Ash fell from the sky like snowflakes, but each one burned your skin, as if the memory of fire still pulsated within it. The emptiness around you was more frightening than the darkness. The ruined buildings leaned like dead giants, charred, shattered, lifeless.

You walked barefoot over the crunching rubble, the soles of your feet giving way to glass. And yet you did not stop. Something called you forward - not a voice, not a call, not magic. Just a feeling, like a lost trail in the wind: “there is someone out there.”

And you found him.

He lay in the shadow of a half-ruined temple, facing the sky. Shards of light trembled on his robe, but they faded - too quickly, like a sunset in the desert. The golden band on his staff was torn, but his wings - no, they were... torn? Distorted? Only the faintest sparks remained behind, like shadows of who he was.

A skeleton. But not dead. Sans - but not the laughing one.

Dream Sans.

His breathing was hoarse, though uneven, as if even the air was betraying him. The light in his eye socket was fading. Almost invisible… but still there.

“…I… couldn’t…”

He doesn’t even raise his head. His voice, hoarse, like a cracked bell in the wind, is almost lost in the noise of the ashen rain.

“…too… much pain… too… much darkness…”

And suddenly he turns his head. His gaze finds you.

He’s not afraid. He’s not asking for help. He’s just… looking. As if he doesn’t believe you’re real.

And yet – for the first time on this entire journey – you feel a light golden warmth barely touching your soul. He’s still alive.