The elven priest suddenly withdrew her healing hand and turned to the others. “I can mend the High Priestess’s wounds for now, but the harm to her soul is beyond my reach.”

  “What should we do?—Right! We must seek the High Elves. Their great magi will surely save her!” A young male elf blurted out, panicked and impulsive.

  But the priest only sighed. “The damage to the High Priestess’s soul is no ordinary injury. It would require at least a fourth-tier mage—one who specializes in restorative magic. And even then, could our tribe afford the price?”

  Her words sank into the room like a stone, drawing out deep, helpless despair. Their small tribe could scrape together the payment, perhaps—but it would crush the entire community for years to come.

  Just then, a small elf shouted from outside: “Gota’ya is back! Gota’ya is back!”

  The elves inside froze, thinking they had misheard. But when a familiar silhouette rushed through the doorway, they jolted awake.

  “It really is Gota’ya!” an elf cried.

  It was indeed Gota’ya.

  She flung herself to the side of the unconscious High Priestess and broke into wrenching sobs. “Mother! I’m sorry—I shouldn’t have stayed out so late. I’m so sorry…”

  The others exchanged glances, wanting to ask questions but unable to bring themselves to speak.

  After a long bout of crying, an elf finally could not hold back. “Gota’ya… where have you been all these days? If you’d come home sooner, the High Priestess wouldn’t have suffered this. What were you doing?”

  The speaker was a male elf named Gubo—Gota’ya’s childhood companion. Orphaned young, he had been raised with kindness by the High Priestess, whom he regarded as his mother. He saw Gota’ya as his own sister.

  Aside from Gota’ya herself, no one grieved more fiercely than Gubo.

  His voice trembled with accusation.

  The priest opened her mouth to intervene, then fell silent.

  Gota’ya’s shoulders quivered. She remembered Glenn warning her long ago: she should at least go home once, reassure her family, and after that she could choose whether to stay or leave. But she had acted on impulse, thinking an extra few days would mean nothing—after all, such time was barely a blink in an elf’s lifespan.

  She had ignored the worries of the ones who loved her.

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  The realization clamped around her heart, squeezing until breathing itself felt painful.

  Her silence made the others uneasy; dark assumptions surfaced. To them, all blame seemed to fall squarely upon Gota’ya.

  “Say something! Don’t tell me you ran off to humans and didn’t intend to come back! Do you have any idea how much the High Priestess suffered? Gota’ya—you’ve disappointed us all!”

  Gubo’s face flushed with anger as he roared.

  Gota’ya sank deeper into her guilt. If her mother died… she would never forgive herself.

  Rumble— The ground quaked sharply, shattering the suffocating tension.

  “What was that?!”

  “An earthquake?”

  Elves looked around in alarm.

  Suddenly, other forest elves screamed from outside:

  “The forest—it’s withering!” “Mother will die like this!” “What is happening?! High Priestess! Please save Mother!”

  Those few words turned every face pale.

  They rushed outside—except Gota’ya, still drowning in self-reproach, deaf to everything around her.

  When the others saw the scene before them, it felt as though the sky itself were collapsing.

  One lush tree after another withered at a speed visible to the naked eye. Many dwellings had already shriveled into useless husks. Worst of all, they felt the breath of their Forest Mother growing faint—fading—disappearing.

  If the Forest Mother died, the elves bound to her would vanish with her, unless another tribe agreed to take them in. Such a plea could only be made by the High Priestess.

  And now she lay unconscious.

  Despair swallowed them whole.

  If one listened carefully, one might have heard a woman weeping—and an old man chuckling in quiet triumph.

  Suddenly, an unfamiliar surge of forest power swept in from nowhere, as though gently supporting the dying woodland.

  The woman’s sobbing ceased; the old man’s laughter snapped into startled confusion.

  The elves felt their Forest Mother revive under some mysterious protection, and bewildered hope flickered through them.

  The blight halted. A phantom silhouette drifted into the High Priestess’s chamber.

  Behind Gota’ya, it coalesced into the vague form of a woman—her veil like nightfall, her gown like mist.

  “Take her to Bayek. I can save her.”

  A voice, faint as wind, echoed in Gota’ya’s mind. She knew it instantly.

  It was the very voice she’d heard when she first entered the outer woods of Bayek.

  She whipped around—nothing was there. But she knew exactly what she had to do.

  She must bring her mother to Bayek at once. If the Forest Mother there said she could save her, then she could.

  **

  In a place far removed from mortal sight—

  The veiled woman who had spoken to Gota’ya now faced a being shaped like an elderly man.

  “I didn’t expect that after ignoring the elemental realms for so long, something as powerful as you would appear—a forest spirit of remarkable strength.” The old man’s voice held reluctant admiration.

  “For one who has transcended the ordinary, you cling pitifully to those meager green spirit-essences. Is this what the so-called gods are? Base creatures of greed?—God of Truth.”

  Her tone was cold contempt, though utterly calm.

  The God of Truth snorted. “Knowing who I am, you still speak to me that way? Do you think I cannot destroy you?”

  “You are nothing more than cowards hiding from calamity. What is there to fear? You had countless devout believers feeding you endless power, yet you abandoned them. You are unworthy of the name ‘god.’”

  Her voice never rose; she merely stated the truth.

  The God of Truth fell silent, then murmured: “No one can withstand that force—not even a god. If a new world is born someday, we can always seek new believers…”

  With that, he faded into mist.

  The veiled woman did not linger either, vanishing shortly after.