The first blow did not come with fire or the roar of war-drums. It came with a terrifying, hollow silence.
The corridor through the Ashen Spiral went dark mid-cycle, not with the spectacular violence of a collapse that would have triggered every alarm across Astralis space, but with a slow, agonizing dimming.
Stabilization matrices flickered, recalibrated, and then flickered again in a rhythmic pulse that mimicked a dying heart. Transit traffic slowed as ships reported phantom resistance and strange, localized drags in space that made no sense under established law parameters.
By the time the corridor fully destabilized, it had already claimed six civilian transports. They were not destroyed in the traditional sense; they were simply lost. Their last signals ended in a burst of white static and profound confusion. The crews reported spatial drift where none should exist, and navigational anchors refused to respond.
