The rough-looking man grinned at me, There still was still kindness in his eyes, but behind them lurked something else. Something deep and ancient. Nothing resembling the wild and unkempt man that stood before me.

"I created this room in desperation.“ I thought out loud. "I am not really sure how to get out of it.“

"You created your own Skill? Ah, you are a Twice-Born then. As am I.“

For a moment I did not know how to react to that. Was there a Twice-Born handshake?

"Ah.“ I said lamely. "Where am I?“

"You are at my home, the heart of the Wyld, under the protection of the Mad King. The place that only the mad and lost can find.“

"The heart of the Wyld? How...?“

"We found you. Not me. I am not much for running around these days.“ There was bitterness in his voice. "Tonja found you.“

"What happened? I remember fighting something in the marshes. Some kind of beast.“

"And after that, you were taken by the song of the Wyld, as we call it. It is not madness, per se. But it will drive you mad in time. Once the dams are broken, your senses will not be your own again for a very long time.“

"I was so confident I could handle it. I am a fool.“

"Overconfidence is the least of the sins driving people into the deeper parts of the Wyld. You followed in the footsteps of great and terrible men and women. The shamans and seers of the Wyldlings. They end up here if they are lucky enough.“

"And you?“

"It is hard to explain. My sin was pride. I stayed and fought the inevitable.“

"You mean the Wyld?“

"No, I mean what created the Wyld.“ He laughed. "The years have taken a lot from me, but this memory I will never forget. It was the last war of the heavens. The Dragon of Life fighting the Dragon of Darkness in the skies, killing each other. Of course, I wasn‘t witness to that. I would have perished in an instant. But the Wyld is where the Dragon of Life fell to his death. The Wyld is his last creation.“

"Dragons are real?“ I shouted in surprise. I knew stories, as did every child in the world.

"Well, they were. I do not know what happened to them. But they were part of the celestial courts. One dragon for every Dogma.“

Well, I was getting side-tracked here.

"What happened to me?“ I repeated.

"Tonja found you in the woods, you were in battle. You saw her and you went to attack her as well. You were more beast than man, she said. But you carried a curious chain that tripped you, bound you, and prevented worse. We brought you here, afterwards. The heart of the Wyld. Home of the mad.“

"Then I owe you thanks - Dio, was it? Maybe even my life.“

"Definitely your life, young man. You were badly hurt, when you came to me. You are healing still.“

"Can you help me come out?“

"Yes, I can. I have been in similar situations many times. And I have learned that speed is the easiest way to explain everything. You will be scared, panicked, you will try to escape. It will take a few seconds, but you will remember what I now say to you: Everything is fine, it just looks scary.“

"What...?“

He gripped my hand and my little white world shattered.

I opened my eyes to a green twilight. Trees grew all-around a little clearing with a beautiful little lake in the middle. There was noise, but I could not really hear it. Then I began to feel again. I was hanging in the air. I could not move my head. There were roots coming out of my nostrils, mouth, and ears. I tried to scream. Nothing. There were roots entering my body on my arms and legs, pulsating, pumping something into my body, holding me up. As I screamed I could feel the bark in my mouth move as the roots slid out, scraping over my teeth. I retched when I had my mouth free, coughing, and spitting. Thrashing and yelling in shock.

"Take your time.“ Someone said jovially while I tried to break free.

I took my time.

I thrashed and cursed, fought and lost. Until nothing was left but exhaustion.

"I tell you a story, my story, to pass the time until you accept your situation. Which is not half as bad as you might imagine, I might add. I was a [Druid] once, and a powerful one as well. Ahh, those were the days. But a dragon crashed onto the lands I had sworn to protect. And the lands changed. And I changed. It was deserted, everyone else was dead or had fled. But I remained, stubborn and prideful enough to think that I could tend to the land, nurse it back to what it was before the calamity. While I fought to hold back the forces the death of the Dragon of Life had unleashed, I went mad. As you might expect. And I died. I do not even know how. A greater god made me his Twice-Born. Why? Because he was amused by my futile struggle. By my madness. By my attempts to do everything over and over again, expecting different results. I was a Twice-Born then, my patron a god of insanity, and was under the influence of the song of the Wyld. The Broken Lands? I broke them. It is when I awoke.“

He floated higher, now standing in the air in front of me.

"My decision may have been rash. My decision was not made in a sane moment. But I came here and became what you see around you. I shattered my mind as I had shattered the earth. I separated the pieces of my mind. One for every sense, eternally assaulted by the madness. And when I get overwhelmed, I cut that part out of me, growing a new tree, starting over. Not much is left of me. I am young, not 60 years old. See that birch over there? That's me, the one talking to you. The rest? you should not go near them. They can be quite cranky.“ He cackled, again.

