Koby and Aries walked through the woods, their footsteps soft against the carpet of fallen leaves that painted the forest floor in shades of amber and rust. The afternoon light filtered down in golden shafts, illuminating drifting motes of pollen and dust. They chatted easily, their conversation flowing between comfortable silences and bursts of shared laughter, until they came to a familiar fork in the path—one branch winding deeper into the valley toward Rowan's cottage, the other curling east toward the quieter, more secluded clearings where Aries made her home.
"Well, I gotta head home," Aries said, lifting her hand in a lazy wave. Her fingers brushed the low-hanging branch of a young ironbark sapling as she turned.
"Yeah, same." Koby shifted his weight, suddenly aware of the lengthening shadows. "Thanks again for helping me with my aura control. The fruit thing was… actually useful. Weird, but useful."
"If I see a weakling struggling, I have to help," Aries said, her face breaking into a wide, teasing grin. "My little good deed to society for the month."
"Haha, Aries." Koby's response was flat, dripping with deliberate sarcasm, but the corner of his mouth twitched upward.
Just then, the soft pad of footsteps on packed earth drew their attention. Raya and Lyrielle emerged from the tree line, walking side by side along the path that led toward Rowan's cottage. Each carried a wicker basket, the handles looped over their arms, brimming with freshly foraged plants and herbs. Koby caught the scent of crushed mint and something earthy, like damp soil after rain.
"Koby." Raya called out as they drew closer, her voice warm with recognition.
"Hey, Raya." Koby offered a genuine smile, the tension in his shoulders easing slightly at the sight of a familiar face.
"Hi, Raya." Aries greeted, her earlier teasing demeanor softening into something more reserved.
Raya acknowledged the greeting with a small nod, her eyes flicking briefly between Aries and Koby with quiet, observant curiosity.
"I didn't know you were friends with Koby, Aries." Lyrielle said, her tone carrying a faint note of surprise. Her long fingers absently traced the delicate stem of a silvery-leafed herb protruding from her basket.
"We met in the woods, Lady Lyrielle," Aries replied, dipping her head in a small, respectful bow. "A few weeks ago. He was… lost."
"Oh, I see." Lyrielle's expression softened. She paused in her idle handling of the herbs, her attention settling fully on Aries. "How's your grandmother? I haven't seen her at the market in some time."
"She's doing better now," Aries said, her voice quiet but genuine. "The cough has eased. Thanks to your herbs. I've been meaning to thank you properly."
"That's good to hear. Tell her I'll stop by next full moon to check on her." Lyrielle smiled, a rare, gentle expression. Then, adjusting her basket, she added, "Well, I have to be on my way now. Rowan will be wanting his tea." She turned and continued along the path toward the cottage, her pace unhurried.
"Bye, guys." Aries waved at Raya and Koby, already stepping backward onto the eastward path.
"Greet granny for me!" Koby called after her, his voice carrying.
Aries glanced over her shoulder, her grin sharp and mischievous. "A greeting from you would probably give her bad luck. She's fragile!" And with that, she disappeared around a bend, swallowed by the green and gold shadows of the forest.
A brief silence settled between Koby and Raya as they fell into step behind Lyrielle. The path narrowed slightly, forcing them closer together. Raya was quiet for a long moment, her gaze fixed ahead, before she spoke.
"So," she began, her tone carefully neutral. "You and Aries?"
Koby blinked. "What?"
"Nothing." Raya's lips pressed together, but the faintest hint of a smirk tugged at the corner. "Just observing."
Koby shot her a confused, slightly defensive look, but she offered no further explanation. He shook his head and turned his attention forward, toward Lyrielle's retreating figure.
"Lady Lyrielle?" he called, quickening his pace slightly to draw alongside her. "Are you… some kind of royalty? Aries bowed to you. And the way she said your name…"
Lyrielle let out a soft, almost self-conscious laugh. "You could say that. Once, a long time ago, in a different life. But now I'm just the local healer. The only royalty around here is the deer and the oak trees."
"You've never said much about yourself," Raya observed, her voice gentle but probing. "About where you came from. Before here."
