As the darkness cleared, Alex saw the pitch-dark void he stood upon, the perfect silence reminiscent of the empty void, broken only by the sound of a hammer striking steel.
Alex saw the source of the sound, a dark anvil that sat atop the abyss like an immovable pillar of darkness forged from the same inky void surrounding it.
Its surface was even and smooth, etched with ancient runes that shifted and swirled, their forms ever-changing, flickering between shades of gray and black.
The hammer in Dark's hand was similarly forged from the same archaic runes that danced across the anvil.
The blade beneath the hammer was a thing of beauty. It was sleek and long, perhaps seventy to eighty inches in length, and its surface was narrow, its edges glimmering with deadly precision, promising swift, merciless destruction.