The morning began with a hush, broken only by the rustle of bark leaves and the soft clatter of tools being moved. Smoke from the cook-fire drifted upward in pale ribbons. The jungle felt unusually still, the kind of stillness that settled before the first break in weather, or before something else.
Raif stood near the orb. The others were gathering, boots dragging, eyes heavy with unfinished sleep. He waited until everyone was close enough to hear.
The orb pulsed faintly, as if on cue. Then came the message.
[Quest: Investigate the Source of Aberrant Growth – 0%]
[Quest: Secure the Perimeter – 12%]
[Total KE: 30 / 200]
Raif took a breath and addressed the group, voice low but focused. "We've made progress, but it's not enough. We're three days into a five-day limit, and that clock won't wait for us."
He glanced at the orb, then back at the group. "The jungle shifts every night. If we don't finish soon, we'll lose more than progress, we'll lose our footing."
His tone held steady, but the strain behind his eyes was harder to hide. "We need to pass halfway by tonight. Let's make it count.""
That earned a few nods, some furrowed brows.
Eloin spoke up. "If we double the support beams on the southern wall and pack more mud into the joints, it'll hold better against the slope."
Lira added, "I can brace the trench with angled staves, might need to check how dry it is as well. It'll buy us time if something comes from below."
Rix glanced at Kael. "If he can map out the weakest vine paths, we can build along those lines. Force the jungle to grow around us, not through us."
Hennick snorted. "Or we give it a good scare with torches. Roots hate flame."
Raif nodded, grounding the discussion. "Good. Stick to your roles, but improvise if you see an opportunity. This isn't about finishing it cleanly. It's about finishing it well enough to hold."
He pointed as he assigned the teams.
"Syl,Hennick, you're with me. We'll move along the southern fringe. Keep it tight and quiet."
"Kael and Rix, same zone as last night. Mark anything that shifts, especially vine structures or odd growth lines."
"Eloin, Lira, you've got the slope behind the shelter. Focus on bracing the lower wall and checking for seepage trails."
"Mira, Naera, eastern lookout. Relay anything you see. Don't move beyond the ridge."
There were murmurs of agreement now. A slight current of tension, but also purpose.
They split off in pairs and trios, the plan already stitched into their steps.
Syl moved like she was born in the underbrush, her stone-edged blade flicking silently through vine and root. Raif followed her lead, stepping carefully, spear haft angled low. Hennick brought up the rear, humming something tuneless under his breath.
"You trying to hack the jungle or yourself?" Syl muttered, not looking back. "Grip's wrong. You're overcompensating for the twist."
"He's got the arms for it, though," Hennick added with a low chuckle. "Just not the wrist. Yet."
"That's generous," Syl said. "I've seen worms cut cleaner."
Raif tested the swing on a low-hanging vine. It parted smoothly. "I'm a fast learner." He says with a smile.
Syl gave a nod. "Fast is good. Fast and quiet's better."
"I'll settle for efficient," Raif said, glancing back at Hennick. "Though apparently my wrists are a problem."
"We'll forge 'em into something useful," Hennick said. "Out here, everything's raw to start. You just shape it, bit by bit."
Syl raised an eyebrow. "So we've got a greenblade and a jungle uncle. I feel safer already."
They shared a brief look. Not quite a joke, but the beginnings of understanding.
Raif glanced at the blade. "Show me."
She took it without pause, rotated his hand slightly, then handed it back. "You'll get cleaner cuts that way. Less fatigue."
But something shifted in her stance. Just slightly.
[Loyalty Increase Detected. +4 KE]
They pressed deeper. The canopy thickened. Raif kept his eyes sharp for the signs Kael described, veins of pulsing bark, spore-hiss pockets, anything unnatural.
Hennick paused by a flattened patch of grass. "No claw marks, but look here."
Raif knelt. "Broken stems. Something heavy moved through."
"Animals," Hennick said. "Big ones. But they're avoiding the centre."
Syl circled the area, squinting at the path ahead. "And this bend, plants don't grow like this."
The vines twisted in slow arcs, too symmetrical, like fingers reaching toward something unseen. Raif marked the spot with a stripped-bark tag. Hennick handed him a curled sliver of dried root. "Chew it. Keeps your head from fogging up. You've got the same look my nephew had, too much weight, not enough sleep.""
Raif accepted it and smirked. "Thanks. I think."
"You're sharp," Hennick said. "But sharp gets dull quick if you don't pace yourself."
"I'll add it to the list," Raif replied.
"Just keep taking the hits without turning brittle," Hennick said. "That's the trick."
[Loyalty Increase Detected. +5 KE]
Kael moved in a crouch, one hand brushing the undergrowth. Rix followed close behind, sketching quick notations onto bark with a sharpened bit of charcoal.
