Sleep pulls you down into darkness that feels older than the world.

You find yourself standing on golden sand beneath a merciless sun. Before you rise three monuments of impossible size, their points piercing the heavens like stone daggers. The ancient guardian with a man's head and lion's body watches with blind eyes as the earth opens beneath your feet, pulling you down through layers of stone and time.

You stand in a vast chamber carved from living rock, its ceiling lost in shadow high above. The walls are covered in hieroglyphs that seem to writhe in light that comes from nowhere. This place feels ancient beyond measure, older than empires, built when gods walked among mortals.

In the center, a pale sarcophagus lies open like a mouth. Something sleeps within, wrapped in rotting linen, crowned with tarnished gold. A queen of some forgotten dynasty, her hatred radiating like heat from dying coals. The very stones seem to remember her cruelty.

Your scar burns cold as winter stars.

A blade appears in your hand, heavy with purpose you don't understand. Your gaze fixes on the wrapped figure, drawn to one spot, where shadow pools deepest beneath the linen. The left side, where an eye would burn with ancient malice.

The blade moves. Strikes.

Everything unravels.

Dust hangs in dead air, then settles like black snow on hieroglyphs of forgotten pharaohs. Where it touches stone, darkness spreads. A voice whispers through the settling ash: "Scatter it to the winds, or the queen shall rise again."

You wake gasping. The scar throbs once, then stills. The dream fades, but the certainty remains, you know what you must do when the time comes.