The forest’s leaves seemed to bend towards Venli, inching closer towards her skin. The hairs on her spine began to tilt upwards, and so did her head, as she lifted it to view this... thing.

The spectres eyes seemed burned out, as if somebody had scraped them out with a scalpel. Its ethereal sleeves hung low from its eldritch extremities, and they swept across the ground as it moved towards Venli. ...

“No!” He thought. They could not do this! If only they knew his capabilities. Though his body had decayed, his mind had remained true, and so Michael had cultivated it, grown it within himself. Years of theorising and thought experiments can make even the dullest of people become erudite savants. And so he devised his own way to heal himself. It worked.

His fingers had already begun to twitch, ach...