The swamp glistened with a living warmth, humming with soft life rather than menace. The trees stretched high like guardians rather than obstacles, their limbs draped with strands of bioluminescent moss that glowed softly with the rhythm of the land.
Every step Ash took sank slightly into moss-slick roots and fungal pads that blinked with residual aether like sleepy fireflies.
Tholn walked ahead without speaking, his silhouette long and lean, blending with the pulse of the forest. Ash followed in silence.
The Murkfen Kin village was less a village and more an unfolding — grown from the land in gentle layers. Homes dangled like glowing fruit from trees, breathing slowly, their surfaces woven with soft moss and trailing light-laced tendrils. Rope bridges swung with playful grace between root-pillars, some woven so seamlessly into the trees that it seemed they had always been there. Lights drifted like fire spirits between branches, winking in and out as if curious.
