It was on a morning when the mist was relatively thin.
As he always did, Ian emerged from a hidden rock crevice. He drank the small amount of morning dew he had collected and prepared to continue his trek.
Suddenly, he froze.
The wind… still carried the bone-chilling cold of the mountains, but the chaotic Magic Power that saturated the air… seemed to have weakened!
It wasn't his imagination!
He closed his eyes and focused his senses. His Spiritual Power reached out like the most sensitive of tentacles.
It was true. The resistance, like moving through water, had lessened!
He opened his eyes and looked around. There were fewer of the twisted, gnarled trees. In their place stood tree species that, while still strange, were at least passably normal.
The moss on the ground, the kind that could spring to life at any moment, was also gone. Only ordinary, slick rocks and sparse clumps of grass remained.
