Cain awoke submerged in silence.
Not darkness—silence.
The world around him shimmered faintly, fragments of the reactor's golden light hanging suspended in a void that seemed to reject the concept of sound. His lungs ached when he tried to breathe, but no air entered. He didn't suffocate; he simply existed—half-dead, half-stuck in the aftermath of destruction.
He forced his limbs to move, every joint screaming. The surface beneath him wasn't solid. It pulsed, bending slightly with each movement like the skin of some enormous creature.
He stood slowly, eyes scanning. The battlefield—the reactor, Roselle, the dome—gone. Instead, there was this: an endless plane of molten reflections and shards of light, flowing like liquid metal underfoot.
He clenched his fists, the pain reminding him he was still alive. Barely.
"Where… am I?"
The words came out soundless. They existed only in thought. The answer arrived not from outside, but from within.
You're between failure and consequence.
