Night stretched above the eighty-meter trunk, and the chill descending from the heights of the forest wrapped itself around the small camp like an invisible cloak. Even sheltered by his crude refuge, Kenzo could feel the cold deep in his bones. The wind whistled softly between the branches, carrying with it the damp scent of earth and vegetation, and yet he eventually fell asleep, lulled by the rustling leaves and the imposing silence of the night.
When he opened his eyes the next morning, a familiar discomfort took hold of him. His muscles protested with every movement, a brutal reminder of a restless night spent atop an uneven trunk.
– « I don't really know if I managed to rest… » he murmured, his fingers brushing the battered surface of the wood beneath him.
The sleep had been shallow, broken by confused dreams and sudden jolts from the cold. And yet, one thing had struck him the day before, during his climb: the trunk had seemed cut, as though by some gigantic, invisible blade.
– « What could have sliced through a tree like this… » he thought, his gaze fixed on the irregular contours of the wood. The tree was so wide and massive that one could have built an entire shack on it, and it was hard to imagine any force capable of severing it so cleanly.
Morning was arriving, but the light was strange. Despite the hour, everything still seemed drenched in lingering dimness.
– « It's morning, so why is it still this dark… » he murmured, lifting his eyes toward the sky.
And that was when Kenzo saw something that left him speechless. Unlike the day before, the sky was no longer covered in gray clouds. The sun was there, but it seemed hidden behind a gargantuan mass an unimaginably huge tree. Its summit vanished into the clouds, and its trunk, immense and overwhelming, stretched on for kilometers.
– « What the hell is that… » he whispered, unable to look away.
He realized that the sun had not disappeared at all. It was simply being blocked entirely by that colossal vegetal structure. Vertigo seized him as he stared at the giant towering before him, solid and overwhelming.
– « That's… a tree? » he murmured in disbelief.
The visible portion of the trunk was only a fraction of its size. It was impossible to see where its foliage began, let alone where its crown ended. The darkness of the previous evening had hidden that reality, and Kenzo had been unable to grasp the scale of what now stood before him.
– « How far does it go… » he wondered, his breath shortening. The idea that a single living structure could be so vast defied understanding.
– « Was there really ever a tree like this in the history of our planet…? » The words escaped him, as if he could not fully articulate the magnitude of what he was seeing. How could a tree like this have gone unnoticed by humanity? Or were he and the two hundred and forty other Awakened the first to ever witness it inside this unstable Fragment?
The thought calmed him, however. Fear, curiosity, and awe mingled inside him, but one certainty took shape:
– « If I want to pass this test, I'll have to solve the mystery of this Fragment… »
A shiver ran through him when he noticed that the tree rose exactly in the direction where he had been chained the day before, where he had been forced to flee from that sinister fog.
– « Don't think about that for now… Today, I should try to scout the area. »
He still had the plant fibers and mushrooms he had gathered during yesterday's run. But water was lacking. Fortunately, his life in the outer walls had taught him how to endure thirst. Even since becoming Awakened, he could last an entire day without drinking, and yesterday's exhausting sprint had awakened neither thirst nor hunger in him.
Kenzo settled himself at the edge of the trunk. From eighty meters up, he had a plunging view over the forest. He lay flat, studying every detail, every movement, and what he saw left him stunned.
Barely a second after approaching the edge, he noticed spiderwebs clinging to the branches, invisible the day before.
– « Are there Void Creatures shaped like spiders…? » he thought, his heart beating faster.
Even more unsettling, at the exact spot where he had begun climbing the trunk, a humanoid creature stood there, at least two meters tall. Its body seemed made of wood, with a green leaf resting atop its head. Focusing harder, Kenzo could make out its hands sharpened like the spear he had recovered.
Unfortunately, he could not judge the creature's level. Lord Karim had said:
– « The more Void Creatures you kill and the more prana fragments you absorb, the easier it will become to determine their level. »
Kenzo knew he was not there yet.
– « Maybe I should go around and observe the surroundings… »
As he moved around the trunk, he realized that many creatures were scattered across the forest, all along the territory's edges. He observed for a long time, noting that there were other gigantic trees, some measuring between one hundred and one hundred twenty meters. But none could compare to the Gargantuan Tree.
One question remained: why had only this tree been cut? He had no answer.
Hours passed, and nothing changed. The Void Creatures seemed to ignore his presence high atop the trunk. And that was just fine with him.
Then, suddenly, something happened below. All the wooden creatures began sinking into the earth, leaving only their leaves sticking out. They all behaved this way, without exception.
– « Why are they doing that…? » Kenzo murmured, both intrigued and uneasy.
The answer came quickly. The sky turned gray, as though an invisible veil had fallen over the forest. This was not the shadow of the Gargantuan Tree, but rather an ominous cloud. Looking up toward the giant tree, Kenzo felt an icy shiver run down his spine.
A fog began to form. The point from which it was spreading the same fog he had fled the day before lay in the direction of the Gargantuan Tree. The danger was approaching silently, slowly smothering the light and the air, covering the forest in a troubling darkness. The tension kept rising, and Kenzo understood that this unstable Fragment still had many mysteries left to reveal.