The days in Orrenwal had settled into a routine—but never mundane. Maple now woke before dawn, enveloped by the scent of damp moss and the soft creak of ropes suspending the village's structures. It was like living in a living web, where everything breathed, even the silence.
On that particular morning, he woke feeling an odd vibration in his Stellar Mark. It was subtle but pulsed irregularly, as if something beyond the runes was trying to attune to him.
As he slowly chewed a crusty bread offered by a narak'thil woman named Teya, he heard the faint sound of a lute being tuned in the background. He approached the common hall of "The Moss Womb" inn, where a local musician with long hands and pointed ears plucked an ancient song about a beast buried beneath a sea of salt.
Maple watched in silence. Something in the melody unsettled him. He sat in a corner, pulled out the small travel lute he'd bought with earnings from selling a runic bracelet—and began to compose.
His fingers, calloused from carving, now strummed chords. The melody came in fragments. It was soft but restless, with notes like claws. The wood of the instrument seemed to guide him, as if his Mark vibrated in sync with the emerging chords.
There, The Song of the Severed Pulse was born, his first composition after the First Star.
The melody started slow and heavy, like the tread of someone wounded. Its verses carried the weight of initiation, the blood spilled in early creations, and the anguish of being unheard until pain became sound. It spoke of days when Maple carved alone in the cold, fingers trembling, missing lines and erasing hopes. It spoke of mocking voices and silence heavier than words.
Verses from the song:
"When echoes don't return, and metal doesn't sing… When the pulse is severed within, without blade or scar… What sound remains, but the one I craft from pain?"
"But if the world won't hear me, I carve the ground… If the world silences me, I vibrate until it cracks… And every note of mine is a thread between nothing and the real."
The song ended with a sustained low note, vibrating until it faded, as if leaving something caught in the world's throat.
By late morning, as Maple stowed his instrument, still feeling the final notes resonating in his ribs, a cold breeze brought a familiar whisper—not in sound, but in sensation. A presence called to him.
He left the inn and walked to the village's edge, where sunlight struggled to pierce the mirrored canopy of the forest. There, Varikus waited.
The old carver didn't meet him at the tower but at the village's boundary, near a drawbridge leading to Norh-Darel's inner forest, an ancestral stretch forbidden to most. Trees with mirrored bark curved in shapes like frozen gestures of pain.
"A runic hunter vanished four days ago in Norh-Darel," Varikus said bluntly. "His last transmission used seals of the Old Lyntar Tongue. The same as your blade."
Maple's eyes widened. The name "Lyntar" pulsed with the mark on his back.
"You want me to go in there… alone?"
"With the bare minimum. But not alone. Take Elvar. And take these," he said, handing him a black wooden case with three carved runic plates: Delr'Nath (repulsion rune), Syrah'Vol (echo rune), and Malrek'Thon (ascending vibration rune).
"They'll be your silent strings. Use them wisely. Not everything that moves in Norh-Darel bleeds."
The return to the village after the talk was quiet. Maple passed the suspended forge, where sparks and hammer strikes of narak'thil smiths filled the air, and acquired a new set of collapsible hooks, curved-tipped carving blades, and a reinforced leather case for runic plates.
Later, with Elvar's help, he gathered supplies: zairn-seasoned cured meat, sweet sap crackers that crunched when bitten, vials of fermented tyern flower nectar, and a white quartz filter-stone carved with purification spirals.
At sunset, the duo crossed the bridge and ventured into the living forest. Each step shifted the branches' direction. The vegetation reacted to sound and intent. Maps were useless—memory and luck guided Norh-Darel's hunters.
On the second day, after crossing a valley of singing mosses that chimed at the touch, they reached an irregular clearing surrounded by dried cocoons. There, they found traces: torn clothing, a spear embedded in the ground. On a stone, a burned runic symbol: Kyrm'Valden—"last breath."
Elvar knelt, touching the stone with reverence.
"He died here. But he fought. This wasn't done by any common beast."
Maple scanned the area. He carved Syrah'Vol onto a plate and activated it. A soft echo swept the clearing, revealing magical imprints in the air, like smoky molds: a creature over two meters tall, quadrupedal, with multiple eyes and a vibrating tail.
"I've never seen anything like it," he whispered.
"I have. Once. In ancient ruins. They call it a Whispering Hunter. Lives between planes. Senses magical vibrations and tears through spaces to attack."
Maple's blood ran cold. The runic plates in his case trembled faintly.
"It's close," he murmured.
The attack was sudden. A crack in the air preceded the creature's appearance: hairless, dark, shimmering skin like living obsidian, asymmetrical eyes, and fangs vibrating with black energy.
Maple activated Delr'Nath and slammed the plate into the ground. The rune erupted in a repulsion wave, pushing the monster back.
