"Help."

"This way."

"Come…come…"

"…Anyone?"

Once she stopped, the crunching of leaves beneath her boots ceased, and only those whispers lingered amidst the dense, disturbing fog. Tristessa was dressed once again in the black leather trench coat that had accompanied her on all those difficult, nightmarish loops, granting her warmth and another layer of protection. Making her look like a shadow traversing the mist, but not enough to trick the local fauna.

She saw, among the bushes to her right, peeking out but not revealing themselves, a group of spinnaraks stalking her. Their yellow eyes shone in the selective darkness between the plants and weeds, far from the sunlight that filtered through the endless branches and leaves of the titanic trees that surrounded them.

"…"

In contrast, Tristessa's somber eyes recalled that first, fatal mistake she made as soon as she arrived in Nekrom. Following those small beasts through the darkness of the Sea of Trees, until reaching that clearing flooded with bones and leaves where she met her end, torn to pieces and devoured.

Her grave and subsequent cradle.

"Fucking rabbits," she snarled, turning her back on them to continue walking in a direction that, fortunately, didn't coincide with the one the spinnaraks wanted her to take. "Shut the fuck up…"

"Hello?"

"…lost…"

"Daughter? Daughter?"

Tristessa tried to ignore those deceptive whispers, looking in every direction for a human silhouette in the fog. She had hoped to run into Jin when she returned from the day's hunt, but those endless corridors between the trees were deceptive; it was also likely the hunter had taken another direction, so she decided not to worry too much.

Her main objective wasn't to meet Jin, but something else entirely, based on the conclusions she'd drawn in her mind palace before Tiara interrupted her.

"Luckily, she reacted as always, after a bit of cold, hard truth-telling," she thought, satisfied to have seen that woman once again defeated and hurt upon hearing what she had to say about the Coven and her family. To hit her where it hurts the most. "With Tiara out of my sight, I still have to find the dead albino Vilecross and..."

But just as her train of thought focused on her objective, one of the spinnaraks following her through the undergrowth spoke with a familiar voice, making her stop in her tracks.

A voice she had never heard in reality, but rather in the form of an echo from the other side... A whisper in the dark.

"I'm alone... They're coming."

"…"

Tristessa held back her anger, the urge to turn around, grab that spinnarak, and snap its neck, even if it pierced her hands with all its spines. It wasn't worth a little beast that did what it had to do to survive. Only the information it indirectly provided.

She was close.

She remembered the path, even through such a labyrinthine place, because it was there that she had met Severus Malak Drakan. She had learned about him, laughed with him, and debated with him about her amnesia. She could even imagine him walking beside her, with that curious smile of his, so manly and gallant that she let out a nostalgic sigh.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

"Sev…" Saying that nickname the elf didn't like out loud twisted her heart. Even more so when she realized that in the previous loop, he might not have even registered her existence. "Logical… Who would be interested in an unknown person when your loved ones are about to die? And when you've already lost them and you have nothing left… Oh, Sev…"

It hurt to think that he had died alone, with no one else in the world to love him… It hurt to think of that loneliness; almost the exact same soul-crushing feeling she felt every time she returned from Death. And it hurt to think that he had been killed at the hands of Aurelia Eramisaptor, unaware that her prisoner held within her a newborn, solidified love for him, after several experiences together that ended in nothingness…

Forgotten by him, but not by her, the only one who could swim against the rivers of time.

Now that desolation was her guide and her motivation, in the Sea of Trees. Even if she had to start from zero, she had no doubt that she wanted Severus back in her life. A selfish wish, given the implicit danger she brought to those around her...

But a wish from someone who loved him.

"Lead me, Sev..." she begged, imagining the blood elf walking in front of her. His long, silky crimson hair capturing the falling leaves; he held his cane firmly and moved the index finger of his other hand back and forth as if explaining something complex and exhausting. "To our common friend."

A short time later, Tristessa made her way between two of those colossal trees, having to climb one of their roots to cross to the other side. The moment her feet touched the ground, she felt an unpleasant smell invade her senses. In front of her stretched that forest clearing, whose earth seemed sickened by the supernatural pollution that parasitized it. Dead trees around the perimeter, their bark broken and twisted, with no leaves left to fall.

And a solitary corpse in the center. Kneeling, crestfallen and wearing a crumbling traveling jacket.

"Viktor…"

The mercenary's corpse called her. Tristessa stopped in exactly the same position as before, a safe distance from the dark thaumaturgy trap hidden from inexperienced eyes like hers. She knew that if she took one more step, she would die in an instant. A very painful death, given the condition of the body of the faerie Severus had used as a scapegoat.

But before she could begin to ponder how to reach him without resorting to her [Divinity of Accursed Existence], her third Divinity took center stage.

"…!"

Tristessa began to feel an unnatural chill appearing around her temples, and her vision suddenly darkened… It wasn't a problem with her eyes, but the appearance of a shadow overlapping the landscape in front of her. The shadowy silhouette of that mercenary made manifest thanks to his [Divinity of Whispers in the Dark].

And that, along with that raspy music that sounded like it was being played on a gramophone, its echoes reverberated through that cursed clearing. Echoes and music that only she could hear.

"Gah, ugh! D-damn bitches…! You won't take me alive! You'll have to kill me, did you hear?! OVER MY COLD, DEAD BODY YOU…! AHHHHGGGG! What the hell are you…?! That [eye]… AHHH, F-FUCK…!"

With both hands on her head and gritting her teeth, Tristessa nearly lost consciousness. It was a struggle not to give in to all the horror that Viktor Enma's echo was transmitting to her, a testament to his end. A demented, cruel horror that sought to simulate those last minutes where Viktor had been driven mad and tortured to death.

Leaving that last echo in Nekrom's material plane for someone to find and learn of the evil that dwells in the Sea of Trees… And that it was always there, waiting, lurking in the shadows.

"Hello!"

That voice wasn't a product of her imagination, or a supernatural influence channeled by her Divinity. What Tristessa heard was a true voice. Spinnaraks? No… Those spiny rabbits hadn't come near that dangerous and accursed place. There was someone else in that clearing, and the gray-eyed girl was forced to overcome the influence of her Divinity in order to see clearly around her.

What she saw was a woman standing on one of the large, protruding roots of a dead tree on the other side of the clearing.

She was wearing a floor-length, gothic black velvet dress, torn in several places and with uneven hems. A black, laced corset covered her abdomen, and the long sleeves were cut and frayed, carelessly worn.

The same could be said of her pale skin, filthy with dirt and grime. Her dirty blond hair was a mess of knots and tree leaves. She looked like a high-society lady who had fallen into a state of savagery. Feral, lost in that natural labyrinth.

Lost, just like her sanity, given the frenzied way she stared at Tristessa, with eyes so wide they seemed about to burst from their sockets, and a smile made with an open mouth full of yellow teeth stained with dried blood.

A witch of the Coven.

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