The fall felt endless.
Not in the way one might expect a fall to be — a short plummet followed by a jarring stop — but a slow descent, as if the world itself was pulling him downward, unwilling to let go. Elias's breath caught in his chest, and his stomach twisted with the sensation of weightlessness.
His hands reached out instinctively, grasping at the air, but there was nothing to catch. Nothing but the cold, empty void.
Where am I going?
The question reverberated in his mind as the world spun around him. The fog, the stone, the light — all of it dissolved into a formless blur. The sensation of falling stretched into eternity, until, just as his chest began to tighten with panic, something changed.
A shift.
A snap in the air, like an unseen tether had been severed. The fog, the mist, the pulse of power surrounding him — it all snapped away.
And suddenly, he was standing.
It was as if the ground had been waiting for him, prepared to catch him just before he crashed. Elias staggered, his legs trembling beneath him, as he blinked rapidly, trying to make sense of what had happened. His body was on fire with the shock of the fall, yet his mind felt disconnected, as if it hadn't quite caught up to the reality around him.
He was no longer in the swirling, formless space of before.
No. This place... it was different.
Elias took a shaky step forward, the stone beneath his feet solid, and looked around.
A forest.
Tall, ancient trees towered overhead, their gnarled roots twisting in and out of the earth like a labyrinth of age-old secrets. The air was thick with the scent of moss and damp earth, and the quiet hum of nature enveloped him in a strange, unnerving stillness. No birds chirped. No breeze rustled the leaves. It was as though this forest had been frozen in time.
He reached out instinctively to touch one of the trees, his fingers grazing the rough bark. It was cool to the touch, alive, but still. His palm, still marked with the faint bluish glow, tingled as it made contact with the surface.
What is this place?
A cold shiver of dread slithered down his spine. He wasn't sure why, but the silence, the stillness, felt wrong. As if something was waiting — watching. He needed answers. And yet, he could sense that they didn't lie within the walls of this forest. They were out there. Somewhere.
Suddenly, a voice — familiar, but not — broke through the stillness.
"You're here."
Elias whirled around, his heart leaping into his throat.
A figure emerged from the shadows of the trees, its silhouette shrouded in the ethereal light that filtered through the canopy above. For a moment, Elias couldn't make out any distinct features, but the shape was unmistakable.
It was human. Or at least, it resembled one. But the way it moved — gliding through the air, almost unnaturally fluid — told him it was no mere person. The sense of wrongness in the figure's presence was suffocating, like a wound that had not yet healed.
It stopped before him, its form becoming sharper, more defined as the mist around it dissipated. Elias's breath hitched in his chest.
A woman. A figure dressed in flowing robes that shimmered like water under moonlight. Her eyes, however, were the most unsettling. Not because they were fierce or full of malice, but because they were empty. A black void that swallowed the light.
"Who... what are you?" Elias managed, his throat tight. His hand instinctively clenched around the pulse of power in his palm, but there was no comfort, no release. Only the sharp, pressing weight of something unseen, something ancient, waiting for him to understand.
She tilted her head slightly, as though considering him, before speaking again in a voice that sounded like the echo of a forgotten memory — faint, distant, but oddly familiar.
"You carry a heavy burden, Elias."
He froze. His name. She knew his name.
"Who are you?" he repeated, his voice firm now, though his mind raced. This wasn't a dream. It wasn't some figment of his imagination. This was real. Too real. The weight of his confusion, his anger, was building. "What do you want from me?"
The woman's lips curled into a faint, sorrowful smile as she stepped closer, and for the first time, Elias saw her face clearly. Ageless, yet bearing the unmistakable expression of someone who had borne witness to something terrible, something that had broken her.
"You haven't remembered yet," she said softly, her eyes never leaving his. "But you will."
A sharp gust of wind broke the stillness, and the trees creaked as though they were alive. A distant memory stirred, but Elias couldn't grasp it. There was something — someone — from his past, something he needed to remember.
Suddenly, the mark on Elias's palm flared to life, its glow intensifying to an almost blinding brilliance. His hand trembled as it pulsed with power, and without thinking, he extended it toward the woman. The same force, the same energy that had guided his movements before, surged to the surface.
The woman didn't flinch. Instead, she placed her own hand against his, and the moment their skin made contact, the world around them seemed to collapse.
Light, shadows, and sound twisted together into a vortex of pure sensation. Elias's heart raced as his body seemed to dissolve into the force, his thoughts scattering in a storm of images. War. Fire. Faces he couldn't place. A great battle. A sense of betrayal. He saw himself — or someone who resembled him — standing at the center of it all, casting a long shadow over everything.
And then, it stopped.
The world shattered.
The forest was gone. The woman was gone.
And Elias was standing alone, in a barren, desolate landscape.
It was a wasteland. Ash and dust swirled around him in the harsh winds, and the sky above was painted a sickly shade of crimson. The ground cracked beneath his feet, like the very earth itself was crumbling to dust.
"Elias…"
The voice again. Louder this time, urgent, cutting through the haze, but it came from nowhere and everywhere at once.
A figure stood before him, but this time, it was different. The shape of the person — the same tall, gaunt figure from the earlier vision. The hollow eyes. The whispering voice. But there was something new. Something more terrifying in the air.
"You must understand," the figure said, its voice raspy. "You've been chosen."
Elias swallowed hard, his throat dry. "Chosen for what?"
The figure raised its hand, and suddenly, memories flooded into his mind — flashes of moments he couldn't understand, faces he couldn't place, a darkness that threatened to consume him. He was there, in the midst of it all, a catalyst for something that had yet to come.
"No… this can't be..." His voice trembled with disbelief, but the weight of the vision crushed him, leaving no room for denial. He had seen it before — the war, the chaos, the destruction. He was the one who had started it.
A cold emptiness seeped into his bones as the memories faded, leaving behind only fragments. Shattered pieces of a past that felt like it belonged to someone else.
"You must remember," the figure whispered again. "Before it's too late."
And then, the world shattered once more.