The cavern had grown quiet in the aftermath, the kind of stillness that followed devastation—a heavy, suffocating silence that settled into the cracks of stone and soul alike, as if the cave itself held its breath in anticipation of what was to come.
Chrome hung from the ceiling like a grotesque ornament, his arms stretched above him by glowing chains of golden light that pulsed with Loki's lingering will—runes etched into the very air binding him tighter than any physical rope ever could. His once-pristine armor was now nothing more than scorched leather and bloodstained tatters, torn and blackened by the fire he once wielded so arrogantly. His body trembled, not from fear—he had long since mastered fear—but from exhaustion and pain, drawn out like the slow drip of a blade pulled deliberately across the skin.
