The glade had not yet recovered from the collision of forces. Ether hung suspended in the air like drifting shards of pale frost, each particle trembling with the lingering resonance of Aeryn's unleashed ability. The forest canopy swayed with a hesitance that felt almost sentient, as if the ancient trees themselves questioned whether the quiet that followed was truly safety or merely the eye of another unseen storm.
Aeryn stood at the center, his breathing steady but his pulse sharpened. His limbs were uninjured, yet his mind hummed with a pressure like distant bells ringing within the inner hollow of his skull. It wasn't pain—just a weight. A reminder that the System's "calibration" still clung to him like a coiled serpent of invisible sigils.
Across from him, Thalanor gripped his own forearm as he studied Aeryn with an expression torn between awe and unease. The Highborne elf's silver eyes, normally composed and aloof, were etched with thin cracks of uncertainty.
"You hid this power well," Thalanor murmured, his voice softened but warier than before. "Or perhaps you hid it even from yourself."
Aeryn didn't respond immediately. He glanced toward the trees—toward the faint smears of shadow left behind by whatever entity had tried to breach the clearing alongside the illusionary serpent. When he spoke, his tone was calm.
"It wasn't my power. Not entirely."
Thalanor raised a brow. "Then whose?"
Aeryn shook his head slightly. "I don't know yet."
Sierra watched silently from the side, her bow still strung though not drawn. Her amethyst eyes searched Aeryn's face as if attempting to decipher whether the calm expression he wore was genuine or carefully chosen.
The System interface hovered faintly in Aeryn's peripheral vision. He willed it open. The text rippled into existence, still lined with a faint flicker of instability.
[System State: Stabilizing — 39%]
[Warning: Host synchronization incomplete.]
[Warning: Unknown Thread detected.]
The phrase "Unknown Thread" had appeared only once before—in the nightmare-dream before his awakening in the System's realm. Back then, it had been a single line of unreadable script stitched into a starless void. Now, it pulsed with a soft red glow.
Not taunting. Not threatening. Calling.
Aeryn dismissed it for now.
"We should move," he said. "If something sent that serpent, it won't be the last thing hunting me."
"Hunting us," Sierra corrected softly.
Thalanor nodded as though embarrassed by the sincerity of the claim. "Yes… all of us. Whatever this anomaly is, it clearly does not wish to remain hidden now."
They began to walk, though there was no path. The forest yielded before Aeryn with a courtesy that felt unnatural—branches tilting subtly away from him, roots shifting just enough to clear his footing. It wasn't magic he cast; it was as if the Ether around him had gained a faint awareness of his presence.
Thalanor noticed. "The forest responds to you."
Aeryn shook his head. "No… something within it recognizes me."
"Which is not any less concerning," Thalanor muttered.
Sierra stepped closer, lowering her voice. "Aeryn… you weren't surprised when the serpent turned to smoke. Did you recognize the technique?"
Aeryn answered carefully. "Not the technique, but the intent. Its attack wasn't meant to kill us. It was searching… testing. Measuring."
Sierra's brows tightened. "Measuring what?"
Aeryn touched his chest lightly. "My resistance to certain kinds of interference."
The wind shifted then—slowly, deliberately—carrying with it a faint murmur like dozens of whispers layered together. None were words. Just sound. Ancient sound. The language of trees older than nations, older than kingdoms, older than even the star-watching temples the elves once tended.
Aeryn's hearing sharpened instinctively. He halted.
Thalanor frowned. "What is it?"
Aeryn raised a hand for silence.
The whisper grew clearer.
Not random. Not chaotic. A pattern.
A warning.
He turned toward the densest part of the forest. The shadows there trembled—not with malice, but with the shifting of something enormous moving far beyond their reach. A force submerged beneath layers of unseen space.
"Astral echoes," Aeryn breathed.
Thalanor stiffened. "Impossible. They cannot manifest without a divine medium. The last divine medium died centuries ago. The Echo Courts shattered. That knowledge is—"
"Not lost," Aeryn said quietly. "Merely asleep."
Sierra looked between them. "What does that mean? What are 'Astral echoes'?"
Thalanor hesitated before giving her the truth. "They are memory-imprints of ancient beings. Not souls. Not illusions. The leftover consciousness of astral entities that once interacted with this realm before the Veil was sealed. They are dangerous, Sierra. Unstable. Even proximity to them can distort one's ether pathways."
"And yet," Sierra said, "Aeryn stands near them like they're nothing."
Aeryn didn't deny it.
The whispering intensified, and a gust of etheric wind rippled through the clearing, causing leaves to swirl in spiraling orbits. Not randomly—perfect orbits, forming geometric patterns within the air.
A sigil.
Aeryn recognized it instantly.
It was the same symbol carved into the throne-like stone he had seen inside the System's realm. The one he had touched. The one that had glowed.
The sigil etched itself in midair, the swirling leaves holding the shape for only a heartbeat before scattering like ash. When the remnants fell, the ground beneath them vibrated. Thalanor instinctively summoned a blade of silver ether. Sierra prepared her bow.
Aeryn did neither.
Because the whispering had changed into a voice.
Not external.
Internal.
Thread-linked.
"Aeryn Vaelorian."
