Adrius rubbed the back of his wrist as if the effort still lingered there.

"Yeah… before you arrived, Lysander and I tried to force an opening in the seal three separate times," he said. "All those attempts have failed. Not because the cocoon, which is the seal we made, resisted, but because the moment we tried to interact with it, the being inside reacted."

Lysander nodded, his expression tight. "Every time we attempted to probe his essence, the storm matter inside him surged. It almost cracked the outer bindings. We can't risk that."

Eccar crossed his arms. "I saw it myself. The bindings shook like they were about to explode."

Aesa added, "And that wasn't even with him awake. If he wakes suddenly, the seal might break entirely. And we might even need to kill him without getting anything."

Adrius let out a slow breath and said. "The problem isn't the cocoon. It's him. There's… something woven into his existence. A kind of layered consciousness. Every time we try to extract information, those layers overlap and scramble the Magic reading we are trying to do."

Erend frowned. "What does that mean?"

Lysander pointed at the floating shape. "Meaning he's not functioning like a regular sentient being. He has memories, but they're distorted, fragmented, and protected. He is not complete and we think he came from somewhere else, not this world."

Adrius nodded. "Even when he was fighting us outside, it was like his body reacted with instinct. The consciousness inside felt disjointed. Like it isn't fully anchored."

"That's why getting anything out of him is difficult," Adrius said. "Beside the cloud around his body, he also doesn't think in a linear pattern. His body just reacts with instinct and a surge of anger. Every attempt to reach into his psyche causes a backlash of elemental force and under that elemental force there was this… incomplete mind."

Erend stepped closer to the cocoon, watching the faint, constant flicker of storm matter inside it.

The being's wild hair drifted in slow motion, like drowned strands caught in invisible currents.

"So his consciousness is fragmented," Erend murmured. "That creature said that these avatars aren't just his servants, they're pieces of the ancient god itself."

Adrius sighed. "Which means we're trying to interrogate a fragment of a god that barely knows it's alive."

Erend didn't respond immediately. He reached out with his senses, letting his gaze sink deeper into the mesh of golden bindings.

The cocoon started to pulse steadily. The storm being slumbered inside, but even asleep, his power was restless. The dark cloud around him curled and twitched slowly, whispering like thunder under breath.

A thin crackle of lightning kissed the inside of the cocoon, bright and brief.

Adrius instinctively stepped back. "See? He senses attention."

Erend lowered his hand and exhaled. "I think we shouldn't force it. If its consciousness is layered and fragmented… we need a method that touches the right layer without triggering the others."

Eccar raised an eyebrow. "And you have such a method?"

"No. I'm not a Mage." Erend softened his tone.

The others exhaled in varying shades of frustration.

Aesa folded her arms and narrowed her eyes at Erend, her gaze sharp enough to cut through steel.

"You must know something," she said. "You have that… power. The one that isn't normal Dragonborn Magic."

Adrius and Lysander exchanged a glance at that. Neither spoke, but the silent question between them was obvious. Special power? Beyond being a Dragonborn?

Neither of them dared to ask now about it but they thought that it was pretty wild.

Erend let out a long breath. He couldn't possibly tell them what was happening with the System about the broken mechanism that everyone believed was simply his strange innate power.

They didn't know it was alive but incomplete.

He rubbed his temple. "I'll try," he finally said.

He closed his eyes and reached inward, calling to the System.

There were a few seconds of silence. Then like a window flickered into existence in front of him, unseen by everyone else.

[New Main Quest!]

The letters materialized in thin lines before settling into clarity.

[MAIN QUEST UPDATED]

[Description: Retrieve the Ancient Forest God to this location. Only they may converse with the Fragment of the Ancient Storm God without triggering catastrophic backlash.]

[Warning: Failure to comply may destabilize the sealed consciousness.]

Erend stared at it and thought, "Veyrun was still bound by procedures even now."

From the outside, all the others saw was Erend gazing at empty space for several seconds, brows shifting slightly as though reading something in the air. They didn't understand what he was looking at but no one interrupted.

