I jolted awake, heart hammering painfully against my ribs, panic clawing at my throat. Darkness pressed heavily around me too deep, too silent. The bed beneath me felt wrong; too cold, too hard, as though sculpted from polished stone rather than comforting layers of silk and cotton. I reached out instinctively, searching for the familiar shape of Smaug or even the comforting presence of Mara and Elira hovering nearby.
Nothing.
No dragon. No servants. No school.
Only emptiness, swallowing the echoes of my shallow breaths.
[Relax, drama queen. You're not dead. Yet.]
I drew in a sharp breath, the familiar sarcastic tone of my system cutting neatly through my mounting dread. "Where am I?"
[A dimensional training space, tailored specifically for you because you're clearly too dangerous to let roam free.]
