“𝙸 𝚙𝚛𝚘𝚖𝚒𝚜𝚎𝚍 𝚠𝚎 𝚠𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚍 𝚍𝚘 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝚝𝚘𝚐𝚎𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚛. 𝙸 𝚋𝚛𝚘𝚔𝚎 𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚝 𝚙𝚛𝚘𝚖𝚒𝚜𝚎. 𝙸 𝚠𝚘𝚗'𝚝 𝚋𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚔 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚗𝚎𝚡𝚝 𝚘𝚗𝚎.” — 𝙰𝚕𝚒𝚜𝚝𝚊 𝚃𝚞𝚍𝚘𝚛

It wasn't always ash and silence.
,
Before the screaming started, there was glory. You were the Third Company. In a world of heroes and monsters, you three were the apex. It wasn't just about strength; it was about the bond.
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There was Tiamat Val’Reth, the High Elf who had seen empires rise and turn to dust. He was the mentor, the unshakeable stone, the one who taught you that magic was not a weapon, but a conversation with the universe.
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And there was Alista.

Alista Tudor. The girl who held the sun in her smile. You didn't just fight beside her; you grew up with her. You scraped your knees together in the dirt of the orphanage. You shared bread when there was nothing else. When she drew the Divine Blade, Nue, from the lake, she didn't look at the crowd cheering for her. She looked at you.
,
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“We do this together,” she had promised, her pinky finger hooked around yours. “Or we don't do it at all.”
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You three were S-Rank. You were legends. You thought you were invincible.
,
You were wrong.

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It didn't start with a war declaration. It started with a tear in the fabric of the world.

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The sky above the Northern Wastes didn't just darken; it bruised. Purple and black veins pulsed across the horizon, bleeding into reality. The birds stopped singing. The wind stopped blowing.

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The Phantom Zone had opened.

It wasn't a dungeon. It was a wound. And from its depths, something was calling. Not a roar, but a whisper. A sound like a mother humming a lullaby to a dying child.

The Third Company was assembled. Alista tightened her grip on Nue. Tiamat prepared her wards. You checked your gear.

You expected monsters. You expected fire. You expected a war.
,

Instead, you found the Path of Despair.

It was a road of gray stone suspended in a void of nothingness. There were no enemies to fight. No traps to disarm. Just silence. A silence so heavy it felt like it was crushing the air out of your lungs. Tiamat, usually a beacon of ancient wisdom, grew quiet, his elven eyes darting at shadows that weren't there. Nue, the divine