A sound outside the room. Not thunder. Not wind.
A voice. Small. Urgent.
"Brother!"
It was Jon.
Ithariel moved before thought. He entered the living room—and froze.
Yuna was shaking.
Her body spasmed violently, face pale, mouth open, breath coming in broken gasps. The candle apple she'd been eating had rolled to the floor, forgotten. Her skin was blotched dark, her neck swelling, her limbs bloating unnaturally.
She was on the verge of rupture—the Pale Reaper's Breath had reached its maximum saturation within her.
"Jon—clean water! Now!"
The boy ran.
Ithariel knelt beside her, pressing his rough hand against her throat. Her pulse thrashed like a dying bird beneath the skin. His fingers trembled. His jaw clenched.
He closed his eyes.
Darkness coiled through him.
Her breath came smoother. Slower. Her body began to shrink. The swelling reversed—like time unspooling. But it was not mercy. It was extraction.
The black poison inside her left her veins—and entered his.
His own body bore it without protest. He had become its host long ago. Only the webbing of veins beneath his skin turned blacker, more visible beneath the collar, the ribs, the back of his arms. But the clothes concealed what truth tried to show.
Jon returned, panting, a dented metal pot clutched in both hands. "Is she… okay?"
"She is now." Ithariel ruffled the boy's hair with a weary smile. "Let's clean her up. Toxin on the skin makes it worse."
The water was cold. They wiped her down with a threadbare cloth, one touch at a time. Her chest rose and fell softly now. She'd sleep. For a while.
Jon sat beside her bed, watching her face with a brother's dread.
Ithariel left them.
Outside, the rain had stopped.
But the sun had not returned.
The world was gray. Not silver-gray. Rot-gray. A sky of unblinking ash.
He looked at the trees. The wind refused to move them.
"That's the fourth time," he muttered. "And it's happening faster. It was once a year… now every six months."
"Stopping the Dark Forest herbs was a mistake."
The Dark Forest wasn't far from his house. But it was a place untouched by the divine. Trees grew there like mirrors—identical height, identical width. No birds sang. No wind passed. The deeper you walked, the more the world forgot you.
But inside it—there bloomed a single mercy.
The Purifying Herb.
A leaf like frozen sapphire, cold to the touch, veined with light. It dulled the symptoms. It didn't heal, but it bought time. A few weeks. A few months.
He had stopped going once he learned to extract poison directly, taught by the voice. But maybe…
"Maybe the herbs had their own worth," he said aloud. "I thought I could carry it all. Maybe I can't."
He stepped back inside.
Jon had fallen asleep in the chair, head resting near Yuna's leg. She still breathed. Ithariel touched Jon's neck—lightly—and pulled a small thread of poison from him, just enough.
"Insurance," he whispered.
Then he grabbed the old iron-handled axe, worn to the bone. And left.
He walked barefoot. The wet soil clung to him like rot. It wasn't far—but distance in this land was not measured in steps. It was measured in omens.
Soon, he arrived.
The Dark Forest.
Same height. Same width. A thousand trees, all alike. No wind. No rustle. No sound.
He stood at its edge. Clenched his fists.
"Here we go again."
He stepped inside.
Silence closed over him like a coffin.
"This always gives me chills…"
But he walked.
Within a few minutes, he found one.
A thin, pale-blue leaf near the roots of a tree. Cold as frost. He plucked it and slid it into the pocket of his pants.
"One down. Need ten."
He kept walking. Eyes scanning. Muscles alert. Memory screaming.
No sane man enters here.
Only the desperate.
Only the damned.
Those who survived brought dogs or birds. Creatures with instincts. Creatures who remembered the way out. He had once brought a dog named Flow. But Flow was gone.
Now, he had something else.
Something older.
The voice.
It stirred now. Whispered from the hollow behind his eyes.
[Right. Then forward. Ten more steps. You'll see another.]
He obeyed.
The all-knowing voice…
Always with answers. Always watching. Always guiding. Except when it mattered most.
He found the next herb.
Then another.
And another.
Until his pocket bulged with frozen blue.
He stopped.
The silence leaned against him.
He didn't move.
"I should release it now," he said.
Ithariel dropped the axe to the soil. Removed his shirt.
In the center of the forest, he stood naked from the waist up. Bare to the bone. A boy carved of ash and promise.
His body was marked.
Black veins spiderwebbed his back. His shoulders. His ribs. Down to his hips. All of it—toxin—borrowed from the brink of death in others. A gift he carried. A death he delayed.
"You said I can't contain it forever," he whispered. "That I need to release it somewhere no one can breathe it in."
He looked at the endless forest around him. No birds. No people. No eyes.
"Then this is the place."
Ithariel closed his eyes.
Then—he let go.
The breath he exhaled was not breath. It was black fog.
