The first thing Daniel noticed was the air.
It wasn't thin and dry like Mars. It wasn't oxygen-rich like Earth either. It was… different. Heavy. It clung to his lungs with a faint metallic taste, humming with a vibration that felt almost alive. Each breath carried a resonance that made his chest tighten.
The crew spread out slowly, their boots sinking slightly into the black soil beneath them. The plain stretched on forever, dotted with jagged pillars that glowed faintly with blue sigils—the same sigils etched on the crystal and the arch.
"This place…" Marquez whispered, her voice hushed as if afraid to disturb the silence. "…it feels constructed. Artificial. Like we're inside something, not standing on open ground."
Hayes scanned the horizon, visor flickering with data. "We'll treat it like an alien environment. Stay sharp. Until we know what we're dealing with, assume everything is hostile."
Okafor knelt, brushing his glove across the ground. The soil gave off faint sparks under his touch. "Not natural rock. More like—" He hesitated, struggling to find the words. "—condensed energy. Solidified, somehow."
Daniel's eyes stayed locked on the towers. They weren't random formations. They were arranged in deliberate lines, stretching toward the horizon in geometric perfection.
A design. A pattern.
As if this entire plain was a machine.
Suddenly, the silence broke.
A deep vibration rippled through the ground, making their suits hum with static. The pillars in the distance flickered, their sigils pulsing brighter, faster, until they throbbed in unison like a colossal heartbeat.
Daniel staggered. "It's reacting to us."
Hayes' hand tightened on his sidearm—not that a pistol would mean much here. "Stay together. Don't run. We move as one."
The plain shifted again, this time with a sound. It wasn't words, not exactly, but a low resonance that slipped straight into their skulls. A chorus, layered and inhuman, speaking without language.
"Descendants of dust… you walk the forgotten threshold."
The crew froze.
Marquez whispered, horrified, "It's aware of us."
Daniel's heart hammered. He remembered the crystal's vision—the cloaked figure, the war, the warning. This was no accident. They were meant to be here.
The chorus spoke again, heavier now, vibrating through their bones:
"The seal weakens. The war stirs. Chosen or unchosen, you cannot turn back."
The pillars flared one last time, their glow lancing upward into the strange sky. And there, above them, stars twisted—folding into a shape that should not exist.
A figure began to emerge. Vast. Shadowed. Cloaked.
The same figure from the visions.
Daniel's voice broke into a whisper. "…It's him."
The cloaked presence loomed larger, its form rippling like smoke against the false sky. It did not step closer, yet its gaze fell upon them, heavy enough to bend the air around their bodies.
And then—just as suddenly as it appeared—it was gone.
The plain fell silent once more.
But none of them doubted the truth.
Something had seen them.
And something had marked them.