Emery opened his eyes.
Violet mist drifted around him in slow, lazy spirals, lit faintly from below by a sickly purple glow that did not seem to come from anywhere in particular. The air was thick, almost gelatinous. There was no horizon. No sound. No sky.
"…Where am I?"
The words came out of his mouth and felt wrong almost immediately — not heard, not echoed, but absorbed by the mist as soon as they left him.
He frowned.
"Didn't I just kill it?"
A pause.
"…what is going on?"
The mist began to swirl. Slowly at first, then faster — and as it cleared, a place revealed itself around him. Not a sky. Not a battlefield. A cave.
Vast.
