The mist did not break, not even after hours of walking. It only shifted in thickness, curling lazily in places like a sleeping beast's breath and thinning in others where shafts of pale sunlight broke through the canopy. The air was dense and wet, carrying the mingled scents of moss, rotting leaves, and something faintly metallic that no one wanted to name.
Roots clawed up from the earth in gnarled arcs, slick with dampness, forcing them to step high or risk tripping. Leaves hung low, brushing against faces and shoulders with cold, dew-heavy touches. The occasional sound of water dripping from somewhere high above punctuated the steady crunch of their boots.
They moved in formation still — seniors at the front and sides, juniors tucked in the middle like cargo being guarded.
Yun's voice came without her looking back. "Stay alert. The forest looks calm when it wants to. That's usually when something's watching."
The juniors tightened their grips on their weapons.
Muye walked in silence, but his eyes scanned everything. He saw the details others overlooked: a vine curling around a tree like a constrictor, its edges lined with small thorns tipped in a faint red sheen; mushrooms with caps the color of bruised skin clustered around the base of an ancient stump; a cluster of pale blue flowers growing low in the shadows that seemed to exhale a faint mist of their own.
"Corpse Widow Bloom," muttered one of the seniors as they passed the flowers. "Toxic if ingested, useful in paralytic powders. Don't touch them unless you want your fingers numb for a week."
A few juniors leaned for a better look, but Yun's sharp tone made them straighten again. "Keep moving."
Further ahead, Feng halted briefly, crouching to scrape at something stuck to a rock — a thick smear of dark green sap. "Bloodvine resin," he said. "Burns when refined properly. Fetches a decent price." He scraped it into a small clay vial before standing.
The moment of stillness allowed the juniors to break formation slightly. A few exchanged hushed words, the kind meant to disguise their unease.
"Smells like something died three days ago out here," one muttered.
"Better than smelling like we did," another whispered back, earning a couple of muffled snickers.
A sharp snap echoed nearby, and the laughter died instantly. Every head turned toward the sound — just a thin branch breaking under its own weight, tumbling to the mossy ground. Still, the tension lingered.
It was Lian who broke the silence this time, his voice low but audible. "Your senses get sharper the longer you survive in places like this. Not because you're more skilled. Because the forest forces you to be."
They kept moving. Occasionally, one of the juniors would spot something and gesture — a nest of chittering, bat-like creatures clinging upside-down to a branch; a strange patch of blackened moss that seemed to swallow light; a trio of brightly colored insects the size of a hand, crawling across a log with clicking mandibles.
The seniors ignored most of these distractions unless something held value. When a small animal darted from the underbrush, one junior startled so badly he nearly tripped. The creature — a long-bodied thing with fur that shimmered faintly like oil on water — vanished into a hole before anyone could get a better look.
"Shadow Weasel," said Feng. "Poison in the claws. Flesh isn't worth eating, but the glands… now those are valuable."
---
By midday, they came to a patch where the mist thinned enough for more light to seep through. The canopy here was higher, the air just a little warmer. The seniors called for a short stop to check the path ahead.
A few juniors took the chance to drink from their canteens. Others crouched to inspect nearby plants, hoping to collect something without drawing attention. One found a handful of small, brittle mushrooms under a rotting log. Another poked at a bush bearing small yellow berries until Yun snapped at him, reminding him that "anything that looks edible here will probably dissolve your stomach lining."
Muye didn't bother with gathering. His gaze kept drifting upward to the dense network of branches overhead, searching for movement. He thought about the junior they had lost earlier. How quickly it had happened. How little it had mattered to the seniors.
When they moved again, the atmosphere shifted. The forest here felt… heavier.
The trees grew closer together, their trunks wrapped in thick mats of moss that swallowed sound. Here, even their footsteps seemed quieter, as if the earth itself was muffling them. The air was cooler, laced with a faint smell of wet stone and something faintly sweet that made the back of Muye's throat itch.
Then it happened.
A sharp gasp came from the back of the group.
Everyone turned to see a boy — one of the quieter juniors — crouched at the base of a massive tree. His hands were half-buried in a thick tangle of roots, and in them, he held something small that glimmered faintly in the dim light.
"What's that?" one whispered.
The boy froze, glancing around as if caught doing something forbidden. "N… nothing. Just a stone."
But Muye's eyes narrowed. Even from here, he could see the way the surface of the object caught the light, shimmering with a faint internal glow. That was no ordinary stone.
Before anyone else could press, Yun's voice cut in. "Form up. We're moving."
The boy shoved the object into his sleeve in one quick motion and rose, dusting his hands on his trousers. He avoided everyone's eyes as they continued forward.
Muye caught a flicker of expression — not guilt, exactly, but the sharp, guarded look of someone who had just decided not to share what he'd found.
The seniors hadn't noticed. Or maybe they had, and simply didn't care… yet.
---
They pressed deeper into the forest. At one point, they passed a fallen tree split open by age and rot, its hollow interior crawling with fat, pale worms that writhed in the damp darkness. Several birds — or what looked like birds — perched high in the canopy, their bodies draped in long, trailing feathers that almost resembled veils.
A low hum began to rise, so faint at first it seemed like imagination. It came from somewhere ahead, a strange vibration that made the hair on the back of Muye's neck lift.
The seniors slowed but didn't stop.
No one spoke now. Even the juniors who had been whispering earlier kept their mouths shut. The hum grew louder as they walked, the source still hidden in the mist.
When it faded again a few minutes later, the relief was almost physical — shoulders dropping, breaths releasing.
---
They stopped one last time before the seniors called the march for the day. The ground here was uneven, broken by jagged rocks jutting from the soil like broken teeth. Mist drifted in slow ribbons between them, curling around ankles before rising to dissipate in the thinning light.
The boy with the hidden object stood near the edge of the group, his expression unreadable. He kept his hands tucked in his sleeves, posture carefully casual.
No one asked him about it again.
But Muye noticed the way his eyes kept flicking to the seniors, as if measuring whether they had guessed his secret.
The forest was quiet here, but it was not a peaceful quiet. It was the kind of quiet that came before something stepped out of the mist.
Yun's voice broke it. "We move at first light tomorrow."
The juniors murmured acknowledgment.
The boy with the hidden treasure looked down briefly, the faintest curve at the corner of his mouth before he masked it again.
No one else saw.
The day ended there — tense, but without another fight.