It was a plain and barren wasteland, a land stripped of mercy and beauty. The only dominating feature was a lone volcano, its fiery crown spitting embers into the air as if it were the heart of the world itself. If it could be called "life," then it was life at its most violent and unforgiving.
The ground shimmered with heat, every inch of scorched earth exhaling vapor that curled upward in ghostly wisps. The land burned hotter than any desert, so blisteringly hot that even the air seemed heavy, molten, alive. The silence of the place was suffocating, broken only by the guttural rumble of the volcano.
