Requiem. The woods beyond.

The Journey itself is strange, we never feel the terrain around us change, but we could tell after a few steps that we were no longer in |Tranquil Glades|. When it comes, the change of skeletal woods swaying in an unfelt breeze into many creaking, blacked clawed silhouettes seems to arrive both in a single moment, yet also with familiarity as if the change was happening over a long time.

Aside from the trees, it is the light that first snares our attention. Whatever the celestial body there is now above us in this place, it is decidedly not our moon nor sun. Far more massive in scope than either, alongside seemingly less light than either. Truly an alien vista, above and beyond the new bevy of powers and abilities we’ve experienced.

“{Beautiful.}”

The air here is brittle, hollow… we wouldn’t have thought, before this, that would be something air could be. Even the tastes are muted here, but for all that, the scent around us is clear, death. Though an older sort of death, older than any we recognize. It is unusual to discover something new about something so familiar. We imagine this might be like what the stories we’d heard referred to as the mustiness of a tomb.

“{All we sought was adventure? Then we suppose an adventure must be had,}” as we make our way forward in these strange woods we reflect on what could have been. The grip of death is strong on this place, like gravity, weighing things down, a subtle pull towards the trees. When we reach out and brush up against one of them, we feel its embrace, calling towards us, beckoning us to rest- forever.

We ^coo^ our pleasure at those gentle caresses, the familiarity of a former home. We’ve moved on, but we’ll likely never even be able to forget. As we continue to walk, we can feel this place shifting around us. Even without attempting to [Step] the woods move under us, as the trees loom larger, grander, deadlier, thicker. Their density of trucks and low hanging branches making it impossible to continue onwards untouched, yet still we hike forth.

We arrive at a place where these eerie black trees grow as if a solid wall of clawing wood, yet we find our passage however snug, a workable path. The timeless whispers and offerings of peace a nostalgic melody that abruptly cuts off as we find ourselves in a clearing. Surrounded on all sides by a seemingly contiguous wall of bark, we are the lone creature in this place.

The ground beneath our feet is like iron dust, clinging to us at a touch, yet also affixed to the loadstone of the ground as we move. The clearing is massive in scope, larger than even the one that now houses Axis, and yet completely devoid of anything bust this dust. No thicket of saplings, no grand tree in the center, no outcroppings of stone jutting out at random or with patterned intent. And so, we continue forward.

The farther we go, we notice some small changes. We are on a subtle slope heading downwards towards what we initially perceived was flat. The absolute uniformity of the texture acts as an illusion of its depths. It has only been a few minutes since we arrived in this dead space when we hear a muffled cry of frustration from behind us, back in the woods. It would seem whatever magic’s she wove to follow us wasn’t as successful at breaching into this strange place.

We feel it now. A compulsion. Achingly strong yet fainter than we could grasp initially. Only with all our senses and powers and minds focused can we hear it. The near silent crying of a babe, long forgotten.

It takes us hours of travel as we go deeper and deeper into this invisible depression. Having long since passed the point where the woods beyond the edge were swallowed by the rim. That not quite noise never gets louder as we get closer to the source, and it stays a struggle to keep focused upon it. And labor we must because we noticed that anytime we lose track of it, we somehow find ourselves travelling up slope instead of down.

All told, we end up marching for more than a day’s worth of time, though the light of this place never changes, somehow, we know a full day has passed. It is with the second step of the second day that we arrive. The clinging black sand skitters and falls from us, rushing either away from this grove or towards a strange sort of rod near the center. Despite looking at everything at once, it’s as though we can’t help but see it in patches.

The rod comes into focus first, as the iron sands reach it and sink into it there is a crackle of lightning that flexes throughout it. Highlighting its form and sending an echo of its still mostly buried shape, a mighty spear, perfectly preserved in the stone that seems to have grown around its blade, so tightly wedged it has become. The strength to have buried it that smoothly, and at such a sharp angel is fascinating.

The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

Next, we are finally able to see directly above where the tip of the blade would be, a single white stem rising out of the seemingly polished stone. The barest start to some form of Life, in defiance to the thick blanket of Death all around. As we watch, it seems our attention, or perhaps simply our presence, is enough for this new sprout of mycelium to swell and grow. We hold our breath as one of the bees from within us chooses this particular moment to forage. Having been seemingly content to remain within us throughout our trek through the woods and sands, it now departs.

