Metal rang against stone as Merric’s hammer slammed into the beast’s carapace. The blow bounced off, sending a dull vibration up his arms.

  “Damn, this thing’s tough,” he hissed, shaking the numbness from his hands.

  The Glassfang reared, its razor mandibles snapping for his throat. Merric barely held it back, the head of his hammer wedged between the fangs.

  Lira moved in, three blades of water slicing across the creature’s shell. The sigils screeched as they slid away, leaving not even a scratch. She tried again, another cascade of lances, and again the water rolled harmlessly off the crystal armor.

  I shut my eyes and reached for the threads around me, letting the chaos filter into rhythm. Every clang of metal sent a strange pulse through the threads, a vibration that seemed to come from the spider itself. Similar to the pulse I felt earlier—maybe this was the heartbeat of the forest.

  I lunged forward, using Merric’s bulk as cover, and drove my blade toward a joint in its leg. The strike skidded off the same unyielding crystal. My arm rattled from the impact, the shock traveling up through my shoulders. Even its joints were plated solid; this thing was a fortress.

  Behind us, Elaria hesitated, then light flared from her hands. My body suddenly felt weightless.

  “I’ve cast support magic on you,” she called. “You should feel it kick in any second!”

  The change was immediate. My movements grew sharper, quicker, more precise. I darted around the spider, slashing wherever I could reach, searching for a weakness, but every cut met steel-hard resistance.

  This wasn’t working. We were each fighting our own battle, and the thing was picking us apart.

  “Guys!” I shouted, ducking under a sweeping leg. “We need to coordinate or we’re not bringing it down!”

  “Then what’s the plan?” Lira called, another burst of water hissing through the air.

  “Yeah. Merric, go for the leg joints. Lira, the eyes. I’ll hit the abdomen.”

  They both nodded and moved, the three of us attacking in unison.

  The familiar pulse rippled out again, then an ear-splitting shriek rocked the clearing. Lira’s and my attacks rebounded in showers of light, but Merric’s hammer found its mark. The crystal shell cracked apart like brittle candy, shards scattering across the ground.

  Finally—a weakness.

  Shards of crystal still rained from its body when Merric turned toward me, disbelief written across his face.

  “What did you do?” Merric asked, eyes wide as he stared at the spider’s cracked shell.

  “Nothing. The beast can repel attacks, but only two at a time.” I ducked beneath a sweeping leg, dirt spraying as it struck the ground.

  “How’d you know a third would land?” Lira called.

  “I didn’t. I just felt that pulse again when we hit it. I figured if we all attacked at once, I could learn what it meant.” I circled behind the creature until I was shoulder to shoulder with her.

  She scoffed. “Reckless.”

  Before I could reply, another shriek split the clearing. The spider’s eight eyes swept between us, its posture shifting now that its armor was fractured.

  It reared back and spat a stream of yellow fluid that hissed the instant it hit soil. Smoke curled upward from the sizzling ground.

  “Holy hell, acid!” Merric shouted, stumbling away from the crater the liquid left behind.

  I sprinted in to close the distance, but a translucent thread snapped from its spinnerets and wrapped around my leg, locking me in place. A second later the same acid arced toward me.

  I slashed free from the thread and rolled aside, the splash missing by inches. The air burned with chemical heat, my lungs stung just from breathing it in.

  “It knows we’ve found its weakness,” I warned. “It’ll keep us at range. Watch for its threads. It binds you, then spits.”

  “Great,” Merric muttered, “a spider with tactics.”

  “This isn’t the time for jokes,” Lira snapped, launching another surge of water.

  If it wouldn’t let me close, I’d fight from range too. I timed my strike with hers, hurling a burst of fire toward the beast. The Glassfang jerked aside, letting both attacks scorch empty air.

  “Tch. Of course it wouldn’t be that easy.”

  Shards of crystal shot from its abdomen, dozens of them, blindingly fast.

  “Lira, move!”

  I dove, shoving her clear. One of the projectiles tore through my left arm.

  White-hot pain exploded through me. My sword nearly slipped from my grip. I glanced down; a chunk of flesh was simply gone. The world tunneled for a second—heat, noise, and blood.

