Fate of The Gifted - Climbing GreyRock at night, visual inspiration

I created these pictures with Dreame App AI, to create inspirational images, for some of the major scenes in my story.

Soon after Kai discovers his magical ability in FATE OF THE GIFTED, he no longer has a safe place to live. He decides to travel back to the place he was born. The problem: The Empire now knows he is a magician and will be watching for him along the roads. Kai must find a different way home.

~*~

The immense gray mountain range to the west was the only thing standing between Kai and that newly erected town. Sharp, deadly peaks, and harsh gray stone jutted this way and that. Nothing grew there. Not even vultures found refuge there. They deemed it impassable.

Kai hadn't been here in the dark before. The mountain didn't look like a mountain at all. It towered above him, reaching up from the smokey valley and touching the sky.

He could not guess how far he’d have to climb. The rocks looked more intimidating at higher elevation. Far above the ground, they became larger, smoother, and sharper. Kai trembled in the face of this massive dark obscurity.

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. It will be like trying to climb giant knife blades.

Pale yellow moonlight gleaming through the thick smoke, cast crude reflections from boulders' tops. The light provided wasn’t enough to see cracks or the sharp chippings scattered over the gray stones, but he didn't have the luxury of waiting until daylight to make his ascent.

He reached forward and touched the cold stone. It felt unreal, chilling him to the bone. He brushed his fingers across the rock, along the sides, the bottom and the top. Lifting his legs upon a chest height rock, he felt his way toward the next one.

As he went, he felt for solid handholds and protrusions for foot placement. He avoided sharp jagged edges as much as he could. He proceeded slowly, attempting to prevent slipping and cutting himself. More than once, crammed rocks left no space to climb. He shimmied up, his back against one blade and his feet against the other, until he reached the next unshakable landing…