I think trapping Niran in a hellish limbo is promising. I personally would be entertained by an exploration of this "timeless place between realities". You could do this symbolically or as a kind of magical journey.
I completely agree @agmoore thank you for the feedback. I had it in the back of my mind for the beginning to the next story being a sort of mishmash of symbolic imagery from Niran's past to fill out his character a little, kind of like Mr Xioin is fucking with him psychically before moving on to the next scene (I don't want to post any spoilers).
Have you ever thought of going into the book market? I know it's hard to make money, but you never know. You have a knack for being both thoughtful and popular. Most people have to abandon one for the other.