“I’ve never seen someone so embarrassed,” Felio said to Aiden around the campfire, laying strips of meat onto a rack above an array. The fire wasn’t enough to cure thousands of pounds of meat, so they were using expensive alchemy gear to do it. “It’s really cute,” she added.

“Nah… that wasn’t just embarrassment,” Aiden said mellowly, cutting meat strips.

“Boys never know what girls are thinking,” Felio said.

“This one does,” Aiden said.

“Oooooh, so confident. Though, come to think of it, you are a Claustra.”

“It’s what we do,” he said. Claustra were trained to be social weapons and understood people’s intentions. He would’ve changed with or without Mira’s influence.

“Awwww, that’s no fun,” Felio whined. “You’re supposed to be yourself around women.”

Aiden pulled out his flask. “It’s funny that people here say that, too.” He took a drink. “‘Cause it’s equally bullshit.”

Cassain snorted. “So what? You’re just gonna keep lying to yourself?”

Aiden raised an eyebrow. “I’ve been quite candid, yeah?”

“If you call drinking water out of a flask ‘candid,’ sure.”

He put the flask into his lap slowly. “What gave it away?”

“Smell, sight, guide,” Cassain said. “But even a peaceful would notice that you’ve never filled it.”

Aiden smirked. “But not Mira.”

“‘Cause she’s purposely avoiding it.”

Felio frowned. “I’ve been meaning to ask you about that, too. Why are you doing that? Are you just mimicking Brexton?”

Aiden nodded. “Keeps me in character.”

“So it’s all just a lie… all of it?” Asail asked.

He shook his head and looked to the sky. “No. If you lie enough, you become your lie. And I’ve lied enough in the last year to become at least half of this. And it’s made me happier. I’m more confident, people like me more… So why not? It makes me feel good. Besides… I promised it to Mira. And for whatever reason, I never forgot it.”

“So you do like her!” Felio cried. “I knew it! Knew it, knew it, knew it!”

Aiden rolled his eyes and stood up. “Think what you like. I’m going to go talk to her.”

He started whistling, hands stuffed in his pockets and walked in Mira’s direction.

2.

There’s an area in Areswood Forest called The Divide that’s located twenty miles north of the Callasan Mountains (the north end of the range Serenflora is located in) and five miles south of Arithiel Pond, where I developed my core.

This area is unique, as it naturally separates the weaker beasts in the south from the stronger beasts in the north for no apparent reason. It was unnatural, a phenomenon without parallel.

In the Amazon, differences in canopy density change the sunlight and heat in certain regions, naturally demarcating areas that certain species live in — but the area directly above, below, and inside The Divide is largely homogenous. It largely has the same access to water, acoustics, and soil.

The natural explanation, therefore, was territorial behavior, like wolf packs demarcating territories — yet territorial borders are created to prevent conflict between equally strong forces. In this case, the strong were voluntarily separating themselves from the weak.

So why?

I got my answer when I activated a nearan scan necessary for making soul pacts with intelligent plants. It was different from Wood Wide Web in that it didn’t highlight aura signatures. It just spread neara through the pathways like light through fiber optic cables, highlighting nearan plants only like blimps in radar. It was fast, efficient, and went far further. It was for that reason I could see far below the ground — and what I saw underground sent shivers crawling down my spine.

There, deep underneath the surface, I saw a colossal wall of neara that spanned as far as I could see, strongest in the divide and thinning out as it expanded. It was as though the entire forest had a soul that started in this location — and I had a guess as to which spirit it belonged to.

“Is that Yakana’s soul…?” I whispered. It was the only thing I could imagine would be so massive. “If so…”

I grimaced when I saw a colossal web of mycelium moving toward it. It was the Treskirita — the soul-eating fungus that I released into the area to kill the wandering reaper.

My heart pounded in double thumps, and I turned to the river. To my horror, there was a box of raw mana near the river, which was containing the original Treskirita, which spanned for miles. It was like it was in a huge gardening box, intentionally placed there to perform some type of function for the river but blocked off from the rest of the forest.

