The triumphant silence following the coordinated defense shattered under a new, terrifying pressure. It wasn't a sound, but an absence—a void that swallowed the very concept of hope. The starfield outside the Sky-Mirror Spire didn't darken; it simply became… less. The vibrant energy of the Fae illusions flickered and died. The precise temporal fields of the Chronos Guard stuttered and collapsed. The fierce fire of the Draconians seemed to gutter in a wind that blew from nowhere.
Malphas had arrived.
It had no form they could comprehend. It was a rip in reality, a bleeding wound in the cosmos through which poured a chilling certainty of oblivion. It didn't speak. It imposed. A single, gut-wrenching thought echoed in every mind, human and cosmic alike: All this struggle, all this light… is meaningless. Everything returns to me.
