'Auraelia,' Nox's thoughts were a private message sent straight to his personal goddess, 'tell me I did the right thing. Leaving them behind like that… was that the move?'

Her reply popped into his vision almost instantly, a private chat window full of her usual, bubbly energy.

[Auraelia, Goddess of Resilient Sparks (Private Chat)] I think you did what you thought was best to protect them! That's, like, super noble! ✨ But they really, really look up to you, you know! Now that you've formed a party, it's going to be hard to keep them away for long. You're their leader! 💖

Before he could even process that, the main god chat lit up like a Christmas tree, and he felt a headache coming on.

[Baron Von Cynic] Oh, look at him, marching off with the elf. So self-important. Thinks he's protecting them, but he's just running from his own damn attachments. It's pathetic, really.

[Lord of Carnage] Cutting them loose was the smart play. Attachments get you killed. Now he can focus on grinding levels without worrying about a bunch of kids.

[Lady Veritas] He abandoned his responsibilities. He created a team and, not five minutes later, dissolved it through lies and deception. That is not how a leader behaves.

God, he was so sick of this. 'They're not my fan club,' he thought, a wave of pure annoyance rolling off him. 'I barely know them. They're just… people who started following me around.'

[Trickster God Hermes IV] Ooh, you guys feel that? The kid's getting grumpy about his new friends! 😂 Someone doesn't like being popular!

He mentally slammed the door on the chat and just kept walking.

Serian didn't say a word, just matched his pace, her presence a quiet, steady weight at his side. They walked for what felt like forever, the ruins of the city slowly thinning out, skyscrapers giving way to smaller, skeletal buildings, and then finally to nothing but cracked, empty roads stretching into the hazy distance. They chewed on some of the snacks he'd bought and sipped water from his pack, but the silence between them was thick.

The sun went down, painting the sky in shades of orange and purple before plunging them into darkness. It came up again. They found a rusted, burned-out shell of a car and collapsed inside for a few hours of uneasy sleep, then they got up and just kept walking.

"We have been moving for quite some time," Serian finally said, her voice laced with exhaustion. "This city of yours is far larger than I had anticipated."

"Yeah, it's a long walk," he agreed, his eyes fixed on the horizon. "Should be getting close to a place called JK Road soon. That's our ticket north."

It was late afternoon on the second day when they finally saw it. He knew it was the right place because of an old, faded street sign, somehow still standing after all this time. But he just stopped dead in his tracks and stared, his brain feeling like it had just short-circuited.

Serian came to a halt beside him. "What is it? Is something wrong?"

He didn't answer right away. He couldn't. He was too busy trying to get his eyes to believe what they were seeing. "This… this isn't right," he finally managed, his voice low and tight. "There's supposed to be a road here. A huge one, like four lanes wide. And houses. There were supposed to be rows and rows of houses."

But there wasn't a road. And there sure as hell weren't any houses.

Where a major suburban artery should have been, there was now a forest. A huge, dense, and frankly terrifying forest, filled with trees that looked ancient and impossibly massive. Their dark bark was twisted into strange patterns, and their leaves were a deep, unnatural green. These were not the kind of trees that grew in this part of the world. He'd never seen anything like them.

"And there's no way it should've taken us two days to get here," he added, a deep frown creasing his brow. "From the city center? On foot? It should've been a few hours, tops. Not two damn days."

While Nox was having his personal reality crisis, Serian was feeling something else entirely. The mana in the air here was thick, and it felt… familiar. It hummed with an energy she knew in her bones, the same untamed power that flowed through the wildlands of her own world. It wasn't the refined, gentle mana of her home in the Lifewoods, but it was from her world, she was absolutely sure of it. This entire forest had been yanked across dimensions, just like her.

Then, a second feeling layered on top of the first. It was a cold, prickling sensation, a watchful presence that made the fine hairs on her arms stand on end. The hostility radiating from within those trees was so thick she could almost taste it, bitter and cold.

"This place feels… weird," Nox said, his voice dropping to a near-whisper. He was staring into the shadowy depths of the woods, his hand already resting on the hilt of his sword.

Serian glanced at him, a flicker of surprise in her eyes. "You can feel it, too?"

He gave her a quick, sharp look. "Yeah. Feels like something in there really doesn't want us to come in."

