Aryndale and Azedreo stepped out of their ship, their boots crunching against the frost-covered ground of Agartha.
The planet was nothing like they remembered. Once a beacon of civilization, a world of golden spires and endless knowledge, it had been reduced to a wasteland of ice and fire.
The skies above swirled with unnatural storm clouds, flashes of violet lightning cracking through the atmosphere.
In the distance, jagged mountains rose like the broken bones of a dying god, their peaks consumed by frost and shadow.
The once-great city of Elarion was in ruins.
Half of it lay buried beneath thick glaciers, its towering structures entombed in crystalline ice, while the other half smoldered under the corruption of dark matter.
The air itself was unstable, shifting between bitter cold and searing heat, as though reality was fraying at the edges.
