Prospect Park at 3 AM was a graveyard.
Not metaphorically.
Ethan could feel the bodies.
Not human bodies—plant bodies. Decades of dead roots beneath the soil. Centuries of fallen leaves composted into black earth. The skeletal remains of trees cut down, burned, buried.
All of it whispering.
He stumbled through the southwest entrance, legs shaking, vision tunneling.
[LE: 298/500]
[Stamina: 12%]
[You've been awake for 19 hours. Your body is begging you to sleep.]
[Recommendation: Don't. You'll dream of roots growing through your brain. 😊]
"Shut up," Ethan mumbled.
[Rude.]
The park was empty. Street lamps casting sickly orange pools across cracked paths. Somewhere in the distance, sirens wailed.
Still hunting.
Ethan walked deeper.
Past the shuttered boathouse. Past the playground with its rusted swings creaking in the wind. Past the—
He stopped.
There.
By the lake.
A dead elm tree.
Massive. Ancient. Its trunk was hollow, split down the middle by lightning or age or something worse. Branches like skeletal fingers clawing at the sky.
No leaves.
No life.
Just dead wood.
But when Ethan looked at it—really looked—he could see the faint shimmer.
Green light. Barely visible. Pulsing beneath the bark like a buried heartbeat.
[Quest marker detected.]
[Approach and speak the passphrase.]
Ethan walked up to the tree.
Put his hand on the trunk.
The wood was cold. Rough. Dead.
But beneath his palm—
Thump.
A heartbeat.
Slow. Deep. Ancient.
Ethan swallowed.
"Sanctuary," he whispered.
For three seconds, nothing happened.
Then the tree opened.
Not split. Not cracked.
Opened.
The hollow in the trunk widened, bark peeling back like eyelids, revealing a spiral staircase carved into the wood itself. Descending down. Deep. Lit by bioluminescent moss growing along the walls.
Green light.
Warm.
Alive.
[Welcome to Verdant Concord Safehouse #47.]
[Please descend carefully. Management is not responsible for injuries sustained via root-tripping.]
Ethan looked around.
The park was still empty.
No witnesses.
No cameras.
Just him and the dead tree with a staircase in its guts.
"Fuck it," he muttered.
And descended.
The staircase went down.
And down.
And down.
Ethan counted steps. Lost count at ninety. His legs burned. His LE ticked down slowly—293, 291, 289—drained by the effort of just existing.
The walls were roots.
Living roots.
Woven together like rebar, pulsing faintly with green light. He could feel them watching him. Tracking his descent.
[You are entering a Verdant Sanctuary Zone.]
[LE regeneration: +5/minute (high chlorophyll saturation)]
[Violence is prohibited. Breaking this rule results in immediate expulsion (via aggressive composting).]
Finally, the stairs ended.
Ethan stepped into—
A cathedral.
That was the only word for it.
The chamber was vast. Fifty feet high. Walls made of woven roots forming Gothic arches. The ceiling was a canopy of living vines, glowing with soft green light that pulsed like breath.
And in the center—
A garden.
Not wild. Cultivated.
Rows of plants growing in perfect geometric patterns. Ferns. Flowers. Saplings. Some of them glowing faintly. Others shifting colors—red to blue to violet—like mood rings.
And people.
Dozens of them.
Some sleeping in hammocks woven from vines. Others tending plants, hands glowing faint green as they channeled LE into the soil. A few clustered around a makeshift table, eating something that looked like bread but smelled like fresh grass.
All of them had the glow.
All of them were Users.
Ethan stood at the bottom of the stairs, frozen.
A woman approached.
Not Mira.
This one was older. Fifties, maybe. Silver hair tied back in a braid. Skin like polished mahogany. Her eyes were green—not metaphorically, literally—the irises had shifted to chlorophyll-green, reflecting light like a cat's.
She smiled.
It didn't reach her eyes.
"Ethan Cole," she said. Voice warm. Practiced. "Welcome to the Concord. I'm Sylvia Chen, Sanctuary Keeper for Site Forty-Seven." She extended a hand.
Ethan shook it.
Her grip was firm. Her skin was warm. Almost feverish.
"Mira sent you?" Sylvia asked.
"Yeah. She said—she said I'd be safe here."
"Safer," Sylvia corrected gently. "No place is truly safe anymore. But we do our best." She gestured toward the garden. "Come. You look like you haven't eaten in hours."
"I—I killed someone," Ethan blurted.
Sylvia paused.
Turned back.
Her expression didn't change.
"I know," she said softly. "We all have."
They sat at the makeshift table.
Sylvia handed him a bowl of something green and steaming. It smelled like vegetable broth and chlorophyll.
"Eat," she said. "It's LE-infused. Will help stabilize your reserves."
Ethan stared at the bowl.
"Is it... safe?"
"Safer than starving." Sylvia sat across from him. "You burned through a lot of LE tonight. Your body is eating itself to compensate. If you don't replenish, you'll collapse within six hours."
Ethan took a sip.
It tasted like hot grass clippings and honey.
Not good.
Not terrible.
His LE ticked up—289 to 295.
[+6 LE from consumption.]
[Fun fact: You're technically engaging in photosynthetic cannibalism. 😊]
Ethan kept eating.
Around him, the other Users watched.
Not hostile.
Just... assessing.
Like he was a new plant in the garden. Checking if he'd grow or wilt.
"How many people are here?" Ethan asked.
"Forty-three," Sylvia said. "Down from sixty-two last week."
"What happened to the others?"
Sylvia's expression went flat.
