The moment they left the clearing, they felt it.
The world was different at night.
Not just darker — stranger.
Alive in a way it hadn't been hours ago.
The air carried a faint hum, like the forest itself was breathing.
Shapes moved between trees, slow and deliberate, their forms half-shrouded in mist and flickering bioluminescence.
Eyes glinted from the underbrush — some yellow, some pale green, others glowing blue in brief flashes before vanishing again.
None came close.
But all of them watched.
Talo slowed his pace, staff loose in hand."Did it feel this alive earlier?" he asked under his breath.
Rasha didn't answer right away. Her eyes were scanning the dark, her hand resting near her blades."No," she said finally. "This… is something else."
Talo glanced sideways."It's like a whole new world after dark."
She nodded, gaze tracking the slow movement of something large and antlered just beyond the trees. Its antlers pulsed faintly with green light, vanishing behind a curtain of fog.
"Most of the animals must be nocturnal," she murmured. "What we saw earlier… that was just the surface."
Talo exhaled through his nose, his grip tightening slightly."So daylight's not safer — just emptier."
Rasha's voice was quiet."Makes you wonder what's watching us now that didn't show its face before."
A sharp flutter cut through the air above them — too fast to place.
Both of them froze, heads tilting skyward just in time to catch the silhouette of a bird gliding overhead. Its wings moved in slow, graceful strokes, feathered in layers that shimmered faintly beneath the moons' pale light.
Then — a flash.
Lightning arced around its wings, silent and silver, threading the sky. It didn't come from above.
It came from it.
The bird tucked its wings and dove — a streak of light tearing down into the treetops.
No sound. No cry. Just a pulse of energy.
Seconds later, it rose again — wings wide. In its talons hung a limp creature — furred, long-tailed, still twitching. The lightning had vanished, but the faintest shimmer of blue lingered along its feathers as it vanished into the clouds.
Talo stared, lips parted."That was…"
"Lightning," Rasha whispered. "It flew with lightning."
The stillness that followed wasn't fear.
It was wonder.
Something stirred deep in her chest. Not panic, not even awe — but recognition. As if part of her had always known the world could be like this. As if it had been waiting to be remembered.
They walked on in silence.
Every step pressed deeper into a world that had its own rhythm — its own memory. The trees began to space wider, some rising into twisted arches where the canopy parted. Thin tendrils of silver mist drifted low across the forest floor, catching in Rasha's boots and swirling around her ankles like clinging ghosts.
That's when she saw it.
A patch of earth just off the trail, veiled behind a curtain of vine-laced branches. At first, it looked like nothing — a dip in the terrain.
But stepping closer revealed more.
A ring of stones, faintly blackened at the center. Ash scattered where a fire had burned. A length of bark, stripped smooth and flattened, still pressed down as if someone had lain there. A half-woven bundle of ferns, dry and hastily tucked beneath a fallen log.
Talo crouched beside the fire ring."This was recent," he murmured. "Maybe a night or two ago."
"No creature made this," Rasha said softly. "Someone was here."
And nearby — faint but unmistakable — the air held the lingering trace of mana.
Subtle.But human.
Talo rose slowly, brushing his fingers over the packed earth."Something's not right," he said.
Rasha's gaze snapped over. "What is it?"
He motioned toward the bed. "Too small. Whoever — or whatever — slept here wasn't fully grown."
He stepped back, eyes narrowing."No adult would camp this exposed. Not out here. And definitely not that small."
Rasha's frown deepened."So what are we looking at?"
Talo hesitated."Either there's someone young — alone — traveling the Forsaken Realm…"
A pause.
"Or this wasn't made by a person."
Her gaze slid to the broken fern bundle."You think it's… an intelligent creature?"
"Something that knows fire," he said. "And how to stay hidden."
A hush fell between them.
The forest grew still.
Even the wind seemed to pause, as if listening.
"Well," Talo muttered, scanning the edge of the camp, "I don't want it finding us before we find it."
He crouched low, eyes scanning the brush. "Maybe we can track it. See where it went."
Rasha moved with him. "Whatever it was… it didn't flee in a panic. It left a trail. That means it wanted to."
She pointed to a faint break in the grass. "Here. Small, but clear."
Talo brushed his fingers over it. "Still fresh."
He stilled — staring ahead.
A narrow strip of torn fabric clung to a branch — brown-gray, the weave too fine for any beast.
A child's cloak. Or something worse.
Rasha's voice dropped."It was watching us."
The trail curved deeper into the forest, weaving between pale-needled trees. The air thickened with damp fog, and strange mushrooms clustered near the base of the trunks — glowing faint green, like open eyes in the soil.
For minutes, they walked in silence.
Talo slowed."You ever get the feeling we're not tracking it?"
Rasha glanced at him."What do you mean?"
He didn't answer at first. Just stared at the way the trail dipped and curved.
"Feels like it's leading us."
They paused near a patch of twisted roots.
"What if this thing… isn't running?" he asked. "What if it wants us to follow?"
The words hung between them.
A trap.
Still, they pressed forward.
Every sign left behind seemed more deliberate. A smoothed rock. A faint scrape on bark. The shimmer of mana in places too exposed to be careless.
Then—
The trail veered north.
But up ahead, something flickered.
A light.