The forest was mine. had walked its darkened paths long before humans learned to fear the night, before their fleeting lives could even begin to touch the eternal silence of this place. For ages, I had been the god of the woods—watching over its heart, where the light never reached, and the air hung heavy with secrets.

But then, they came.

At first, they were just another mortal—a child of the sun who dared wander too far into the edge of the forest. I had watched from the shadows, hidden behind the thick boughs of trees, as they stepped cautiously into the dark. Their presence was a disruption to the stillness I had known, but there was something about them—something in the way their eyes searched the darkness without fear, something that made her different from the others.they didn’t belong here, of course. They was too fragile, too fleeting. The forest was not for their kind. But still, I watched. They would visit the forest from time to time, always just beyond my reach. They would stand at the threshold, never stepping too far in, as though they knew something I didn’t.

And then one day, they wandered too deep.

I stepped from the shadows, my form rising from the darkness. My voice was low, like the rustling of leaves in the dead of night. “You shouldn’t be here,” I told them, my words sharp, yet filled with something else—something I couldn’t quite name.

they froze, their wide eyes locking onto mine. They had never seen me before, not truly. I had watched them, but I had always stayed hidden, unseen, a presence just beyond their perception. But now, there was no mistaking me. I was the dark of the forest, the shadow that lingered, the god she had unknowingly trespassed upon.