November 19, 3009 AW. Nine years ago, Second East Block District.[1]
The sun bled its final light over the Eastern District, painting the sky in hues of fire and rust. Shadows grew long across cobblestone streets, and the golden glow melted over buildings like honey spilled on stone. The air pulsed with the smells of fried oil, grilled meats, and faint incense curling from doorways. Shopkeepers shouted final deals in hoarse voices, their words swallowed by the city's ever-churning noise.
Inside a cramped, sweltering restaurant wedged between two aging tenements, Kai was sweating bullets. At eight years old, he stood barely tall enough to see over the edge of the grill, flipping patties with thin, shaking arms. Pots bubbled around him, steam clinging to his skin like the guilt of forgotten prayers.
"Move faster, kid! You're slower than a snail in a salt storm!"
Jerry Logan's voice was a rasp, rough, constant, and unkind. Like a whetstone scraping bone.
Kai flinched but didn't speak. The heat wrapped around him, thick and cruel. His apron clung to his back, soaked through. The chaos of the kitchen surged around him, knives striking cutting boards, boiling oil popping like angry spirits, servers shouting over one another in desperation.
He dared a glance at the rusted clock above the prep counter. Still three hours to go.
The Summit of Redemption was in a few days, and the city had already bloated with visitors, foreigners with fat purses and locals too proud to admit they were starving. Every inn was booked, every street lit with Starfire lanterns. And the restaurant, Jerry's pride and prison, would not close until the last coin was scraped from the last table.
Kai's feet ached. His fingers burned. But he worked. Because that's what the Forsaken did.
They worked. They served. They survived.
Many Forgiven, and maybe even royals, would be at the Summit. Dressed in flowing silks, dripping in moonstone and dragon glass, they'd raise their glasses in praise of unity. They'd speak of progress and harmony and the greatness of the realm.
But it was all a lie.
The Forsaken still lived in soot-stained corners, in places where even light hesitated to enter. No matter the speeches, no matter the golden flags fluttering in the breeze, they remained beneath notice.
And yet, as Kai stirred the stew pot, his eyes kept drifting to the stranger at the corner table.
Then a man walked in, calm and in control. His entrance alone shifted the tone of the crowd. Everyone stopped to take glances at him, and he knew. He smiled at every person he saw. Then went to take a seat like he owned the restaurant. His robes were black as midnight, threaded with faint silver that shimmered like a constellation held captive in silk. His Light blue hair fell in loose waves to his shoulders. One hand rested on the table, the other stirred his tea not with a spoon, but with magic. The liquid swirled in an unending spiral, smooth and silent.
Kai wasn't sure how he knew. But he felt it like cold fingers brushing the edge of his thoughts.
A mage. A real one.
Not the charlatans who juggled sparks in market squares, but the kind from whispered stories, the kind mothers warned their children about. The kind who changed things.
Kai's breath caught in his throat.
A crash of laughter broke the spell.
"Hey! Can we get some attention here? We're starving!" someone hollered.
"Kai! Customers are waiting! Move it!" Jerry snapped, voice cracking like a whip through the chaos.
He obeyed. He always obeyed.
He layered lettuce and onions on burger buns with trembling fingers, then rushed from the kitchen into the packed dining area. The air outside the kitchen wasn't much cooler thick with sweat, perfume, and the tension of impatient hunger.
"Two veggie burgers and a soda," snapped a man in a gold-trimmed coat, eyes fixed on a ticking pocket watch. "And hurry up. I've got places to be."
Kai scribbled it down in his grease-stained notebook, nodding mutely. He turned back toward the kitchen
And the front door burst open.
A flood of people stumbled in laughing, shouting, already drunk on celebration. The Summit had turned the city into a carnival, but the revelers rarely noticed the bodies they stepped over in the alleys.
Kai squeezed past until a scream froze the room.
"Holy crap, the kitchen! Look!" A person a few inches apart from Kai pointed towards the kitchen.
He turned.
Fire.
Flames leapt up the curtains above the stove, licking the ceiling with greedy tongues. A grease pot had tipped. The open flame had caught it. In seconds, the wall was aflame. The heat surged like a living beast.
People screamed. Chairs scraped. Glass shattered. The room exploded into panic.
Kai couldn't move. Couldn't breathe. The fire was everywhere. His eyes burned. His legs locked. A scream clawed at his throat but never made it out.
And then.
The mage stood.
Calm. Deliberate, like the flames meant nothing to him. And it did
He stepped forward, his presence cutting through the panic like a blade. His fingers danced, tracing glowing runes in the ai, sigils of blue and silver that pulsed with ancient rhythm. His lips moved, speaking words Kai couldn't understand.
A wind rose. A surge of water spiraled from the air itself, shaped by invisible hands. It crashed into the fire in waves, elegant, precise, controlled.
Steam billowed. Smoke hissed.
Silence fell like a dropped curtain.
The fire was gone.
The mage turned, meeting Kai's gaze across the wreckage.
"You alright, kid?" he said. His voice was soft. Smooth. Unnatural. Like a cold river stone worn by centuries of current.
Kai opened his mouth to speak
But Jerry was faster. He shoved past him, grabbed Kai by the collar, and dragged him into the back room.
"You little scamp!" Jerry roared.
Kai winced, bracing for the blow. But it never came.
Jerry's fist trembled in the air, then slowly dropped. His face twisted not with rage, but something more complicated. Weariness. Maybe even regret.
He let out a long breath and rested a heavy hand on Kai's head, almost awkwardly.
He let go of his collar. "Clean this place up, I'll evacuate the customers," he instructed
Jerry then went into the restaurant with Kai following behind him.
Jerry moved towards the mage who had saved the restaurant. He called out to him, and the mage turned
"Words cannot begin to explain how grateful I am for saving my restaurant," he thanked the mage
"You own this dump?" The mage snared, moving a few inches away from Jerry as if trying not to make contact with him.
"Next time you run a restaurant, try not to be a greedy cheapskate and employ more people to run this place. Not just a little twerp. I'm I clear?"
Jerry couldn't speak; he just stood there smiling awkwardly, watching the man leave. Then he murmured a few words under his breath, "fuki'n royals"
A few hours later, Kai was almost done with the cleaning; he had already gotten rid of the burnt-out cooker. All that was left was to do the dishes and clean the table and chairs, then he would be on his way home
He returned to the kitchen, charred, wet, half-ruined and found Jerry sitting next to the back room door with unblinking focus.
There was no smile now. No warmth. Just something old. And dangerous.
Kai felt something twist inside. Not fear, not exactly. Something older. A thread pulling taut in the fabric of his life.
Then Jerry walked up to him, "Meet me at one a.m. sharp. We'll talk then."
And that was all. No explanation. Just a command.
He turned and walked away, boots crunching on broken glass.
Kai stood frozen.
The rest of the evening blurred into motion. He worked like a ghost, moving through the tasks as if watching himself from far away. Dishes. Orders. Cleanup. Every second dragged, yet somehow slipped away
Kai didn't speak. He drifted to the back room, a narrow closet with a thin pallet and a crate of linens and collapsed.
The image of the fire danced behind his eyes.
The mage's voice echoed in his ears.
"You're alright, kid."
He couldn't lie; even though his day was ruined, he still felt a thrill burn within him
For the first time in his life, he had seen a mage.
[1] AW means after the war