The Meeting
The portal dropped Sera into the gardens of Mira’s old estate.
Not Graves Landing. And not Obsidian Ridge.
Somewhere neutral. Somewhere abandoned.
The manor rose ahead of her, pale stone cracked with age, vines swallowing the walls, windows dark and empty. Once, Mira had ruled from here. Now it was nothing but old stone and bad memories.
That was exactly why Sera chose it.
This estate was built over the first containment sigil — an ancient ruin that, when activated, became both a trigger for energy and an anchor to it.
Its power did not lie in raw magic alone.
It lay in the instructions infused into it — the deliberate coding carved into its design that dictated what that power could do.
The massive sigil was buried beneath the fountain in the garden, etched into stone