"You ever sleep?" Rix asked. No response.
Kael tapped a nearby tree, then pointed to the fungal dust clinging to its roots, glowing faintly green. The tree stood at a subtle angle, and the roots sloped gently downhill, barely noticeable unless you were looking for it. But the fungal spores had gathered along the upper edge, not where moisture would usually pool.
Rix crouched beside it, eyes narrowing. "Roots angled down, spores clinging up. That's not runoff, it's climb. Moss too, look, the fronds are thicker on the high side." He scraped a patch clean with his knife. "Even the bark's warped slightly. Like it's been pulled toward the slope instead of growing with it."
He stood and scanned the surrounding trees. "This whole patch is leaning the wrong way. Subtle, but wrong. It's like the jungle's trying to reroute itself."
Kael knelt again, fingers brushing the fungal spread. Then he rose without a word and disappeared into the vines, circling to the north. He returned minutes later, holding a curved piece of bark with fresh markings. He laid it beside the root and tapped the arc, mirroring the tree's angle. He pointed to another cluster farther off, then traced a line through the soil, connecting them.
Rix muttered, "Pathways. You're mapping pathways."
He crouched again, tapping his charcoal against the markings. "So maybe it's following the slope to find water. No... too erratic for that. Could be nutrients in the soil, but then why curve around high ground?"
He scratched his chin, eyes darting between tree lines. "Maybe it's growing away from something... or toward something else. Heat? Sound? Light?"
Kael tilted his head but didn't move.
Rix stood and gestured broadly. "If it's reacting, then it's got input. Which means awareness. Primitive, sure, but still awareness."
He stopped, then looked directly at Kael. "You think it's hunting? Or testing?"
Kael didn't answer with words. He simply held up two fingers, then pointed them forward slowly, like an arrow tracking something unseen.
Rix exhaled through his nose. "Right. Forward. Keep watching."
He turned back to his notes and kept sketching, slower now. But his eyes kept flicking toward the trees, as if trying to read the jungle's next move.
Rix crouched beside it. "That's upstream. So why is the spore flow pooling here instead of draining off?"
Kael ran two fingers along the bark, then pointed to a line of hair-fine fibres running at an angle, barely visible.
Rix tilted his head. "Fibres growing against gravity. That's... wrong."
He stood, scanning the surrounding growth. "Try circling north. See if it bends that way, too. I'll mark here."
Kael gave a short nod and disappeared into the vines, noiseless.
Rix watched him go. "Guy doesn't talk, but he sees everything."
Minutes later, Kael returned and laid a thin branch on the dirt, curved, almost crescent-shaped. He traced its arc in the soil with one hand, then pointed to the fungal bloom again.
"Same pattern," Rix muttered. "Like it's drawing a line."
Kael touched his fingers to the earth, held up two, then tilted one.
Rix blinked. "Two sources? One shifted?"
Kael nodded slowly.
"You're good," Rix said, almost impressed. "Scouting with you's like working with a damn ghost."
Naera sat on a fallen log, Mira standing above her. Neither spoke much. Mira watched the treetops, stave in hand, shoulders tense. Her gaze flicked from branch to branch like she expected something to move.
The silence between them wasn't hostile anymore, but it wasn't comfortable either. Mira's grip on her stave loosened, then tightened again, as if unsure whether to speak or stand guard.
Naera spoke low. "The jungle's watching again. I feel it in my ribs."
Mira didn't look away from the canopy. "Good. Let it watch. I'm watching back."
Then, more quietly ,she added, "Still doesn't explain how you're here. Alive. After..."
Naera didn't answer. She didn't need to. The silence between them accepted it for now.
Mira's eyes dropped for the first time, glancing at Naera's profile.
"I'm trying," she said. "To be useful. Even if none of this makes sense."
Naera's lips curved, just slightly. "You already are."
Naera glanced at her, and for the first time since the night before, her lips almost curled.
For a moment, they both watched the wind shift through the branches.
Mira exhaled slowly and shifted her stance. For the first time since arriving, she wasn't just guarding Naera. She was beginning to stand with her. At the camp's edge, Lira drove a sharpened stave into the soil and stepped back, brushing grit from her palms.
"Kael's the quiet type," she said. "But he watches everything. Reminds me of a hunting cat."
Eloin was coiling vines nearby, methodical and quiet as always. "And he doesn't wait for orders. Just does what needs doing."
Goss adjusted his grip on the crutch. "I like him. No fuss, no questions. Just nods and gets on with it."
"Unlike Rix," Lira added, with the faintest twitch of a smile.
Goss snorted. "He's got more angles than a snare trap. But sharp. You can see him weighing every move."