"There isn't much to say," Lyrielle replied, her smile faint, almost wistful. She adjusted the basket on her arm. "I'm a very boring person, I assure you. My history is mostly just a long list of quiet days and stubborn patients."
Koby and Raya exchanged a glance—brief, loaded with unspoken curiosity. They said nothing, but the questions lingered, unasked, between them.
In a cramped, musty room on the upper floor of a creaking inn, the air was thick with the smell of old straw, beeswax, and the faint metallic tang of unlit steel.
The room was meager in its furnishings: a narrow bed with a thin, wool-stuffed mattress, a single coarse blanket folded at its foot, and a small, scarred side table pressed against the wall. Upon the table sat a chipped ceramic cup, a heel of dark bread on a stained wooden plate, and a single tallow candle whose flame guttered and swayed with each faint draft, casting trembling shadows across the low ceiling. The only other source of light came from a tiny, grime-caked window set high in the wall—barely a slit—through which a sliver of grey sky was visible.
The door groaned open on un-oiled hinges.
The mysterious blonde man stepped inside, his broad shoulders barely clearing the frame. He moved with the practiced economy of someone accustomed to tight spaces and hostile ground. Without a word, he sat heavily on the edge of the bed, the old ropes beneath the mattress creaking in protest.
With one hand, he idly spun his greatsword in a slow, lazy circle, the massive blade catching the candlelight in brief, dangerous flashes. With the other, he worked at the laces of his boots, tugging them free and tossing the grass-stained leather into the corner.
He let out a long, low sigh—not of weariness, but of anticipation. His fingers tightened around the leather-wrapped hilt of his sword.
"Well," he murmured, his voice soft, almost intimate in the oppressive silence of the room. "Let's start the fun, shall we?"
From the darkest corner of the room—a recess so deep the candlelight could not reach it—a pair of eyes opened.
They were not human eyes. They burned with a low, steady, molten gold light, set in a face that was little more than shadow and suggestion. A voice emerged from the darkness, hoarse and dry, like stones grinding together.
"The item you requested will be here shortly. The courier crossed the Stonebridge an hour ago."
"Perfect." The man's smile widened, a flash of white teeth in the gloom. He leaned back against the thin pillow, the greatsword resting across his thighs. "Now even I'm excited."
The golden eyes watched him, unblinking.
The morning of the expedition dawned grey and cool, a thin veil of cloud diffusing the sunlight into a soft, uniform pallor. The air smelled of dew-damp earth and the sharp, resinous breath of the ancient forest that loomed before them.
Koby, Kai, James, Raya, and Axle stood in a loose line at the edge of the tree line. Before them rose the Forest of Shoggoths—a wall of colossal, sky-scraping trees whose trunks were as wide as cottages and whose canopies blotted out the sun, plunging the interior into perpetual, breathing twilight. The bark was dark and furrowed, veined with pale lichen that glowed faintly even in the daytime. No birds sang here. The only sound was the slow, rhythmic creak of ancient wood and the distant, subterranean rustle of something moving beneath the carpet of needles and decay.
Rowan stood before them, his back to the forest, his expression calm and unreadable.
"You can't be serious," Kai said, his voice flat, stripped of its usual bravado. His eyes were fixed on the colossal trees, on the palpable darkness that yawned between their trunks.
"Let's see," Rowan replied evenly, "if you have the basic knowledge that will help you advance to the next stage of your training. Theory is useful. Application is the test."
"That place is literally crawling with thousands of shoggoths," Koby said, his voice tight. He could still feel the phantom press of shadowy tendrils against his arms, the suffocating cold of their touch. "We barely escaped with our lives last time. And that was just at the edge."
"I don't think any amount of training is going to prepare us for the horses there," James added, his grip tightening on the hilt of his practice sword. "They don't just… run. They flow."
"You're not here for the shoggoths," Rowan said, his tone cutting through their protests with calm finality. He reached down and slowly, deliberately, unbuckled his sword belt from his waist, the leather sliding through the loops with a soft whisper.
The group fell silent, watching.
Rowan looked at each of them in turn—his gaze steady, assessing, unafraid.