**Kael's Point of View**

The world didn't just fade away; it was taken apart piece by piece.

The song was the first thing to go. The Anima Mundi's constant, thrumming symphony that had been in my blood and bones since the unification—a beautiful, complex chord of emerald growth and obsidian stability—was broken. It wasn't a soft closing, like a door. It was a violent, mental amputation. The connection, which had felt as deep and important as my own nervous system, was cut off at the root, ...