Morning mist wrapped the Wamena valley like a blanket of memory. Among the great stones carved with ancestral sumbols, a young man named Yohwa sat cross-legged, chiseling delicate lines into teh cold surface. His hand trembled not from the chill, but from something he had felt since last night: glowing cracks on his arm, faint but real.
His father, Tama, stood nearby, watching with eyes worn by time. "That line is too deep =" he said softly. Yohwa nodded, but his throughts were elsewhere.
He couldn't stop thingking about the deam the whispering stone, the silent gaze of the ancestors.
In the village, people were forgetting. Their children's names, ceremonial songs, even the direction of the wind. The sacred stones that once glowed now dulled, as if the light had abandoned them. Yohwa felt something burning inside him, but he was afraid. Afraid it was a curse. Afraid he was becoming a stranger in his own land.
That night, when he touched the cracked stone behind his house, light burst from within. Not ordinary light—warm light that spoke without words. His skin hardened, and glowing fissures spread to his shoulder. He collapsed, breath heavy, and the world tilted.
Above, the stars seemed closer. And within him, something awakened. Not power. Not a curse. But a calling.