In the beginning, there was no sound, light, or limit.

The universe was a silent, uncarved stone waiting for the chisel.

Then, the Void Mother Primordia gave birth, and the Primordial Six clawed their way into existence to claim the empty canvas.

First came Sura, the Golden Sovereign, who ignited the sun and demanded the world be seen.

To balance the blinding heat, Minerva wove the silver veils of the moon, granting the world the mercy of shadow and the mystery of the tides.

Then Gaia unfurled her body to become the World, a stage of silent stone and sleeping mountains upon which the Great Work would begin.

Raga tore open the earth to pour the endless seas, commanding the storms and the breath of the atmosphere.

Beneath the crust, Placades stoked the eternal furnace, the God of Flames who gave the world its core and its rage.

But the world was a jagged place of rock and steam until the final sibling took root.

Ymira, the Goddess of the Forest and Nature, spread her limbs to soften the stone into soil.

She was the anchor, the bridge between the burning sky and the frozen deep.

For eons, the Six stood in balance.

But even gods can fade, and even the oldest roots can rot.

Now that the original nature Goddess Ymira has withered into stardust, the seat of nature sat empty, and the world has began to become gray.

Without our Patron God I don't know what directions us Elves are to go too.

All we can do know is pray for a miracle.

- Extract from Tales of Gods by Melron Vestan

***

My awareness returned just as quickly as I had lost it, but the London rain was gone.

Instead, I was submerged in a dense, heavy silence.

Everything felt wrong.

I knew I was in a forest—the information was just there—but when I tried to open my eyes, I couldn't find them.

In fact, I was pretty sure I didn't have any.

I couldn't "see" in the traditional sense, but I could perceive the world in a terrifyingly high-definition, 360-degree radius.

I did what any normal person would do: I tried to move.

I tried to take a breath, but my lungs didn't exist.

I tried to swing my arms, shout for help, or even just wiggle a toe. Nothing.

It was like being encased in the world’s tightest suit of armor, or buried alive in something incredibly solid.

Wait. Why can't I move?

I panicked, or tried to. I reached out with my mind, searching for the familiar weight of my fingers, the bend of my knees, the slouch of my shoulders. Instead, I felt... extensions.

I was stuck. Seriously, statistically impossibly stuck.

Am I a ghost? I wondered, my thoughts echoing in the void of my own mind.

Is this the 'limbo' part? Is this what happens when you get hit by a truck while standing on the pavement?

Judging by the luscious greenery and the massive canopy above, I was definitely a long way from a South London pharmacy.

The air was thick and sweet, heavy with the scent of damp earth, ozone, and something ancient.

Just being here felt... good. Satisfying.

It was as if some internal measure I didn't know I had was finally being filled.

There was a pressure here, a saturated weight that pressed against my very soul.

Slowly, my senses began to bleed together.

I perceived giant, prehistoric-looking trees reaching up so high the sky was just a memory.

Their bark looked like polished obsidian, and their leaves glowed with a soft, bioluminescent pulse.

Compared to them, I felt tiny. A literal speck.

Please don't let me be a bacteria, I pleaded with whatever cosmic force was listening.

I didn't die for a promotion to 'microbe.' But that didn't make sense.

I didn't think bacteria could feel the heartbeat of the world.

And I could feel it.

Now that I was actually paying attention, I realized there were thrumming veins of consciousness spreading out beneath me, miles into the cool, dark earth.

They were deep, thirsty, and sensitive to every vibration in the soil.

Above me, I felt thousands of tiny "fingers" swaying in a breeze I couldn't feel on skin.

They were drinking the light, turning the dim glow of the sky into a sugary, electric hum that flowed down into my core.

I felt a massive, dormant power coiled within me, like a sun trapped in a seed.

Maybe I’m paralyzed? I thought. A coma. Yeah, that’s it. I’m in a hospital in London, and this forest is just a very vivid, very weird drug-induced hallucination.

I tried to focus on a single point of vision which was a patch of obsidian-dark bark about five feet away.

I wanted to reach out and touch it. I commanded my arm to lift.

I visualized the muscles tensing, the shoulder pivoting.

Nothing. But the patch of bark felt warm.

Then, I heard it—or rather, I felt the vibration of air before the sound reached me. A chirp.

A small bird, its feathers a shimmering, iridescent violet , fluttered into my field of perception. It was beautiful, but it was moving toward me.

Don't hit me, I thought, a phantom flinch crossing my mind. I can't move to dodge!

The bird didn't hit me. It slowed down, its tiny talons reaching out.

I felt a sharp, pin-prick sensation—not painful, but distinct—as it gripped onto-

Ayye.

Wait. If that wood was five feet away, how did I feel the grip?

The bird hopped twice. Scritch. Scritch.

The sensation was maddeningly intimate. It was like someone was scratching an itch I couldn't reach, right on the bridge of my nose. But I didn't have a nose.

The little creature leaned forward and began to rub its beak against the surface. Rub. Slide. Rub.

My entire being vibrated.

It was the most surreal feeling of my life—like feeling someone brush their hair, but the hair is made of solid oak.

Every scrape of that beak sent a ripple of sensory data directly into my brain.

That’s not a branch to the right of me, I realised as my soul rose to a roar of static. That’s... my chest? Or is it my shoulder? Whatever it is, its connected to me.

The bird let out a contented peep and fluttered upward, landing on a long, thin limb that stretched out over the forest floor. As it settled, its weight caused the limb to dip slightly.

I felt the sway. I felt the tension in the muscles of the wood as it held the bird's weight.

I felt the breeze catch the thousands of tiny fingers at the end of that limb, and for the first time, I realised those fingers weren't just near me.

They were my leaves.

I'm not in a suit of armour, I thought, the horror finally settling in with the weight of a falling mountain. I'm not a ghost in a forest. I'm a fucking tree!

The bird tucked its head under a violet wing and went to sleep on my arm. But the only thing that resonated in my mind is that I had become a true. A flipping tree.