The next morning dawned under a heavy, bruised sky. Dark clouds sagged over the mountain peaks, threatening rain at any moment. Stony Creek was buzzing with restless energy. News of the stranger's arrival had swept through the hamlet like wildfire. Everyone now knew: they were not alone in this fight, and in many places, the situation was far grimder. Early that morning, the elder convened the head trackers: Harold, Rane, the hunter from Riverbend, and two veteran local scouts.
They sat in the village square and debated for hours. By mid-morning, they reached a single consensus: sitting on their hands and waiting for the next attack was suicide. They had to take the initiative.
"If this plague is spreading," the Riverbend hunter insisted, "it leaves tracks. Everything leaves tracks."
An expedition was quickly assembled: Harold, Rane, the stranger, two local scouts, and Kaelan. Aether stepped forward, wanting to join, but Harold laid a firm hand on his shoulder.
"Someone needs to stay and watch the village."
Aether didn't argue, though disappointment weighed heavy in his chest. Kaelan patted his friend's shoulder.
"Wait for us."
Aether nodded, watching them disappear into the treeline. The team followed the old hunting trail back into the gloom. This time, they weren't looking for wolf packs. They were looking for patterns—the hidden threads connecting this madness. Sunlight pierced the foliage in thin, sickly pale beams. The woods seemed as quiet as ever, yet with every stride, the hunters grew tenser. Rane stopped first. A short distance ahead, a herd of deer was grazing at the edge of a thicket.
There were easily a dozen of them. Curiously, they didn't bolt. By all rights, wild game should have scattered the moment human footsteps echoed at this distance. Instead, the stags merely lifted their heads, gave the party an indifferent glance, and went back to chewing grass. They only ambled away slowly when the men stepped within spear-throw. The Riverbend hunter scowled.
"That's not right."
"Not right at all,"
Rane agreed quietly. Kaelan watched the herd vanish into the brush.
"Could it just be dumb luck?"
Rane shook his head.
"Deer don't act like that. At least, no deer I've hunted in twenty years."
Pushing further, they found another anomaly near a streambed: fresh big-cat tracks. Big cats were solitary, territorial creatures that avoided low-altitude streams. Yet the mud was churned up with dozens of prints, as if a predator had lingered here for days without hunting. One of the local scouts knelt, his face turning pale.
"It's been like this for months. All the beasts... they're losing their minds. Wandering where they shouldn't."
Silence fell over the group. The terrifying part wasn't that they were facing monsters. The wolves were still wolves. The deer were still deer. The panthers were still panthers. It was their *behavior* that had turned alien. It was as if whatever law held the natural order together was quietly snapping. By mid-afternoon, they reached a deeper hub along the old trail—a long-abandoned scout outpost. The roof had caved in, moss draped over the rotting timber walls, and the door lay half-buried in mud.
Harold pushed his way inside. It was stripped bare. Nothing remained except rotting benches and a few decayed wooden markers scattered across the floorboards. They searched for an hour, desperate for anything of value. The yield was agonizingly sparse—faded trail symbols and illegible logs. But one thing became horrifyingly clear: this shift hadn't started yesterday. It had been festering for a very long time—perhaps far longer than any of them had imagined.
"What in the hell are we even looking for?" the Riverbend hunter snapped, wiping sweat from his brow. No one answered. No one knew. Rane stared into the dark woods beyond the outpost, his voice hollow.
"I grew up in these woods. I know how wolves drive prey. I know when deer migrate. I know where cats lair."
He paused, his knuckles white on his bow shaft.
"But lately... I don't recognize a damn thing out here."
The woods offered no reply. The trees were still trees. The dirt was still dirt. But the unspoken soul of the wilderness was gone, replaced by an unsettling void. They returned to Stony Creek by nightfall, where the entire village was waiting. A fire was stoked in the square. The elder, the scouts, Harold, and Rane circled up to report their findings. The atmosphere grew heavier with every word. They had gathered facts, yet they were further from an answer than when they had left.
Aether sat near the edge of the circle, listening quietly. He noticed something. Everyone was offering isolated observations, but nobody was connecting the dots. He cleared his throat.
"When did Riverbend first notice the attacks?"
The stranger blinked.
"Late winter. Right before the thaw."
Aether nodded, turning to Rane.
"And Stony Creek?"
"Around the same time,"
Rane muttered.
"What about Pine Ridge?"
Aether pressed. The hunters fell quiet. They had been so focused on their own survival that none of them had compared the timeline. For the next hour, Aether kept asking quiet, precise questions. He nudged them to detail weather shifts, game movements, and dates. He didn't offer theories; he simply kept them talking, building a picture out of scattered pieces. The Riverbend hunter looked at Aether with a faint, surprised smile.
"You've got a knack for getting men to talk, kid."
Aether flushed slightly.
"I just want to understand what's happening."
"That's rarer than you think," the hunter said.
"Most folk prefer to shout answers rather than listen."
Harold sat nearby, his dark eyes resting on Aether for a long moment, thoughtful. By midnight, the brutal reality settled over the fire. They had done everything within their power. They had tracked, searched, and analyzed. But their woodcraft couldn't solve this. It wasn't a lack of courage. It was a lack of knowledge. A lack of information. Their world was too small. After a grueling silence, the Riverbend hunter spoke up.
"There might be one place that actually has answers."
Everyone looked up.
"Where?" the elder asked. The hunter gestured toward the eastern horizon.
"Whitestone City."
The fire crackled. Every eye slowly turned to Harold. He was the only man among them who had ever left the valley—who had seen the world beyond the mountains. Harold stared into the flames for a long time before giving a slow, heavy nod.
"I've been there," he said quietly. Kaelan stared at his father, stunned. Harold had never spoken of his past travels.
"It's a hub," the Riverbend hunter continued.
"Merchants, scholars, mercenaries from all four corners of the realm gather there. If anyone knows what's happening to the land..."
Harold looked up, catching his words and finishing the thought softly: "...it won't be found in these woods."
The firelight flickered across their faces. No one said a word, but everyone knew: the time for waiting was over.