The voice was not a voice. It was a resonance that vibrated directly through the nerves behind his eyes. Familiar, yet distant. Like hearing a memory of a memory.
This time, he answered aloud.
"What are you?"
Thalanor and Sierra exchanged alarmed glances, but Aeryn ignored them.
The resonance deepened.
"I am the remaining fragment. I am the thread severed yet unbroken. I am the cadence you have forgotten."
Aeryn felt his breath tighten—not from fear, but from recognition he didn't know he possessed.
"Why appear now?" he asked.
"Because the anomaly moved," the voice said. "Because the one who observes has begun to search for you again."
"Who?"
Silence.
Then—
"The Veil is thinning."
A chill spidered across Aeryn's skin.
Before he could question further, the voice faded. Not abruptly—like a candle being slowly pinched shut.
Thalanor exhaled sharply. "Your aura convulsed. What did you hear?"
Aeryn didn't answer immediately. He sifted through the imprint of the voice, through the way it had stirred something in the base of his consciousness. It didn't feel hostile. But it wasn't gentle either. It was simply… inevitable. A force tied to his existence.
"The forest warned me," Aeryn finally said. "Something is moving beyond the Veil."
Sierra's gaze darkened. "The same 'something' that sent the serpent?"
"No," Aeryn said. "Something far older than that."
Thalanor stepped forward. "Then we must reach Silvaranth sooner than planned."
Aeryn nodded. "Agreed."
They traveled deeper into the woods, the air thick with unsettled ether. Hours passed, though none of them marked time audibly. The world around them had become unnervingly still. Even wildlife seemed to withdraw from the path ahead.
Aeryn caught faint hints of resistance from the roots beneath the soil—as if the forest itself struggled to choose between aiding or hindering their progress.
But he continued forward, undeterred.
Sierra kept close to him, though she did not speak. Thalanor observed Aeryn's posture, his breathing, the synchronization of ether around him—all signs that Aeryn's pathways had changed subtly after the serpent encounter and the astral whispering.
Eventually, the forest began to thin, and the land opened into a cliff overlooking a sprawling expanse. A silver river coiled like a luminous thread across the landscape, splitting into tributaries before merging again like the veins of an enormous leaf.
Sierra gasped softly. "The Crescent Lowlands…"
Thalanor nodded. "We made better time than—"
His words cut short.
Because Aeryn had stopped walking.
His eyes were locked on something the others hadn't noticed yet: a faint shimmer hovering above the farthest bend of the river. Not bright. Not obvious. It was a distortion—a ripple in the air, like heat haze but wrong. Completely wrong. It pulsed once every few seconds, creating rings of warped light.
Sierra followed his gaze and whispered, "What is that?"
Thalanor answered first. "A breach attempt."
Aeryn stepped closer to the cliff edge. "From the inside… or the outside?"
"Outside," Thalanor said grimly. "Nothing on this side generates distortions that wide."
Aeryn's pulse sharpened. He could feel the System react too, projecting information without him even willing it.
[Unidentified Distortion Detected]
[Origin: Beyond-Veil Interference]
[Classification: High-Dimensional Echo]
[Warning: Host proximity recommended but hazardous.]
The wording startled him.
Recommended?
"Why proximity?" Aeryn murmured.
The System answered immediately.
[Thread Recognition Required.]
Aeryn felt the world tilt a fraction.
Thread.
That word again.
The voice in the forest.
The sigil.
The throne inside the System.
The ancient imprint that whispered his name.
It all connected, forming a pattern. A pattern he did not yet understand, but one the System clearly expected him to follow.
He inhaled slowly.
"I'm going to investigate," he said.
Sierra's head whipped toward him. "Aeryn—absolutely not, that distortion could tear your pathways apart—"
"It won't," he assured gently. "If it wanted to harm me, it wouldn't be calling me toward it."
Thalanor crossed his arms, his jaw tight. "You're assuming intent from an entity beyond understanding."
"No," Aeryn said. "I'm reading it."
The wind shifted—another deliberate gust. The distortion pulsed again, stronger this time, as if acknowledging his decision.
Sierra stepped in front of him, gripping his forearm. "If you go, we go."
Aeryn held her gaze. "It might respond only to me."
"Then we stay close," she said firmly.
Thalanor sighed, resigned. "Your recklessness is becoming concerning."
Aeryn shook his head. "Not recklessness. Necessity."
They descended from the cliff path, moving toward the river bend as the shimmer grew more defined. The closer they got, the more the air vibrated—softly at first, then steadily, like a drumbeat from another plane.
Aeryn felt it sync with the steady rhythm behind his eyes.
The Thread.
It called again.
But this time, more clearly.
"Aeryn… return."
He halted.
Sierra froze beside him. "What is it?"
Aeryn's voice was quiet. "It spoke again."
Thalanor's expression tightened. "And what did it say?"
Aeryn's eyes narrowed as he stared at the distortion.
"That I should return."
"Return where?" Sierra whispered.
Aeryn exhaled, slow and controlled.
"That," he said, "is what I intend to find out."
The distortion pulsed once more.
And this time, it answered him back with a single word that neither Thalanor nor Sierra heard.
A word that froze him.
"Home."
And the ground beneath their feet trembled.
The distortion widened.
And something stepped through.