TOTEM: the invention of fire

He mastered it . . . They worshipped it . . . everything burns

While Pyramie gathers food in the dry forest the tribal chief's daughter, Theo, sneaks out to visit him. When lightning strikes a fire in the brush Pyramie tries to impress her by playing with the flame. He doesn’t know that one of the hunters watches them from a distance, and will drag them both back to the council for defying their religion.

A council ensues and determines to shame Theo in front of the gathered people, and to sacrifice Pyramie  to their goddess Ashirah as scapegoat for the recent drought.

On the sacrificial altar, Pyramie's mother attacks the warrior conducting the ceremony. The warrior, known as the Terror, kills her.  In the commotion, Pyramie escapes to the forest with his painted canine, Dogo. There he must keep alive, alone and hunted. He is terrified and can only dream what childhood life was once like and remember Theo, who taught him what a kiss was before he escaped to the wild. In the forest he grows to become the tribe’s nemesis, ultimately learning the secret history that lies outside their mythology.