The King Trials 2: Beyond.

~The Midnight Visitor~

"Welcome to the Silverwood."

The entire riding convoy slows their steeds to a steady trot.

My eyes explore the metallic forest, everything in sight shines under the lustre of a scintillating sun. Though every gnarly tree and shrub are bare, all the twisting limbs and knobby branches are coated in sheer metal. The earth beneath the horses' hooves is like star dust.

I cannot smell a thing. Nothing in the air, the wind itself is scant. The only thing I feel is the mounting heat, bearable, but the further we venture, the more the temperature seems to spike.

"This is...remarkable," Solaris breathes from beside me.

My gaze glides up the prevailing trees encrusted in steel. No leaves nor foliage or any kind of vegetation burgeons. Everything is entombed in a veneer of silver.

"What...made this forest to look like this?" Treyton asks from my rear.

Anthia and her brother trek on foot ahead of Kelan's horse.

"Time," Anthia says. But the way she uttered the word with such a meld of grim and sorrow. "The Silverwood is known as the place of last blood. The end of Pavelia. A futile, final battle between the reminder of the Ulris's forces and Urium battalions."

Aries instantly picks off from where she left, and says, "The predecessors had successfully managed to close the portal, the breach between the hellscapes and here, cutting off their means of sending in a surge of reinforcements. Thus ending the war, the Eternal Eclipse had passed and with it, Vilnus's strength and the might of his malign soldiers dwindled."

The time of black sun.

Anthia adds her voice ,and says, "This place is where the last of them fought. The result of their dark magic resulted in this territory looking like t'was plagued by the Black Death. Even powerful Hitsches weren't  able to heal it completely. But had to salvage it in a different way."

"So nothing grows out here?" Markiveus questions with a raised voice, loud enough to be heard from all the way at the back. "No fruits or anything?"

"Everything is literally steeled in silver, you imbecile," Brennon spews. I can practically hear the eyeroll in his tenor. "What do you think?"

"Unless you want join with our dead Herems. I suggest you learn how to speak to your betters."

Brennon snorts wryly. "We bear the same title?"

"And yet you are still inferior to me," Markiveus retorts.

"Enough," Vince exclaims with a fatherly reproach. "Stop squabbling like children, your mere voices make my ears bleed."

My shoulders keep slouching no matter how many times I mend my posture. My torso bopping to the rhythm of the Arabian's gait. "Wait." I stare at the back of Anthia's hooded head.

"If the devastation of this place mirrors the Black Death. And if even powerful Hitsches were not able to restore the land to not only what it was but to revive its fertility. What does it mean for the farmlands that have been infected by this blight?"

Anthia sneaks a look off her shoulder, her hood still shielding her face.

"Yes," Treyton harmonises. "The Black Death is a sickness that is rapidly spreading through Urium. Never mind its origin, is there a way to reverse its affects?"

"The place of last blood has been like this for thousands of cycles," Aries says gravely, his voice devoid of hope. "And still now it remains. If there is a way, it is still to be discovered."