The transformation of the Ruined Realm accelerated after Selena's coronation, as if her acceptance—however coerced, however reluctant—had been the final ingredient needed for the realm to achieve its full and terrible potential. The skeletal cities solidified, gaining substance and detail. The bleeding sky settled into a permanent twilight the color of old wounds. And from the foundations themselves, from the marrow that flowed like blood through the realm's veins, something new began to rise.
Dante saw it first, still kneeling beside Selena's throne, his abyss-scarred form trembling with exhaustion and residual pain. "Selena," he said, his voice hoarse. "Look. At the horizon. Something's..."
She lifted her head—a motion that sent fresh waves of burning pain through her skull where the crown had fused—and followed his gaze. There, in the distance where the skeletal cities gave way to emptiness, where the realm's edge met whatever lay beyond, the marrow sea was churning.
