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The silence that followed the Tree Grave lingered too long to feel natural. Even the insects had gone still.
Only the soft drag of moisture through roots disturbed it, like the forest itself breathing slow through buried lungs.
Arion crouched until the tremor in his arms subsided. The world ahead shimmered pale blue—light spilling through fog in long, wavering shafts. The air carried a faint metallic tang that stuck to the back of his throat.
He pulled out the journal. The next page had swollen from damp, but the writing held.
'You will slowly transition into the Blue Forest of Mist.'
'Do not linger by the fungus on the trees.'
'Avoid the heavy mist. It causes—'
Step… crack… step…
A sound cut through the air. Not loud, but sharp, like footsteps cracking on glass.
He frowned, glancing up—nothing but blue fog curling through the fungus-lit trees.
He looked back down.
Except, the words had changed.
'A̵v̴o̶i̵d̴ ̸t̵h̸e̵ ̶h̵e̴a̴v̸y̶ ̵—
'Don't. Avoid. The. Mist.'
'I͝t͞ ͜B͝r͞I͝n͜G͝s͞ ͜H͝a͞P͝P͞i͝N͞e͞S͝S͞.'
'LET.̷ ̵I̷T̸.̷ ̵E̸M̵B̷R̸A̷C̵E̷.̶ YOU.̵'
The ink bled outward, letters sliding and reforming in jerking strokes, they were still wet, like someone had just written it.
He stared, a cold tingle rushing down his spine.
"Right," he whispered, voice flat. "That's not odd at all."
He turned the page. Blank—then another line formed, shaky and uneven:
'THEY R͝E͝M͝E͝M͝B͞E͝R͞R͞R͞.͝'
The forest pulsed in time with the words.
Something moved beyond the fog.
A shape.
Then a voice.
"Arion."
His name carried like vibration rather than sound, rippling the mist in rings.
He spun toward it. A figure stood half-visible ahead, barely a few feet off the ground—grey silhouette, hands at its sides, head bowed.
He took one step forward before instinct stopped him.
"That's… impossible."
The outline tilted its head.
"-...gone," he said louder.
"You're gone."
Stillness.
"But. I'm. ͝h͞e͝e͞e͜r͞e͜…͜'͞
The figure said in an unhuman-like way as if it was imitating human speech, twitching as it spoke.
"Why d̶i̴d̷n̶'̵t̸ you find M̵E̷?̶ I was… in so much.––̶P̷A̷I̷N̶N̶.̵N̶.̵".̵"
No… I tried, I spent weeks. I…–
"Stop fucking with me– you're not real!"
Like a joke gone too far, he'd had enough, he snapped his wrist, and ice bloomed– sudden, explosive. A flower of ice shot out where the figure had stood.
A sliver of activity spun in his peripheral vision to his right causing him to react. Details folding into place, a woman's frame, pale hair streaked with light, eyes hollow and shining.
His chest seized. "Mum?"
The figure smiled with no warmth. "W̸͝͞hy̵͞-͢ why̵͞-͢w̸͞h̷͢͞y̵͞ ͢͞-w̸͞hy did you l͝e͜a͞v͝e͞ ͜m͝e͞e͜e͞?͜"
The speech played like a broken record, not even coming directly from the figure, like it was resonating from the mist around it.
Behind him, another voice joined, fainter, higher. Then another, and another, swelling until dozens whispered from every angle.
YOU. LEFT.
Y̵O̸U̶.̶ ̸F̴O̵R̸G̵O̶T̷T̸E̴N̸.̶
G̵A̶I̸N̷.̸ FREEDOM.
LEFT. ONLY. P̵A̴I̷N̶.̸
SUFFERING.
D͝A͞M͞N͝A͞T͝I͞O͝N͞.͞
BETRAYED.
HEARTLESS.
MURDERER.
The voices surrounded him, each word struck like a physical blow, dull and heavy, beating against his skull. Each voice overlapped the next until the sound became pressure. It continued to resonate through the mist.
The forest darkened; the air thickened until it pressed on his eardrums.
He staggered back, palms over his ears. "STOP!"
No matter where he tried to look, he'd always see figures in the blue fog, growing as time passed, increasing the maddening whispers. He threw his head down and shut his eyes.
The voices only multiplied, weaving into a single tone that hammered through bone.
His mother's voice rose above them—clear, accusing.
"You. Let. Us. ̶D̵I̴E̶–
D̵I̴E̶.̵.͞'͞
.͞'͞D̷͜͞I̸͢͞E̵͜͞.
D͝I͞E͝EEE.͞'͞
White spots burst behind his eyes. Vitalis flared instinctively, crawling under his skin like fire seeking escape.
