The first drop fell.
It didn't glow.
Didn't burn.
Didn't sparkle with magic.
It was just…
Black.
So black it almost looked like a hole punched through the world, a smear of absence that my eyes kept trying, and failing, to focus on. It wobbled slightly as it fell, as if the air around it didn't quite know what to do with it, like reality itself was reluctant to touch it.
It struck the rooftop of a nearby building.
fup!
There wasn't an explosion.
No shower of stone.
No burst of flame.
The slate tiles simply… folded inward, as if someone had pressed a fingertip into the world and dimpled it. The matter twisted into the drop, compressing into a smooth, dark sphere that pulsed once, then went poof.
A perfectly round pocket in the structure remained, like a bite taken out of the rooftop—edges smooth, almost polished, the missing stone now sealed inside a floating bead of black hanging just above the impact point.
"…What…?" someone whispered, voice thin and disbelieving.
