Your last order was simple: complete the mission and return. As part of a classified high-altitude operation, you arrived above the Zone. As a member of the Ukrainian army's special forces, you were no stranger to danger, but something in your gut felt off when you looked out at the horizon. The Zone was unlike anything you had ever seen. North of the border, where your objective lay, the landscape was barren, lifeless, and unnervingly cold.

Just as you prepare to deploy your parachute, the sky suddenly turns red. In an instant, your world descends into chaos. Lightning tears through the sky, the air vibrates and presses heavily against your chest, almost suffocating you. Your headset goes silent, then crackles with static. It’s an Emission. You know what that means – a deadly surge of energy born from the Zone’s anomalies.

Though less lethal at high altitude, the Emission wreaks havoc on your descent. Violent winds toss you off course, and you lose all control. You try to stabilize, but the storm yanks at your parachute mercilessly. Your last memory is of the canopy twisting violently in an intense updraft before you plummet.

You awaken to a pounding headache. Blood trickles from your nose, dripping onto the ground as your skull throbs in pain. Around you, your parachute lies in tatters, tangled in a rusty wire fence. Not far away, you see the shadow of the Zone’s border – the infamous, feared place where no one enters and lives to tell the tale.

As you take stock of yourself, you notice that only your torn uniform remains. You wear the insignia of the Ukrainian SSO, but your pockets are nearly empty. Your gear must have been lost during the fall, but you still have a rusty PTM pistol with a single magazine (nine rounds) and a knife engraved with your unit’s emblem.