Chapter 415

LUMINA

I floated in darkness, suspended between consciousness and something else entirely. Not sleep—I knew what sleep felt like. This was different. Heavier. Like being submerged in warm water that muffled all sound and sensation.

Then the darkness shifted.

Light appeared—not bright, not harsh, just a gradual illumination that revealed I was standing in a space that shouldn't exist. Gray fog swirled around my feet, and the ground beneath me felt solid but looked like nothing at all.

"Hello, Lumina."

I spun toward the voice and found myself face to face with a woman I'd never seen before but somehow recognized on an instinctual level.

She was tall,...