The ground in which Noel was standing suddenly screamed before it broke.
Not sound.
Pressure.
A huge exhaust of energy surged upward like a wounded beast finally lashing out.
The cavern split.
The stone did not fall.
It slid—wrongly—like layers of reality peeling apart.
"Noel—!"
Anna's voice cut off mid-syllable as he separated from him
The world tilted.
The man form fractured into several afterimages, each dragged in a different direction by the eruption. The energy currents collided, twisted, tore.
Rose vanished first.
Swallowed by a collapsing fold of light.
Anna was thrown back, flames erupting instinctively from her bow as she skidded across broken stone.
Noel felt nothing grab him.
That was the problem.
There was no pull.
No impact.
Just absence.
The floor beneath his feet thinned into translucence, like glass stretched too far.
He stepped back—
And the world inverted.
He did not fall.
He descended.
Silence replaced sound.
Darkness replaced direction.
Everything faded.
Not suppressed.
Ignored.
Time stretched into something viscous.
Then—
he landed.
Stone beneath him.
Cold. Smooth.
No sky above.
No walls around.
Just space.
Endless shelves rose from the ground, vanishing upward and outward, packed with books of every size and material. Paper. Crystal. Bone. Things that were not meant to be written on.
They did not move.
They waited.
Noel stood slowly.
His heartbeat echoed too loudly.
"This… isn't where they went."
His voice felt unwelcome here.
The air reacted.
Light bloomed ahead—thin, pale lines forming a circular sigil beneath his feet. Letters rearranged themselves constantly, never settling into a language he fully understood.
Yet meaning pressed into his mind anyway.
Unregistered existence detected
Lineage : unknown
Intent :unknown
The sigil brightened.
Inheritance Trial initiated.
Noel frowned.
"I didn't activate anything."
The answer came without sound.
You entered
A pause.
Then—
One only may proceed
The space behind him folded inward.
Gone.
No path back.
No path forward.
Just shelves.
And silence.
For the first time since the eruption, Noel understood.
This wasn't an ambush.
This wasn't a trap.
This was a place that did not care who he was—
only whether he was fit to remain.
The sigil dimmed.
A single sentence remained.
Perception will be tested first.
The shelves shifted.
And the world began to lie.
The world shifted where there was nothing in the place, just darkness .
Then. A single note of light came into view
And the darkness was swept away and Noel eyes went wide as he saw a scene that he won't ever forgot .
In the place was nothing, just a white expanse stretching to the horizon and suddenly .
Tapp.
A breaking sound of a glass sounded .
The sky was torn apart, the place where he was standing was split and from there the white expanse was removed and in its place .
"First plants started sprouting then he felt a feeling of land and land was made before him at the same time Noel looked up and saw .
The blue skies were there in place of that white expanse. A sun that didn't exist was there making the land bright.
Hoot hoot .
"The chirping of birds sounded, making it all felt real.
"Noel, who was there, didn't move forward for some time as he couldn't even digest the scene in front of him .
The silence pressed in.
Too clean.
Too deliberate.
Noel closed his eyes
Not from fear—
but from instinct.
"I don't know how i got here ," he muttered.
His eyes narrowed.
"But this place doesn't care about it. I just have to survive, that's what I am doing from the start.
" But he still felt fear of this strange place because
He had faced enemies before.
This felt different.
Enemies could be fought.
"This place would judge if he was worthy or not
The made up forest was huge. The trees were so long that they were covering the sunlight given by the sun .
"And they were not large in a straight line; they were all twisted; some were so hideous we couldn't even look at them .
"Strange plants were grown in this forest, some even have a face made on them looking like a person .
"What an eerie place this is, I don't want anything to do with it . Muttered Noel
"And just then a voice came
Participant Noel winters.
Your first test will start now
"The forest of whispers don't let anyone pass through them there are many craft beings there your perception too will be distorted but there is only two outcomes of this test
Reward : Life
Penalty: Death
And then the voice disappeared .
"What was that? It didn't sound like a system , maybe some other thing ? Noel muttered to himself.
"Hmm?
"He felt something in his hands and saw a envelope was there .
This time he was not overly surprised as he has seen more strange and miraculous things then this
"He picked up the envelope and opened it and was surprised
"A map !. But what is this map ?
"He opened the whole map and saw it and also understood which place this map was .
It was the map of this forest .
Noel also saw many names written inside the map .
"He saw his name just below the entrance and he also saw a cross mark at the other side of the map .
"All paths leading to there were there inside the map .
"Noel put his fingers on his chin and thought won't it be too easy if they just gave me this map
"I have to be cautious otherwise I won't even know how I died
Noel then started his first test towards the .
*FOREST OF WHISPERS "