Beyond The Barrier

Chapter 1: The Day the Sky Broke

No one remembered the first scream.

Some claimed it came from the heavens.

Others swore it echoed from beneath the earth.

In truth, it didn't matter.

By the time people looked up, the world was already ending.

The sky split apart like cracked glass, revealing a darkness deeper than night itself. From the wounds in the heavens came creatures that had never belonged in the world of men. Their horns scraped against the clouds, their wings blotted out the sun, and their crimson eyes burned with a hatred older than history.

Cities fell before anyone understood what they were fighting.

Steel shattered against claws harder than iron.

Walls that had stood for centuries crumbled in a single night.

Kings died beside beggars.

Heroes became nothing more than names whispered over funeral fires.

The demons did not conquer.

They slaughtered.

Every victory humanity claimed was paid for with thousands of lives, and every battlefield became another kingdom swallowed by blood and ash.

Years became decades.

The maps grew smaller.

The world grew quieter.

Until only a handful of people remained.

Exhausted fleets sailed across seas no one had crossed before, carrying the last fragments of humanity. Children too young to remember the old world slept beside soldiers too tired to dream. Every sunrise felt borrowed.

Many believed they were sailing toward their graves.

Then, on the forty-third day...

Someone saw land.

It was unlike anything they had ever seen.

A single emerald island stood surrounded by calm waters while storms raged everywhere beyond its shores. A wall of shimmering light rose around it like an invisible dome, bending sunlight into thousands of dancing colors.

The demons pursuing the fleet screamed.

Not in triumph.

In fear.

The first beast hurled itself toward the island.

The moment it touched the glowing barrier, its body dissolved into black ash before the wind carried away what remained.

Silence fell across the sea.

For the first time since the sky had broken...

Humanity was safe.

No one understood who had created the barrier.

No one knew why the demons could not cross it.

All they knew was this—

Beyond that wall of light lay mankind's final chance to survive.

And beyond that same wall...

Something was waiting.