The Fraying Thread - The Big Picture

The dull, red sun has set, and night has fallen, bringing with it blessed shade. You had made your way out of Wayward Refuge, the only real safe place for hundreds of miles, out into the labyrinth of red cliffs and desolate valleys. You hear the hoodoo stones long before you see them. A dreadful wailing that sounds far too much like the tortured moans of sentient creatures.
A dusty corridor in the stone cliff face leads you to a flat hilltop that is sheltered from the ever-present wind. There, in the center of the thin wall of howling stones, sits the same cloaked figure you met in the alley. They sit at the same stone table, which you now see is carved with an intricate map of some distant place you don't recognize. The figure turns their shadowed hood in your direction as you approach. The darkness within is occasionally broken by a distant mote of starlight or an ephemeral mist of color as if the night sky of an alien world lies within.
The same, strange voice echoes across the hilltop. "Welcome. We are glad you made it, though it seems... not all. No matter. The threads of fate that are woven between you are bright and strong. This will serve you in the trials to come." They gesture behind you and, glancing over your shoulder, you notice a stone chair has appeared behind each of you. "Please, sit. What I have to show you is beyond mortal kenning and can be.... difficult to experience for you limited beings."
You feel cold pressure, as if in deep water. Faraway points of light drift into your vision, slow and distant. It is impossible to tell how much time passes but the lights begin to move. Closer and faster, like rushing into a blizzard at night. They blur past you in waves until there is more light than dark. As your vision clears, you see glimmering roots and branches of an impossibly large tree spreading out before you. You fly along one shining limb but as you travel the light within dims and gutters and cracks appear in the branching forms. The farthest piece of the branch is nearly entirely dark, only small, glittering threads keep it attached to the main branch. In the void beyond, red-tinged clouds boil up and threaten to swallow the withered fruit at the end of the branch.
Then your vision goes white, you blink, and once again you are on the flat hilltop under your own stars.
"That is the best way I can show you what threatens this world. The reality of the multiverse is unknowable by mortal minds.
If the threads of this world are indeed cut, it will be overrun by demons. There must be light. The tallow tower must be lit, it is the only way to strengthen the threads. Then we can find ways to make new connections."