The plunge ended not with impact, but with unmaking.

Light peeled Elaria apart strand by trembling strand, as though she were a tapestry the world finally had permission to unravel. Her breath vanished first, pulled into a glittering thread. Then her heartbeat. Then her name.

Only her awareness remained—thin as a whisper in a storm that had forgotten what silence meant.

Then the light spat her out.

Not onto ground. Not into air.

But into something living.

Something that breathed through ...