The aether gate opened with a sigh, and Aerith stepped into shadow.
The glade she entered should have been alive with songbirds and rustling leaves, but this place was smothered in silence. Trees sagged beneath blighted bark, their leaves blackened and brittle, dripping sap that hissed like acid when it touched the earth. The air was thick with rot, every breath she drew tasting like smoke and ash. Even the light filtering down from the canopy seemed sickly, filtered through a veil of corruption.
Her staff glowed faintly, a pale balm in the gloom, yet its light felt swallowed by the forest's despair.
"This isn't how a forest should feel," she whispered. Her voice sounded small, lost among the hollow groans of the dying wood.
The ground quivered beneath her boots. Roots split the soil, writhing like serpents, and from the heart of the glade rose a monstrous silhouette.
It towered above her, its bark black and cracked, oozing green ichor that hissed as it struck the ground. Hollow sockets burned with violet flame, and limbs that should have been branches had twisted into jagged claws. Its maw opened wide, not in the sound of creaking wood or whistling wind, but in a broken wail — a sound like nature itself crying in agony.
Aerith's chest tightened. Her grip on the staff trembled.
"A guardian of the forest… turned into this?" She lowered her head for a heartbeat, grief heavy in her voice. "I'm sorry. But I'll free you."
The treant's claws tore downward. She barely leapt aside as the strike split the ground, roots lashing after her ankles. Raising her staff, she conjured a burst of shimmering wind. Blades of air cut the roots before they could ensnare her, buying her precious space.
But the monster's corruption spread faster than her light could cleanse.
Poison mist poured from its bark in rolling clouds, choking the glade. Vines whipped forward like iron lashes. She raised her staff high, a barrier blooming around her, yet each strike rattled her bones and bent her knees.
Her lungs burned. Already her skin sizzled where the mist touched, green-black lines crawling like veins of sickness across her arms. She fell to one knee, coughing violently. Then, with stubborn will, she slammed her staff into the earth.
"Esuna!"
A wave of cleansing light burst outward. The poison retreated from her veins, burning away into sparkles of pure aether. She inhaled shakily, the lilies engraved on her staff jingling softly.
"No… you're not taking me down that easily."
The treant roared, roots tearing upward in fury. Aerith darted aside, only for a claw to rake her shoulder open, blood seeping into her sleeve. A root slammed into her chest, flinging her back into the hollow trunk of a dead tree. Poison mist rolled in waves.
Every wound she closed seemed to be answered by three more.
"Cure!" she gasped, light wrapping around her ribs, knitting fractured bone.
"Regen!" A gentle aura traced her skin, forcing her battered body to keep moving.
But still the corruption pressed harder. The treant siphoned life from the very soil, its hulking frame glowing with stolen strength. Each claw struck heavier. The poison mist thickened.
Her vision blurred.
For a heartbeat, she saw Zack — standing as he had once, smiling, promise bright in his eyes. That smile she never got to save. Her heart clenched, tears pricking.
I couldn't protect him…
Her grip faltered, knees shaking. A massive claw slammed down where she stood. She rolled, dirt tearing at her palms, the strike shattering the earth beside her. Pain shot through her chest.
Am I going to fail again?
She pressed her forehead against her staff, panting, tears falling onto the blighted ground.
Her voice trembled but refused to break. "No… not again. I won't let despair take me. Not again."
Light answered her plea.
Her staff blazed, brighter than ever before. White lilies blossomed at her feet — one, then a dozen, then hundreds. They stretched outward across the poisoned soil, blooming defiantly through rot. Their fragrance filled the glade, sweet and clean, pushing back the mist.
The treant screeched, writhing in agony as the lilies' glow burned away its corruption. Roots split and recoiled, ichor sizzling into nothing.
Aerith staggered upright, robes torn, hair loose, but her eyes clear. "I can't heal everything. I can't save everyone. But I can give hope. I can remind them to fight. That's what it means to heal."
She raised her staff high. Light cascaded outward, and the lilies erupted in radiant explosion, cleansing poison, sealing her wounds, forcing the treant backward.
The forest itself seemed to breathe again, faint patches of green flickering amid the black.
But the corrupted guardian was not done.
With a guttural roar, it clawed deep into the earth. Roots surged outward in a storm, tearing the glade apart. Trees toppled, the sky itself cracking open with their fall. Poison and molten fire merged as the monster's corruption sought to devour not just the land, but the very trial itself.
Aerith braced herself, staff glowing in her hands. "Then I'll heal even this."
The barrier shattered.
The blighted glade dissolved in a cascade of broken glass. Forest bled into desert dunes, into cavern storms, into jagged mountain peaks. Twilight consumed the world, leaving only fragments — a broken battlefield where every trial collapsed into one.
Aerith gasped, nearly staggering as the weight of countless trials pressed on her. She caught her breath and looked across the chaos.
And saw him.
Zack — battered, bleeding, but alive — holding his glowing sword against a giant of iron. His grin shone even through exhaustion.
"Aerith!" he cried.
Her heart leapt. She raised her staff, light bursting in response. "Zack!"
But before they could close the distance, shadows merged. Behind her loomed the treant, its roots fused with molten stone from the Colossus's cracks. Its bark burned with desert fire, its eyes alight with fury stolen from another realm.
Two monsters were becoming one.
Aerith's grip tightened, but her voice rang firm. "If the world itself is sick… then I'll heal it."
Lilies bloomed once more beneath her feet, radiant against the broken twilight. She stepped forward, fear in her heart but hope stronger still.
The oath of lilies had been spoken.
And she would see it kept.