The moment he finished reading, the window dissolved into dust-like particles that faded into nothing.

Erend nodded to himself. "Alright. I think… I have a solution."

Four sets of eyes locked onto him instantly.

Aesa stepped forward. "You do?"

Erend didn't elaborate. Instead, he turned toward Eccar.

"We have to visit our old friend."

Eccar's brows rose as he tried to guess who Erend meant. A moment later, realization struck him.

If they were about to deal with an ancient god… then the only sensible move was to seek out another one.

And fortunately, this particular ancient god was no longer an enemy but an old ally they had already redeemed.

Eccar's eyes widened slightly. "The forest god."

Erend nodded once. "Yeah."

"Alright." Eccar stepped beside him. "If anyone can talk to another ancient god, it's them."

Erend lifted his hand, and a white and red portal spiraled open before them.

He looked back at them.

"I'll be right back," he said to the others.

Without another word, Erend and Eccar stepped through the portal.

The rift snapped shut behind them, leaving Adrius, Aesa, Lysander, and the sealed storm avatar in that room.

—

Erend and Eccar emerged from the spiraling portal into a world that once had been nothing but ash, ruin, and the echo of a dead god's sorrow.

Now it breathed live again for some time.

The sky that was once suffocated in grey and crimson had changed with faint green hues and a little bit brighter. Barkless, skeletal trees that used to jut from the earth like broken ribs were now wrapped in living vines.

Young forests sprouted across the land in wide patches, their leaves trembling with soft, newborn life.

Flowers of strange shapes grew from cracked stone and glowing faintly as if fueled by lingering divine warmth.

Erend took a slow breath.

"It already changed this much," he murmured.

Eccar let his gaze sweep across the landscape. "Yeah. Last time we came here, the ground was still scorching."

It meant only one thing, Thar'Zul-Vekar was healing fast.

And as the world healed, the god themself was restoring their identity, their strength, and the purpose they once lost when they were betrayed.

A low hum rippled across the air, like wind passing through thousands of leaves at once.

Then Thar'Zul-Vekar descended.

They floated toward the two Dragonborn, their androgynous face tightened with visible urgency.

Their body was filled with bark, moss, bioluminescent sap, and layers of leaves woven like robes. Roots curled around their arms like bracelets, blooming and retracting with each shift of emotion.

"I was waiting for your visit," they said, voice quiet yet trembling with strain.

Erend and Eccar exchanged a glance. If they were this tense, then the situation was far more dire than they thought.

Erend stepped forward, forgetting entirely about greetings.

"What's happening?"

Thar'Zul-Vekar's gaze flickered with worry. "I feel that another of my kind has awakened. But not of their own choosing. They were forced."

Erend widened his eyes slightly.

Eccar stiffened. "You sensed it too?"

Thar'Zul-Vekar nodded slowly, their leafy hair rustling like a forest in restless wind.

"It shook the remnants of my essence. That kind of awakening is violent and painful. It was wrong to do that."

"That's exactly what's happening," Erend said. "The Storm God which turned out to be your kin has been forcibly awakened. Not fully yet. The entity controlling him split him into three avatars to attack different regions."

Thar'Zul-Vekar's expression darkened with each word.

"My friends managed to seal one of the avatars," Erend continued, "but his mind is fragmented. We can't ask him anything without triggering a violent reaction. That's why we came to you."

Silence lingered only for a few seconds.

Then Thar'Zul-Vekar's gentle features hardened into something ancient and cold.

"This is indeed a grave matter. My kin were believed to be gone. Some chose to perish and the Storm God was among those who embraced their death."

Their voice sharpened.

"To force him back into existence…" Their eyes blazed with green divine light. "Is a violation. An unforgivable disrespect."

The living leaves around their body rustled wildly, growing thicker and sharper in response to their rising anger. The ground beneath them trembled as roots writhed like serpents.

Thar'Zul-Vekar lifted their face, fury and sorrow weaving together in their expression.

"Take me to him," they said.

And with that, Erend opened the portal again. This was far quicker than he and Eccar had thought.

—