"Some roots do not grow. They burrow."
They found it at dawn.
The last bend of Wither Hollow gave way to a sunken field so unnatural that even the insects had learned to avoid it. Aren Yu stood motionless at the edge of the slope, eyes narrowed. Ahead stretched rows of trees—ashen, skeletal, and wrong. Their branches arched upward like begging hands, and their roots burst from the ground in tangled knots, exposed and quivering.
White blossoms dotted the trees.
Petals like bone. Stems like veins.
None of them moved.
None of them should have existed.
Yin stepped up beside him.
"This is it?"
He didn't nod. He didn't blink.
He just said:
"The Eighth shrine. The orchard that remembers what we forget."
They descended without ceremony.
Each footstep sank into soft, red-tinged earth—damp, like it had been crying before they arrived. The orchard exhaled around them, but not with air. With memory. Each breeze felt like a whisper that hadn't decided whether it belonged to you or someone else.
The first tree they passed was hollow.
Inside its trunk hung a necklace made of cracked prayer beads.
The second tree bore a child's shoe, caked in mud and dried blood.
The third held a scroll—blank, but humming.
Each object swung gently on black thread.
"Offerings?" Yin asked.
Aren shook his head.
"Trophies. Left behind after someone gave up a piece of themselves."
He stepped closer to the fourth tree, reaching a hand toward its hollow.
Inside, hanging from a silver hook, was a scrap of silk with his own handwriting on it.
I do not want to remember.
He snatched his hand back.
The trees began to whisper.
Not loud. Not dangerous.
Just familiar.
Each word crawled behind his ear and pulled at things he thought were buried.
A voice he recognized from his first death.
Another from a brother he didn't remember having.
Another—a lullaby.
His mother's voice. A lie wrapped in warmth.
"Go to sleep, and the pain won't follow you."
He pressed forward.
Yin followed, eyes darting. Her blade remained sheathed but ready. She didn't understand the orchard—not fully—but she felt its weight, the way soldiers feel incoming arrows moments before they're struck.
They crossed into the center of the grove.
Here, the trees stopped pretending.
Their trunks opened like mouths.
Their roots pulsed visibly beneath the ground.
And in the middle of it all, the Heart Tree stood waiting.
Wider than the rest. Taller. Split down the center like a cracked ribcage. Its bark oozed a black-red sap that hissed when it touched the ground.
The air here wasn't breathable.
It was remembered.
Aren approached it.
The scroll in his hand began to shake.
Not violently.
Rhythmically.
As if in heartbeat.
He unrolled it without thought.
A new sigil carved itself into the parchment, inked in crimson.
--" VIII — The Orchard That Remembers What You Forget "--
Below it, a second line pulsed into existence.
--"This is where the pieces you sacrificed wait for you to return."--
The Heart Tree shifted.
A section of bark peeled back.
Not rot.
Invitation.
Behind it, a hollow chamber glowed.
Aren walked inside.
The interior didn't make sense.
It wasn't spatial.
It was emotional.
He stepped into a memory—and every direction led deeper into himself.
The walls were root-veined and slick, pulsing in sync with something buried.
At the center, suspended in a web of red strings:
A jar.
Filled with black water.
And inside it: a human heart.
Still beating.
His own.
He knew it the way you know your own voice, even when you've forgotten how to speak.
Yin stepped in behind him.
Her hand went to her blade again, but she didn't draw.
"Aren… that's…"
He nodded.
"I buried it here. A long time ago."
She swallowed.
"Why?"
The scroll pulsed again.
Words etched themselves midair, unseen but undeniable.
--""To survive, you severed the part of yourself that grieved."
"You gave it to the Orchard."
"And now it waits.""--
Aren stepped forward.
The jar trembled.
The red strings vibrated like spiderwebs plucked by a corpse.
Beneath his feet, faces began to bloom.
Not flowers.
Memories.
Each face was his.
Younger.
Older.
Versions of himself that had died screaming.
Others silent.
Aren clutching a knife in a monastery.Aren drowning under a moonless sky.Aren strangled by roots.Aren folding paper prayers that no god answered.
Each face looked at him.
None smiled.
They spoke in unison.
"Why did you abandon us?"
"Why did you pretend we never hurt?"
"Why did you let the pain rot instead of bloom?"
Yin stepped back.
Aren didn't.
He walked to the jar.
Touched the glass.
It was warm.
Alive.
But it didn't beat with life.
It beat with grief.
The scroll in his hand unraveled further, offering no comfort.
Only truth.
[ 🩸The Eighth Vow
I buried my sorrow in a grove of whispers.
I let the flowers drink my ache.
But grief does not die.
It waits.
It grows.
And now I wear it again.
]
He shattered the jar.
No explosion.
No flash.
Just rupture.
Like silence breaking after centuries of screaming.
The heart fell into his hands.
Cold.
Then warm.
Then pulsing.
He pressed it to his chest.
It passed into him like ink into skin.
His breath caught.
His body folded.
He didn't fall.
He remembered.
He was kneeling.
In a temple older than language.
Surrounded by roots that whispered names.
He held a body.
His.
Dead.
Eyes open.
Not in pain.
Just tired.
So tired.
And from behind him, a voice whispered:
"Leave it here. It's easier."
And he had.
And the trees had taken it.
He opened his eyes.
Still kneeling.
But not broken.
Yin stood before him.
Worried. Steady.
"You stopped breathing," she said.
"I was reliving the moment I gave up."
She didn't ask what he meant.
She just offered her hand.
As they stepped out of the Heart Tree, the orchard responded.
The trees straightened.
The blossoms bloomed wider—still bleeding, but now proud.
The whispering wind grew quiet.
For the first time, the Grove didn't scream.
It listened.
Yin asked softly, "Did you get it all back?"
He shook his head.
"Just the part that still hurts."
She gave him a sidelong glance.
"And what do we do with it now?"
Aren smiled, faint and steady.
"Now we plant it in the world."
The scroll closed.
But a final line etched itself across its margin.
A name.
Not his.
Hers.
Yin Shu — Forgotten Daughter of the Ninth Shrine
Aren stopped cold.
Yin looked down at the scroll.
And her eyes widened.
"I… I don't know what that means."
He met her gaze.
"You will."