The gate swallowed Aria whole.
There was no sensation of movement, no falling, no twisting, only the sudden, violent presence of heat and noise. She stumbled forward, boots striking cracked stone as the world snapped into focus around her.
Screaming.
Not distant. Not muffled.
Immediate.
Aria froze.
The sky above was the color of dying embers, thick with smoke that stung her eyes and burned her lungs. Buildings, if they could still be called that, stood half collapsed, blackened by fire and claw marks. The air reeked of blood and ash.
A city.
Or what remained of one.
Figures ran through the streets below, men, women, children, faces twisted in terror as shadowed creatures tore through them with brutal efficiency. The beasts moved like living smoke, bodies edged with molten red ligh
