The Hollow trembled.
Once, silence had been its sovereign. For ages uncounted, its dominion had been complete an endless reign of stillness, unmarred by voice, by fire, by the faintest quiver of sound. Silence had not merely ruled this place; it had been the marrow of its existence. The abyss had known no pulse, no vibration, no ripple across its vast eternity. But now now the ancient order faltered.
What had once been a void of devouring quiet began to shudder beneath a hum so vast, so deep, it felt as though the bones of creation itself had been struck like an eternal bell. That resonance was not sound not in the way mortals knew it but something greater, a vibration that gnawed at the roots of existence. It carried no melody, no note, and yet it filled every fracture in reality. It slithered through shadows, sank into the marrow of stone, drummed against the hidden pulse of the Hollow until even the abyss itself seemed to awaken beneath its weight.
