She turned her gaze to the landscape that stretched out beneath her, a gloom-cast sky hanging overhead. The hill whose slope she stood atop was surrounded by dead plants, gnarled leafless trees shook in the wind.

With caution and curiosity Zelsys walked down the hill, looking to and fro to get a bearing on her surroundings. As quickly as she began walking she stopped, captivated by the sight at her back. Far off in the distance, a great wall of dark stone reached into the sky and past the clouds, its scope so grand that she couldn’t even estimate how far away it was, just that its base was past the horizon. It stretched off far into the horizon in both directions, a barely-noticeable concave bend to its shape.

The wind picked up again, it's cold bite snapping her out of it. “Fuckin’ cold…” she muttered, holding the rough fabric of her makeshift cloak close as she made her way further down the hill and towards the dead forest. The trees were not just dead, they were twisted and deformed, gnarled and intertwined in a way that made it difficult to find a clear path. Even so, she pushed through the gnarled wood, the dead roots rough enough that slipping wasn’t a concern. Minutes turned to hours as she walked, and walked, and walked, until eventually she reached an intersection of trees too dense to walk between.

Presented with the options to go back or go over she chose the latter, taking a breath and lowering herself in preparation to attempt a jump high enough to reach a branch. The silver markings on her legs briefly shone and let off silvery wisps before she jumped. A sharp exhalation, dry wood shattering underfoot and ropes of Fog trailing from the corners of her mouth as she ascended, reaching for a branch. As thick as the branch was it strained and creaked under her weight, a loud crack echoing and wood dust flying when she pulled herself up into the tree.

“Should’ve done that earlier,” she thought, looking out over the dead forest. There was a narrow but clearly visible footpath only a few dozen meters away, just about visible from where she was. She sat in the tree for a short time while she plotted a course towards it through the treetops. Inhale air. Exhale Fog. Jump.

Branches shaking and creaking, the tree she landed on threatened to collapse under her weight, then shattered into kindling when she jumped to the next one. Inhale air, exhale Fog. Jump.

Another tree. Another breath. Zelsys left a trail of broken trees in her wake as she traversed towards her goal, the path. As she neared the path, the sound of people talking grabbed her attention. She finally jumped off onto the dry dirt path, only to feel something briefly yank on her waist as she fell, accompanied by the sound of a branch creaking - the bandage by which she had tied the Tablet got snagged, and by some obnoxious miracle the branch didn’t break, the Tablet hanging out of the tree, having partially slipped out of its wrapping.