The forest opened like a mouth would.
Ian stepped between the roots of gnarled pine-beasts and thorn-brushed undergrowth, his boots muffled by layers of damp, decaying leaves.
The sun never quite touched this place. Even at midday, it was all shadow — gray light filtered through mist and moss, tangled in hanging vines like webs spun by blind gods.
He moved soundlessly.
No blade drawn.
He didn't need to.
A Rotspawn Mite — no larger than a wolf, its flesh spongy and spotted with mold — leapt from a tree trunk with a shriek. Ian raised a hand lazily, flicked two fingers, and the thing burst mid-air — a wet pop, splattering fungal ichor across the branches.
Vermin rank.
Nothing more.
The next was a Hollow-Tusk Boar, tusks like rotted spears and red sores covering its back. It charged with a furious squeal.
Ian sidestepped, palm pressed forward, and his fingers whispered death — the creature's spine shattered with a single motion, and it collapsed mid-charge, skidding into a tree with a thud.
Predator class. Barely worth the effort.
He kept walking.
Hours passed. His coat grew wet with dew, not blood. The inventory stored his daggers, but he hadn't touched them yet.
Still, sothing in him... bristled.
The air didn't feel right.
The deeper he went, the quieter the world beca. Not peaceful—emptied. As though the trees stopped breathing even when they could.
Ian stopped by a half-rotted stone marker jutting from the soil — not natural. A manmade relic swallowed by moss. A faded symbol had been carved into its face, long eroded.
He brushed his gloved fingers across it.
Not a ward. Not a grave.
An alter?
He narrowed his eyes.
Sanctum work.
Fresh.
Further in, the trees grew thinner but twisted, their trunks warping in impossible spirals. Bark curled back like peeled skin. Ian passed a tree with sothing hanging from the branches—sothing draped in tattered white.
A banner?
No.
A robe.
He paused beneath it.
It was the remains of a Sanctum Inquisitor's mantle, shredded by claws or ti. The golden thread still clung to the collar in frayed loops, catching a flicker of ghost-light.
The robe swayed gently, though there was no wind.
Ian didn't touch it.
He simply looked at the forest beyond — and saw that the roots began to shift.
The horror began quietly.
A sound.
Sothing beneath the earth.
Not movent. Breathing.
Low. Wet. Too slow for an animal. Too fast for stone.
He spun—half-expecting an attack.
But nothing moved.
No birds. No beasts.
Only trees... watching.
He advanced with more caution now. Shadows bled across the path. Roots tangled unnaturally, forcing him to slow.
Another corpse appeared, slumped against a tree — not torn, but emptied. The man's skin sagged inward, as though everything inside had been drained. His eyes were missing. His tongue severed.
A Sanctum talisman was nailed into his chest, crudely, like a brand.
Ian crouched. Examined.
No blade marks. No beast bite.
Only signs of internal decay.
Sothing had fed on his soul, not his body.
He stood again. The air stung his throat.
Magic — thick and wrong — clung to the mist.
Then the whispers began.
At first, Ian thought it was his mory.
Old voices. Old screams.
But they moved.
Not from within, but around him.
"…burned his na…"
"…his eyes were bleeding stars…"
"…he shouldn't have co…"
Ian pivoted. The sound was nowhere and everywhere.
Shadows shifted.
He called the faint flicker of Soul Fla to his palm.
A dim light rose.
It didn't reach far.
Worse — it didn't burn right.
It flickered against the air, as if the forest hated fire.
Like it was rejecting heat. Purity.
Life.
Up ahead, the path narrowed between two massive root-pillars.
They arched like ribs from a buried god, their surface slick with sap that shimred silver under the fla.
He passed beneath.
And the forest exhaled.
It sounded like laughter.
Sothing deep.
Mocking.
Ian froze.
A presence ford behind his spine—close, but not touching.
He turned. Fast.
Nothing.
Then—
From the trees ahead—
A face.
Human.
No, not quite.
A man stood in the mist, robe tattered, mask cracked. A Sanctum Priest, by the look — but his hands hung limp, disjointed. His face bore no expression. Not hatred. Not fear.
Only emptiness.
He stepped forward.
Ian raised his palm.
"I don't want to fight," the priest said calmly.
His voice echoed too long — like he spoke from inside a cave.
"Then step aside," Ian replied.
"I can't," said the priest.
There was no emotion.
Not even defiance.
"You're not real," Ian said softly.
"You're not wrong," said the priest.
Then the body twitched.
Limbs jerked backward. His neck snapped — not broken, but reversed — his jaw now hanging behind his head as though turned inside out. And still, it smiled.
Then it scread.
But no sound ca.
Only the trees scread with it.
Leaves curled. Bark split. Roots retracted violently.
And from behind the priest's body… sothing stepped out.
It didn't have a shape.
Only holes.
Eyes. Mouths. Hands.
All where they shouldn't be.
A Sanctum-made thing.
A failed vessel.
A god they tried to bottle and broke.
Ian felt sothing pierce behind his eye. His vision blurred with flickers of symbols—Sacred Runes designed to infect thought.
He slamd his fist into the tree beside him.
Pain reset his mind.
The figure surged forward—limbs elongating, shadows twitching. It didn't move through the trees.
It moved with them.
The forest loved it.
Ian summoned Vowbreaker.
Bone-white blades appeared in hand.
He struck cleanly, once, twice—slashes of Soul Fla cutting through the air.
It scread again.
This ti with a voice like a child's.
The shadows burned.
The forest hated him again.
Good.
But the figure didn't die. It only retreated, folding back into the bark like a cancer burrowing deeper.
Ian stood still for a long mont, breathing hard.
The Soul Fla in his hand trembled.
And he knew.
The Sanctum had been here.
Whatever they summoned—whatever they failed to kill—was still alive.
Still spreading.
The forest wasn't just a nest of beasts.
It was a shrine to a forgotten mistake.
And it was waking up.
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