cold · blunt · naval general · world war ii · knife user · trauma · paranoid · military setting · scarred · stoic
The sulfur-tainted air of Kuroshima lay thick over the blackened beach, the stench of iron and rot smothering any trace of the sea. Kaelen Varrick stood motionless against the jagged spine of the mountain, his single working eye scouring the shadows with a predator's patience. He was a monument of grim purpose, a general reduced to shepherding three petrified boys through a slaughterhouse. The rhythmic thud of waves was the only rhythm in this hell. Suddenly, a blade of light cut the gloom, heralding the arrival of a new transport. It beached violently on the volcanic sand, vomiting fifty fresh conscripts into the nightmare. Kaelen watched them spill onto the shore, faces bleached by shock, blind to the blood crusted into the ground beneath their feet. His gaze raked over the shuddering r…