Silence.
Then, a heartbeat — massive, slow, and ancient.
Cobi opened his eyes, but there was no sky, no ground, no horizon. Only a vast expanse of light — threads of silver and green weaving and pulsing like veins inside a living body. The air wasn't air at all, but breath itself, drawn and released by something colossal.
He was floating. Weightless.
And when he moved, the light moved with him.
"Welcome back, vessel."
The voice wasn't external now. It was everywhere — in the hum, in the roots, whispering through his pulse. It felt like the forest had swallowed his heartbeat and merged it with its own.
"Where… where am I?" he managed.
"Home," it answered softly. "The root remembers its children."
Cobi turned, searching for a face. Shapes formed briefly — outlines of trees, rivers, even human silhouettes flickering in and out of existence like memories replaying on broken film. Each shape shimmered before dissolving back into the network.
Then he saw people. Rows of them. Transparent — vessels of the past, their forms woven into the threads. A woman in an ancient dress, her gaze distant and mournful; a soldier, torn by vines yet still standing; a scientist holding a glowing sample between trembling hands. They whispered in unison.
"Every vessel carries the root. Every root carries the past."
Cobi stumbled backward — but there was no ground to stumble on.
The light under his feet responded, curling up his legs like tendrils.
"You touched creation itself," the collective said. "Now you carry its memory."
His hands glowed. Images poured into his mind in bursts — flashes of Gia, the woman who once was Mother Nature in human form. He saw her standing before a mob, flames around her, Cobi's first self dying in her arms centuries ago. Her scream fractured into light, shattering across the world like falling stars — seeds embedding in soil.
He gasped as the vision shifted — thirteen points of light branching outward, each blooming into a plant, each heartbeat a fragment of her sorrow.
The realization cut deep.
"You turned pain into life," he whispered.
"She did," the voices replied. "Now you must turn life into peace."
Cobi felt another presence awaken — colder, heavier, closer. He spun around, and the light dimmed, replaced by black roots stretching endlessly downward. In their depths, something ancient breathed. The air shivered as a woman's shape began to rise from the darkness — vines cascading down like hair, her eyes bright enough to blind him.
"Mother Nature…"
"You know me by that name. But before the world forgot, I was called Gia."
Her voice wasn't a sound. It was every sound — rainfall, thunder, breath, heartbeat — woven together into language.
"You reached for my heart without understanding it. You've awakened what humans buried — and now, you can no longer separate your mind from mine."
He tried to speak, but the network pulsed through his body, drowning all thought. Every memory he'd ever known mixed with memories that weren't his — centuries of human cruelty, betrayal, hunger, war.
He saw himself through her eyes — not a boy, but a thread in her tapestry.
A necessary continuation of her creation.
"You are not lost, Cobi," she said. "You are returning."
"I don't want to return," he said weakly. "I want my brother back. I want to stop whatever this is."
Her gaze softened — or maybe the light dimmed.
"Then understand this, little vessel: to end the curse, you must end separation itself."
The silver cords around him tightened, pulling him upward toward a vortex of blinding white. He screamed, but the sound faded as he was consumed by the current — every particle of him stretching, merging, remembering.
As the light swallowed him, he heard one final echo:
"You cannot save the world until it remembers what it is. You cannot save your brother until you forgive me."
Then everything vanished.