The forest's silence was a lie.
It was cooking something for him, more ways to break him.
Dave slumped against the gnarled trunk of a luminous tree, its bark split like scorched flesh, oozing sap that glowed faintly blue. The moss beneath him sighed, cushioning his weight as if the earth itself pitied him. His hands—blistered, cracked, still trembling from the phantom grip of Thorne's hammer—hung limp at his sides. Blood crusted his sleeves, some his own, most not. The Scion stirred in his collar, her centipede legs prickling his neck.
"Rest, Scion,you seem to need it , your stamina is slightly better than a bitch," she hissed, though her voice lacked its usual mockery. "Even rot needs quiet to fester." This was an improvement.
He didn't trust the quiet, less he trusted the his companion. Mercy here was a blade wrapped in silk.
---
Sleep took him like a thief.
In dreams, he stood at Thorne's forge, the heat blistering his cheeks. The hammer felt alien in his grip—too light, too clean. Thorne loomed behind him, a shadow without a face.
"Strike true, boy," the blacksmith growled, his voice frayed at the edges. "Steel don't forgive hesitation."
Dave brought the hammer down. The anvil screamed. The metal twisted, warping into Mara's dagger, its edge serrated with rust.
"Why didn't you run?" she whispered, her voice echoing from the flames. "You could've lived."
He woke gasping, the scent of molten iron searing his lungs. The forest watched, its roots coiled tighter around the tree.
---
Moonlight pierced the canopy—a silver shard cutting through rot.
The being descended like a falling star, its form luminous and cold. Robes of woven starlight fluttered around limbs too slender, too perfect, as if carved from glacial ice. Where its face should have been yawned a void, depthless and accusing.
"You carry death in your veins," it intoned, the words vibrating in Dave's marrow. "The forest's rot has made you its blade."
Dave staggered back, his crude sword—a jagged thing forged from scrap and spite—clutched in trembling hands. "I didn't ask for this."
"Choice is a luxury and I just couldn't afford it ," Moonlight replied. "You are a wound. I am the cautery."
---
The fight began without ceremony.
Moonlight moved like a hymn, its blade thin as a moonbeam slicing the air with crystalline precision. Dave fought like a trapped wolf—all snarls and desperation. He rolled beneath a sweeping strike, roots tearing at his clothes, and lashed out with a handful of mud. The Scion shrieked as the muck struck Moonlight's robes, sizzling like acid. The being recoiled, its void-face rippling, and Dave pressed forward, driving his shoulder into its chest. It felt like tackling mist—cold, empty, *wrong*—but he didn't relent.
Steel clashed against starlight, sparks scattering like dying fireflies. Moonlight's blade grazed Dave's ribs, searing flesh with frostfire. He roared, swinging wildly, and felt his sword bite into something solid. Silver ichor sprayed, hissing as it struck the moss. The Scion laughed, feasting on the splattered light.
"Cleanse him!" she taunted, her voice a jagged rasp. "Burn the rot away or be my guest and whine.
---
Dave's vision narrowed to blood and moonlight. He fought not with skill but with memories—Thorne's hammer, Mara's dagger, Kestrel's ruthlessness. His body moved as if puppeted by the forest itself, muscles singing with borrowed strength. He feigned collapse, knees buckling, and when Moonlight descended, blade poised for mercy, he surged upward, driving his sword through the void where its heart should have been.
The being shuddered, its radiance dimming to a sickly gray. "You… are not… the first," it rasped, dissolving into ash. "Nor the last."
The Scion crawled down his arm, her mandibles clicking happily feasted on the thing he just killed then said , he tasted a little bit like salt , rot always better , rot rocks seems i like homemade food.
Dave just registered in his mind the more this spirit's mind and vocabulary was evolving but there were more pressing matters than that, there was always.
---
The forest exhaled.
Dave knelt, gasping, Moonlight's ichor smoking on his skin.
He was staring at his hands. They were stronger now—veins dark as roots, scars glowing faintly green. The forest had remade him, bone by bone, sin by sin.
Thorne's voice echoed: "You've got the will. That's more than most."
But what was will without choice?
---
As Dave rose, the tree's luminescent lichen pulsed, casting jagged shadows. Among them, a silhouette flickered—hooded, watching.
The Scion stiffened. "Shadows hunger," she hissed.
Dave turned. Nothing but leaves.
He walked deeper, the forest's whispers sharpening.
"Even the light has monsters," he muttered.
Somewhere, roots coiled tighter.