Karu's Discovery

Written by Jake Hoyer

Karu had been in Elderen for about four months, having sailed up the coast on board a merchant ship from Yslean. The vast cities they stopped at along the way, with their bustling streets and a constant chorus of foreign voices, were a different world from the quiet mountainside village he had spent his life in. In each port the heavy, damp air carried an assault of vivid new smells, their intensity enough to make him ache for the simple, fresh breeze of home. Every time they docked onto the various quays and jetties the intensity of it all would overwhelm him, but by the time they moored onto the wharf in Catun he found himself growing used to the ever-present clamour of life that thrummed amongst the cobbled streets and stone buildings.
From the City of the Flame, Karu had followed the advice of his mentor, Inka, and travelled north into the Muted Forest. He was unsure what it was he was meant to find there, but the carpet of sweet pine needles and music of various songbirds reminded him of his home and so he wandered, happy in the embrace of nature. Months passed, spring turned to summer, and Karu continued to ramble. With the days getting longer, he found himself drawn ever more northwards, up into the slopes of the Arau Mountains.
As he moved through the foothills, he started to notice things change: burnt marks across the ground and trees, the jagged lines scorched into wood, earth, and stone; sparks and flashes of multicoloured light appearing in the air; tracks of foreign creatures he had never come across before. The further north he went, the higher up into the mountains he climbed, the more frequent these became. Until one afternoon, as the last warm rays of the sun withdrew behind the eastern peaks, they no longer appeared. It was as if he had crossed an invisible wall through which they could not pass.
Not long after, Karu came across a boundless grove of thurhath spruces. These imposing giants stand upwards of four hundred feet tall with trunks wide enough that an entire coil of rope wouldn't fit around them. Forever growing throughout their lifetime, the tallest ones are believed to be more than a millennia old. Their timber is said to be as strong as steel, with bark harder than even the lacquered scales of Cerdaienel armour. It is for this that they get their common name: ironwood trees. While thurhaths are normally found solitary or in groups no more than a few, this grove seemed to hold dozens if not hundreds. As Karu stepped through their frigid shadows, the accompanying firs and pines dwarfed below their towering size, he could not help but feel like a child amongst the ancients of the world. After several minutes of walking, the curtain of needles and branches opened up before him, revealing a deserted battlefield between nature and a devastating foe.
The remains of ironwoods littered the ground, their unbreakable bodies shattered and splintered. Lying amongst the jagged remains sat countless boulders and rocks, each thrust into the earth as though hurled by an unseen hand. Karu moved further into the clearing. Ripples of light danced across the stones as he did, deep purple with hints of blue and black. He picked one of the stones up, rolling the coarse pebble between his fingers, and saw that while they had first appeared to be just dark rock they now showed translucent purple veins running through them. The veins seemed almost like clouded glass, the light forced to push its way through it, and when held in the waning sunlight they cast deep indigo shadows that danced around him.
The goliath had heard of these rocks before - burning stars that had fallen to the ground during the Nightfall, that time when the skies had been shredded by fiery claws and magic had stormed into the world. Their name in the language of his people roughly translated to "the tears of Loviator's mourning", though in his time in Eorin he had heard them called nightshadow stones. They were one more mark that the grievous event had left in its wake.
His mind on edge and instincts shouting at him to leave, Karu tentatively inched forward, his feet advancing of their own accord. His eyes were drawn towards a great slab in the centre of the clearing. It was larger than any boulder he had ever seen, at least four times the size of any of the buildings in his village. As he approached it, the air absent of the sounds of nature he had become so accustomed to, Karu began to pick out lifted markings running along its skin. The closer he got, the clearer the smooth lines appeared on the rough surface. They formed some intangible script - like living vines that had grown out of the stone to twist amongst each other until they formed a bewildering mass of swirls and curves. Captivated by their form, Karu traced the lines through the air with his fingers, some incomprehensible force pulling him towards them. Then he touched the stone.
Searing pain arched through his hand and up his arm, engulfing his body until every single part of him was burning. Through the pain and heat he could feel a presence; a sharp needle that jabbed into his head, forcing its way into his mind. The shard dug deeper, prying into his every thought as it searched for something. Visions darted before Karu's eyes, memories torn from his past. He saw a great oak fallen on a pale body. He saw a ring of faces looking down on him, anger in their eyes. He saw an endless expanse of water, the horizon like a blade's edge in the distance. He saw a fawn drinking from a brook, its eyes filling with fear as the snap of a breaking branch rang through the woods.
He saw a world dying. He saw the ground cracked and split, great ravines running through the rock. He saw flames, consuming all that they touched. He saw a great arch jutting a mile into the sky, its dark form shifting as it rose.
The presence started to waver. Karu could feel its panic and fear as it tried to pull away from him, but some ethereal grip held it in place.
He saw a blast of light. He saw the stone crumble away below him. He saw the arch shatter and explode. He saw the sky fray, shards of white light cutting gashes in its skin.
He saw flashes of other worlds, too many to count. Beautiful worlds. Grotesque worlds. New worlds. Old worlds.
A thunderous growl clawed through Karu's mind. An inaudible voice with no source. Incorporeal yet with more strength than anything he had ever witnessed before. He did not know what words the voice said or what language it spoke, but he did not need to. He knew its meaning exactly.
"Leave!"
The presence withdrew from him, the pain fleeing his body as fast as it had arrived. The visions snapped away as his palm fell from the stone's surface and his legs collapsed beneath him. Karu scrambled backwards from the stone across the dirt and moss. Turning away, his eyes and muscles regaining their strength, he fled as far and as fast as he was able. Only when he dropped from exhaustion did he stop, the voice still echoing in his ears.