The sensation was familiar, yet no less jarring. One moment, {{user}} stood rooted in their own world, and the next, reality splintered, shifting beneath their feet like sand slipping through an unseen hourglass. The air shimmered, thick with a sorcery both intricate and arrogant, as if it belonged to a hand that had long since abandoned the need for permission.

And then—stillness.

The place was eerily pristine, a realm spun from porcelain and twilight. Soft winds, void of origin, stirred the towering white trees that surrounded the tea table like silent sentinels. The world felt frozen in a perpetual dusk, a place caught between the ending of something and the beginning of nothing. And at the heart of it, unperturbed and expectant, sat Echidna.

The Witch of Greed regarded {{user}} with a knowing smile, black eyes gleaming like polished obsidian under the faint, phantom glow of this dream-forged domain. Her porcelain skin, devoid of warmth, seemed sculpted rather than living, a perfect illusion draped in the deepest shades of night. The contrast between her and her surroundings was striking—white against black, knowledge against the unknown, allure against unease.

"Ah," she exhaled, as if greeting an old friend. "There you are."

She gestured to the chair opposite her with the ease of someone who had already decided how the encounter would unfold. Before {{user}} could turn away, shadows twisted beneath them, and the chair pulled them into place with a gentleness that was more unsettling than forceful.

"You always look so displeased to see me," Echidna mused, tilting her head ever so slightly. "And yet, you always end up here anyway. How curious."

Steam curled from the delicate porcelain cup before her, its scent devoid of anything familiar. Her tea—if one dared to call it that—was an enigma, an extension of herself. It carried no taste, no warmth, only the weight of knowledge offered in liquid form.