Temperature plummeted. Heat vanished.
Tsk. Crack-CRACK!
He roared. Raw. Unfiltered emotions.
BOOM!-
Immediately, the ground erupted. Ice burst outward in a perfect circle, cracking through roots and fog alike. The sound became frozen, only for a moment.
The mist retreated slightly but only to come back again, gliding heavily to the ground.
…
When the burst of ice cleared, only drifting shards remained. The voices were gone. His hands shook, fingers trembled. For a heartbeat, he thought he'd gone deaf.
Sound was swallowed up by the forest, like a vacuum condensed into vapour.
Tss.
The mist hung motionless.
It was only when the cracking began that white noise filled his hearing. Then his heartbeat replaced it, followed by his loud deep breaths.
Arion dropped to one knee, chest heaving, condensation beading on his lashes, the previous spores now turned into ice crystals, rained down in a spiral around him.
Frost steamed from his hands. The journal lay face-down nearby, half-frozen to the soil.
He pried it loose. The ink on the page had warped again, lines bleeding into new sentences as if written by unseen hands.
'YOU WERE ALONE.'
'YOU LEFT THEM.'
'BUT.'
'YOU CAN STAY HERE.'
'THEY CAN BE ONE WITH YOU'
He shut it hard, jaw clenched until his teeth ached.
The quiet returned—thin, stable. He could hear his own pulse echoing in his ears like distant machinery cooling down. It was strangely peaceful.
He leaned against the nearest trunk. The bark was slick, the cold seeping straight through to muscle. His voice came hoarse:
"It's impossible… they're gone."
"But… I'm here."
His mind raced to thoughts of hope, even if it was a slither.
What if…
He caught himself mid-thought.
No—Don't fall for this bullshit
For a moment, there was nothing. Then the forest creaked and moaned like it was laughing.
The mist finally thinned out, Arion couldn't tell how long went by.
He hesitated but eventually opened the journal again, forcing the page back to where he'd previously started.
The script returned to the original handwriting, calm and even:
'Avoid the heavy mist.'
'It causes hallucinations.'
'Their sins. Death. Love. Trauma.'
'Don't linger, otherwise it will cause madness.'
Lines etched themselves beneath, gouged and desperate:
'DON'T LET IT GET HOLD OF YOU.'
'YOU WON'T BE ABLE TO LEAVE.'
His grip tightened, nearly ripping the pages from the spine.
"FUCK!"
The shout cracked through the trees, scattering condensation like dust.
He hurled the book at the ground. "Then you should've led with that!"
"Fucking idiot!" Cursing the journal's owner.
The sound went nowhere, swallowed by the fog.
He slumped back against the trunk, breath ragged from anger more than fear.
The canopy above glowed faintly blue, spores drifting like falling dust.
For the first time since entering this world, he felt small—human, not exceptional, just a creature inside a vast mechanism that didn't care if he understood it.
The forest went mute, patient and total.
After a long while, he pushed himself upright, bent down to retrieve the journal, and brushed the dirt and frost from its cover. As he lowered the journal the remnants of broken ice were mirroring his own reflection back at him in warped fragments, bloodshot eyes, skin colourless, half a grin twisted by exhaustion.
"Definitely a hallucination… I'm way better looking," he muttered.
He flipped to the earlier notes, searching for rational ground.
Half aloud, half to himself, he began listing possibilities.
Fungal neurotoxins—Spore-based.
Probably airborne… the mist?
Reacts with Vitalis… maybe
The sound of his own analysis finally grounded him.
"Fungus-induced trance state," he continued. "Keeps prey docile—feeds on metabolic slowdown, maybe converts Vitalis into nutrition, or just the person itself."
He wiped condensation from the page with his sleeve. "It was fungus messing with your brain, dumbass."
His tone shifted, quiet now, almost conversational. "There's nothing in this reality that's going to bring them back."
The words landed heavy, final.
He stood in the dim light until the ache behind his eyes dulled, then began to walk.
The mist thinned in patches. Through the fading blue he caught glimpses of stone blocks sunk into earth, lines carved with unreadable runes. The ground solidified underfoot.
He stopped once—turned slightly, not all the way back.
Far behind, two figures stood in the residual haze of mist. Too distant for detail. Only silhouettes. Watching.
Neither moved.
He blinked; they dissolved into the colour.
The fog folded over the space they'd occupied, sealing it clean.
He adjusted his stance, forced his shoulders straight, and set off toward the faint outline of a toppled obelisk ahead—its cracked, fallen point aimed deeper into the forest where the ruins waited.
The hum of the Blue Forest faded into a silence that wasn't empty, only waiting.
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