Chapter 629: Moonlit Pond

Sol tried his best to get out of their entrapment, but he was thoroughly defeated by their shamelessness.

But thankfully, he didn’t have to endure for long, as a group of elders was coming towards him.

Three lineage matriarchs approached with the unhurried, immovable presence of women who had managed households and bloodlines through decades of harder times.

Their gazes swept the cluster of younger women with the kind of calm authority that required no raised voices.

The effect was immediate.

The predators who had been so confidently closing in on the helpless prey exchanged quick looks, offered him a final set of lingering, unashamed glances, and reluctantly withdrew... still casting looks back over their shoulders as they went, as if the interruption were a temporary inconvenience rather than a true retreat.

Only then did the matriarchs come fully forward.

Approaching him, they expressed their gratitude for saving their young ones, speaking lengthy, elaborate blessings in the older dialects of the tribe... words heavy with ancestry, protection, and the formal weight of gratitude.

Sol understood only fragments, but the intent was clear enough. He inclined his head respectfully to each in turn and took their blessings while the matriarchs looked on with solemn approval.

But just as they had left, more warriors squeezed in, nudging his elbows, toasting his name, pressing roasted ribs, dried mountain figs, and other eatable into his arms.

Every time he took a sip or cleared a plate, two more hands appeared from the crowd to refill his flagon and pile more sizzling meat onto his tray.

The sheer volume of people, the thick wall of roasted smoke, the deafening thunder of drums, the constant clinking of horns, and the endless stream of joyful, overwhelming affection began to close in from all sides.

Sol was a monster on the battlefield. He could face four Layer 4 warlords without blinking an eye, crush timber palisades, and slice through a hundred enemies without his pulse jumping a single beat.

...Handling an army of over-enthusiastic, drunken tribespeople shoving roasted boar down his throat, however, was an entirely different kind of ordeal.

He looked toward the roaring bonfire.

Kira and Zeyra were still in the thick of the dance, caught in the wild, celebratory circle that spun around the flames. Firelight flashed across their faces as they moved.. Kira’s laughter bright and unrestrained, Zeyra’s usual composure loosened by the drums and the unrestrained joy to simply enjoy the night.

Both of them looked fully swept up in the moment, breathless, unrestrained and alive, with no sign they would be leaving anytime soon.

Sol glanced down at the three skewers of meat in his left hand, the full horn of juice in his right, and the young women from earlier currently preparing to surround him against just three paces away.

A faint, wry smirk tugged at the corner of his lips.

Time for a tactical retreat.

Channeling a subtle, feather-light wisp of his Dreadwing agility, Sol shifted his weight. With a smooth, imperceptible sidestep, he slipped behind the shadow of the elevated spectator platform, completely melting out of the noisy, crowded plaza before the next round of toasting warriors even realized he was gone.

By the time the young women reached the spot where he had been standing, Sol was already gone... leaving only the lingering scent of roasted meat, laughter and the brief confusion of three hunters who had just watched their prey vanish without a sound.

...

The thunderous drumming and roaring laughter of the central plaza faded into a distant, muffled hum as Sol walked along the narrow, winding dirt path leading away from the settlement’s core.

Passing beyond the outer ring of timber huts and the quiet perimeter watchposts, the land itself seemed to exhale.

Near the eastern edge of the settlement the terrain sloped gently downward, drawing him away from firelight and voices until the great celebration behind him softened into something half-remembered... a distant dream of drums and laughter rather than a solid, present thing.

The further he walked, the thinner the world’s noise became, until even the memory of the feast felt like a story told in another life.

Tucked beneath the leaning shadows of willow-like trees, far from human activities, lay a natural spring-fed pond... an unexpected jewel set into the dark world of the Great Orrath.

It rested in its hollow like a secret the forest had deliberately chosen to keep.

The water was crystal clear, so pure it seemed less like liquid and more like captured moonlight given form.

A continuous silver trickle of cool mountain runoff spilled over moss-covered stones at the far end, each drop striking the pool with a sound so soft it felt sacred. The moss itself glowed faintly in the silver light, emerald and velvet, as though the earth had decided to keep a private garden for the moon alone.

Even the surface scarcely moved. It only seems to breathe a slow, luminous tale. Whenever a wandering breeze moved through the willows, the reflection only stirred slightly, sending soft ripples of light outward in widening circles that eventually faded back into perfect calm.

Willow-like trees stood around it like patient guardians.

Their long, trailing branches hang like curtains of living silk. They leaned languidly over the water as if drawn by thirst or by longing, the tips of their leaves brushing the surface in slow, affectionate strokes as if trying to touch the full moon that floated, perfect and unbroken, upon its face.

Its eaves whispered against one another in a language older than speech.

Above, the sky had deepened into a rich indigo, vast and quiet.

Moonlight filtered down through the canopy in soft, broken shafts, scattering across the pond until the entire basin seemed filled with liquid silver.

Every ripple, every drifting leaf, every slow curl of mist along the banks was etched in that pale light. Nothing of the feast reached this far... no smoke, no shouting, no press of bodies.

Only the hush of water and the slow turning of the night.