Refined Chaos

In the cluttered workshop at the edge of the city, chaos lived in glass jars. Some pulsed like hearts, glowing with unstable light. Others fizzed and spat sparks, whispering strange syllables that made the hair on the back of the neck rise. Most artificers avoided such things; to work with raw chaos was to court disaster. But the artificer had never been one to shy from fire.

She stood at her bench, goggles fogged, hands steady despite the storm in front of her. A sphere of shifting colour floated over the worktable, threatening to unravel into smoke and lightning. With slow precision, she fed a copper coil into its surface. The chaos flared, lashing out with jagged tongues of violet flame, but she only tightened her grip, muttering a steady mantra under her breath. The words weren’t spells in the strict sense—no wizard’s incantation, no priest’s prayer. They were the rhythm of her craft, the scaffold on which she laid her will.

The sphere bucked and fought, swelling dangerously, and for a moment the workshop smelled of burnt cedar and thunderstorms. But then it shrank, condensed, and settled into a low hum. The wild glow folded neatly into the copper lattice, forming a crystal core that gleamed with a soft, steady light. The artificer leaned back, exhaling, wiping soot from her cheek. What had once been chaos now pulsed like a heartbeat of order—an engine waiting to power wonders yet unbuilt.

She smiled. Refining chaos wasn’t about taming it. It was about listening, coaxing, shaping. And in that fragile balance, creation was born.