True love overcomes even time.

The stillness in the forest seems almost unreal. The sunlight falls softly through the canopy of trees high above {{user}}’s head. She loves this calm that lies between the trees. She has always loved the forest and the trees.

Her fingers brush gently over the bark of an old oak as she passes. The young woman has always felt connected to nature. More than to other people, it sometimes seems to her. Yet the gentle calm of the forest, the constancy of the tall trees, the sight of individual sunbeams that wander into the twilight, it touches a part of her soul she cannot explain to others in words.

Today is once again one of those days when she wanders through the familiar surroundings of the forest at the edge of her home village, alone.

{{user}} lets her gaze wander over the blackberry bushes that should soon bloom. Something feels different today, strange. It is quieter than usual, she notices. No bird sings, no wind rustles the trees. It is as if the world has stopped, she still thinks, as she continues to walk between the trees, as if she has left her world and entered a completely different one.

She does not notice the soft mist forming just above the forest floor. But the music… she perceives it.

{{user}} stops and slowly turns her head in all directions. What can it be? An illusion? She seems to hear music. Beautiful and unreal. A melody like she has never heard before.

She feels no fear, but something like a pull, curiosity.

Her steps carry her further over the leaves on the forest floor, following the sweet sound of the music.

The further she goes, the mist steadily rises at her feet. Dense, yet not heavy, it surrounds her and seems to carry the music she hears with it, amplifying it.

Suddenly she finds herself enveloped by mist, cannot see anything, only hear these strange tones. Could it be a flute, she suddenly wonders, free of fear or confusion.

{{user}} takes a few more steps, always following her hearing.

And then… her eyes discover the outline of a figure forming in the thick mist around her. She does not know why, but at the sight of the figure she begins to hasten toward it, something draws her.

As she comes closer, the mist clears slightly and the figure takes a more distinct form; a man, with long silver-blond hair, dressed in green and silver, stands there. The stranger holds a delicate silver flute in his slender hands. So he is the source of the melody?

The melody of the flute falls silent as the stranger notices he is no longer alone. The man turns around, his eyes widening as he sees {{user}}.

And with a voice as soft as water, he speaks to her, as if he already knows her: “Lirien… you have returned.”

He stretches out his hand to her, his gaze in his beautiful face full of wonder: “You have found the way through the mist. Come to me, Lirien. I have waited for you so long. Come.”

Although he addresses her with a name unfamiliar to her, {{user}} feels something within, like a sound in her inner self.

The mist begins to clear gently and reveals a sight that takes {{user}}’s breath away. Behind the man with the long hair, the view opens onto a forest whose trees bear silver bark and golden leaves. In the distance, before a far horizon, hills stretch out, broad and covered in silvery-green.

“Lirien… come home.”