The trail left behind the remnants of the ancestral forge. The air was no longer thick with magical heat and living embers but fresh, carrying the scent of the approaching forest. Elvar led with long strides, not rushing Maple, whose every muscle ached after days of tension and intense work.
As they descended the slopes of the Thorn Range, the landscape subtly shifted. Rocky ground gave way to firm earth, moss and roots cloaked stones and ancient trees, and the sounds of wildlife filled the air. Gone was the oppressive silence of the ruins. This was the living whisper of the world.
Maple's boots were caked in mud, his pack hung heavy on his shoulder, and his mind buzzed with questions. His fingers still stung from the cuts he'd suffered carving Sylwenar, and the scent of burnt wood seemed embedded in his skin.
"The village we're heading to is called Orrenwal," Elvar said, finally breaking the silence. "Small, but well-stocked. Plenty of travelers stop there to rest or sell things they find on the edges of the wild."
"Have you been there before?"
"Many times. It's a good place to find things no one sells in big cities. But they're not exactly… warm to outsiders. There's a runic alchemist there who might teach you, but he doesn't teach just anyone. You'll have to prove you're worth his time—and that you know your place."
Maple nodded. He'd expected resistance, but hearing it from Elvar made it more real.
The forest gave way to rustic civilization. Bastion-style houses of dark wood and living stone were connected by suspension bridges over shallow valleys. Glowing plants hung from metal hooks on doors—a local protective symbol.
At the outer gate, two guards of the narak'thil race—beastlike, with rodent-like snouts and small eyes, clad in heavy cloaks and stained armor—pointed runic spears at the group.
"Stop. Name, origin, intent."
Elvar calmly removed his hood.
"Elvar of Ulnar, returning for rest and trade. My apprentice, Maple, seeks instruction with Varikus."
The narak'thil exchanged silent glances. One sniffed the air.
"Smells of ancient embers. You've been to the ancestral forge."
Maple stepped forward slightly.
"I survived it, yes. And brought this with me."
He opened his pack and revealed part of Sylwenar, its runic wood faintly pulsing with living mana.
The guard didn't touch it but stared with restrained reverence.
"It sings. Like the trees of eternal lament."
He nodded respectfully but growled, "Orrenwal is no haven for the curious. Respect our terms and rites. Any breach… will be paid in blood. Understood?"
"Understood," Maple replied firmly.
The spears lowered, and the gates of living vines creaked open, groaning like weeping wood.
The tower wasn't a house but a collapse of eras compressed into one space. Walls covered in symbols, metal scaffolding, enchanted roots supporting floating stones, and trails of multicolored smoke weaving through the floors.
Varikus descended a staircase with an ancient bone staff. He was almost spectral—short, hunched, with skin so pale it seemed untouched by the sun. His amber eyes, always half-closed, burned with restless fire. A thin, long beard was tied in three braids, each adorned with runic beads. His bald head, reflecting the surrounding candlelight, bore faded tattoos of alchemical formulas. He wore layered alchemist's robes—scorched black leather, runic fabric, and thin plates of engraved alchemical metal. A belt clinked with vials, rolled scrolls, and miniaturized bones. His cracked glasses, one blue lens and one amber, seemed to see beyond mere shapes.
His gaze wasn't welcoming—it was judgmental.
"You. The redhead with the scent of living wood."
He approached, stared into Maple's eyes, and pointed his staff at his chest.
"Where did you find it?"
Maple hesitated.
"It chose me. In the ancestral forge, after I carved it at the risk of my life."
Varikus sniffed, then tapped his temple.
"It whispered. And it didn't lie. But surviving isn't enough merit. Want to learn from me?"
"I do."
"Then prove it."
He tossed a small runic leather pouch at Maple's feet.
"Three ingredients. A mud worm, a pure silari root, and a living witchoid gem fragment. Get all three in three days, without dying or damaging them, and I'll speak to you again. Otherwise, leave. I don't tutor fools."
The search was brutal. Maple faced muddy swamps filled with natural traps, enchanted thorns emitting shrill, repelling sounds, and camouflaged creatures that ambushed him.
The mud worm was found after two nights of silent digging by an alkaline lake's edge. Capturing it with an improvised runic pincers, he felt the first burn of raw mana in his hand—the worm's core reacted to emotional tension.
The silari root was guarded by a floral illusion field, only extracted after he played a harmonic melody on an improvised fox-bone flute. The plant trembled before revealing its pulsing blue root.
The witchoid gem was the most dangerous: a living crystal embedded in the skull of a nocturnal creature, a Funereal Vespor, which attacked while he gathered leaves. The fight was desperate; his makeshift blade snapped in half. He used a distraction rune—Syth'Kalreth—activated by breath to create a magical boom and escape, limping.
Battered, hands wounded, and soul exhausted, Maple returned to the tower gate three days later.
Varikus sat on the steps, as if he already knew.
"Let me see."
Each item was handed over and inspected under spectral light.
The old man gave a faint smile and nodded.
"It didn't choose you for nothing. Come in, apprentice."