Elvar rolled aside, drawing two curved blades. He struck fast, but the creature dissolved into smoke.
"It jumps between shadows!" Maple shouted.
Using Malrek'Thon, he created a rhythmic sequence of ascending vibrations that disrupted the creature's perception. This bought time to carve Keln'FarRune, a dissonant containment rune based on traps.
The seal glowed beneath the Hunter as it reappeared to strike—ensnaring it in a web of solid sound.
Elvar didn't hesitate. He drove his blades into the vibration point—between the asymmetrical eyes.
With a distorted scream, the creature crumbled into gray ash.
Maple dropped to his knees, breathing heavily.
"That was… a test, wasn't it?" he said, glancing at Elvar.
"If it was, it was a test to kill anyone who faced it." Elvar gave a bitter laugh. "But you passed."
That night, back at the tavern, Maple picked up his lute again. Before the curious and still-wary narak'thil eyes, he played The Song of the Severed Pulse for the first time.
It spoke of pain. Of pulses that break. Of unseen scars. Of echoes that warn before death.
But it also spoke of finding one's voice. Of shaping oneself amid the world's noise. Of playing on when the strings are cut.
The melody filled the room like fog. Some bowed their heads. Others closed their eyes. Even the mugs stopped clinking.
And from a dark corner, Varikus' eyes glinted faintly, hidden in the shadows.
The morning after the battle with the Whispering Hunter dawned cloaked in heavy mist. Orrenwal was silent, as if the village itself had heard the previous night's song and still meditated on its words.
Maple woke later than usual, muscles exhausted and body sore from the physical and magical strain of the fight. But something was different. When he shed his light sleeping tunic, he noticed his Stellar Mark—once a thin, pale trace—now glowed with an amber hue and seemed to have thickened, pulsing with life. Smaller runic lines were forming around the main symbol, as if the star were gaining new layers of meaning.
He approached the polished stone mirror in the corner of his room and touched the mark. A faint hum ran through his skin. Varikus' words echoed in his mind: "Not everything that moves in Norh-Darel bleeds."
Maple descended to the tavern, where he found Elvar eating a thick porridge with bubbles of floating nectar. The veteran nodded in greeting, but his eyes studied Maple's bare shoulder closely.
"Your Mark changed. Felt anything different?" Elvar asked.
"Yes. Like it was being rewritten while I slept."
"That's rare. And good. But you need to strengthen it now that it's been awakened in combat. Runes require discipline, and discipline requires structure. So train with me today," Elvar said, standing.
Together, they headed to the "Temple of Strings," a clearing within the village where runic cords hung from branches like living veils. It was where the narak'thil taught their young to listen before speaking, to feel before acting.
Varikus awaited them, kneeling before a stone slab carved with twelve runic runes. He was shirtless, revealing a body etched with decades of runic scars—glowing like maps of knowledge and pain.
"Today, you'll learn to sustain a living rune," Varikus said bluntly.
Single-use runes—like pulses—require only carving, activation, and release. But living runes, or continuous-flow runes, demand a permanent bond between carver and symbol. They consume mana slowly but relentlessly, offering great power and risk.
Maple was led to a low carving bench made of living roots. He received a slab of Kalthrimor wood, known for retaining vibrations for weeks. Guided by Elvar, he began working on Aen'Rune—a basic persistent rune for sustaining warmth.
It took hours of focus. The wood resisted, warped, vibrated. The slightest distraction deformed lines. Maple sweated, breathed slowly, felt his Mark's energy flow to his fingers.
When he finished, a pressure gripped his head—like hours submerged in a freezing river. Then he activated the rune with a touch and a whisper:
"Aen'Rune… Kalshenor."
The wood glowed amber, and gentle warmth radiated from the small carving. It didn't fade. He felt the connection to it.
"Now try to deactivate it," Varikus said.
Maple tried to withdraw his energy, but the rune resisted, as if a bond had formed. Finally, with effort, he cut the flow, and the rune dimmed.
"Now you understand everything has a cost," Varikus said. "Imagine sustaining five of these during a hunt. Or ten in combat. The power's there. But it's your blood that pays."
That night, after training, Maple sat with his lute again. Exhausted but alive.
The strings responded faster than ever. His fingers wove a captivating, rhythmic melody that spoke of resilience. Of strings that burn but don't break.
He named this new composition The Candle That Doesn't Fade.
A fragment echoed across the inn's veranda:
"While the wood endures and fingers burn, I write in pain but vibrate in flame. What doesn't consume me keeps me alive. Like a candle that burns but doesn't fade."
The few listeners' eyes lifted. There was no drunkenness in that song—only presence. A promise.
And from a dark corner, Varikus smiled again.