"Thorne," she said. "They raided a supply run. Killed eight. Captured eleven." She paused. "The rest scattered. We don't know if they're alive."
Ethan's stomach twisted.
"You can't—can't you fight back?"
Sylvia smiled. Sad. Bitter.
"With what? Most of us are Tier 1 Users. Barely functional. We can grow plants, heal minor wounds, maybe animate some vines if we're lucky." She gestured toward the garden. "Thorne has military-grade weapons. Herbicide drones. LE suppressors. They hunt us like animals."
"Then why stay?"
"Because out there—" Sylvia pointed up, toward the surface. "—we're targets. Down here, we have numbers. Community. A chance." She leaned forward. "You're a Conduit, Ethan. Mira told me. That makes you valuable. Dangerous. And very, very hunted."
Ethan set down the bowl.
"What's a Conduit?"
Sylvia glanced around.
The other Users were pretending not to listen.
"Come with me," she said quietly.
She led him through the garden, past rows of glowing plants, toward the back of the chamber.
There was a door.
Carved into the root-wall. Sealed with vines that pulsed faintly with red light.
Sylvia pressed her hand against it.
The vines withdrew.
The door opened.
Inside was a small room.
No furniture.
Just a single tree growing in the center.
Small. Maybe six feet tall. Its bark was white. Bone-white. And its leaves—
Ethan's breath caught.
The leaves were moving.
Not swaying.
Shifting.
Changing shape. Growing faces—human faces—then dissolving back into foliage.
"What is that?" Ethan whispered.
"A Memory Tree," Sylvia said. "Grown from a Primordial Fragment. It records the experiences of anyone who feeds it LE." She looked at Ethan. "We've been documenting what we know about the Awakening. The factions. The powers." She paused. "And the Conduits."
She touched the tree.
One of the leaves solidified.
A face appeared.
Male. Young. Scared.
He was glowing so bright it hurt to look at.
"This was Marcus Li," Sylvia said quietly. "Tier 3 Conduit. Awakened in Hong Kong six months ago. He could regrow entire forests from ash. Heal terminal diseases. He was... extraordinary."
The image shifted.
Marcus screaming.
Strapped to a metal table.
Men in white coats draining green liquid from his veins.
"Thorne captured him in week two," Sylvia continued. "Drained him for three months. Sold his LE on black markets. When they were done—" The image shifted again. "—they dumped his body in the South China Sea."
The leaf showed a corpse.
Withered. Grey. Skin like dried paper.
Empty.
Ethan felt bile rise in his throat.
"Why are you showing me this?"
Sylvia turned to face him.
Her green eyes were hard.
"Because you need to understand. You're not special because you're powerful, Ethan. You're special because you're profitable." She stepped closer. "A single vial of Conduit LE sells for 200,000ontheblackmarket.Yourbodycontainsapproximately500LE.That′s200,000 on the black market. Your body contains approximately 500 LE. That's 200,000ontheblackmarket.Yourbodycontainsapproximately500LE.That′s100 million walking around in a meat suit."
Ethan backed up.
"I'm not—I'm not staying here—"
"You don't have a choice."
The voice came from behind him.
Ethan spun.
Mira stood in the doorway.
She looked different in person. Taller. Sharper. She wore combat fatigues, black, splattered with something dark and wet.
Blood?
Sap?
Her expression was ice.
"Thorne Industries just hit Safehouse Twenty-Three," she said flatly. "Twelve dead. Five captured. They're escalating." She looked at Ethan. "And they're looking for you specifically."
"How do you—"
"Because they sent me a message." Mira pulled out her phone. Turned it toward him.
The screen showed a video.
A man. Fifties. Grey hair. Expensive suit. He was smiling.
The smile of a shark.
"Hello, Verdant Concord," he said smoothly. "My name is Director Elias Thorne. I'll keep this brief. We know you're harboring the Brooklyn Conduit. Ethan Cole. We want him."
He leaned closer to the camera.
"Deliver him to us within 72 hours, and we'll consider this a business transaction. Refuse, and we'll burn every sanctuary in the tri-state area to the ground."
He smiled wider.
"You have until Friday. Choose wisely."
The video ended.
Ethan's legs gave out.
He sat down hard.
[LE: 312/500]
[Emotional stability: 8%]
[Recommendation: Scream into a plant. It helps. 🌱]
Mira crouched in front of him.
"We're not giving you up," she said quietly. "But they're coming. And when they do, this place will become a war zone." She paused. "You have two options. Stay here and hope we can fight them off. Or—"
"Or what?"
Mira's expression shifted.
Something almost like respect.
"Or we teach you how to fight back."
Ethan looked up at her.
"I don't know how—"
"Then you'll learn." Mira stood. Extended a hand. "You killed three Thornbound cultists tonight with zero training. Imagine what you could do with actual skill."
Ethan stared at her hand.
Then at Sylvia.
Then at the Memory Tree, still shifting, still screaming silently.
He thought about his mom.
About Marcus Li's corpse.
About the birch-man's face cracking apart under his touch.
He took Mira's hand.
She pulled him up.
"Good," she said. "Training starts in four hours. Get some sleep."
"I can't—"
"You will." Mira's smile was sharp. "Because if you don't, you'll die tired."
She walked out.
Sylvia followed.
Ethan stood alone in the room with the Memory Tree.
One of the leaves shifted.
Showed his own face.
Eyes glowing green.
Scared.
Lost.
Alive.
He reached out.
Touched the leaf.
[Memory recorded.]
[The tree remembers.]
Ethan pulled his hand back.
And left the room.