"Useful, sharp," Eloin said. "So long as he's with us."
Goss gave a lopsided shrug. "Hennick seems to think so. And he hasn't been wrong yet."
Lira straightened and looked toward the treeline. "Mira's tense, but... protective. And she listens to Naera."
"That matters," Goss said. "Naera's steadier with her around. I'll take it."
Eloin tested a length of vine between his palms, then nodded to himself. "Syl knows the trees better than anyone I've seen. Has an instinct for movement."
"She's been out here longer than any of us," Lira said. "You can tell. Jungle hasn't broken her yet."
They stood for a moment, not speaking, just listening to the soft knock of hammers and rope pulling taut across camp.
"Strange mix," Lira said eventually.
"Yeah," Goss replied. "But maybe strange is what we need."
Raif returned with his team just after midday. Kael and Rix arrived minutes later. The air was thick with spore haze. He called everyone in near the shelter wall, motioning with his hand.
"Report," Raif said, crouching and pulling out the earlier map scrap.
Kael handed him a new drawing, rough but precise. It showed another arc in the fungal growth, eerily consistent with what they'd already mapped.
Rix stepped in beside him. "It's not a cluster. These are aligned paths. Same bend as two days ago, nature doesn't repeat like this unless something's influencing it."
He glanced at the bark again, his eyes narrowing. "We're not dealing with nature. We're dealing with intent. That should scare us more than any bark wolf."
Naera unfolded a palm-length scrap of bark. "Something's guiding it. The vines shift faster along the bends. I saw a nest yesterday that was pulled down by morning."
Raif laid the bark scraps on the dirt, piecing together a crude yet coherent arc. The others gathered around him.
He compared Kael's drawing to the earlier system projection from the orb, still faintly etched into a nearby slab of bark.
"It matches... mostly," Raif murmured. "But your arcs are tighter here. The orb's map shows a wider spread."
Kael tapped one of the tighter curves, then pointed to the ridge near camp.
"Elevation," Rix said, catching on. "Orb's giving us a flat plane. Kael's mapping by terrain. That's why his bends are sharper. He's feeling what it's doing, not just seeing it."
Raif nodded slowly. "That's useful. Keep both. We'll use yours when we're in the thick of it." As the pattern took shape, his gaze drifted toward the orb. The jungle wasn't waiting. Neither should they.
He straightened, clapped his hands once to call attention. "We're pushing harder. We've got blueprint options we haven't used. That changes today."
He ticked them off with his fingers. "Goss, Syl, Eloin, you're helping me mark where we can place the Perimeter Fence and the Dryroot Storage Pit. That'll lock in our defensive line and give us somewhere better to keep supplies. If we have time, we start building the Herbal Rack too."
Rix raised an eyebrow. "Making use of the system tools now, are we?"
Raif gave him a sharp look. "We've been sitting on them too long. If they help us survive, we use them."
He turned to Kael and Rix. "You two are heading out again. But this time, focus on foraging. Anything edible. Syl, Hennick, once you're done scouting with me, start prepping traplines near the clearing."
Syl tilted her head. "We're in a jungle and no one's thought to trap birds yet. They're loud, fat, and everywhere."
Raif gave her a quick nod. "Start there then."
Syl smirked faintly. "About time."
Hennick cracked his knuckles. "I'll get the lash-vines ready."
With a growing sense of purpose, Raif turned back to the orb. It pulsed again, faint but steady.
They had the tools. Now they just had to use them.
Eloin spoke up. "Lower supports on the shelter split overnight. I replaced them, but we'll want to double-bind."
"Trench held," Lira said. "I shored the edge with ash and angled braces. Nothing came through."
"Syl marked the south line again," Raif added. "Jungle's pushing growth back across our cleared space. Like it's resisting."
"Dryroot pit's dug," Goss said. "Needs sealing. Shouldn't leave it open much longer."
"I've got bark sheeting for that," Hennick said. "Kael spotted a deadfall patch. Should hold."
Mira finally spoke. "Birds won't fly over the northern ridge. They rise and veer. I don't like it."
Rix stared at the sketches. "This isn't instinct. It's reaction. Maybe even coordination."
Raif let out a slow breath and looked down at the maps.
The orb pulsed softly.
[Quest Progress Updated]
[Investigate the Source of Aberrant Growth: 37%]
[Secure the Perimeter: 26%]
As the others returned to their tasks, Raif lingered by the orb. Around him, the group had fallen into quiet motion. Syl sharpening tools. Hennick helping Naera reinforce shelter seams. Mira pacing the edge of the trees.
For the first time, he let the thought settle.
Maybe they're starting to trust me.
And maybe, he could trust them too.