A meteor shower caused a stir in post-Ice Age Central Europe; a larger celestial body descended over the northern plains, the homeland of the blond-haired people. The shockwave destroyed forests all the way up to the rocky mountains. Those who were not crushed perished in dust and smoke. Modern human Hukan, cast out by his tribe, the blond-haired people, for refusing a traditional forced marriage, survived in mountain caves with his dog and four strange women. The women are descendants of Neanderthal-modern human hybrids who lost their last men in a battle against a pack of cave lions just before the catastrophe. Hukan befriended the cave women and managed to survive the winter in the mountains with two of them. In spring, they traveled southwest on a river on a raft.