The Girl in the Well (Part One)
The illusion was gone, the curtains pulled back.
It was the only thing protecting Krysaos from that which did not want to be seen.
Reality began to crash in from his sides... and from below, like he was on a sinking ship.
Krysaos held his hand out, conjuring a ⌈Water Sphere⌋ to protect himself.
He stood fast... concentrating on the unbroken flow of his mana... watching the world around him change.
The clouded sky drained to black, emptying into a small, white, rapidly-shrinking point... as if he was at the bottom of a well, looking up.
Outside of his protective shield, the water level had risen to his shins... waters filled with thin strands of dark seaweed.
It looked almost like... a woman's hair.
The narrow stream of light from what was no longer a sky shone down upon that woman.
She laid with her face in the shallows... unmoving.