Pain did not arrive all at once.
It crept in.
It seeped.
It bled into existence the way cold seeps into bone—quiet at first, almost ignorable, until suddenly it was everywhere and there was no memory of what it felt like before.
The moment I fully crossed into the profane path, the cave stopped pretending I was a guest and began treating me like prey.
The ground burned.
Not heat like fire, not heat like magma, but something sharper—something intentional. Every step sent needles of agony up through my feet, through my legs, into my spine. The broken glass shifted beneath me, biting, melting, reforming just enough to ensure I never found stable footing.
My boots smoked faintly. The reinforced soles held, but I could feel the heat through them, licking at my skin, searching for weakness.
The air itself hurt.
Each breath scorched my lungs, dragging in invisible razors that tore at my throat on the way down.