The tiny bee alights upon the little mushroom, the turbulence of its landing making it gently sway. The bee crawls all over the little plume, tasting and touching and sampling this piece of strange life out here in this nowhere. As it goes about its investigation, we task our DM to take specific note of its dancing. These new creatures we’ve borne are more than what they were before, their tenuous tie into the system allows their movements to be recognizable as language when properly studied.

As we watch however many moments it takes the scout to complete its trip, the little stalk has grown substantially, having tripled its mass just since the bee’s contact. And with its task complete, ^Good pollen. Fertile, rich, make good honeycomb,^ it flies back to us. As our breathing returns to normal as the rest of this strange place comes into clarity.

Now able to properly recognize and remember what we’re seeing, we notice this cleared area is a silhouette. It all seems like the same polished stone, almost like marble- a smooth white surface with veins of various shades of green streaking throughout, flecks of gold, silver and various shades of grey serve as counterpoint to the leaf-like patterns of green and white. The area itself is quite large, holding a shape that is certainly reminiscent of a creature of some kind, though its image is unknown to us.

If we were to map out that portion as a tail, with the shorter larger piece opposite as a singular head, then those as four thick quadrupedal legs around this center torso mass. All that leaves are these two large patches mostly devoid of the green veins, or even most of the other colorations, just empty stone. Despite the discrepancy, that would make where the spear is affixed in the stone to be… {Piercing the heart, or possibly lungs. Either a quick or at least certain death without redundancies or regeneration.}

After the first successful harvest, more bees leave to continue gathering from the still visibly expanding fungi. It is from that idle observation that we notice something rather bizarre. As several more bees land on the cap and then walk around the edge to collect from its gills, we see what looks like jaws form out of the roof and try to bite at them. Even managing to snag a limb on one bee, but then another buzzes over and both bees tap and dance around where the maw opened, and it eventually releases the leg.

[Vitalis Dracoshroom; tier 3 fungus, exotic resource; A: Life, O: Bite]

We feel a wave of omen and fate wash over us as this moment fully settles. Not of the bees and their actions, but of a choice for us to make… now that we’re here in this place. Walking our way over to the spear and mushroom, we are able to make out a ring of that iron sand around this defiant patch of growth. Measured in a perfect circle around that center point, with the haft of the weapon serving as marker for the outer edge.

Already we’ve seen the effect it has on the bees, initially attracting their attention, both the weapon and the blackened ring both release sparks whenever something draws too near. Getting a closer look, we are able to see the spear itself seems to be made entirely out of that same fine material, constantly grinding against each other, shifting around, while maintaining its shape and purpose.

[Dragon-slaying Voltiron Spear; tier 3 weapon, exotic resource; A: Lightning, O: Pierce, D: Shock]

[Ironman Redacting A weapon crafted with the sole purpose of slaying a dragon, now cursed by the spilt blood of an innocent to perpetually harm any wielder of impure heart.]

As we grip the pole with a mouth, the sparks sizzle against us for a moment before quieting down once we get a good bite going. As large as object as it is, we recall from that initial flashes of imagery that the actual spade of the weapon was significantly smaller than what the haft would presume. So, we leverage our mass and strength, grip it with one of our claws and pull. It takes some serious effort, but especially when we invoke our Graveflesh again, it starts sliding out of the rock.

However, when it does, we also notice the ring of sand shrinking as well, scorching its way inward to stay connected with the pole, but no longer centered around the fungus. We stop at this realization, {Fungi unimportant. Spearpoint VITAL.} Huh, disharmony. How strange… We suppose we’ve come to think of the skill as a part of us, instead of its own voice. Perhaps it is here that we find our path forward, not as a single choir, but as a concert of singers.

“{As vital as whatever the point of the spear may be, nothing could be worth destroying this solitary patch of life, not here, not in this eerie place. Even without that rush of intuitive warning we had before, it would be the wrong choice to take a life for power’s sake. Remind us of our options as you see them, but our choice to act must always be the better one,}” and then we have me breathe oh so carefully upon the spear, upon the ring, and ever so gently upon the mushroom itself.