Inside Lucian's mind, it was a warzone. He stood on a cracked, black plain, fighting a endless tide of monsters. They weren't physical beasts. They were nightmares given form—whispering shadows that promised oblivion, screaming voids that hungered for thought, twisted concepts that broke logic itself. Every one he cut down with a blade of pure will was replaced by two more. He was losing ground, his own sense of self being slowly eroded by the chaos.
"Just… give… up…" a thousand voices hissed at him from the horde.
"Never," Lucian grunted, swinging his blade and forcing back a wave of formless dread.
Just as a particularly massive horror, a thing of shifting geometry and silent screams, loomed over him, a flash of golden light filled the mental landscape.
It wasn't loud or violent. It was calm. Absolute. The light washed over the horde of nightmares, and they didn't explode or burn. They simply… dissolved. They un-became. The chaotic plain fell silent.
