1. Mist walkers

It was calm, so calm and quiet, his ears had never been exposed to air so all the sounds he knew were muffled and far away. It was also dark, his eyes hadn't developed fully yet. A light cut through the darkness, well not so much a light but an aura, it was warm despite him not knowing cold he knew this was warmth. A voice cast away the silence, it was powerful, powerful enough to cut through the liquid that was his world and come through clearly.

"They are my greatest creations" it said as the light passed by him, "They will lead my men and unify all man"

There was another voice, it wasn't as powerful so he knew not what it said but he knew it was there. As his eye adjusted to the overwhelming aura of the light, he could sense another next to it, weaker but there, and he soon felt the warmth of more auras around him. Twenty in all, they were like him although they didn't speak and he didn't think any of them were listening. The great light soon retreated and he was left among his brothers, it wasn't so dark anymore.

Time must have passed but he didn't know how to measure the passing of it, the light returned but as quickly as it came it fell away in to darkness. The world was no longer calm it was turbulent, it was no longer quite but deafening. He could hear voices, they weren't strong and powerful like the light but low whispers, he didn't know what they were saying but he didn't like it. He could feel the voices' cold hands wrap around him, grabbing at his very soul. The world was no longer warm and calm but cold and violent.

Time must have passed but he didn't know how to measure it, the world became calm again, it was warm and soft voices could be heard. He opened his eyes for the first time and the first thing he saw was the fog.

The planet of Solaero was covered in fog. Legend has it that man lived all over the planet, they built cities in the deep valleys and created marvels so wonderous they wanted for nothing, they became overconfident and would boast they were the equal to the gods so the gods taught them a lesson. The gods that protected man from the horrors of the underworld unlocked the gates they had kept shut since time immemorial. First came the fog, so thick that a man can barely see his outstretched hand through it but ultimately harmless, after the fog came the beasts, monstrosities from the depth of the underworld that hunted man. Man's weapons didn't work against the monsters and so they were forced to abandon their great cities and made their homes on top of the tallest peaks of the world.

Most created a simple life for themselves, villages dotted every mountain with cables and bridges connecting them all, but not everything could be grown on mountain soil and the herds they kept weren't always large enough so a brave few would descend and face the horrors of the fog. The mist walkers were brave men who hunted the more docile beasts that called the fog home and scavenged whatever lost tech they could find, many would descend and few would return but what they brought back could be the difference between a village starving or a village making it through another year, whether by abundance of food or lack of mouths to feed.

He kneeled at the peak, the thick blanket of clouds below him and a clear blue sky above him, he kneeled in front of a small shrine with hand caved statues inside and the skulls of great beasts surrounding it. It would be his third time descending, more than anyone else in the village and close to the world record, he knelt in silent prayer as he petitioned the gods for his life and possibly a good haul. The man rose, he was no higher than 6 feet and his face was covered in thick beard hair, making him look older than he was.

"Alright all of you get up we need to prepare to descend" he encouraged some slightly younger men that were kneeling behind him to stand

"So what's it like in the fog?" one of the men asked, overly excited

"Scary" he answered, not as cheerful as the other men, "You should rely more on your ears than your eyes"

"Is it really that thick?" another asked

"In some places yes but most you can probably see the guy next to you"

"Have you ever seen a beast?"

"You don't see them and you don't want to"

He answered the questions of the eager young men as they walked the path down in to the village, he looked at each of their faces and couldn't help but wonder which, if any, would make it back. They soon entered the village and their people were waiting for them, the men dispersed amongst the crowd to say goodbye to family members and collect what they needed for the expedition.

"I heard ancient humans believed that three was a lucky number or was it unlucky" A woman approached the man carrying a large pack for him, it was old and worn covered in animal teeth and wooden charms, "Aldean, promise me you'll be safe"

"I always am" he smiled at her as he took the pack, "The secret is being the fastest in the group"

"So that's why you're always running in the morning" she chuckled at the morbid joke

"I'll come back Elia" He placed his hands on her cheeks as he looked in to her eyes, "Besides the record for successful descends is five, only three more after this"

They shared a kiss before the gates of the village opened and the group passed beyond its threshold and in to the underworld.

"Did you see that star fall a few days ago" one of the men made idle chatter

"I was on night watch at the time" another answered, "It was all quiet and suddenly a streak across the sky, the thing landed somewhere near Old Solra"

"Old Solra" some of the men shivered at the name, "We're not going anywhere near there, right?"