Wide-eyed, I took in the trees around me. They were dark, twisted things and they were swaying wildly, as in a storm no one but them could feel.

"The roots are how I entered our mind to free you. And the other ones are healing you. I mean you no harm. I understand myself as a protector and guide for the poor souls that try to master the Wyld, where I failed many many years ago.

"Why are you so...“

"Normal? Because I am young. And I don‘t feel anything negative. The tree in me, and the song of the Wyld, take over more and more as the years go by until I have to lose something of myself again. So many memories and so much knowledge lost. Well, not lost, but imprisoned in them.“ He gestured to the other trees. "I don‘t really talk to you, you know? I am a vision created by your own mind, speaking your own language, referring to your own life experiences. A Skill related to madness, not unsimilar to what you heard and saw out there. This image,“ he looked down his floating body, "exists nowhere but in your head. In reality, I just convey meaning and intent, the rest is constructed by your brain. So yes, I am a very old tree, although in a young body as far as trees go at the moment, and talking to the real me would be a nightmare.“

"If your intent is to drive me mad in truth,“ I said weakly, "you are well on your way. I am so lost, as to what is going on here.“

He laughed. "I like you. You are not a shaman of the Wydlings, are you? Or one of the few male seers? You do not look like one of them. They are pretty stiff and reverent when they talk to me. Makes it hard to hold a conversation. And you are a Twice-Born. I have not met many of us, even before this existence. The Wyldlings do not have gods and others seldom come here.“

"No, I am a human. I come from the Empire of the Sun. But I tried to travel the Wyld to finish a quest. I am tasked with finding a way through the Broken Lands.“

"In all those centuries I watched over the shamans and seers, while they learned to handle the song of the Wyld, there was only one who tried to walk the Wyld and came back alive. A young shaman of the Snake Clan, not even 20 years ago, I think. That is why I can remember him so clearly.“

"Can you let me down? And can you tell me about him?“

Slowly, ever so slowly, the roots shifted and I felt soft earth underneath my boots again. Almost immediately I got tackled by Zero, the chain painfully and with quite a lot of noise bouncing at me and slapping me gently on the neck and face in his excitement. I stood quite wobbly on my feet, so I fell under his assault, which he took for an invitation to jump on me.

"Thank you buddy.“ I said laughing, trying to shove him off my face.

"Quite an artifact, you have there. Sentient even?“ Dio asked.

"Yes, I don‘t know much...“ suddenly I had an idea. "Do you know of a civilization living under the mountain range to the east? What we call the Divide today? They are long gone, but maybe you remember them?“

He shook his head, sadly. "I do not. Maybe the others have. But I cannot face them, and you should be very sure that the answer is worth the risk before you try to reach out to them.“

"Maybe.“ I murmured. "Could be nothing.“

I stood up, walking around the cave, and looking at the trees more carefully. They were old, impossibly old even some of them, and unbelievably large. I had never seen trees this grand. But they were twisted, they were wrong, they seemed off. And they moved far more than any tree had a right to.

"Not yet.“ I turned back to the vision. "What about that shaman?“

"Barak was his name, I think. He went into the Wyld, without having mastered the art to see the strands of wisdom in the chaos, despite my warnings. And yet he returned, sane, confident, cruel, and unbearably condescending. There were some issues and he was cast out.“

"Barak?“ I asked surprised. "Barak Bloodbraid?“

"I do not know that name, but he did smear something red in that long braid of his. Telling others it was dyed in the blood of his enemies. That fool.“

I could see the small birch, in the company of his dark and giant brothers, sway with what felt like agitation and annoyance.

"He returned to his clan,“ I explained, "wielding strange powers and magics. Strong enough to make his chieftain throw every other clan, and ultimately the Empire of the Sun, into the dust.“

"Well, he did not learn such tricks under my tutelage.“

"Where else, then? What did he find? Where did he go?“

"He went to the Broken Lands and I cannot see further.“ The Mad King tipped his chin in thought. "What a conundrum indeed. Has he solved the riddle of the Wyld, after all these years? A fool such as him, succeeding where I failed? Careful, Dio! Is that pride you feel? Anger?“

The image of him walked in circles now. "Not yet. Not yet. Do not feel! Excuse me, young Twice-Born. I have to rest, I think I felt a feeling. I must not let that happen. Behind you is a way out, Tonja is waiting there. She will take care of you. I will call on you if I have finished examining my problems.“

And the clearing went silent, but for the crashing branches and rustling leaves all around me. I left, carefully keeping the trees in my sight.

