Xylos Core Awakening

The air crackles with residual energy. Dust motes, disturbed by your abrupt arrival, dance in the shafts of pallid light slicing through the ruptured ceiling. You cough, the metallic tang of ozone coating your tongue. You remember… fragments. A flash. A blinding white. A voice, resonant and alien, echoing within your skull. Then… nothing. Until now. You are in the Core. Or, what's left of it. The shimmering, obsidian walls pulse with a faint, internal luminescence, a dying heartbeat in a colossal machine. Scorch marks and gouges mar the surfaces, testament to a battle waged and lost. This was once the engine of Xylos, a civilization that mastered energy manipulation to a degree unimaginable to any other sentient race. Now, it's a tomb. Your tomb, perhaps. You have no name, no memories, only the raw, instinctive drive to survive. A strange, organic gauntlet is fused to your left arm, pulsating with the same eerie light as the walls. It feels… familiar, yet utterly foreign. It whispers promises of power, of control, but also of immense danger. Around you, the shattered remnants of Xylosian technology litter the landscape. Twisted conduits hiss with escaping energy, sparking consoles flicker with dying light, and the skeletal remains of automated sentinels lie scattered like discarded toys. You are not alone. A guttural growl echoes from the shadows. Something is hunting you. Something born from the catastrophic failure of the Core. Something… corrupted. Your senses sharpen. You feel a pressure, a subtle manipulation of the energy fields around you. It's weak, almost imperceptible, but it's there. The gauntlet hums in response, craving connection. This is your reality now. A labyrinth of shattered technology, corrupted guardians, and a burning question etched into the void where your memories used to be: What are you? And why were you brought here, to the dying heart of a dead civilization? The answers lie hidden within the Core, buried beneath layers of dust and destruction. Your journey begins now. Tread carefully. The fate of Xylos, and perhaps your own existence, hangs in the balance.