"That place is crawling with beasts, this is your first descent we're going to the Clearing" Aldean told them

The Clearing was the name for a place where the fog was thinner and beasts not so common, it was a good hunting ground and they could scavenge some good tech although to get to it they would have to pass close to Old Solra.

"Maybe we should go to Old Solra, whatever fell could be worth a lot maybe enough for a ticket to Aeoror"

"If we go to Old Solra then you'll all die and I'll have to tell your families how stupid you were" Aldean shook his head as the men continued to talk and joke as they went further and further down

After half a day the slope of the mountain flattened out and they reached the ground. Thick white fog surrounded them on all sides and a still silence hung around them. They all pulled out their weapons, many veteran mist walkers were equipped with ancient tech that could damage the thick hides of beasts, known as beast forged weapons, but it was rare to find them so most were equipped with lesser weapons that could be scavenged or made from the scrap that was found, the men of this expedition were equipped with simple ballistic rifles that were enough to take down the prey they were hunting but Aldean was equipped differently. He was the most experienced mist walker in the village and most of the surrounding villages so he was entrusted with the two village treasures, Fen's wrath and Mist cutter, one was plasma weapon that could shoot through the toughest hide and the other was a sword that had slain many great beasts. Aldean pulled out Mist cutter and the blade glowed as it hummed to life, the light seeming to part the fog as the group moved carefully through it.

Time had passed, about a day, they had trapped a few small animals already but the expedition was to last for a few weeks and they hadn't reached the Clearing yet. Aldean and his group climbed up a tree and set up camp, most monsters weren't good at climbing so the only safe places were the mountains and trees, they pulled up their packs and settled in for the night.

"So you ever been to Old Solra?" a man asked Aldean as they started eating their meal, mostly dried meat and a few vegetables

"On my second descent"

"What's it like?"

Old Solra was the last surface city, it had managed to hold off the fog and keep the beasts at bay, it was a great city that thousands of people flocked to but a few hundred years ago its defences had failed and all the people who lived there were consumed by the fog. It was now a cursed place where the worst of beasts roamed and the fog was the thickest but it was one of the few places that beast forged weapons could be found in any abundance. Aldean looked at Fen's wrath and Mist cutter, they were weapons that had been found in Old Solra, he remembered his first descent, it had gone horribly wrong but he managed to take down one of the beasts and saved most of the men, that's what earned him his name and why they headed to Old Solra on his second descent, although they only looked around just outside the city limits were it was safest.

"Never been in the city, way too dangerous, but quite a few good pieces of tech if you have a good eye" Aldean looked around at the men as they strapped them selves to the trees they sat in, "I'll take first watch so get some rest"

The fog was so thick that sunlight barely reached the surface so it was hard to tell the time of day but the fog was thin right now so he could tell that the sun was going down and it would soon be night. The fog swirled around the tree trunk, almost like it wanted to climb up, but he had pretty good visual all around although he was looking out for prey more than he was any beasts. A few uneventful hours later his time to rest came.

The men dropped from the trees and started to trek towards the Clearing. It took another day and a half to reach the Clearing but when they got there the men were amazed.

"WOAH!" the fog was so thin that you could see almost 7 feet ahead of you, it was probably the thinnest fog that could be found on the planet

"Ok clam down men" Aldean reined in the excited me, "Keep together and keep your weapons ready, just 'cus monsters rarely appear here doesn't mean they don't"

They moved as one, just as they had been drilled in the village, completely silent to pick up on any noise the beasts happen to make. Time didn't seem to pass as nothing happened and they searched for tracks and any sign of prey, it was all silent when Aldean tore Fen's wrath from his hip and fired to his left, the cry of an animal in pain came soon after and then the thud of it's collapsing body.

"How?" the men were impressed as they went to check the kill

"Spend a few days in this hell and you gain a sixth sense" they stood over the corpse of an Aletram, a large beast almost as tall as a man with large horns that could rip through the mist walkers leather armour and strong hooves that could cave a man's skull in

"Well don't just stand there, butcher it before the smell attracts something else"

The men pulled out their knives and got to work carving the body up, careful not to leave even the tiniest scrap of meat, they tightly sealed the cuts in bags to keep it fresh and stop them smelling too much like dinner. It took about 20 minutes in all to reduce the Aletram down to bones and move on. A few of the men managed to bag some other prey; one manged a head shot on a Kettling, a small creature that ran around on two legs eating berries, another bagged an Onyxin a stout beast that had a tendency to charge and break mist walker's shins.

