The jungle led him there.
Not with signs or paths, but wiht silence so deep it swallowed even the sound of his breath.
Aryasa moved carefully, the kris at his side, the mark of the child and tied to his back. The river stone pulsed in his palm, guiding him like a compass of memory.
He had not told Mangku Gede where he was going. He wan'st sure he knew himself. Only that something was callong low, steady, ancient.
The trees parted.
And there it was.
A field of bones.
They jutted from the earth like roots turned out white, weathered, some carved with symbols, others wrapped in fadded cloth. Skulls rested atop stone altars. Masks hung from branches, swaying in a wind that did not touch the leaves.
Aryasa stepped into the orchard.
The air changed.
it was not cold. it was not warm. it was still.
He knelt beside one of the altars. A mask stared back at him cracked, hollow eyed, its mouth frozen in a silent scream.
He reached out.
The moment hos fingers brushed the bone, the world shifted.
He stood in a circle of guardians.
They wore robes of ash and gold. Their faces were hidden behind masks some fierce, some serene, some broken. In the center stood a woman.
Not Rangda.
Not yet.
She was younger. Her mask was plain. Her hands trembled.
"We cannot hold the veil alone," she said. "We must bind it to memory."
The others hesitated.
"If we do this," one said, "we become the veil."
"No," she replied. "We become its echo."
They raised their kris blades.
They cut their palms.
They bled into the earth.
And the orchard was born.
Aryasa gasped.
The vision faded.
He was back among the bones.
But now he understood.
This was not a graveyard.
It was a covenant.
A place where guardians had bound their memories to the land, so the veil would remember even when the world forgot.
He stood.
The wind rose.
And from the trees, a voice whispered.
"You carry the mark. But do you carry the burden?"
Aryasa turned.
A figure stepped from the shadows—tall, robed in black and red, its mask carved from obsidian.
"The veil is bleeding. The orchard is waking. And the forgotten are stirring."
Aryasa gripped the kris. "Who are you?"
"I am the one who remembers what should have been buried."
The figure raised a hand.
The bones trembled.
The masks screamed.
And the orchard came alive.
Spirits surged from the earth twisted, broken, half formed. Echoes of guardians who had fallen, corrupted by time and silence.
Aryasa stood his ground.
He closed his eyes.
He listened.
Not to the screams.
But to the rhythm.
The pulse of the mask.
The breath of the veil.
The memory of the child.
He moved.
The kris sang.
Light met shadow.
Not to destroy.
But to remind.
Each strike was a name remembered.
Each step, a vow renewed.
Each breath, a bridge between what was and what must be.
When the last spirit faded, the orchard fell silent once more.
The figure was gone.
But in its place stood a single mask—new, unbroken, carved from dark wood and etched with gold.
Aryasa picked it up.
It was warm.
It was waiting.
He placed it beside the others.
And the orchard whispered:
"You are not the last. You are the next."