It began like any ordinary day—too ordinary to be remembered. Cities breathed in routine, forests whispered in ancient calm, and the Earth held its silence. Then, without warning, the ground trembled. Not violently at first, but with intention, as if the planet itself had sensed something approaching.
The sky tore open.
High above the clouds, a massive portal formed, spiraling with unnatural light. From its center poured a dense, shifting mist—neither smoke nor fog, but something alive. It descended slowly, spreading outward in all directions. Within hours, it consumed more than a hundred kilometers of land. Anything that touched it—humans, animals, machines—died instantly. No wounds. No screams. Just erasure.
Global agencies declared an immediate high alert. Governments scrambled, satellites tracked, weapons were aimed—but nothing worked. The mist could not be stopped. Only a handful of countries were affected at first, but fear traveled faster than the phenomenon itself. Borders closed. Skies emptied. The world held its breath.
Soon, patterns emerged.
Animals exposed to the mist did not die as expected. Instead, they changed. Their bodies adapted, their minds sharpened. Predators became strategic. Prey became intelligent. Reflexes improved, instincts evolved, and something resembling awareness awakened within them.
Humans, however, suffered the opposite fate.
Those who survived exposure grew weaker. Their bodies slowed, grew heavier. Their minds dulled. Discipline, speed, and clarity slipped away. Science failed to explain it. Medicine offered no cure.
I remember writing in my journal that night: This is not destruction. This is selection.
The mist eventually stopped expanding—but its consequences had only begun.