The mana-lamps failed across the outer market quarter before the first hour was even up.
It did not happen all at once. The disruption spread sector by sector, rippling outward from the dimensional rupture like a stone thrown into a stagnant pond. The ambient field destabilized in violently expanding rings until the city's carefully cultivated grid lost its coherence. The low, familiar hum of imperial energy died in the walls, plunging the narrow streets into an absolute, suffocating darkness. What replaced the warm light was entirely wrong. It was the cold, sickly blue-black bioluminescence of the things that had crawled through the tears. They were scattered across the ancient stone of Korreth's outer district, casting a bruised, necrotic glow that had absolutely no business touching this city.
Ashe moved through the shifting shadows without slowing down.
