I followed The First Veil without resistance.
Not because I lacked fear.
But because fear itself had somehow become distant.
Everything around her felt inevitable.
Before leaving the audience chamber, I glanced once toward Ryn.
She gave me a small nod.
Then forced a smile I immediately recognized as false.
It hurt to see.
A moment later she turned away and exited alongside several Moonfen Sisters.
And somehow…
That felt worse than if she had tried to stop this.
The First Veil guided me through a descending corridor deep beneath the roots of Yggdra.
The deeper we walked, the warmer the air became.
Not physically warm.
Alive warm.
Like moving deeper into the body of something sleeping.
The walls themselves seemed to pulse faintly beneath the pale light.
I remember hearing distant sounds during that walk.
Not voices.
Something softer.
Almost like breathing through wood.
The First Veil spoke to me several times in Common Tongue during our descent.
Her voice reminded me of my mother.
Not in sound.
In feeling.
That realization disturbed me deeply even then.
Yet somehow I still did not feel afraid.
Only homesick.
She told me we were heading toward a place called The First Cradle.
Then she said something that made my thoughts stop entirely.
She wanted me to witness.
To archive.
To remember.
The same way I had once served as Chronicler for the Dragonkin during the Flesh Bargain beneath Drakenspire Sanctum.
She told me I had arrived at the correct time.
A time of birth.
I did not understand what she meant.
I do not think my mind even attempted to.
After what felt like an endless descent, we finally arrived.
The First Cradle.
I still do not know whether it was a chamber built beneath the World Tree…
Or part of the tree itself.
The room was circular.
Perfectly circular.
Massive roots intertwined across the walls and ceiling like living veins.
They moved slowly.
Breathing.
The roots emitted a pale silver-white glow that illuminated the chamber in soft pulses.
At the center rested a vast circular pool filled with thick white liquid resembling milk.
The surface remained perfectly still.
Too still.
Only occasional ripples disturbed it without visible cause.
Above the pool hung a crown-like structure formed from enormous roots curving inward toward the center.
Thin mist drifted above the pale liquid constantly.
Everything there felt sacred in the same way storms feel sacred.
Beautiful enough to become frightening.
I was guided toward the edge of the pool.
The First Veil instructed me to stand there and witness.
To remember.
To archive what I saw.
Several Moonfen Sisters wearing white fox masks surrounded the chamber silently.
Then the ritual began.
The chanting started softly.
Low.
Melodic.
A language beyond my understanding.
The sound rose and fell like waves breathing against stone.
At first the rhythm felt distant.
Then gradually it became impossible to ignore.
Faster.
Louder.
Not chaotic.
Deliberate.
Like the beating of a colossal unseen heart.
The First Veil stood within the white pool.
Half submerged.
Motionless.
As the chanting intensified, something began happening behind her.
At first I thought the pale light itself was distorting strangely.
Then I realized—
Tails.
One after another, long silver-gold tails slowly emerged behind her.
Not illusion.
Not metaphor.
Real.
Beautiful beyond reason.
Terrifying beyond reason.
Nine in total.
The moment the ninth tail fully formed, two masked Moonfen Sisters approached carrying objects wrapped carefully in pale silk.
An old wooden mallet.
And a plain wooden spike.
The moment I saw them—
My stomach dropped.
I knew them.
No.
Not the objects themselves.
The story.
Durandal’s story.
The Mallet and the Spike.
Discouragement.
Doubt.
Hopelessness.
For a single impossible moment, my mind tried desperately to convince me this was coincidence.
Then The First Veil accepted the mallet and spike into her hands.
And every comforting lie inside me died quietly.
The chanting grew louder.
Faster.
The pale roots surrounding the chamber pulsed like veins beneath skin.
The First Veil raised the spike toward the first tail.
Then struck it once with the mallet.
The sound echoed through the chamber like a heartbeat inside a coffin.
The tail shattered instantly into white-gold light.
And from that light—
A woman emerged.
A fully grown Moonfen Sister fell gracefully from the light into the white pool below.
Breathing.
Alive.
Beautiful.
Complete.
I think my mind stopped functioning properly at that point.
The second strike came.
Another tail shattered.
Another woman emerged.
Third.
Fourth.
Fifth.
Again.
Again.
Again.
Nine strikes.
Nine births.
Nine Moonfen Sisters emerged from broken light and pale liquid beneath the roots of the World Tree.
Each one fully grown.
Each one immediately graceful.
Aware.
Perfect.
As soon as they stepped from the pool, they knelt before The First Veil without hesitation.
Not one appeared confused.
Not one appeared newly born.
It was as though they had always existed somewhere just beyond sight.
Waiting.
The chanting stopped abruptly after the ninth strike.
The silence afterward felt catastrophic.
I do not remember much clearly after that.
Only fragments.
Pale light reflecting across white liquid.
The roots breathing slowly around us.
The sensation that the World Tree itself was watching.
And a single realization forming quietly somewhere deep inside me:
The Moonfen Sisters are not simply living beneath Yggdra.
They are connected to it.
Fundamentally.
Perhaps literally.
Even now, five days later, I still cannot fully process what I witnessed there.
Every attempt to reconstruct the memory makes my stomach turn violently.
I think some part of my mind still refuses to accept it.
But there is one thing I know with certainty now.
Durandal’s story was never just a legend.
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