  “Vaelyn’s hurt! Elaria, now!” Lira shouted.

  Elaria rushed over, hands glowing a pale yellow.

  “Sorry, this is going to sting.”

  The healing hit like fire under my skin. I bit down hard as tears welled unbidden. Lira was already back beside Merric, water and steel crashing against crystal while Elaria worked.

  After a few torturous seconds, the light faded. My arm throbbed but held.

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  “You’re stable,” Elaria said, already retreating to the back line. “Just go easy on that arm.”

  A dull ache lived under the healed limb, every movement sending faint tremors through the muscles.

  “Got it. Thanks,” I said, flexing my fingers. The pain lingered, but it wasn’t enough to keep me out of the fight.

  I forced myself back into the fray. Lira and Merric were still locked with the Glassfang, their movements slower now, the ground glittering with shards of broken crystal. The fight felt endless, each breath heavier than the last.

  “Anyone got a plan?” Merric panted, hammer raised. “Because I’m running out of stamina.”

  “Yeah,” I said, catching my breath. “It might be stupid, but it’s all I’ve got.”

  Lira shot me a sharp look. “And what might that be?”

  “I’ll let it web me, hold it in place while we all hit it together.”

  She blinked. “Are you insane? It nearly tore your arm off!”

  Before I could answer, the beast shrieked and fired another volley of crystal shards, forcing us to dive aside.

  “You got a better idea?” I shouted, heat burning in my lungs.

  Merric parried one shard with a metallic clang.

  “Nope. We go with Vaelyn’s plan—make it quick!”

  I nodded once and sprinted past them, drawing the creature’s attention. It turned on me instantly, mandibles clicking in fury.

  I darted between the trees, forcing it to follow. Branches whipped past; each step pounded through the soil.

  Then I felt it—the whip of a thread cutting through the air. I raised my arm and braced. The strand struck with a sharp thwap, wrapping tight around my forearm. I hooked it twice, widened my stance, and pulled until the fibers groaned.

  The acid hissed behind me, sharp and metallic on the air. My arm burned where the thread bit into skin. If this didn’t work, I was done for.

  “Now!” I yelled.

  Merric’s hammer came down like thunder. Lira’s water lances followed, and I drove a surge of fire along the thread binding me. The silk ignited in a blinding arc, heat blooming through the clearing.

  The spider’s abdomen erupted, shards whirling like shattered glass as smoke and steam twisted around its body. It staggered once, legs buckling, then collapsed with a scream that cracked through the forest. The creature convulsed once, then went still.

  The forest exhaled. Sap hissed in the split trunk. Acid ate slow circles in the dirt.

  I stood there, chest heaving, the smell of burnt resin thick in my throat. The thread fell away from my arm in blackened strands. My fingers shook, but the hum—the pulse—was gone.

  Lira staggered, water falling away from her hand in a dripping curtain. Merric sank to a knee and let his hammer tip bite the earth. Elaria pressed a palm to her ribs, light glittering around her fingers.

  No one spoke. For a few breaths, all I heard was the Glassfang’s dying rattle settling into the ground. The clearing stank of acid and ash.

  “We… actually did it,” Merric said at last, half laugh, half wheeze.

  I let out a shaky breath and looked at the carcass, its glow already fading into the earth.

  “Yeah,” I murmured. “We did.”

  For a second, I swore I could still feel its pulse beneath the soil—slow, fading, sinking back into the Weft.

  Lira knelt beside the Glassfang’s corpse, her fingers tracing the fractured shell.

  “Strange,” she murmured.

  Merric snorted. “Yeah, a giant crystal spider trying to eat us definitely qualifies.”

  She shot him a glare.

  “Not that. The Essence—it’s not dispersing. It’s lingering. After death, this much concentration should’ve scattered instantly.”

  I closed my eyes and reached out. She was right. The air was thick with it, heavy as mist, the threads clinging instead of fading. Each breath felt like inhaling liquid light.

  “She’s right,” I said quietly. “The Essence is hanging in the air. Maybe that’s why the Glassfang was here. We might’ve found a new high-Essence zone.”

