Tempus Gate Cold Open#

The last thing you feel is the Winter Court’s forest—needles and frost underfoot, air so cold it makes your lungs sting, the hush of snow-dampened sound.

You’re standing just inside the shimmering portal or the Hollow Threshold, the outline of the winter woods still visible behind you. Cold air spills through the opening at your back, but it’s already losing the fight. In front of you, the air is heavy with pressure and primal energy, roaring with wind that doesn’t blow past you so much as reach for you, tugging at cloaks and straps like impatient hands.

What extends out in front of you is a circular platform of black stone suspended over a boiling sea of storm cloud. Three towering storm-spires rise around the center, arranged like a triangle of dark fangs. Lightning crawls between them in snapping, impatient threads—bright enough to leave afterimages behind your eyes. The smell of ozone is so sharp it feels like a taste. Metal warms against your skin. Teeth buzz in your skull.

And in the exact heart of that triangle—ten feet above the stone—something hangs in the air. A Tempest Egg, a blessed gift from Cygnus, and heirloom of the Ornithopian royal family.

Then thunder cracks so hard it feels like someone struck the inside of your ribs with a hammer. When you look up, you see a large blue skinned humanoid hovers 10 feet above the far end of the platform. He wields a scimitar; a swirling vortex where his legs should be. Nearby you see a roiling, cloud of rage with glowing red eyes and vine like arms.