The ground slopes upward gently. The landscape doesn't blur around you or anything, but the distance is a little strange. You're at the trees much faster than expected.

Well, you're at their foot, and even the roots of both trees are vast where they buckle or arch their way free of the ground – some higher up than Onyx tower, some thicker around than cabins, an imposing tangle. There are three clear entrances where it looks like you could go further in: left towards the black tree, right towards the ghostly tree, or straight forward between the two.

Mithos is standing here . . . a version of him, anyway. If you were present at the very beginning of Aather, this is how he looked back then: younger, a little shorter and softer in the face, hair down and covering his ears. He wears no key and casts no shadow. He looks very angry. He's holding a light sword, though its tip is still pointing towards the earth.

“What do you think you're doing here?”