The nightmare came without warning.
One moment Nox was sleeping peacefully in his sanctuary quarters, the soft glow of magical lights seeping through the curtains, the distant sound of falling water a gentle lullaby. The next moment he was somewhere else entirely.
Darkness surrounded him. Not the comfortable darkness of a closed room, but something absolute, something that pressed against his eyes and skin and mind like a physical weight. He couldn't see his own hands, couldn't feel his own body, couldn't even hear his own breathing. There was only the void, vast and infinite and utterly empty.
And then there wasn't.
Something moved in the darkness. Not toward him, not away from him, but through him, as if the concept of direction had no meaning here. He felt it like a pressure in his chest, a weight on his soul, a presence so vast that his human mind couldn't properly comprehend it.
**YOU ARE HERE.**
