Meanwhile, the passengers themselves had far more immediate concerns than the reputation they had acquired among the crew. As the sun began to sink towards the horizon, Bertho looked towards Arin with growing interest, having spent much of the journey thinking about the technique Karl had used to bypass his grandson's senses. The novelty of travelling along the Rhine had worn off considerably, and the passing scenery was no longer enough to keep everyone entertained. With nothing particularly exciting happening aboard the ship, Bertho decided that investigating the mystery might be a more productive way to spend the remaining hours.
"Arin, have you figured out how to get around Grandpa Karl's stealth yet?" Bertho asked, sounding genuinely interested in whether his cousin had made any progress. He knew Arin had been thinking about the problem since learning how Karl had managed to approach him without being detected. Given Arin's habit of analysing unusual abilities and looking for ways to improve his own skills, Bertho had expected him to come up with at least a preliminary theory by now. However, the journey had provided little opportunity for practical testing, and the answer he received was less encouraging than he had hoped.
"No, I haven't figured anything out yet," Arin replied with a sigh. "I'll need to see Grandpa and discuss his technique with him, which is annoying because now I want to go home and talk about it while also checking on the state of the forest." He leaned back slightly, frustrated by the fact that the two things he wanted to investigate were both waiting for him at their destination. Karl's technique was an interesting problem in its own right, but the condition of their ancestral forest mattered far more than satisfying his curiosity. Unfortunately, he would have to wait until they arrived before he could make meaningful progress on either matter.
The ship continued moving upriver, carried along by the wind that had filled its sails after the rowers were given an opportunity to rest. It was a Viking-style longship that had been optimised for speed beyond the usual design, with its current configuration intended primarily for river travel rather than long ocean voyages. The combination of rowing and sailing allowed the vessel to maintain a respectable pace when conditions were favourable, although the lack of anything to do still made the journey feel longer than it actually was. Everyone aboard wanted to reach their destination quickly, partly because they had work waiting for them and partly because sitting on a ship while the landscape slowly passed by was becoming increasingly tedious.
"Nothing will have happened to the forest that we can't fix, you know," Lilian remarked, tilting her head as she considered Arin's concern. "It's enormous, and it has only grown since the expansion of the Earth." From her perspective, the Black Forest was too vast for every small disturbance to become a serious problem, especially given how much additional territory and vegetation had appeared after the world changed. She understood that the Sonnenbergs took their responsibilities seriously, but she did not see why Arin seemed so convinced that something terrible would be waiting for them. Surely, whatever they discovered could be addressed once they had identified the problem.
"Ah, that's where you're wrong," Arin answered, shaking his head. "Something will have happened, and it's something all of you will feel soon enough, now that you can sense the forest in the same way I can." His expression grew more serious as he tried to explain something that he had struggled to put into words even when speaking with people who shared his connection to nature. The forest was not simply a collection of individual trees, plants, and animals that happened to occupy the same territory. To someone capable of sensing it properly, it felt like a single, interconnected entity whose parts were connected in ways that ordinary people could barely begin to understand.
"It's alive, and it's real," Arin continued, his voice becoming quieter as he searched for the right way to describe the experience. "It's beautiful, and it has opinions, even if it doesn't seem to possess thoughts in the same way we do." He explained that the forest could respond to its surroundings through emotions and reactions that were difficult to interpret using ordinary human logic. Its feelings were not necessarily organised into clear decisions or deliberate plans, but that did not make them any less significant. If something disturbed the forest badly enough to upset it, the consequences could extend far beyond the immediate area where the disturbance had occurred.
Arin shivered slightly as he considered the possibility, remembering that the forest's reactions were not always gentle. "If we make it angry, then we could be in for a rough week," he warned them, his expression conveying more concern than his words alone could explain. He was not talking about a few irritated animals or a patch of damaged vegetation that needed to recover naturally. He meant the entire forest reacting to a disturbance, with its wildlife, terrain, and interconnected natural systems becoming far less accommodating to the people moving through it.
"I think I understand what you mean," Tom said, his expression gradually turning horrified as a memory came back to him. "The Crimson Forest was really happy on the day you were caught. You could practically feel it in the air, so are you telling me that a forest can become even scarier than that?" He remembered the unusual atmosphere that had surrounded the Crimson Forest and how clearly its mood had seemed to affect the environment. At the time, the experience had been strange enough to leave an impression on him, but the thought that the opposite reaction might be even more dangerous made him reconsider just how much he understood about nature.
"Wait, what's wrong with the forest?" Lilian interrupted, looking between them with genuine confusion. "Nobody has updated me on the forest itself." She had been selected for her stealth expertise and had focused much of her attention on the practical requirements of their mission, particularly the possibility that someone had disturbed the wildlife by changing the road. Although she knew the Black Forest had a dangerous reputation, nobody had explained that its condition might be connected to something resembling an emotional response. The discussion had moved far beyond the sort of routine inspection she had expected, leaving her unsure whether she had missed an important report.
"The forest itself is fine," Arin assured her, though his serious expression did little to make the reassurance comforting. "In fact, it will probably be one of the most beautiful places you have ever visited." He wanted her to understand that his concern did not mean the Black Forest was somehow corrupted or dying. Its natural beauty was part of what made it so remarkable, and the forest had continued to thrive despite the enormous changes brought about by the expansion of the Earth. The problem was that its beauty existed alongside dangers that visitors could easily underestimate if they assumed the environment would behave like an ordinary woodland.
"At the same time, it lives up to its name," Arin continued, his tone becoming more sombre. "Once you are beneath its canopy, there is almost no sunlight, and the forest is teeming with wildlife that is no longer particularly afraid of humans." The dense growth made it difficult to see far ahead, while the animals had grown accustomed to a world in which people were no longer necessarily the most dangerous creatures around. The terrain was also treacherous, with hidden drops, unstable ground, and other natural pitfalls scattered throughout the forest. Even experienced travellers could find themselves in serious trouble if they moved carelessly or assumed that the path ahead was safe.
"And that is with the forest being as calm as it can be," Arin finished, looking at the others with absolute seriousness. "If it becomes angry, then may the gods help the fool who upset it, because that fool will have a great deal of trouble trying to appease it." The warning silenced the group for a moment as they considered what it might mean to travel through an environment that could respond to disturbances on such a large scale. They were heading towards the Black Forest to inspect a mine and the road leading to it, but the mission suddenly seemed considerably more complicated than a routine scouting expedition. If someone had interfered with the forest and provoked a reaction, they might discover that the greatest danger waiting for them was not the person responsible, but the forest itself.