—CURIOSITY—

  Ato walked in silence behind the stranger, every step a reminder that he was alive only because this man allowed it. The forest was colder now. Not in temperature, but in atmosphere like the trees themselves tensed when the stranger moved. The air thickened as if the woods were holding their breath.

  Ato’s own breath felt foreign in his chest.

  His threads had stopped leaking.

  The dull ache in his body from the near death collapse still pulsed, but it no longer dominated him.

  He kept his eyes forward, watching the Stranger’s back as he walked with unhurried certainty, like he already knew where Ato needed to go before Ato even asked.

  Eventually, Ato broke the silence.

  “Who are you?”

  The Stranger didn’t turn. “A traveler.”

  “That isn’t an answer.”

  “It’s the only one you’re ready for.”

  Ato clenched his jaw. Annoyance flickered in between a mix of caution, and a fear he refused to acknowledge. This man had stepped into his life at the exact moment everything fell apart. He had seen Ato’s threads. He had touched them. No one should have been able to do that. Not without being a Lifeweaver themselves.

  Yet the Stranger wasn’t one.

  Ato would have sensed it.

  Ato tried again. “Why did you help me?”

  This time, the Stranger slowed. Not enough to stop, but enough for the shift to feel deliberate.

  “I didn’t help you,” he said. “I simply prevented waste.”

  Ato’s brow tightened. “Waste?”

  “Your death would have been pointless. Death should serve a purpose.”

  “And what purpose do you think mine serves?”

  “You’re still asking the wrong questions.”

  Finally, he looked back at Ato only for a second, but it was enough for Ato to feel something like pressure pushing behind his eyes.

  “And you’re still thinking like a child.”

  Ato’s hands balled into fists. “I’m not–”

  But before the anger left his mouth, the Stranger raised a hand. Not to threaten but to show.

  A faint cut across his palm split open, Ato wasn’t even sure when he had done it, maybe the branch he brushed past and a thin line of blood began to bead.

  Then something happened that made Ato’s breath stall.

  The blood… stopped.

  Not only stopped but it reversed, pulled back into the flesh like it had been commanded. The skin knitted itself together, smooth, without scar.

  Ato stared. “What the… How did you—”

  “Vita,” the Stranger said simply. “The breath of life. The essence that preserves.”

  He didn’t slow down. Instead, he brushed his fingertips across the bark of a decayed tree. The wood darkened instantly, the rot receding into hardened, blackened armor like plates.

  “Ferro,” he added. “Essence of body made of metal.”

  He stepped forward again, and as he did, the forest went silent.

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  Not quiet. Silent.

  Ato looked around, instincts rising sharply, no insects, no leaves crunching under their steps, no distant wind. Even his own heartbeat seemed muted, as if something had wrapped the world in a heavy cloth.

  The Stranger didn’t look at him when he spoke this time.

  “And Nox. Essence of stillness.”

  Ato swallowed. “You’re using… magic?”

  The Stranger didn’t laugh, but his tone held the shadow of it.

  “Magic is what humans call anything that frightens them.”

  Ato stared at the back of the man ahead of him, at the subtle dimness of the forest around them. His mind raced.

  “You’re not human.”

  “No.”

  That single word was the calmness of truth spoken without hesitation, without concern. Ato felt something cold slip beneath his skin.

  “Then what are you?”

  “Something inconvenient for your people,” the Stranger said. “And for mine.”

  Ato stepped closer. “But you can see the essence. Use it. Control it.

  The Stranger stopped walking this time.

  He turned fully, and though his face stayed hidden beneath the shadowed hood, Ato felt a chill rise along his spine.

  “I can see what you are.”

  Ato stiffened.

  The Stranger’s voice lowered not threatening, but certain.

  “Your threads move wrong.”

  Ato’s heart dropped.

  “I couldn’t see them at first,” the Stranger continued. “Life threads are invisible to almost all. But your soul… hums.” His hand hovered inches from Ato’s chest. “It vibrates with something old. Something forbidden. Something almost extinct.”

  Ato didn’t breathe.

  “You are not a normal boy, Ato.”

  Ato’s jaw tightened. “How do you know my name?”

  The Stranger didn’t answer that. Instead...

  “Lifeweavers,” he said. “Weren’t supposed to exist anymore.”

  Ato’s stomach twisted. The word burned.

  “How do you know about them?”

  The Stranger tilted his head. “Because your presence stinks of VITA. Not the crude kind humans wield to mend flesh or keep crops alive. No… you reek of pure life essence. The kind the world hasn’t tasted in generations.”

  Ato took a step back.

  The Stranger didn’t move.

  “You’re lying,” Ato whispered, though even he didn’t believe it.

  “If only I were,” the Stranger murmured. “Your blood is loud. Even now it screams. A warning. A promise.”

  Ato remembered the sensation of earlier threads leaking, power surging, something inside him tearing open.

  “What am I?” he asked quietly.

  “Something the world feared,” the Stranger said. “Something the world hunted.”

  They stood in silence for a moment, the weight of the revelation pressing like stone. Ato’s mind churned. His mother. His father. Their deaths. Their secrecy.

  Everything suddenly felt like a pattern he hadn’t noticed.

  “What do you want with me?” Ato finally forced out.

  The Stranger turned away again, continuing deeper into the forest.

  “To teach you not to die.”

  “That’s not an answer.”

  “It is the only answer that matters today.”

  Ato followed, resentment and curiosity mixing in his chest like poison.

  After a few minutes of walking, the forest shifted. The air grew warmer. A faint vibration brushed against Ato’s senses like something alive pulsed beneath the soil. The trees no longer felt ordinary. Their bark was marked with spirals and lines, natural yet purposeful, glowing faintly with essence he didn’t understand.

  The Stranger spoke without looking back.

  “You asked before why I helped you.”

  He paused. “It wasn’t kindness.”

  Ato expected that. The Stranger never hid the truth.

  “It was recognition.”

  Ato frowned. “Of what?”

  “That you are a seed,” the Stranger answered. “One that, if nurtured correctly, could reshape fate itself.”

  Ato let the words settle. They felt heavy, too large to grasp.

  “Do you think I want that?” Ato asked.

  The Stranger’s voice was low. as he spoke

  “No. But destiny rarely cares what we want.”

  They moved past a curtain of thick vines, and the atmosphere changed again this time dramatically.

  Soft light poured across the forest floor, a gentle glow unlike anything Ato had ever seen. The air shimmered faintly, warm and humming with an energy that made Ato’s skin prickle.

  Ahead of them, rising like a pillar of woven light and ancient bark, pulsed a tree so large it seemed impossible.

  Its trunk glowed with veins of soft blue essence.

  Its leaves shimmered silver, drifting with motes of living dust.

  Every branch sang a quiet, resonant tone that vibrated along Ato’s bones.

  Ato’s eyes widened. His breath left him.

  “What… is that?”

  The Stranger finally looked back at him, the faint glow of the tree illuminating the lower half of his hidden face.

  “A Spirit Tree,” he said softly.

  “One of the last.”

  Ato stepped forward, drawn helplessly to the glow.

  “And where your real training begins.”