The wind had a sour taste.
It swept over the cliffs from the northern gulch, carrying with it the scent of old wood and something fouler—like wet ash soaked in spoiled blood. The children stood at the edge of the ridge in neat lines, their backs straight despite the nausea twisting their stomachs.
Below them lay the Hollow Reaches.
A stretch of blackened woodland that had once been part of the clan's outer territory, long before the corruption seeped in. Trees there grew wrong. The ground sometimes moved. Birds never flew over it, and even the mist seemed reluctant to cling to its soil.
No child had ever been sent down there.
Until now.
**Instructor Garen** stood at the front, his arms folded behind his back, eyes scanning the horizon with the cold patience of stone. He was tall, broad-shouldered, and built like an old war statue come to life. His skin was the color of dark bronze, etched with age and discipline, and his close-cropped black hair had streaks of iron-gray running through it. The deep scar across his neck, just above his collarbone, never seemed to fade. He wore the Ironreach insignia with pride—but no warmth. His face was a chiseled mask of silence and command.
Beside him, a younger man wore dark leathers and a blade across his back—a Tier 1 Knight, lean and weather-worn. His name was Rusk, a patrol leader with eyes like rusted steel. He was slightly taller than Garen but far less imposing in presence—like a shadow that lingered just out of reach. His pale skin had a sickly undertone, his jaw angular and sharp. A long, jagged scar ran from the corner of his right eye to his ear. His black hair was tied in a loose, oily tail that hung behind his neck, and a perpetual grimace twisted his mouth, as if he found even breathing distasteful.
"This is not a punishment," Garen began. His voice was calm, but its edges sliced.
"This is instruction. You have trained your muscles. You have tasted exhaustion. But discipline must survive beyond comfort. And your minds must face what waits outside the walls."
He let that hang, then turned to Rusk with a nod.
"You will descend into the Hollow Reaches. In three groups. Your objective is simple: retrieve the clan markers lost during the last patrol. They're carved into stone plates. You will know them when you see them. Each team returns with at least one, or no one returns at all."
No one moved.
Adem's fingers tightened slightly. A breeze tugged at his collar.
Garen spoke again. "You will be accompanied by Knight Rusk. He will intervene if necessary. He will not guide you. If you fall behind, you are not worth saving."
Silence.
Then a hand rose—small, shaking.
Toren.
"Sir… are the stories true? About what's in there?"
Garen looked at him. "Which story?"
"The one about the tree that eats—"
"All stories are true," Garen said flatly. "Until you prove them false."
Adem was placed in the second team with Lira, Toren, and Vela—a sharp-tongued girl with burn scars on her left arm and a gaze that seemed older than it should be.
The first team had already gone down. Their figures had disappeared into the dense mist below. No one had screamed. Yet.
Rusk walked ahead of them, saying nothing, the leather of his boots whispering against wet roots.
Adem felt the corruption almost immediately.
The moment they crossed the iron marker stones at the base of the slope, the air grew thicker, colder—drenched in something that made the bones feel loose in the flesh. The trees bent inward unnaturally, forming canopies that let in only fractured light. The moss glowed faintly in places, pulsing dimly like heartbeats.
"Don't touch anything green," Lira said softly.
Toren, wide-eyed, kept to the trail.
Vela walked last, her fingers twitching near the knife on her hip.
"How far do we go?" Adem asked.
"Until the forest decides we've gone far enough," Lira answered.
No one laughed.
After an hour of weaving through twisted roots and blackened vines, they found the first stone marker—cracked in half, buried near the base of a collapsed tree.
Adem knelt beside it. Strange symbols had been burned into the stone—not Ironreach script.
He brushed away the dirt. The stone **hummed** beneath his palm.
It stopped the moment Lira touched his shoulder.
"Don't hold it for long," she said. Her voice was calm, but her eyes weren't. "It remembers things."
Together, they wrapped the stone in cloth and tied it to Vela's belt.
That was when they heard it.
A wheezing sound, slow and wet. Like an animal breathing through a torn throat.
Then another.
And another.
Adem turned.
Shapes moved between the trees. No footsteps. Just shifting—a wrong kind of movement.
Rusk drew his blade.
"Form a line. Don't speak."
The shapes didn't charge. Didn't shriek. They just watched.
From behind bark. From above branches. From beneath the ferns.
Their forms were partly hidden—barely human, but still too familiar. One had limbs that bent backward. Another had eyes in the center of its ribs. Some bore Ironreach tattoos—faded and half-consumed.
Adem's chest grew tight.
They were former knights.
Twisted.
Corrupted.
"Don't look into their eyes," Rusk muttered. "Their minds are already gone. Yours may follow."
As they retreated deeper into the woods, Adem's head began to ache. The deeper they went, the harder it became to think clearly. Thoughts repeated. Breaths skipped. His vision pulsed faintly at the edges.
He tried to focus on the path. On his feet. On the warmth of the stone against his side.
But then came the whispers.
They weren't voices—not really. Just ideas pressed into his skull like fingerprints into wax.
"You could grow here. You are already breaking. Let yourself fall."
"They would let you die."
He blinked and nearly tripped. Toren caught his arm.
"You okay?"
Adem nodded. He was not okay.
---
They reached the second marker in a clearing where the trees bent outward, as though trying to flee. The air was warmer here. Sweet. Like rotten fruit.
The marker lay at the base of a spiraled tree, its branches twisted into a cage above.
Lira moved toward it.
And then she froze.
"Don't step forward," she said sharply.
Adem saw it then—a second set of footprints. Fresh. Not from boots. Not from bare feet.
They looked like hooves.
Vela cursed softly.
Rusk raised his sword. "Get the stone. Now. We leave in sixty breaths."
Adem moved with Lira. His head was spinning. His thoughts churned in fragments.
He could feel the pressure rising—beneath the skin, behind the eyes.
A pulse that didn't match his heartbeat.
"You are not ready. You are becoming. Stop resisting."
They retrieved the stone and fled the clearing.
Whatever had been watching them didn't follow.
But something had changed in Adem.
The voice was quieter now—but closer. It no longer felt like it came from outside.
It felt like it had always been there.
Vela stared at him as they climbed back uphill. "You're quiet."
Adem didn't look at her. "Listening."
"Did something touch you?"
"No."
She grunted. "That's what someone touched would say."
---
When they reached the ridge, the fog was thick and hot. The last team had not returned.
Garen stood there alone.
He did not look relieved. Only watchful.
Rusk gave a nod.
"Two markers. All intact."
Garen looked over the children. His gaze lingered on Adem's eyes.
"You've seen it now," he said. "You'll never see the world the same again."
---
Nightfall
That night, Adem couldn't sleep.
He sat outside the barracks, staring at his hands.
They felt heavier. Not tired—just denser, like the skin had thickened around something that had grown.
The dream came again.
He stood before the staircase, but this time it was lower. Shorter. Just five steps.
The voice said nothing.
He looked down.
The first step had his name carved into it.
He reached for it and woke to the sound of Lira's breathing beside him.
In the morning, Garen addressed them all.
"You are no longer untested. You have walked into rot and walked out whole. But something now walks with you. It waits. It watches."
His gaze turned to Adem briefly.
"Endure. Or break."
Adem said nothing.
But when he walked away, his footsteps were quieter than they had ever been.
Almost like they were being muffled…
by something listening from within.