“It’s contained…” I muttered.

It occurred to me that this mushroom was separated from this area for a reason — but I had taken it out of its box and set it loose inside.

“Why hasn’t anyone mentioned it?” I whispered. “Did they know? No… they had to have known…”

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I was Brindle’s student. I was Yakana’s guardian. Yet neither of them had mentioned it. Was it not a problem? I wasn’t sure, but I knew something else for certain. My chest heated and my muscles bulged and I screamed, “Lithco!”

“Been a while,” Lithco said, appearing on a branch above me. He was standing, but he sat down. “I was starting to feel like an audiobook reader.”

“Wipe that smirk off your face,” I said. “You know what I’m about to ask.”

“I can’t assume the things you want to ask, let alone answer them,” he said.

“Well then take a guess,” I said. “That’s an order.”

“Ho ho,” he said amusedly. Then he looked at the ground and said, “If I had to take a guess, I say you want to know if the Oracle brought you here to inoculate the forest with a soul-eating mushroom?”

“Spot on,” I said. “Now answer me. I deserve that much.”

Lithco shrugged. “Yeah. That’s about the gist.”

My muscles spasmed and I sat on a nearby log. “Why me?”

“Why you?” He scoffed. “Mira. Do you even understand how rare you are? Not… you. Not botanists and climbers. But I mean your situation? Finding someone with mycoremediation skills who asked for this forest’s ultra specific criteria within this specific planet’s integration period. The oracle had better chances of finding a wedding ring at the bottom of the ocean.”

I smiled wryly. “So I wasn’t special.”

“No,” Lithco said. “You’ve certainly proved to be — but you weren’t chosen for it. You had one role — to inoculate forest. From waking up on the reaper, to leading you to the Treskirita — that was it.”

“So you sacrificed me!” I screamed. “How’s that even fair?”

Lithco laughed. “Don’t look so surprised. You knew the Oracle was using you from the beginning. You know it’s designed to produce mass murderers. Stop pretending to be outraged just because you got answers.”

I balled my fists and trembled, then shifted my feet to avoid poisonous groundcover.

“You were warned, Mira,” he said. “If you can’t fulfill your position, the Oracle’s gonna place you where you’re needed. That’s what I told you from the beginning. Convincing people to make stupid decisions is how she fulfills her quota for plumbers. She has rules, sure, but she opts for the thing that needs done. All of this. This entire life. The pain, the struggling, the killing — it all started by one stupid decision you made in a rebellious state of panic. Arguing it was anything else is just an exercise in grumbling for the sake of nothing.”

Deja vu hit me like a dump truck. It had been a while since we had this conversation, and I was growing tired of it, so I decided to be proactive.

“What’s down there?” I asked.

Lithco shrugged. “Dunno. But it has nearan veins all the way in the First Ring — and those veins activate when individuals trip on Lumidran spores. A rather remarkable scientist conducted an experiment on this phenomenon. It was called — ”

I cut him off. “It’s Yakana.”

“Yeah,” he said. “Probably.”

“And you want to kill him?”

He shrugged again. “Oracle does. If you’re trying to conquer a forest, it’s rather inconvenient to have a communication network that can span hundreds of miles, no?”

“I knew it…” I watched the Treskirita mycelium move toward Yakana’s soul. “How long before it reaches it?”

“Judging by its growth, you have till next harvest,” he said.

I nodded. “I can make a pact with that thing, right?”

“The mushroom?” he asked.

“Yeah.” Soul pacts were already the focus of my training, as I needed to learn them to enter the Bramble and get my stuff. So by focusing on them, I could accelerate my schedule. If I could solve this problem through soul pacts, it would be the ideal solution.

“You can,” Lithco said. “But not at the moment. That thing just ate hundreds of reaped souls. Trying to make a deal with it in your state would probably break your mind.”