Varikus offered no rest. The next morning, Maple was woken by a sharp sound from an enchanted glass bell. It reverberated in his temples, causing a slight headache, as if tiny needles vibrated in his bones. It was Varikus' way of saying: Wake up, or be forced awake.
Descending the living stone steps to the tower's lower laboratory, Maple was hit by a bittersweet smell of burnt amber and ancient dust. The air was thick, heavy with the weight of past practice and mistakes. The workbench was covered with surgically precise tools: three-bladed runic chisels, double-edged carvers, enchanted flint blades that reflected light as if breathing, iridescent chalks that shifted color with the wielder's mood, and sealed containers of mysterious extracts and resins pulsing like small hearts.
Varikus stood before three wooden blocks on black iron stands. The woods were distinct: one ivory-white with blue veins, another gnarled and green, and the third black with silver flecks, faintly vibrating as if whispering.
"Today begins your true training," Varikus said without looking at Maple. His voice was dry as old paper. "To be a true runic carver, you must master three fundamentals: trace, vibration, and offering. Each requires a tool, a ritual, and a curse to overcome."
He turned slowly and pointed to the black wood.
"Your first task is to awaken the song of the material."
Maple approached. As he reached out, the air around the block seemed to warm. The wood radiated subtle heat, and touching it sent a chill up his arm. As if the wood were reading him.
"This… feels alive," he murmured.
"It is," Varikus confirmed. "It's a fragment of Drathlen, a tree that only grows where creatures die in deep suffering. It only accepts the touch of those who've failed."
Maple recoiled instinctively but took a deep breath and touched it again.
"Touch it wrong, it cracks. Touch it right, it sings. Carving without feeling is like teaching a fish to fly. Begin."
Maple spent the entire day studying the wood. Sometimes listening for something. Sometimes touching, then pulling back. Varikus offered no help—just sat in the corner, holding a smoldering vial, watching like an old owl.
On the second morning, exhausted, Maple decided to carve despite his uncertainty. He gripped the silver runic chisel with both hands. Positioned himself. Made a stroke. Nothing. A second. A faint tremor. A third—the wood shook, a deep note echoed. A muffled tone, like a drowned bell.
He stopped, startled. Something responded.
From there, he traced the same patterns slowly, adjusting pressure, feeling the wood's fibers resist and yield like tense muscles. After hours, the Drathlen block emitted a harmonic hum. Low. Steady. Profound.
Varikus stood and approached.
"That's the beginning. You're now heard by the material. Keep going, and it might even answer your name."
Maple collapsed to his knees when finished. Exhausted. Sweating, hands aching. But smiling.
The next day, Varikus introduced the resonant chalk. White-silver powder condensed into long, fragile sticks.
"Vibration is making the material remember what it can be," he explained. "Every rune is an echo of the possible. Make the right trace with silence in your heart and rage in your fingers. Feel the fury running through the wood."
Maple traced a simple ignition rune but misjudged the angle. The wood vibrated wrongly. A sudden crack and a dry explosion threw him against the wall.
Varikus merely watched.
"No blood, no learning. Start again."
For three days, Maple carved and failed. Tried with dead wood. Tried with the ancient blocks. Tried blindfolded. Until, in a solitary predawn, he succeeded.
The rune vibrated. Softly. No cracks. And when he touched its center, a note sounded—high, melancholic, and beautiful.
Varikus appeared behind him, unnoticed.
"That's your first signature. Every rune you make will carry this sound. It's your name among objects."
Maple was moved. He touched it again.
He named it Ilyen'Serath, the rune of harmonic pulse.
The next morning, Varikus led him to the tower's deepest chamber. Doors guarded by four seals, a corridor adorned with runic mandalas, and an iron sentinel shaped like a crow with ruby eyes.
There lay the materials Maple had gathered: the living silari root, the mud worm encased in amber, and a witchoid gem fragment pulsing steadily like a drumbeat.
"Every creation demands an offering. The wood or crystal must know what you're willing to give in return."
Maple hesitated.
"Pain?"
"Pain. Memory. Blood. A secret name. A forsaken lie. Choose."
He chose blood. He dripped it onto the silari root. It trembled, then briefly bloomed, releasing a faint scent of bitter tea and dust.
"It accepted. Now use it as the base for a preservation rune."
Maple carved with the care of a soul sculptor. The lines flowed like rivers. The wood seemed to breathe under his fingers. When finished, a blue-green light traced the veins and settled in the center.
He named it Taryn'Valeth.
Varikus studied it for a long time.
"You're ready to learn for real. Now I can call you a shaper."
That night, Maple met Elvar at an inn called "The Moss Womb," built inside the hollow trunk of a millennial tree. They sat by the hearth, drinking bitter, smoky telnar leaf tea.
"The old man seems cruel, but he's shaping you," Elvar remarked. "I've seen plenty crumble before the second week."
Maple smiled less often but with more conviction.
"He's taught me more with a glance than others have with words. It's like my hands know what to do even when my head doesn't understand."
"That's true forging," Elvar said. "You're getting strong."
Maple looked at Sylwenar's blade. The runic wood vibrated softly. He knew that vibration now had identity. He was starting to mark the world.
And all of this… was just the beginning.