It had been hours since they left the trees and the group was preparing to climb back up and make camp, Aldean tied his pack to a rope and one of the men pulled it up as a few others moved about the branches, securing and tying things down, and a few other men prepared to climb. Suddenly one of the men screamed and a high pitch screech tore through the silence, a curved blade shot out of the fog and pinned a man to the ground, right through his chest. Aldean pulled out Mist cutter and blocked the blade as it headed for another man, an identical blade cut through the fog to his right and Aldean jumped back, dodging the tip my millimetres.

"Stay in the trees!" He ordered the men that had already climbed, "Everyone else drop any extra weight"

The beast that was assaulting them came in to full view, it was an Intarch; it was tall, probably just over 8 feet, and it walked on four thin legs at the back of it's body with two equally as thin arms that ended in the deadly blades that killed two men, it's head was an oblong shape with two eyes running down each side and a jaw that split open to reveal a circular hole filled with needle like teeth. Aldean rolled as he dodged another strike, he kept the beast's attention on him as he moved away from the group, he blocked a slash and pulled Fen's wrath from its holster, firing point blank at the Intarch's armoured chest and managing to shoot clean through the shoulder joint. The beast reared back in pain and Aldean use the opening to swing Mist cutter high and decapitate the insectoid monster.

The men still on the ground rushed over to him as the body and head fell, "That was terrifying"

"From what I heard Intarchs don't normally hunt around here" Aldean knelt down and picked up the head

"Yeah most live around Old So…" the man didn't finish his sentence as a foot-long needle lodged itself in his back

Everyone ducked as another needle sailed over their heads, "It's a needle tail" one of them identified

"We need to run" Aldean set off

"But th…."

"They'll be safe in the trees and they know it, leave your gear with them"

The group set off in a random direction and ran with all their might, ducking and weaving to dodge the needles that were flying around them, they could hear the screams of their comrades as they were struck in the back or other hidden beasts caught them. Aldean got a bad feeling and stopped just as a long coiling creature shot out of the fog and crossed his path, catching another man in it's mouth. There were beasts everywhere, too many for this region and way too dangerous, Aldean ran and didn't look back not until he couldn't hear screams anymore. He slowed down and took a seat on a rock, catching his breath, the last few possibly hours had been crazy and he had lost everyone else in his group.

"This has been a disaster, I hope the tree guys are alive" he hung his head as he tried to think about his next action

Snap, Aldean whipped Mist cutter out and pointed it at the source of the sound, "Woah, it's just us" three men walked out of the fog, "Have you seen anyone else?"

"No" Aldean sheathed the sword

He looked at the three surviving men, all thin and pale just like most people on the planet, all three of them had just turned twenty, "What's your name?" he asked the one who spoke first

"Oediel" he was the second son of one of the shepherds in the village

"You?" he pointed at the unusually short man next to Oediel

"Iridean" the only child of the man who made their leather armour

Aldean just looked at the third one, "Urude" looking eternally grim he was the eldest son of a merchant who called their village home

He knew all these men, and the ones who died, he wasn't even a decade older than them, he looked at their scared and confused faces and summoned all the strength he could, "Anyone got a map, we need to know where we are?"

"I have one" Iridean pulled a folded map of the area out of a breast pocket

They gathered around and studied it, "It's pretty peaceful here but the fog is quite thick, so maybe the silent gorge" Urude pointed at a region quite close to the Clearing

"Then if we move north, we'll hit the smoking forest and from there we can get our bearings at the shrouded rock" Aldean folded the map and handed it back, he took out a compass and they moved out.

It had been hours and they hadn't seen any forest, they were starting to think they would be lost in the fog forever, "Where is this forest?" Oediel was getting jittery

"We should be there soon"

"What if we didn't end up in silent gorge?"

"We'll be fine, we're going to get home" Aldean tried to calm him down

"Besides the silent gorge is the only place that could be this peaceful" Urude reasoned

"Not the only place" Iridean had stopped as was staring at something while the others were absorbed in their argument

The other moved over and saw what he did, "impossible" they said, "we should be dead by now"

In front of them, about 7 feet away, was a giant wall that reached to the sky, it was the city wall of Old Solra. The four men looked up at the imposing walls in awe, it was always said that so many beasts coated the walls of Old Solra that the stone work couldn't be seen but right now the walls were completely bare and the only living thing for miles were the four mist walkers.