I sneered and closed my eyes, activating Moxle Dilation and Mental Shielding for absolute concentration. The best way to learn anything, I thought honestly. Is to jump in—and work backward.

I dug my fingers into the soil and activated the soul pact skill.

3.

Sina and Kael caught up with Aiden in less than ten seconds after hearing Mira’s scream. They were all running when they heard her, and none of them wasted time. As they approached, Aiden jumped in the air with superhuman power as Kael barreled past him and then fell on top of the lurvine, clawing his way up into a sitting position. This wasn’t something he could’ve dreamed of doing a year ago, but supernatural powers, magic, and intensive training tended to change things — quickly.

The group blew into the clearing where Mira was located, only to find Kline in his panther form in front of her, growling at them to leave.

“What’s wrong?” Aiden yelled.

Kline swiped his paw, and invisible slashes cut through the earth, sending a chilling warning.

Aiden ignored the bravado.

“You’re not going to kill me,” he said, jumping off Kael. “Mira would never forgive you.”

Kline roared.

“Yeah, yeah, you’ll never forgive me if I get near,” Aiden said. “But Mira’s not hurt. Which mean’s talking’s useful. So just… chill.”

“It’s fine,” Mira said quietly. “Just let him through. Not like there’s anything to see, anyway.”

Aiden found Mira sitting with her back against a tree, staring into the canopy with a furious expression. “What was that?” he asked.

“Your advances were too embarrassing,” she said.

Aiden chuckled and walked over to her.

“Great, he’s making it worse,” she said. When he didn’t say anything, she sighed. “Would you believe it if I just said it was nothing?”

He shook his head. “I felt that… Whatever it was. Everyone did. Was it you?”

Mira clutched her head and winced. “Yeah. It was just another form of divination pulse I’m trying out. It's a bit extensive.”

“Come on,” he said. “You’re not even trying to act convincing.”

She took a deep breath and said: “Listen, Aiden. I look forward to you living with me. I… really am, okay? I’m digging the new confidence… humor… stuff. It’s great. But let’s get something clear: if I leave this forest? If I’m training? If I hint at something strange? Anything? I don’t want you anywhere near me.” She grimaced at her coldness. “Life’s not fair.”

He looked away, stabbed by the ten-year wall that stood between them.

“But…” she said. “I’ll trust you with a secret. Don’t tell anyone I’m using different divination spells. Got it?”

He nodded. “If it’s just that, I can do it.”

She eyed him strangely as if she had made the connection that he said those same words the last time he made a promise — a sentence, through any given words, he was required to say — after accepting secrets. He felt she got it.

Aiden knew that her distrust wasn’t personal. It just… sucked. She had done so much for him, but he hadn’t done anything for her yet.

Guess I’ll just make her smile, he thought. It’s good enough.

Aiden offered his hand. “I thought you liked living on the edge.”

She eyed him sharply.

“What? I told you I was dangerous. Ignoring my hand now’s an insult to your past judgment.”

Mira groaned. “You’re unbearable.”

“But you just accepted my hand.”

Mira sighed and studied him. Then she said, “Come on, we still have stuff to do.”

5.

I returned to camp and made excuses about my training and told some jokes and settled back in. Everything was fine on the surface—and in some ways, it still was. I couldn’t practice soulmancy around Felio or anyone else for their safety, so ninety-five of my time would be focused on alchemy, foraging, and prime living. But that last five percent could prove the difference between life and death of this forest.

That night, I contacted Brindle and told him about the Treskirita. He didn’t tell me if it was important or not, but Lithco sent me a message:

-

Patron God Brindle Grask has submitted his tribute requirements:

Remove the Treskirita miranita from The Divide.

Special Condition: Remove it with soulmancy.

Note: Special conditions are a means for your patron god to reward you for your performance. If you complete the special condition, you will get a reward.

-

I read the message over and over again. “Guess there’s no choice.”