The moment Zakar stepped into the rift room with Sera and Myia trailing behind him, a strange and unsettling stillness wrapped itself around the space like an invisible fog.
The air felt undisturbed in a way that immediately raised alarms in Zakar's mind, as though nothing had moved for a while, yet at the same time, something had been taken away from it.
Zakar's gaze sharpened almost instantly as he slowed his steps, his eyes moving carefully across every inch of the room with the trained awareness of someone who had lived his life expecting danger at any moment.
And silence lingered too long. His instincts screamed before his mind fully caught up, and when it did, the realization settled in coldly.
Justin was gone.
He didn't say it immediately. Instead, he walked further into the room, his movements controlled, deliberate, as though confirming what he already knew.
