The next morning was heavy.
Not cold.Not warm.Just… heavy.As if the forest had held its breath all night.
Ren walked a few steps ahead, staff in hand, eyes fixed on the ground.Something was calling him—not as directly as the fragment,not as violently as the colossus—but calling nonetheless.
Lyra moved beside him.Borin and Draven followed behind, each wrapped in an uneasy, uncomfortable silence.
No one had slept well.But Ren…
Ren hadn't slept at all.
"The forest feels… empty," Borin muttered.
"Not empty," Ren corrected, without looking back."It's hiding."
It was true.
No animals.No sounds.No movement.
As if the entire forest was fleeing from a single point—and that point was pulling Ren like a dark beacon.
Draven walked closer, nervous.
"We're really gonna follow this thing?""If I don't follow," Ren said quietly,"it will find me instead."
Draven shivered."That's the worst sentence you've ever said."
They walked for ten minutes.Then three more.Then—
Ren stopped abruptly.
"Here."
Lyra looked around, confused.
"Here… what?"
Ren knelt and touched the soil.
The sensation hit instantly.A cold dryness, lifeless, completely out of place on the warm forest floor.
It felt like touching dead stone.
He brushed away some dirt with the staff.
And saw it.
A circle.
A perfect circle of ash-gray earth, cracked in thin, branching lines—as if the ground had been burned from the inside out.
Draven's eyes widened.
"What IS that?!""Magic?" Borin guessed.
Ren shook his head.
"Not magic."He cleared more soil."It's aura."
Lyra knelt beside him.
"Aura of what?"
Ren's gaze hardened.
"Cultivator."
He looked up at them.
"The same one who freed the colossus."
Silence fell immediately.
A cold, metallic silence.
Borin stepped closer and studied the mark."When did he leave this here?"
Ren touched the center of the circle.
It was cold as snow—but dry as ash.
"Right before the creature surfaced."His voice dropped."He was here."
Lyra touched the outer edge of the mark.Her skin prickled instantly.
"This aura… it doesn't feel natural."
Ren nodded.
"It isn't."
Draven stepped back.
"Ren… this smells like the colossus dust."
Ren gripped his staff.
"It has the same scent…"He lifted his eyes."…and the same origin."
Lyra's breath caught.
"You think that cultivator… absorbed energy from the colossus?"
Ren didn't respond right away.
Because the answer burned on the tip of his mind—and it was worse than any of them wanted to hear.
He pressed deeper into the center of the circle.
There it was.A faint echo.A whisper.Almost a breath.
But not human.Not creature.
Something between.
"This was left," Ren said quietly,"when he used a technique."
Lyra leaned forward.
"What kind of technique?"
Ren lifted his head.
"A binding technique."His voice turned heavy."He was listening to the colossus."
A beat.
"And the colossus was listening to him."
Draven's face turned ghost white.
"So they're… allies?"
Ren shook his head.
"No.He doesn't control the colossus."He paused."But the colossus recognizes him."
Borin clenched the axe handle.
"So this cultivator not only freed it…he spoke to that thing?"
Ren nodded.
Lyra steadied her breath.
"Ren… do you feel anything else here?"
Ren closed his eyes.
Yes.Something else.Something beneath the circle.Something not root.Not creature.Small, but powerful.
He brushed away more earth.
And found it.
A shard of black stone—thin as glass, broken unevenly.When Ren touched it, it pulsed.
Just once.
Then faded.
Draven stumbled backward.
"WHAT—what WAS that?!""A fragment," Ren murmured."A piece of a larger stone."
Lyra reached toward it, but hesitated.
"Does it belong to the circle?"
"No," Ren said."It belongs to the cultivator."
Borin frowned deeply.
"So he dropped it?"
Ren shook his head.
"He didn't drop it."He lifted the shard between two fingers."He left it."
Silence.
Lyra swallowed hard.
"For who?"
Ren closed his hand around the shard.It pulsed faintly—like a dead heart trying to beat.
"For me."
His voice was soft.But everyone heard it.
And everyone understood.
The cultivator knew Ren would come.Wanted Ren to see this.Wanted him to find it.
Borin stepped forward.
"Ren… is this a warning?"
Ren shook his head slowly.
"No."
He opened his hand, revealing the shard.
"It's an invitation."
The forest grew even quieter.
Behind them, the White Spirit Flower flickered.Inside the cabin, the fragment vibrated faintly—like it recognized the shard.
Ren lifted the stone into the weak sunlight filtering between the trees.
A symbol was scratched into the center of the shard.
Simple.Crude.Almost like a scar cut into obsidian.
A vertical slash crossed by a diagonal one—like an eye sealed shut by a wound.
Draven felt sick.
"That… that's his symbol?"
Ren inhaled slowly.
"No."
He turned the shard so everyone could see.
And his voice dropped, heavy as stone:
"That is his name."