There was silence above the inferno.
Not peace — never peace — but a silence that followed awe, as if even the air had forgotten how to breathe.
Atlas hovered above the ruined citadel of Dagon, his white cloak whispering against the dead wind. The black towers beneath him glowed with the reflected fire of the battlefield below.
Every gust carried screams — divine and infernal — and the wet percussion of dying gods. The war of realms unfolded beneath his feet, a tapestry of ruin painted in gold and ash.
And beside him, floating as if gravity itself bowed in courtesy, was the Elder.
The Elder of the demons — ancient, inscrutable, his body draped in robes that shimmered like molten obsidian. His eyes, however, were still human. Too human. They watched the chaos not with fury or fear, but with the quiet of one who had seen too much and survived it all.
They stood — or rather, existed — in the heart of stillness, while around them the world screamed itself apart.
