The mist at the bottom of the Maw of the Serpent did not move like natural fog. It clung to the earth in heavy, thick layers, smelling of wet stone and the metallic tang of ancient magic. As the dust from the bridge's collapse finally settled, the survivors of the Imperial Carriage found themselves standing in the shadow of an impossibility.
Surrounding the wreckage were colossal, needle-thin towers carved from solid obsidian. They rose into the gloom like the ribs of a buried god, their surfaces polished to a mirror-sheen that reflected the violet glow of Vera's phantom form. There were no windows, no doors—only smooth, geometric perfection that pre-dated the First Western Empire by a thousand years.
This was the Sunless City, a myth whispered by Northern scholars and feared by Southern mages. It was a place where light was a trespasser.
