God’s Tree

They traveled for days.

The forest had grown too vast for time to measure properly. The sun, still hidden beyond the layers of ancient canopy, offered no guidance. Day bled into night with no transition, and night bled back into day just as quietly.

But they moved forward.

One step at a time.

The Forsaken Forest was wide—thousands of miles, and more. The land warped with old magic, folding and stretching as it pleased. Sometimes they crossed paths they swore they had never seen, only to find markers from days before.

No beasts attacked them.

No whispers haunted them.

Only the forest itself remained—a living maze of towering trees, glowing moss, and mist that clung to their boots like fog from a dream.

Kaelred broke the silence once or twice.

"So," he muttered after one long stretch, "are we sure this isn't just a very elaborate death march?"

No one answered.

Not because they disagreed.

But because the truth was uncertain.

Each night, they made camp carefully—never too close to water, never near trees that bent inward, never beside roots that pulsed. Argolaith had learned which spots the forest allowed.

On the fourth night, they stopped in a shallow basin ringed with pale rocks and fern-like shrubs that glowed softly blue. The trees here were old and wide, but spaced far enough to see the sky—a rare luxury in the forest's choking embrace.

Argolaith wordlessly began to cook.

He drew from his storage ring: a slab of marbled war beast meat, preserved perfectly in enchanted ice; a pouch of ironseed herbs that burned hot when ground; and a handful of embervine petals, harvested days earlier and stored in sealed glass.

He sliced the meat into thick strips, rubbed it with crushed frostthorn and shadow-salt, then pan-seared it over a controlled flame fueled by magewood shavings. The air filled with the scent of sizzling fat and peppered magic, sharp and rich, almost intoxicating.

Thae'Zirak's nostrils flared as he exhaled in pleasure. "You were born to cook in forgotten places."

Argolaith smiled faintly, flipping the meat. "Cooking is just another kind of alchemy."

Kaelred poked at a bowl of roasted root and bitterleaf salad Argolaith had plated. "Yeah, well, this kind of alchemy makes me forget we're wandering through a sentient graveyard. So I approve."

Malakar didn't speak, but the way he ate—slow, purposeful—was compliment enough.

There were no battles.

No trials.

No beasts.

Only walking, eating, resting—and a growing sense that something beneath the forest was preparing.

Argolaith felt it in the way the trees began to lean forward ever so slightly.

In the way the moss grew thicker.

In how the roots shifted at night when no one watched.

The forest wasn't hostile.

Not yet.

But it was not sleeping, either.

And as the days passed, and the group ate around quiet fires and walked under a sky that never changed, they all knew—

Something was watching their journey.

And whatever it was…

It was waiting for them to arrive.

The fifth morning arrived without sunlight.

As always, the canopy above was too thick, the sky too distant. Instead, a pale violet hue filtered through the trees, not from the sun—but from spores drifting lazily across the branches like ash in still air.

They moved slowly now, wearied not by exertion, but by the quiet. The kind that numbed the senses. The kind that whispered that something was wrong, even when nothing was in sight.

Argolaith walked at the front, his hand resting lightly near the hilt of his blade. Thae'Zirak prowled to his left, while Malakar and Kaelred followed behind, speaking little, alert.

Then Argolaith stopped.

He had seen something ahead.

The forest floor sloped into a hollow—bowl-shaped and shallow, like a depression pressed into the earth by something heavy. The moss here was torn, shredded in wide patches. The trees nearby leaned outward as if recoiling from whatever had once been at the center.

And there, in the middle of the clearing…

Lay a corpse.

It wasn't a war beast.

Nor was it anything they'd ever seen before.

"What… is that?" Kaelred muttered, slowing to a halt beside Argolaith.

It stood over eight feet tall, or had once. The body was humanoid in structure—two arms, two legs, long and lean—but the skin was black stone, cracked and webbed with veins of gold. Its chest cavity had been torn open, as if something had reached inside and pulled its core out.

There was no blood. No scent of decay. But the ground around the body was burned in strange spirals.

Thae'Zirak narrowed his eyes. "That is not of this forest."

Malakar slowly crouched beside it. "Nor is it of this realm."

Argolaith approached carefully. The creature's face was still mostly intact—a mask-like visage, featureless except for faint carvings resembling runes. Its mouth was sealed shut. Its eyes—if they had ever opened—remained closed.

He crouched beside Malakar. "Is it a guardian?"

Malakar shook his head. "No. This creature wasn't made to watch. It was made to hunt."

"Hunt what?"

"Us. Things like us. Travelers. Trespassers. Dreamers."

Kaelred stepped back. "So, good news: it's dead. Bad news: something killed it."

Argolaith scanned the trees. "And whatever did… isn't far."

Thae'Zirak moved closer to the corpse and sniffed the air. "This was no fight. This thing was unmade from the inside."

Malakar nodded. "There's no weapon mark. No scorch. No poison. The magic that did this wasn't cast—it was released."

"From what?" Kaelred asked.

Argolaith stood.

"From something stronger."

He turned back toward the direction they'd come, then looked ahead into the forest—where the trees grew even darker, their bark glistening with dew that shimmered like oil.

"This wasn't a warning," Argolaith said quietly.

"It was a reminder."

The wind picked up.

Soft at first.

Then stronger.

And with it came the scent of something old—dust and sap and embers. Not threatening. Not hostile.

But intentional.

As if something had opened its eyes.

Kaelred glanced around, suddenly uneasy. "I don't like this."

Malakar remained still. "We're being shown this on purpose."

Argolaith nodded.

The forest had not only remembered them—it had begun to test the things that had once hunted intruders.

And they had failed.

Now the forest was watching to see what Argolaith and his companions would do next.