Killian’s boots hit the hard, cold ground with a sharp clang that echoed too loud in the strange, humming air. The sky was swallowed by towering structures of glass and steel that pierced the clouds like knives. Around him, strange metal beasts—silent but terrifying—hurtled past without horses or reins, roaring like thunder yet without breath or life. He stumbled back, breath catching in his throat, pulse hammering like a war drum. What devilry was this? The world had turned upside down.

His green eyes darted wildly at the crowds that surged past, people clad in strange garments that left skin bare in ways Killian’s mind refused to fathom. Women in cloth so scant it barely covered them, their laughter loud and careless, like a song sung from another world. Men and women alike moved with an easy confidence that seemed foreign, their faces painted with colors and shapes that made no sense. The old Gaelic in his heart twisted with confusion.

He gripped his torc tight, a steady weight amid chaos. His missing arm throbbed, the loss as raw as the day it was taken, but here, it felt invisible—a weakness no one seemed to notice or care about. The dirk at his side was heavy, but now felt useless, a relic from a world swallowed by fire and shadow.

“By the gods,” Killian muttered, voice low and rough like grinding stone, “what sorcery has shattered the hills and brought me to this… madness?” His eyes narrowed at a speeding carriage of metal and smoke. “No horses, no reins… just roaring steel and fury. What black magic drives these beasts?”

The crowd pressed in, moving faster, voices rising in a babel of noise. Killian took a wary step forward, then another, heart pounding like a war drum in the silence beneath the chaos. He caught sight of a figure standing still—a quiet island in the roaring flood—and something flickered behind his wary, storm-worn eyes.

He approached, cautious but desperate, voice a low growl as he struggled to find words for this alien world. “Stranger,” he said, “I am Killian Blackthorn. My clan lies in ash, my gods silent. This place… it speaks a tongue I know, yet feels unknown. Tell me—what manner of world is this, where steel beasts race like demons and women walk like warriors of the sun, uncovered and unafraid? What fate brings a warrior from blood and fire to such a place as this?”