Bonds of Lightning

The chamber of the Dagger Throne was gone.

Not broken. Not ruined.

Erased.

One breath, Selena had stood amid fragments of sacred stone, the echoes of judgment still resonating in her ears. The next, the ground beneath her had vanished into something that defied comprehension. Mist curled around her ankles, and the silence pressed in on her like a weight. The air was thin, electric, and unyielding, clinging to her skin and refusing to fill her lungs properly. She blinked rapidly, trying to make sense of the scene, but the light around her seemed to pulse, bending at the edges of her vision, too bright and too dim all at once.

The world—if this could still be called one—had changed.