"What is going on?" Aldean questioned as he looked at the walls in disbelief, "We were ten times further from the walls when I came here and the beasts would not give us a second of peace"

"Maybe this is where all the beasts in the clearing came from" Iridean suggested

"Meaning there are none in Old Solra" Urude pointed out, "This could be a once in a life time opportunity"

"You don't want us to go in to the city" Oediel looked at him like he was mad, "Why would the beasts leave unless there was something worse inside"

"Or it could be a migration of some kind" Iridean theorised, "Maybe there is no more food in Old Solra so they left"

"Or maybe it's Fen and we're gonna be the first to get eaten"

"That's just a story, you're too superstitious" Urude turned to Aldean who had just been staring at the walls in disbelief this whole time, "You're the leader, what will we do"

He deliberated for only a few seconds, "We're going in, we need to find out what happened here"

"When we die and go join with the gods I'm gonna complain the whole time" Oediel grumbled as they started to follow the walls, looking for a gate

They walked along the great walls of Old Solra for about an hour, and didn't see a single living thing, before they found the great gate to the city. It was massive, standing taller than 10 men, with thick steel doors that showed reliefs of the beasts pouring out of the underworld and people fleeing to the city, on either side of the gate stood two massive statues of sentinel warriors but that was when Old Solra still had people living in it, now the doors lay rusted and ripped from their hinges in the middle of the road in to the city and the warriors stood broken and shattered.

"Nothing here either" Aldean noted as they walked over the steel doors in to the city

Old Solra was a magnificent city, in it's prime, the buildings that were once so tall they rivalled the mountains that man calls home now lay as broken and rusted skeletons, the streets that were said to be paved with silver were now just dirt and weeds, everywhere they looked all they found was the shattered legacy of man and all they had lost.

"How many people have been in this city since the disaster?" Urude wondered as he looked around at the crumbled ruins

"And lived? Maybe less than a handful" Aldean answered

"Let's see what's inside" Iridean moved towards the half-collapsed doorway of a small building, it wasn't easy to see what it could have been through the decay and centuries of being abused by the beasts

"Get eaten if you want" Oediel ignored him and kept walking down the road

"Come on" Aldean grabbed his collar and dragged him over to the house

The four of them crawled through a small opening, the place was obviously once a home, furniture was broken and thrown about the place and many scattered items covered the floor, Oediel knelt down and picked one up, a stuffed Aletram toy that was ripped to near shreds. In the corner of the room a group of four skeletons, one of them obviously a child, lay in a huddled group, their bones covered in claw and teeth marks.

Iridean looked down at them, "We should…." Aldean stopped him

"This city is full of bodies like this we don't have time"

They left the small home and walked back in to the streets, "that wasn't as fun as I thought it would be"

Urude turned to Iridean, "It's been hundreds of years there's nothing here but death and ruin"

The group made their way deeper in to the city and as they got closer to the towering central complex that lay at city's heart they found that the streets were filled with more and more dead. Aldean knelt in front of one that lay slumped against a wall, still in its grip a rifle, it was easy to take, the bones crumbling under the slightest touch.

"Beast forged" Aldean inspected and then fired the weapon, throwing a bolt of plasma in to a wall and melting right thorough it, "Here"

He threw the weapon to Urude and searched for more, Aldean had been the only one who had more than a combat knife since the incident in the Clearing. Urude tested the weight of the weapon and put it to his shoulder to check the ancient sight. It didn't take much looking to find the other two weapons, the ground was as littered with weapons as it was bones.

"We should try and take back as many as we can" Iridean suggested as he picked up a shield, activating it and producing a wall of blue energy

"Yeah we'll be heroes, the village will become the richest place on the planet" Urude swung around a sword he had found, "there is no way it'll stay this quiet forever"

"Just try not to over encumber yourselves after that we're leaving and heading back to the clearing to help the others" Aldean ordered as Oediel found a mostly intact bag and they started collecting weapons

They went through the city collecting weapons and seeing wonders that they had thought were legends, metal beasts that could stop a Molda's charge and flying machines that could reach the tallest peaks with ease, the technology of Old Solra was far beyond anything the people currently possessed.