'He can sense that?' She was genuinely impressed. 'A human at his level shouldn't have that kind of awareness.' Her masters had always taught her that humans were blunt instruments, blind to the deeper currents of the world. But Nox… he was growing so fast it was almost scary.

"So, what is the plan?" she asked, her own hand drifting towards her sword. "Do we attempt to find another path?"

He stared at the menacing wall of trees, then glanced back at the empty, broken road they'd just walked down. "Another path to where? North is that way." He shook his head, his decision already made. "We don't have a map for… whatever the hell this is. We go through."

'He is not afraid at all.' The thought struck her again. His directness was a constant shock. He saw a problem, and he just walked straight at it.

"That is a reckless course of action," she told him, her tone flat and serious. "We do not know what lies within. The presence I feel is… considerable."

"Yeah, well, sitting out here isn't getting you home, is it?" he shot back, all blunt pragmatism. "We're losing daylight. The plan is simple: we go in a little way, find a spot to make camp for the night, and then we push through tomorrow." He didn't even wait for her to agree, just turned and started walking toward the edge of the trees like he owned the place.

She let out a quiet sigh and followed. He was right. Standing out here was pointless. The sun was already sinking low, casting long, distorted shadows from the monstrous trees across the road.

The second they stepped under the canopy of the first branches, the world changed. The air instantly grew cooler, and all the ambient sounds of the open road just… died. It was like walking into a soundproof room. The trees were so thick and their leaves so dense that barely any light reached the forest floor, plunging them into a deep, green-tinged twilight.

'He just walks in like he belongs here,' she thought, staying close behind him, her eyes darting into the oppressive gloom. 'This man is either the bravest person I have ever met, or the most foolish.'

Nox, for his part, didn't look scared. He just looked focused, his eyes constantly scanning their new, hostile surroundings.

After a few minutes, they found a small clearing a short way in, a spot where a few giant trees had fallen long ago, leaving a patch of open ground. It felt a little less claustrophobic than being smothered by the woods.

"This'll work," he said, dropping his heavy backpack to the ground with a thud. "We can see if anything tries to sneak up on us from here."

Serian nodded, her gaze sweeping over the dark, hulking shapes of the trees that hemmed them in. The feeling of being watched was even stronger now, a constant pressure on the back of her neck. She gathered some dry tinder and branches from the undergrowth, and Nox used a simple lighter from his pack to coax a small, crackling fire to life. The little flame felt fragile, but it pushed back the suffocating darkness, its light making the shadows around them writhe and dance.

They sat by the fire, silently eating some trail mix from his seemingly bottomless pouch. Nox just stared into the flames, his expression completely unreadable.

"So," he finally said after a long silence, his voice quiet. "This forest is from your world, isn't it?"

She looked up, startled by the directness of the question. "Yes. The mana… it is the same."

"And that thing we feel in here," he continued, not taking his eyes off the fire, "that hostility. Is that from your world, too?"

She nodded slowly, her gaze drifting to the impenetrable woods around them. "There are many dangerous creatures in my world. Things that hunt in the darkness and feed on fear." She looked back at him, her expression grim. "Whatever is in here with us… it is not friendly."

He just grunted and tossed a small stick into the fire, watching it pop and hiss. 'Dangerous creatures. Great. So, more monsters.' He wasn't even surprised anymore. That just seemed to be the new normal.

Later, as the fire burned down to glowing embers, he laid out a blanket for her. "You should get some sleep," he told her. "I'll take the first watch."

She wanted to argue, to insist that she was fine, but the truth was, she was exhausted. Her body still ached from the beatdown she'd taken from those two mercenaries. She just nodded, lay down, and pulled the worn blanket over herself.

Nox sat with his back against a massive tree trunk, his sword laid across his lap, and watched the darkness. The forest was quiet. Too quiet. There were no crickets, no rustling of small animals, no wind in the leaves. Nothing. Just the faint crackle of the dying fire and the sound of his own breathing.

'Something's not right,' he thought, feeling his mana stir in his chest. It felt like a coiled snake, agitated and on edge. 'It can feel it, too. It's… restless.'

He kept his eyes glued to the wall of black between the trees, waiting for something, anything, to move.