The world of Hal'Zirath stirred with a tremor that wasn't natural. Stone did not quake here not unless something greater than the demon lords willed it. Black dust lifted into the air, curling into ashen spirals as the seven obsidian thrones that lined the Desolation Court flickered with violet fire.
Velgrin stood apart from the circle, his hood veiling his expression. He had not returned to report. He had come to summon.
The silence of Hal'Zirath was broken by a sound like glass fracturing across the sky. A fissure opened in the void above the throne chamber, and out of it descended something… not demon, not god.
A being draped in cinders. Its form shifted like an unfinished statue, limbs folding, breaking, then reforming in impossible symmetry. Each step it took reshaped the stone beneath it—black mountains in the distance collapsed into valleys, spires bent into arcs, as if the world itself remembered its fear.
"Velgrin the Silent One," the being's voice reverberated like molten iron poured into hollow caverns. "You called, and the ash answers."
The other demon lords hissed, recoiling on their thrones. Even Azareth, calmest of them all, leaned forward, shadows deepening around his horns.
Velgrin bowed his head. "Ashen Architect. I require what only you can forge."
The being turned its formless gaze toward him. "You dare command me?"
"Not command," Velgrin replied, voice like a whisper that still silenced the entire chamber. "But offer purpose. The world is not yet ready for Ravh'Zereth's awakening. A conduit must be carved between realms. One that can withstand both Hollow and mortal skies."
The Architect's cinder-form flickered. "A Spire, then. A Mirror to breach."
A thin smile crept beneath Velgrin's hood. "Yes. The Mirror Spire. A tower that will twist the Hollow Realm into the human world. When it stands, the vessel will not resist. He will shatter beneath it. And from the shards—our Ascension begins."
The chamber darkened. Through the void fissure, fragments of stone rose, suspending themselves in the air as if pulled by unseen strings. Each fragment burned with gray fire, reshaping into the foundation of something vast.
The Ashen Architect extended one skeletal hand. "Then let us build. Not of earth, not of flame… but of memory. Every scar this world has endured will become stone. Every scream will be mortar. The Mirror Spire will not be built. It will remember itself into existence."
As the Architect spoke, the horizon of Hal'Zirath buckled. An ocean of ash split open, and a colossal base began to form, a skeletal tower stretching upward.
The demon lords stirred uneasily.
"This power—" hissed Shyrrath the Vein Eater. "Even the Abyss recoils!"
But Velgrin did not move. His gaze pierced the shifting monument. Already, he could feel Sid Arkwood far away in the human world—twitch in his dreams. The demon inside him stirred at the Spire's conception.
Velgrin's whisper was nearly lost in the storm of ash.
"Sleep while you can, vessel. The world you cling to is already being rebuilt into your grave."
The Mirror Spire rose higher, splitting the skies of Hal'Zirath with a glow that bled into both worlds.
And for the first time in centuries, even the gods turned their gaze downward.