After hours of being the only living things they saw, the group drew closer to the centre of the city and as they did, they found themselves in a square that was so filled with the remains of the dead that the ground was a sheet of bleached white bone. The bones snapped and crunched underfoot as the number of dead became greater and greater until it suddenly stopped at the foot of some steps, they were beautiful white marble that made it difficult to see where the dead stopped and the steps began and seemed barely touched by the passage of time with none of the scratch marks of the other building of Old Solra, the four ascended and soon came to the base of a great statue that stood as tall as 20 men. It depicted a crowned man with an axe battling a ferocious beast but the head of the beast was gone, smashed to pieces and laying around the base. The statue depicted Aeoran, the first king of Old Solra and the first mist walker.

The legendary king Aeoran was the first mist walker, legend has it that he cut the wings off all the beasts that could fly and the claws off all the beasts that could climb so that man could live in peace. He ruled Old Solra and fought off hordes of beasts single handily and when his life drew near to its end he took his great axe, Beast splitter, and walked in to the mist fated to return at the end of the world and battle the great beast Fen for the very survival of all men but legends say that he still wanders the mist searching for the slumbering Fen, to slay the beast before it can wake.

"This is the great temple of Aeoran" Urude looked up at the statue in wonder along with the other three men

"Let's go inside" Oediel suggested as he walked past the statue toward the temple itself

The temple was a short building, overlooked by all the surrounding buildings, only two or three storeys tall but much like the statue and the steps it seemed untouched by the passage of time, even the mist had cleared, it looked to be carved out of one massive block of solid marble with great arch ways that contained detailed stain glass of Aeoran's deeds, the only part of the temple that saw any damage were the massive steel doors which had been blown off their hinges and now lay inside the temple.

They crossed the threshold and wandered in to the temple, light came in through the giant windows casting colourful shadows across the floor and the skeletal bodies of hundreds of people but unlike all the remains found outside the temple these bones showed no signs of being touched by beasts, the bones were completely clean with not even a scratch or claw mark on them, these people had not been killed and eaten by the beasts outside, no they had starved to death probably pray for a saviour who never came.

The four looked around the temple but voted against touching or taking anything as to respect such sacred ground but as they wandered close to the back of the temple Aldean noticed something, the completely smooth and flawless floor had a deep gorge cut in to it, like something had smashed in to it.

"Hey guys over here" He called the others over as he followed the gorge

The four gathered at the very back of the temple, at the foot of a shrine dedicated to Aeoran, just a hairs width from touching and disturbing the holy monument was what looked like a metal coffin with a glass lid and inscribed on it was "II".

"What is that?" Urude asked as they looked at the strange box in wonder

Iridean looked back at the doors of the temple and did a few calculations in his head, "It came through the doors" he kneeled down to look at the right angle, "it was what destroyed Fen's head"

"It was what fell from the sky a few days ago" Aldean realised

"What is it?" Oediel asked

"No clue but it might be the reason why there are no beasts here anymore" their leader stepped forward and placed a hand on the mysterious device

His hand brushed against a button and the lid unlocked with a hiss as water flooded out of it and puddled in the gorge it had cut in the floor. Aldean opened the lid and found a baby inside, sleeping as if it were in its mother arms.

"By the gods" the three other men grabbed the charms they kept on them and started praying to the gods but Aldean couldn't look away from the child

It was beautiful, almost unreally so, without thinking he picked the child up and took it in to his arms. His wife had been pestering him for a child recently, ever since he started descending really, she would probably be overjoyed.

"What are we going to do with it" Oediel asked as he held his charm over his heart

"Him" Aldean corrected, he could clearly see the child was a boy, "We'll take him back, Elia always wanted children"

"It came from the sky, it's….it's…." Iridean stumbled over his words

"He's a gift from the gods" Aldean smiled at the sleeping child, "He's Aeoran returned"

They soon left the temple and the city with Aldean carrying the sleeping child but as soon as they left the city, he opened his eyes and stared off into the fog. The entire way back to the clearing they found no beasts and eventually they found the remaining me still stuck in the tree they left them in. it was decided to end this expedition and mount another one in a few weeks, they had a better haul than they could have ever hoped for.

Elia tended a small field with many of the other villages, praying as she went for the crops to not fail but as she went about her work she heard someone announce that the expedition had returned. An expedition only returned early for one reason and that is survivors fleeing a devastating beast attack, the woman panicked as she rushed to the gates and prayed that Aldean was among the survivors. She arrived at the gate and found the returning party in a more joyous mood than would be normal, she soon spotted Aldean and rushed over to him and found him holding a small bundle in his arms.

"What is that?" She asked

"Our son"