  Elaria stepped closer, voice soft.

  “But what could cause something like this?”

  “I don’t know,” I admitted. “But we’ll report it. For now, let’s collect the resin.”

  “If this really is a new Essence zone,” Merric said, “the Church’ll wall it off before the Guild can blink.”

  None of us bothered to respond. He wasn’t wrong; discovery only mattered until the Church decided it was theirs.

  I drew my knife and pried a shard of crystal from the tree’s bark. It came away with a soft crack, translucent yellow catching the fading light.

  “Comes off easy enough,” I said. “We shouldn’t be here too long.”

  For several minutes, we worked in silence, the forest quiet except for the scrape of metal and the distant hum of threads still vibrating in the air.

  “I think that’s all we can carry,” Merric said, tying off his pack.

  “Then we head back,” I replied. “Stay sharp. Essence this dense draws more than just spiders.”

  Lira paused beside me, glancing back toward the carcass, her brow furrowed.

  “No new high-Essence zone has been documented this close to Etrielle in years,” she said. “That alone is strange.”

  I wiped my blade clean on the grass.

  “Strange doesn’t begin to cover it. Essence this dense doesn’t just happen. It means something’s out of balance.”

  Merric adjusted his pack.

  “Then we tell the Guild and let the smart ones argue about it.”

  “Right,” I said, glancing once more at the forest. The air still shimmered faintly, as if the threads themselves were waiting for something. “Either way, I think this is just the beginning.”

  We made it out of the forest without a hitch. The road back to Etrielle was quiet. None of us said much; the only sound was the crunch of dirt under our boots and the faint clink of resin crystals shifting in our packs. The forest’s edge faded behind us, its shimmer still ghosting at the edge of my senses like a feeling you couldn’t quite shake.

  Merric broke the silence first.

  “You’d think nearly dying would make our walk back quicker,” he said, half laughing, half wheezing.

  “Try carrying half your weight in resin and see how fast you walk,” Lira replied, though her tone lacked its usual bite.

  Elaria smiled faintly.

  “At least we all made it out in one piece.”

  I gave a small nod.

  “That’s progress.”

  When we crested the hill overlooking Etrielle, the city looked like a painting against the dusk—layers of light spilling from spiraling towers and street lamps, the faint hum of artifact networks glowing through the streets. For the first time in hours, I let myself breathe.

  The Guild gates came into view. Inside, the usual noise of the main hall washed over me: boots, laughter, the thud of cups hitting tables once their contents were gone. After the stillness of the forest, it all felt too loud, too lively.

  We dropped the resin off at the clerk’s desk. She took one look at the yellow shards and blinked.

  “You gathered all these from the eastern woods?”

  “Yeah,” Merric said. “Ninety-three, in total.”

  I stepped in front of him and set a fang from the beast we’d slain on the counter.

  “We also managed to kill this.”

  The clerk’s eyes widened.

  “Is that… from a Glassfang? How on earth did you kill a Tier Four Essence beast? And why was one so far north?”

  Lira stepped forward.

  “Those are the same questions we were hoping you’d answer. The area was unusually dense with Essence; we believe it to be a new high-Essence zone.”

  The clerk hesitated, then nodded.

  “Very well. I’ll notify the Guildmaster and have a team sent to investigate. Thank you for the report.”

  She slid our reward across the counter.

  “Appreciate it,” Merric said, picking up the bag of coins. “We’ll split this four ways.”

  He counted the shares, and we each took our cut before heading toward the exit.

  Outside the Guild, the night air was cool—the kind that carried the scent of rain long before the clouds rolled in.

  Merric stretched, wincing.

  “Hot meal, cold drink, and twelve hours of sleep. That’s my plan.”

  Elaria smiled softly.

  “We should all follow Merric’s lead. We earned it.”

  Lira gave a faint smile.

  “For once, I agree with him.”

  I didn’t join in. My gaze drifted back toward the tree line barely visible beyond the city lights. For a moment, I could’ve sworn I saw a faint shimmer pulsing along the horizon, like the forest exhaled.

  I blinked, and it was gone.