The first attack had been frightening.
The second had been alarming.
By the third, people began calling it a calamity.
By the fifth, nobody knew what to call it anymore.
And after that, the attacks stopped behaving like a pattern at all.
They became a storm.
***********************************
The eastern border had barely recovered when another report arrived.
A fortified town several hundred miles from the first settlement had been attacked during the night.
There had been no warning.
No scouts had spotted an approaching army.
No messenger had reported unusual movement.
There was no evidence that a large force had even entered the region.
Yet by sunrise, part of the town had been destroyed.
The soldiers stationed there had fought back.
Then the attackers disappeared.
No bodies.
No prisoners.
No survivors who could describe what they had seen.
Only remnants of dark energy lingering in the streets.
