hand curled into a tight fist—knuckles white, wrist screaming.

  He desperately slammed his fist straight into the wolf’s charge—luckily striking its throat.

  The impact was brutal. A hard, sickening CRACK tore through the clearing as his knuckles smashed into the weakest spot of the beast’s neck. The wolf’s windpipe collapsed under the extreme force of its own charging momentum.

  A choked, horrible sound escaped the wolf. Its body spasmed mid-air as its breath was cut off instantly.

  Pain shot up Yuu’s arm—his wrist twisting, bones giving way under the recoil—but he held firm, driven only by survival.

  The wolf crashed to the ground, rolling and twitching helplessly as its crushed throat refused to draw air.

  Within seconds, it went still.

  Yuu dropped to his knees beside it, clutching his ruined, frostbitten hand. Thin patches of ice still clung to his shoulder, ribs, and side—each spot the wolf had struck marked by ice as if the beast had left its signature on him.

  His wrist throbbed, and his fingers twisted at angles that made his stomach turn. His shoulder burned. His ribs throbbed with every breath. He tasted nothing but blood.

  The forest went quiet.

  No wind.

  No insects.

  No sound.

  Just his heartbeat.

  His vision blurred. His body shook uncontrollably. Tears rose without him meaning to—whether from pain, fear, or exhaustion, he didn’t know.

  His chest tightened again, the weight of survival pressing down on him.

  He forced himself to breathe through the agony—forced himself to stay awake a moment longer.

  Darkness swallowed him whole.