The light let go of them all at once, and the Regalons landed on wet black sand under a sky the color of old steel.
The island rose behind the beach in tiers of dark rock and pale forest, maybe six miles across at its widest, ringed on every side by an ocean that stretched to the horizon without a single break. The water was a deep, strange blue, almost violet where the light hit it, and it moved with a slow patience that made everyone watching it feel, without knowing why, that it was watching back.
The Hub wrote their welcome across the sky before anyone had taken ten steps.
[War Event: Conquest of Thurmugin Ocean]
[First Objective: Your starting island is sinking. Build a vessel from native materials and leave before full submersion.]
[Time Remaining: 24:00:00]
The counter started falling the moment they finished reading it.
"Well," Ainen said into the silence, "at least the event is honest about wanting us dead."
