A cursed forest? 

Silence!

Complete silence welcomed Kara and Chris as soon as they entered the Forest of the Darn.

A gaudy and dazzling dark world filled with nothing but silence and darkness. The feeling felt like getting warped into a different dimension in a slow creepy manner. There were no sightings of the moon or the stars, so it felt like they were suddenly on a different world. 

Following Kara's back, Chris had a worried look on his face. He turned his gaze to left and right and started to tilt his head around in a slow manner. 

'I never knew it is like this inside.' He was both agape and alerted, 'I know he told me that nothing lives here, but…'

With their eyes, both of them could navigate easily in the dark. They could walk just fine even with the dreary and seemingly murky surroundings. 

"I can see why travelers would avoid this forest." Chris said as they walked, before glancing at three skeletons with clothes on leaned against the leafless trees.

Crunch! Crunch!

Tap!

Their trail of footsteps echoed, stepping on the grasses and dead twigs as they advanced. Due to the silence here, the sound was strangely loud. The sound was akin to someone finding something to eat at 3am. 

"Aren't you worried about the clan chasing us though? They know that we entered this forest." Chris asked.

"They can't. This forest is like an ever changing maze, but it also isn't like that. As soon as we entered this forest, we are inside and we know where we entered from but it doesn't mean that we can still come back using the same path."

Chris was still confused. After pondering and not talking for a few seconds, he still did not understand, so, he couldn't help but speak out his thoughts, "…What do you mean?"

"If visitors enter this forest, we are sent somewhere in the forest and the only way out is to navigate ourselves to our own exit on our own maze. But at the same time, when other people come in, they would also be sent on a different place with a different exit. The chance of meeting each other is close to 0."

"I see." Chris said, as they continued to move forward, "What are you going to do to get out here?" Chris asked again, as the silence of everything was somewhat making him uncomfortable and uneasy.

Glancing at him without turning his head, Kara opened his mouth;

"We're meeting someone."

"What? What do you mean? Didn't you said yourself not a soul lives here?"

Chris was becoming more uneasy. The young boy started to walk slower, but Kara made him change his mind, "Chris. Don't worry about it. This soul is a friend." He explained briefly.

Chris was still worried, 'Something like this…'

In this dark silent place where everything was like an abstract puzzle or an unsolvable riddle and meeting another party was close to 0, there was someone and they were going to meet them?

It could not be more worrying. Chris has always viewed himself as a strong character. He never had any problems by meeting new people, but they were escaping right now.

'Meeting someone in this situation? I can get away with anyone in a fight, but this place is…strange.' Chris' heartbeats started to drum nervously. He was becoming more nervous than he expected. So he violently shook his head.

Chris massaged his forehead, trying to clear his head of all his thoughts but suddenly, his vision was getting blurry. He felt an abnormal throbbing pain in his head and his eyelids were slowly dropping. 

Obviously, something was wrong with him. But for some reason, he nonetheless carried his legs forward and continued as though nothing was "wrong". 

'Who is this person though? Why are they here and how could they meet each other when the forest is like this?' 

Increasingly, Chris started to feel baggy and heavy as if chains weighing tenths of tons were in his ankles. He squinted his eyes, unconsciously started breathing raggedly, as extremely confusing array and funnel of thoughts danced more and more violently inside his mind like a storm! 

Pant. Pant. Pant. 

"S--igh…"

He reached out with his hand to feel his forehead. For some reason, it was all moist and cold. Cold sweat. It did not take long for him to realize his back felt exactly the same.

"Huh?"

He found it weird. "Why am I so tired?" 

He saw the silhouette of Kara moving forward and rushed his legs to catch up. With cold sweat dripping around his face, he approached Kara and attempted to open his mouth. 

"A--a."

But suddenly, his eyes duly closed and he passed out. Before he knew it, his body lost balance and dropped to the ground.

Kara heard this and stopped his stride as he turned around. 

"Seems like the forest had finally gotten to his mind." Kara said, carrying Chris and safely putting his back against the tree to rest.

It was at this moment!

When he was finished putting Chris safely, the sight of a person leisurely sitting at a stump was seen in the corner of his eyes!

Kara narrowed his eyes. 

He looked at the girl. It was a young lady who can be easily mistaken to be in her teen years. Even from here, Kara could discern she had a smooth-looking skin, a youthful exotic aura, pretty black eyes, and lustrous black hair that reached her back.

There was no doubt that this girl was a shadow!

But for some reason, Kara couldn't keep his eyes off the girl for a strange incomprehensible reason.

To be honest, this girl was no doubt the most beautiful girl his eyes has ever seen, yet that was not what caught his attention the most or why he can't stop looking at her. 

Like a lost memory. A tingling emotion. A wave of familiarity swept past over his body, making his eyes extremely enstranged. 

He couldn't help but unconsciously swallow hard, then he slowly felt something strange coursing inside him. 

"This is…"

Just then, the girl stopped looking at the darkness and turned to his direction with a slight mysterious smile on her face. As she looked at his direction, her body and face could not be more attractively criminal as though it was meant to steal anyone's heart!

After heaving a silent invisible sigh, Kara calmed himself down and asked in full wonder, "What? You never told me you were this beautiful? Or is this a fake face and body? An illusion?" 

Obviously, this girl could be no none other than the feminine voice that he talked to in his mind earlier. There was no room to be surprised here. Even if words have not been exchanged yet, Kara knew that this beautiful lady was naturally the person in the book! 

"She" told him that he could meet her "physically" if he goes to a "dark and silent place", so he did. 

The girl smiled when he heard the question. Without turning her gaze and not moving from her position, she used her eyes to size Kara from head to toe before speaking. She blinked a few times, making her thick eyelashes flicker for more than two times.

Then she spoke solemnly. 

"Beautiful…Illusion?" she placed her palms on her cheeks and started squirming which was obviously fake, "How embarrassing."

She uttered those words in a very seductive fashion, making Kara feel extremely weird. 

But he held his tongue. First, this girl was strangely suspicious. Second, she was important. Third, she was obviously not weak. After she had finished, the girl finally started to stand up. 

As the distance between them increasingly reduced, Kara remembered the girls' words when he was in the temple telling him "they are now one".  And now, there was no doubt that there was a strange connection between them ever since he saw her. For some reason, it allowed Kara to have a deep level of trust…even when the girl was a stranger. 

If a stranger this suspicious and obviously powerful came at him, he would have been very alert. But he did not. 

"Do you care to explain how this works? How did you suddenly appear? Did I do something subconsciously? I need to understand this somehow." Kara asked when she finally reached him. 

However, the beautiful lady ignored him, changing her direction, as if Kara wasn't even real. She started walking from left to right and in circles like a princess in some garden.

Kara's eyebrows tied into a knot watching such behavior. With much force, he decided to open his mouth to speak again, but then the beautiful lady turned around and looked at him with her very black eyes.

"Liste--,"

"Mm?" 

Kara unconsciously swallowed his thoughts. 

The girl's eyes were like the most beautiful pearls of the greatest ocean floors, and had the aura of a strange otherworldly creature. With the dark silent background, it was like her beauty was amplified.

"My name is May Shadow, the dark princess of silence. I am glad you freed me."