Naturally, the 'owners' of the fracture that led to the Dead Realm weren't pleased when Alex first showed up in their city wanting to enter the fracture.
But, after he showed them his diplomatic status, they could do nothing to stop him from doing so.
Of course they tried to complain to their higher ups from the Higher civilisation, but they simply told them the same thing Alex did – he wasn't to be bothered.
***
The instant Alex stepped through the fracture, a wave of blistering heat hit him like an impervious wall.
Not the heat of summer, or a desert sun.
No – it was like the realm itself was on fire, constantly.
The sky above – if it could even be called that – was a haze of bronze and black, streaked with fiery crimson clouds.
Below, the landscape consisted of jagged canyons splitting the cracked obsidian earth, filled with flowing rivers of lava so bright they made even Alex's Higher life form eyes sting a little.