I emerged from a natural tunnel, formed by giant roots, and came to a field of grass and flowers. A little hill overseeing endless woods in every direction. There were a few huts around, simple ones that looked to have been grown out of roots and not been built. A couple of Wyldlings milled about, picking flowers, staring into the distance. They all had dramatic changes to their natural bodies. Where the Wyldlings I had seen and fought had a couple of traits here and there, Cogar's horns, for example, those that lived here looked way more chaotic. There was a winged tiger with a womens head, a man with hooves and pincers. Another had the head of a wolf.

I stopped on the spot, taking the sight in.

"When they get strong enough to handle the song of the Wyld, they usually have enough levels for their [Wyldshaping] to revert back to more appropriate forms. They get a new Skill in [Wyldshaping] every 10 levels, no matter in which classes. Well unless they have a [Wyldshaping]-specific class. Then they get more.“

There was a woman sitting next to the tunnel on a bench. She greeted me with a warm smile as I turned to her. Had she not talked about the others that way, I had thought her a Wyldling as well. She had pleasant features, overshadowed by her bright smile that was just as captivating as the dawn. But her skin had a rough texture and dark color to it. Bark, I realized. There were little green twigs and leaves, even a few flowers growing in her light brown hair. Her intense, green eyes just beamed with joy. By the spirits, it had been a while since I saw a living and breathing woman.

"Hello,“ I stammered, "I am Hannibal. Are you Tonja?“

"The very same!“ She laughed. "Did you have a good talk with the old man?“

"I don’t know. Felt like it. I am still very disoriented, to be honest.“

"Yes, I thought so too when I found you. Glorious little chain you got there. Saved my life, didn‘t you?“ she talked as you would talk to a baby and tickled the chain. Zero gave her the satisfaction of reacting appropriately, even if he presumably did not feel a thing.

"And what do you do here?“ Do you live here?“ I asked to keep the conversation going.

She nodded. "I came here trying to learn what they learn. But I am useless as a seer.“

"Why is that?“

"Because I cannot hear the song. Nothing. Not even a whisper.“

"That sounds great to me.“ I said honestly.

"You don‘t see the merit in seeing the past and the future? Have you never been in a situation where a little bit of forewarning would have been helpful?“ She raised an eyebrow mockingly at me, but there was the hint of a smile already. She knew the answer. Well, damn. Yes of course that would have been great.

"Yeah. All right. I am sorry, then.“

"Don‘t be. I came here because my people thought me to be special. And I am, no one can help Dio as I can. The mad tending after the mad? That had always been a disaster. I am glad that I can be of use.“

"I am as well. As I understand it, I owe you my life.“

"Might be. Yes. Do try to be punctual with the repayment, will you?“ We laughed.

We spent a few minutes there, in the calm morning sun, talking about nothing of importance, until she showed me a place to bath, to get food, and to pitch my tent. I was in the water so fast, my clothes had not hit the ground yet. Zero tried to sneak away, but I pulled him into the river as well, while he thrashed and tried to escape the inevitable bath. We painted the river in red and brown until the rapids carried the muck away and we were clean. The last bath had been a while.

[I am so glad that you are safe! I was worried too, you know. You were out for three days and nights only. There may be some underlying psychological trauma with you now, but I guess your Skill saved you from the worst of it. Good job!

But listen, you have a lot of notifications. I had to think about 5 names for creatures I had never seen before, and all of them looked like a nightmare made flesh. But that is not as important now. Look at that:

[Unknown Scout of the Snake Clan defeated! Reward 16 EP.]

There was a Shard as well. It was a Wildling that you caught on the edge of the woods with a snake tattooed on his face and around his shaven head. He had scales as well. But I do not actually know if he was of the Snake Clan, so take this with a grain of salt. -Lily]

The Snake Clan was here? Or had it been one of the sheltered souls here? With Barak Bloodbraid somewhere in the Shattered Sea, would that mean that he had a way even for his troops to move through the Wyld? Were they looking for a way through as well or were they looking for the Mad King? He had said that Barak had been cast out. Maybe he was back for revenge or something else?

I whirled around as I heard the sound of a blade getting pulled out of a sheath. Tonja stood there with the sunset at her back. A gentle breeze moving hair and dress around her soft curves, while she held the dagger up, catching the last light of the day. She smiled mischievously and something changed in me, a knot I had not realized was there disappeared, leaving room for something else to bloom.

"Want me to cut your hair?“ She asked. "You look like you wear a sheep as a hat.“