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CHAPTER 6 — The Girl Who Spoke to the World
When Aren woke, the forest was singing.
Softly. Wordlessly.
It was not music made by man or beast, but by the slow rustle of leaves, the whisper of wind, the quiet breath of the living earth. The kind of sound that didn't come from the outside world—but from the world itself remembering how to breathe.
He sat up slowly, wincing as pain flared in his arm. Dried blood marked the place where one of the red phantoms had touched him. The skin around it was pale, almost frostbitten, but alive.
Beside him, the girl slept.
The crystal's light had dimmed to a faint pulse, enough to cast her face in a soft blue glow. She looked fragile, almost unreal—skin pale as moonlight, hair silver-white where the light touched it. The mark on her neck shimmered faintly with each breath, like the rhythm of the seed itself.
Aren hesitated before whispering, "You saved my life."
The forest stirred as if it heard him.
But the girl didn't move.
He sighed and leaned back against the roots, letting the moment sink in. For the first time since arriving in this strange, cruel, beautiful place, he wasn't running.
He wasn't fighting.
He was simply existing—and the world, for once, seemed okay with that.
Then her voice came, soft and tired.
"You shouldn't talk so loudly. The forest listens."
Aren blinked. "You're awake."
She opened her eyes slowly—blue, deep and endless, with that faint glow still within. "Not completely. But enough."
There was silence between them for a while. Then he asked, "Do you have a name?"
She tilted her head, as if the question confused her. "A name…?"
She looked down at her hands. "The people who used to walk these woods called me Lirien. But that was long ago."
Aren nodded. "Lirien. Okay."
He gave a small, awkward smile. "I'm Aren. I guess we're both… out of place."
"Out of place?" she echoed, curious.
"I don't belong here," he said quietly. "One moment I was in my world. The next, I woke up in yours."
Lirien studied him for a long time, her expression unreadable. "Then perhaps that is why the seed woke. The world summoned you, Aren."
He frowned. "Everyone keeps saying that—but why? I'm not a hero."
Her lips curved faintly. "No. You're something rarer."
The air shifted.
The seed pulsed once, brightening for a heartbeat, and Aren felt it—memories not his own brushing the edge of his mind. Cities swallowed by sand. Rivers of light. Children laughing under stars that no longer shone.
"Those visions," he said quietly. "They came when I touched it. What were they?"
"The world's memory," she replied. "Before the forgetting began."
Aren's brow furrowed. "Forgetting?"
Lirien reached out, her fingers brushing the soil. "Every world breathes, Aren. It grows, learns, remembers. But this one…" Her voice softened. "This one started forgetting what it means to live. The people stopped listening. So it began to die."
Her eyes lifted to meet his. "That is why you are here."
He exhaled slowly. "To make a dying world remember how to live."
"Yes," she said simply. "Not by saving it. But by showing it."
The words hit harder than he expected.
He'd never been anyone's teacher. He'd barely known how to live his own life. And yet… maybe that was the point.
He looked down at his hands, still shaking faintly. "You really think I can do that?"
Lirien smiled faintly. "The world does."
A silence passed between them. Not empty, but full—like a pause between two breaths.
Then, from deep within the forest, a faint rumble echoed. The trees shivered. Birds—or things like them—scattered through the canopy.
Lirien's expression darkened. "They've found us."
"Who?" Aren asked, rising quickly.
"Hunters," she whispered. "Not of beasts. Of voices. They silence anything that still listens."
Aren clenched his fists. "Then we run."
She nodded weakly. "The river runs north. The current will hide us. Follow the light of the seed when it dims."
He hesitated. "What about you? You can barely stand."
"I will walk," she said, and when she rose, the roots themselves moved to support her—gently lifting her feet from the earth. "The forest remembers me. It will carry us for a while."
He stared in disbelief. "That's… cheating."
Lirien's lips curved faintly. "Survival," she corrected. "Even the world allows that."
And then they moved—through mist and light, between towering roots and whispering leaves.
Behind them, a faint red glow began to spread once more, chasing through the fog like fire feeding on air.
Aren glanced back.
"Guess the world's lessons start early," he muttered.
Lirien smiled without looking. "It always does."
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End of Chapter 6
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