The Nightmare Specter lunged, its form a terrifying blur of dissolving shadows and reforming agony, its blue eyes burning with an unholy cold. Andrew had barely a split second to react. He instinctively threw himself to the side, rolling clumsily across the gritty factory floor.
The Specter's ethereal claw, a shimmering, elongated extension of its arm, swept through the space where he had been, passing harmlessly through the rusted metal pillar he'd just cleared. It left behind not a physical impact, but a chilling psychic void, a momentary spike of profound loneliness and despair that pricked at the edges of Andrew's carefully constructed mental barricade.
[Psychological Resistance Check: Passed (Minor Stress)]
He scrambled to his feet, combat knife held defensively. Against a foe that wasn't entirely physical, its steel felt ridiculously inadequate, like bringing a butter knife to a gunfight.
