The light ahead flickered—unnatural, like fire held in a jar too long forgotten. Ren's steps grew heavier the closer he drew, not from exhaustion, but from the weight of something else… something ancient tugging at his soul like rusted chains.
He pushed through the final veil of undergrowth and entered the clearing.
There, in the center of it, was the remnant.
A broken monolith, jagged and obsidian-black, stood lodged in the soil like a tooth torn from the mouth of the world. Glyphs pulsed faintly on its surface—ones he recognized only in the way you recognize a dream you never remembered having.
Ren didn't speak. His throat tightened. The air here buzzed with wrongness. All around the clearing, the forest seemed to bow inward, trees bending unnaturally, their branches curled like watchers at the edge of an arena.
And he wasn't alone.
A shape sat crouched beside the monolith, half-shrouded in shadow. Ren couldn't make out their face, but the form was familiar in the worst way.
