Lila took the smooth, cool communication stone from Riku. It pulsed with a faint, internal light. She took a deep breath as she started speaking.
"Father?" she spoke into it, her voice a little hesitant at first. "It's Lila. Can you hear me?"
A moment of silence, then a crackle from the stone, followed by Barou's familiar, slightly distorted voice. "Lila! Yes! I can hear you. Riku had given me this stone, which he had asked me to keep close. But it was supposed to be only for emergencies. Is everything alright? Did something happen?"
"We are fine, Father. We're together. And we found something… something important about the weird infections we noticed earlier in the forests near our village."
Lila quickly summarized their findings in the Whisperwood – the dark stones, the red mist, the cart tracks leading towards Luxia.
"It seems this blight was deliberately brought here, Father. From the capital." "Luxia?" Barou's voice was grim. "That's… troubling news. Very troubling."
