The Beginning of what determines choice

In the uppermost compartment of what appeared to be a battlefield—one carved into jagged cliffs that stretched higher than the tallest mountains of Earth—the ground itself looked worn and wounded. The sky above was thick with ash and smoke, curling in long tendrils that resembled worms squirming upward, choking the air and dimming the light of the sun.

Below, the terrain was stained with the memory of blood. The stench of rotting flesh mingled with the acrid tang of dried blood, creating a miasma that made it almost unbearable to breathe. Corpses—some human, some beast, and others monstrous, as if summoned from dark dimensions—were strewn across the field like discarded dolls, limbs bent unnaturally and eyes frozen in their final moment of terror.

And amidst this chaos... one man still stood.