As the decision was made—to trap Elius, to close the rift and find another dimensional fold to open—Zhark raised his bracer, and Fraven began the incantation to activate the cube network.
Keith exhaled slowly, looking at the crackling gate one last time, eyes hard with finality.
Then—
SSHHHHOOOOOOMMM!!!
A sonic scream ripped across the horizon.
The earth shook.
The atmosphere bent. Not in tremors. Not in warps. But in raw, absolute velocity.
A shadow. A blur. No—less than a blur. A black thunderbolt, sheathed in heat haze and mist, howling louder than screaming missiles.
It came from the distant sky—from the dungeon.
From the very bottom.
In an instant, the world itself stopped breathing.
KRKA-KRRAAA-BOOOOOOOM!!!
The sound came after the figure landed.
A crater bloomed in the center of the plaza. Stone tiles shattered. Shockwaves flung dust and debris outward in rings, like a meteor had struck. And then—silence.
A heavy, suffocating silence.