Thick. Greedy. Endless.
It poured from his skin, his eyes, his back, his scars. It hissed from the marrow of his bones. Darkness unfurled in slow, suffocating waves—like a second forest being born atop the first. The trees vanished. The sky disappeared. It filled everything. Crawled into roots. Bit at stone. Smothered the land in silence.
A fog not meant to exist in this world.
Poison.
But not ordinary.
This was borrowed death. Stolen sickness. A collection of other people's last breaths he'd hoarded inside his body like a cursed priest keeping the sins of a dying village. The boy stood in the center of it all. Breathing. Unchanged.
To him, poison or air made no difference. He was immune. Or damned. Or both.
And still, the voice spoke.
[Wait—]
But Ithariel didn't.
The fog coiled around him like a cloak of silence. Nothing stirred. No branches creaked. No voices called. For a moment, Ithariel believed he had finally found the place—still enough, empty enough—to release the poison he had carried so long. A space made, at last, for letting go.
Then—
[You shouldn't have done that.]
The voice returned. Sharper. Ash-coated.
[You damn brat. You didn't speak with me first.]
"You were the one who said I couldn't keep the poison in me forever," Ithariel said. "I needed space—to carry more."
[…Then you woke him.]
The words sliced. Cold. Final.
[You poisoned his forest. And now the king stirs.]
Then—
A voice not from within.
[Dodge.]
Ithariel dropped flat. A blur—white and fast—cut past him. Trees behind him exploded like matchsticks, sheared by a fang the size of his body.
He scrambled backward, heart thundering.
"What was that?!"
[The King of the Dark Forest.]
And then—footsteps.
No, not steps. Impact. Weight. Crushing rhythm. The whole forest trembled like a drum skin.
Ithariel's throat dried. His limbs went cold.
From between the silent trees, it came.
A white tiger.
But not merely large—mythic. Tall as the canopy. Eyes the color of fresh wounds. Its breath boiled the fog. Its fang glinted like moonsplit metal.
Ithariel shook. The air around him grew heavier.
[That is no beast. It is a dungeon survivor. An apex-class predator. A relic of before the Serpentfall.]
The tiger stopped a dozen paces away. Its claws carved the soil. Its eyes pinned Ithariel with a knowing cruelty.
It spoke.
"Human." Its voice made the trees lean away. "Was it you who released this filth?"
"Yes," Ithariel answered, jaw clenched.
The tiger exhaled—and a thousand blackened leaves drifted down, burned by heat alone.
"This poison stinks of serpents." Its tone turned savage. "You reek of them."
"I'm not one of them!" Ithariel shouted.
"No," the tiger agreed. "You're worse. Because you brought their curse into my forest."
It stepped forward.
The poison fog parted around its paws. As if it feared him.
"This forest is mine."
"Its silence. Its death. Its balance. You broke it."
"I had to protect my family."
The tiger's voice grew quieter. Almost human.
"Then let's see who dies for theirs first."
It lunged.
Ithariel's eyes widened. He dove backward—but the tiger did not stop. It entered the poison fog, the same fog that would kill gods, beasts, monsters—
But not the king.
The white tiger roared.
And the fog trembled.
"He's not stopping!" Ithariel screamed.
[Then take it back.]
"What?!"
[Take it BACK, you FOOL—before he tears your spine from your mouth!]
Ithariel hesitated.
Then—he bit his lip. Blood ran.
He spread his arms wide.
And welcomed the poison back.
It came screaming.
The fog that swallowed half a forest was sucked back into his body like a black hurricane. It entered through his skin, his mouth, his eyes. His spine burned. His muscles locked. His veins turned pitch-black. The skin beneath his eyes hollowed. His body shook.
But he stood.
Alive.
The tiger—paused.
Its breath caught. Its eyes narrowed.
"What… are you?" The voice now low. Curious. Careful.
Ithariel didn't answer.
The beast stared at him for a long time.
Then—laughed. A dry, rasping sound that wasn't entirely animal.
"I think I'll watch you, boy."
And with that—it turned.
Its massive white body melted into the trees.
Gone. Not a sound. Not a breath. As if it had never existed at all.
Ithariel collapsed to his knees.
Shaking.
Sweat dripped down his spine. His fingers twitched. His heartbeat refused to settle.
But he was alive.
Alive… after facing a king.
[You impressed him.]
Ithariel didn't reply.
[He won't forget this. And now—someone knows. Poison doesn't work on you. That's dangerous.]
"I know," Ithariel said, voice low.
He rose in fragments, each limb unsure if it should move.
"But I have to go home. Send the herbs."
His footsteps were unsteady.
The forest behind him watched.
And somewhere, far ahead—fate shifted.
Ithariel did not yet know it… but in the next hours—his life would never be his own again.