Days slowly settled back into a quiet rhythm.

  Raian returned to the forest, where silence sharpened him more than sword or stone. Among the trees—and with his old companion, the ancient oak—he trained as he always had.

  Ariani tended the house and the garden behind it, grounding their small life in steady routines: soil beneath her claws, herbs drying in the sun, quiet warmth returning to their home.

  And Mika…

  She had begun to take her first steps back into the world.

  The scar across her cheek remained. The memory of that night still lingered at the edge of her dreams. But she no longer startled at every creak of the floorboards.

  She was healing. Slowly.

  She still could not bring herself to walk the market streets, nor endure the weight of too many watching eyes. But she had found something else.

  The riverside paths.

  Each morning she left through the back garden, following the narrow trail that curved beside a winding stream flowing gently through the jungle’s green heart.

  If Raian walked deeper into the forest’s center—

  Mika walked along its edges. Where the trees thinned. Where sunlight touched the water. Where the world felt just a little safer.

  She followed the riverbank with a small wooden bucket in both hands. Each morning she came here—to fetch water and check the fish snares she had set along the shallows the day before.

  The morning was bright. Sunlight scattered across the river’s surface, turning the gentle current into shifting ribbons of gold.

  Mika stopped at the water’s edge. Between the stones where the stream narrowed, she reached down and pulled up the woven trap she had placed there.

  “Yippie… that’s a big one.”

  She lifted the snare. Inside it, a fish thrashed weakly against the wooden weave.

  “What a nice catch for this morning.” She carefully slipped a cord through the fish’s gills and mouth, tying it so she could carry it back with the others she hoped to catch.

  Then she reset the trap. The woven snare slid back between the stones where the current funneled through the riverbed—right where fish liked to pass.

  Her chest puffed with quiet pride. Then she exhaled slowly, shoulders relaxing as the cool Veralis air brushed through her fur.

  “I wonder about the other snares…” She hopped lightly from stone to stone along the riverbank, moving toward the next trap she had set the day before.

  One by one, she collected the fish.

  When she was finished, she knelt by the stream and dipped her bucket into the clear water.

  Just before the bucket touched the surface—

  She saw it. Her reflection.

  The water was calm enough to mirror her face clearly.

  She was beautiful. More than she believed.

  There was a quiet elegance in her features, a gentle poise in the way she held herself. The blood of the Sein’ei Clan ran within her veins, and though she wore no crown, no cloak of nobility—There was something noble in her presence all the same.

  Then the reflection shifted. The surface rippled slightly. And the image changed.

  Three claw marks cut across the left side of her face, running from cheek to near the edge of her lips.

  Her left paw rose slowly. She touched the scars. Her fingers traced the faint ridges beneath her fur—three lines where the hair no longer grew.

  The water trembled slightly. Mika’s eyes trembled too.

  Whether from the current—Or from what she felt—Even she could not tell.

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  Mika suddenly pulled her knees to her chest and buried her face between them. Her body rocked gently in that small embrace for a few moments, the quiet river flowing beside her.

  When she finally lifted her head again, her eyes stung—slightly red.

  “Yeah… you’re grown up, Mika…” she whispered softly to herself. “You’re not a little girl anymore.”

  She stood again and dipped the wooden bucket into the stream. Water sloshed inside as she lifted it.

  Splash. Splash. The surface spilled from side to side with each step as she struggled to carry it carefully in both hands. Behind her back, the fish tied to the cord occasionally thrashed, its wet body slapping lightly against her cloak and soaking the fabric.

  Just as she began walking back toward home—

  Krss. Krss. The sound of rustling brush came from deeper within the forest.

  “Hello?” Mika’s ears perked forward. Her eyes narrowed toward the source of the sound.

  Krss—It came again.

  “Don’t tell me…” She quickly set the bucket down. For a brief second, she saw something white dart between the trees.

  “A rabbit… I think I saw a rabbit.” Excitement flickered across her face. She slipped the cord of fish from her shoulder and dropped it beside the bucket. Her cloak hood fluttered as she dashed after the small white shape disappearing into the undergrowth.

  What a prize it would be if I caught it too…

  The forest slowly darkened as she chased it deeper among the trees. Tall trunks passed beside her one after another as she followed the fleeting flashes of white.

  Then the light changed. Clouds drifted across the sun. The jungle air grew strangely quiet. And still Mika followed—deeper than she had ever gone before.

  Finally she stopped. Her eyes searched the forest around her.

  “…Ah. What bad luck.”

  The rabbit was gone. She sighed and turned around to head back. Then she froze. She didn’t know the way.

  The jungle—once as familiar as her own breath—now loomed vast and unfamiliar. The trees seemed taller here. Their branches strangled the sunlight above, leaving the ground drowned in shadow.

  All around her, darkness thickened. It was as if the forest itself had shifted.

  Her breath caught. And then—A sound. The rustle of underbrush—slow, steady, drawing closer.

  Heart pounding, Mika parted the thick leaves with trembling paws. “Hello…? Is anybody there…?” Her tail swayed uneasily behind her.

  Then—She saw it.

  A figure. Still. Serene.

  Shrouded in white robes embroidered with fine silver threads that shimmered faintly, though no wind moved through the forest.

  The figure was crouched, one hand extended toward the ground.

  A moment later, a small white rabbit darted away from beside them, disappearing into the undergrowth.

  Mika’s heart thundered in her chest. Her pupils shrank to thin slits. Her claws slid out instinctively. Yet the words escaped her anyway.

  “…Hello?”

  The figure turned slowly toward her. Mika could not see their face. A delicate veil fell over it, sheer and pale, draping down like moonlight over hidden features.

  But what held her attention more than the veil—

  Were the eyes behind it.

  Deep. Black. Unmoving.

  Eyes without white. Eyes that did not blink. Eyes that seemed to have looked far beyond light itself.

  Mika felt no threat. No comfort either. Only—Presence.

  Slowly, her claws withdrew back into her paws. The figure stepped forward. Without a sound.

  They raised one paw. Mika’s eyes darted nervously, studying every movement of the strange figure.

  Then—gently, almost reverently—the figure touched the scar along Mika’s cheek.

  Mika did not flinch. Not because she was unafraid—But because her body would not move. It was as if something unseen held her still.

  Within that touch, Mika felt something she could not name.

  Ancient. Understanding.

  Not pity. Recognition.

  Those dark eyes blinked once. Slowly.

  The figure lowered their head slightly, as if acknowledging something only they could see. Then, from within the folds of the white robe, the figure withdrew a vial.

  A small glass bottle. Its surface was polished smooth, rimmed delicately with silver leaf. It glowed faintly.Not with bright light—But with something softer. Something like memory. A glow that soothed rather than dazzled.

  The figure placed the vial gently into Mika’s hands. Still, no words were spoken.

  Then the figure raised a single hand and gestured behind her—toward the direction of the forest path. Mika’s brows lifted slightly.

  Her body finally loosened enough for her to turn her head.

  She glanced back over her shoulder. Then looked down again, whispering a quiet thank you through trembling lips.

  But when she lifted her gaze—The figure was gone.

  No sound of footsteps. No movement of branches. No trace.

  As though they had never stood there at all.

  Only the hush of the forest remained. Only the small glowing bottle resting in her paw.

  And deep within her chest—

  A strange feeling lingered. Like something vast and ancient had just passed beside her.

  She did not yet know the figure’s name. But the forest did. And so did the scar.