The mist parted slowly, revealing jagged spires silhouetted against a blood-colored sky. Nythralis.
It was a city built in defiance of reality—stone arches twisted impossibly into the air, buildings floated slightly above the ground, casting no shadow, and the streets curved back upon themselves like a serpent devouring its own tail.
Elira tightened her grip on Aran's hand. "This place doesn't belong to time."
They moved cautiously through the ghostly ruins. The air shimmered with distortion, and fragments of forgotten lives lingered like echoes—laughter cut short, prayers unfinished, screams swallowed by silence. Vaerin trailed behind, sword drawn, uneasy in the warped quiet.
At the city's center stood a coliseum of obsidian glass. A voice echoed from within.
"You carry the Flame, and yet you walk willingly into the Mouth of Sleep."
Aran stepped forward. "We came for truth. For the boy. For the future."
Out of the darkness strode a figure robed in crimson shadow, its face masked in mirrored silver. The Mark of the Hollow Star pulsed from its chest.
"Then let the Forgotten judge you."
The ground shuddered as the coliseum lit with ghostly fire. From the stands rose hundreds of pale, translucent forms—spirits lost to time, bound to the city by the Void's song.
Aran raised his blade. Elira summoned the Flame to her palms.
They would not be devoured by memory. They would forge their own.
And in the heart of a city that forgot itself, Aran's promise burned like a star.