The world was not born with magic.

At first, no one knew what to call it.

Some called it a gift, a sign of divine will. Others feared it as a curse...something that shouldn't be.

The first to wield magic did not understand it, only that it was. A starving man, shivering in the cold, reached for warmth and found flame curling at his fingertips. A child cornered by wolves, screamed and felt the air split before her. A woman, dragged beneath the waves, reached out...and the water parted.

Yet magic was never a matter of fate. It was everywhere...in all things, in all people. Some controlled it. Others let it control them.

A girl laughed, and the air shattered around her, slicing her mother’s flesh like broken glass.

A man caressed his wife’s face and watched in horror as her skin melted beneath his fingers, her screams raw and wet with blood.

A child took his first steps, and the earth cracked open to swallow him whole.

And for those who sought magic, believing they could tame it, the price was steeper still.

A lord who wished to command fire was consumed by it, his body burning for seven nights. A scholar who sought to unravel magic found himself unraveling instead...his mind fraying at the edges, his words twisting into sounds no human tongue should form.

Those who sought to wield magic as a weapon, to rule through it, learned too late that it bowed to no master. It answered only to those who listened, not those who demanded.

Over time, the world learned to classify it. Some possessed internal mana, reinforcing their bodies, bending themselves to match their magic. These were called Augmenters...warriors who burned without burning, moved faster than the eye could track, struck with the weight of mountains.

Others wielded magic differently, drawing power not from within but from the world itself. These were Conjurers...mages who shaped the elements, their strength dependent on forces beyond their own flesh. Their power was vast, but it was never truly theirs. Some wielded it with precision. Others were left at its mercy.

But then, there were the Variants.

They did not fit within the laws of magic.

A man who could step through walls as if they weren't there.

A woman who vanished completely, unseen even in the brightest light.

And the world does not tolerate uncertainty. Magic existed for all. But those who broke its rules...who wielded something beyond mere elements...were never seen as people.

They were threats.

And threats do not get to live.