The iron gates behind them did not just close; they fused into the obsidian wall with a final, hollow boom that vibrated through Kaels chest. The sound was swallowed instantly by a silence so dense it felt like a physical weight against his eardrums. There was no longer a floor of frozen smoke or a ceiling of gray mist. The pack stood upon a vast, circular dais of polished black glass that seemed to float in a starless, infinite well. At the center of this void stood the ziggurat, a massive pyramid of shifting shadow and bone white star glass that rose into the darkness, terminating at a single, pulsing point of violet light.
Kael felt the gravity of the fifth layer pulling at his marrow. It was a heavy, ancient pressure that tried to turn his every movement into a struggle. Beside him, D
