Abruptly, the elven priest ceased her healing ministrations, lowering her hands and turning to face the assembled elves. "For the present, I can merely tend to the High Priest's corporeal wounds. However, the injuries to her soul lie beyond my purview."
"What are we to do? Aha! Let us seek out those high - ranking elves and beseech their powerful mages to lend their aid. Surely, they can rescue the High Priest!" exclaimed a young - looking male elf, his voice betraying a touch of hysteria.
The elven priest merely sighed. "The High Priest's soul affliction is of a most peculiar nature. It is likely that only a mage of at least the fourth rank, one who has dedicated themselves to the arts of healing magic, might hold any hope of effecting a cure. But the crux of the matter remains: can our tribe shoulder the cost?"
These words cast a palpable pall of despondency over the elves present.
As a small tribe, while they might be able to muster the requisite recompense, it would undoubtedly impose a significant burden upon the entire community.
At that very moment, a young elf's voice rang out from without. "Gotaya has returned! Gotaya has returned!"
The elves within the chamber were initially taken aback, suspecting they had misheard.
However, when the familiar form burst through the doorway, they were jolted back to reality.
"It is truly Gotaya!" cried one of the elves in astonishment.
Indeed, it was Gotaya who had rushed into the room.
She immediately flung herself beside the unconscious elven High Priest, her sobs echoing through the chamber. "Mother! Forgive me! I should not have tarried so long. I am truly sorry..."
Watching the distraught elven maiden, the other elves were eager to pose questions, yet found themselves hesitant to do so.
After a protracted bout of weeping, one elf could no longer contain their curiosity. "Gotaya, where have you been these past days? Had you returned earlier, the High Priest might have been spared this misfortune. What exactly were you doing?"
The inquirer was a male elf named Gubo, who had been Gotaya's companion since childhood. Orphaned at a tender age, Gubo had long been the recipient of the High Priest's maternal care.
In his heart, Gubo regarded Gotaya's mother as his own, and Gotaya as a sister.
In this dire situation, aside from Gotaya, Gubo was the most deeply affected.
The tone of his query was laced with reproach.
The elven priest, upon hearing this, had been on the verge of interjecting but ultimately held her tongue.
Gotaya, in the throes of her grief, shuddered. She recalled that Glen had long ago counseled her to return home, to reassure her kin, and that she could then decide whether to remain or depart as she saw fit.
Yet, she had been willful, reasoning that a few additional days would scarcely matter, given the insignificance of such a span compared to an elf's lifespan.
Consequently, she had overlooked the concerns of those who cared for her.
At the recollection, Gotaya felt as if her heart had been seized in a vice, an indescribable anguish washing over her, making even the simplest act of breathing a struggle.
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Observing the figure slumped beside the High Priest, unresponsive for so long, the others began to entertain various speculations.
Perhaps they all held Gotaya solely accountable for this turn of events.
"Speak up! After extricating yourself from those humans, did you have no intention of returning? Do you have any notion of the torment the High Priest has endured during this time? Gotaya! You have sorely disappointed us!"
Gubo roared, his face flushed with anger.
Gotaya was consumed by a profound sense of self - reproach. Should anything befall her mother, she knew she could never forgive herself.
Rumbling!
The ground trembled, shattering the oppressive silence within the chamber.
"What is the meaning of this?!"
"Could it be an earthquake?"
Several elves exclaimed, their voices tinged with alarm.
Suddenly, from without, the panicked cries of other forest elves reached their ears.
"The forest... the forest is withering away!"
"Our Mother will perish thus!"
"What is happening? High Priest! Come and save our Mother!"
These few words were enough to drain the color from the faces of the elves within the room.
They rushed outside, save for Gotaya, who remained ensnared in her self - recrimination, seemingly impervious to the commotion without.
As they beheld the scene outside, the elves who had just emerged from the High Priest's abode felt as if the very heavens were about to collapse.
Before their eyes, one verdant and flourishing tree after another withered away at an alarming pace, visible to the naked eye. Many of the elven dwellings had decayed to the point of disuse.
Yet, what filled the forest elves with the most profound despair was the palpable weakening of their forest mother's essence, on the verge of dissipation.
Should their forest mother perish, they, the denizens of this forest, would meet the same fate, unless other elves were willing to offer them sanctuary. But this would necessitate the High Priest's intervention.
And yet, at this very moment, the High Priest lay incapacitated.
All the elves found themselves mired in the depths of despair.
If one listened closely, perhaps they might have heard the sobs of a woman, and the faint, triumphant chuckle of an old man.
Suddenly, an unfamiliar force of the forest, of unknown origin, seemed to gently cradle the forest on the brink of death.
The woman's sobs ceased, and the old man's laughter was replaced by a startled exclamation.
The forest elves, sensing that their dying mother had been saved by some mysterious force, were filled with a mixture of confusion and elation.
The withering ceased its spread, and an ethereal shadow drifted into the High Priest's chamber.
Behind Gotaya, it coalesced into the spectral form of a woman, her head adorned with a veil as black as the night sky, her gown billowing like a wisp of mist.
"Take her to Bayek. I can save her."
A faint, almost imperceptible voice echoed within Gotaya's mind, a voice she knew all too well.
It was the very voice of the forest she had heard upon first entering the outer woods of Bayek.
Gotaya spun around abruptly, but her gaze fell upon nothing.
Yet, she knew precisely what she must do. She had to convey her mother to Bayek with all due haste.
The forest mother there had promised to save her mother, and she had no doubt that she would.
In a realm hidden from mortal eyes.
The woman in the black veil, who had but moments ago addressed Gotaya, was engaged in a confrontation with a figure resembling an old man.
"I never anticipated that, after so long a period of inattention to the elemental realm, such a powerful forest spirit as you would emerge."
The old man's voice carried a note of wistfulness.
"Despite being beings of transcendent nature, you still hanker after that meager green magic spirit. Are all so - called gods as base in character as you, God of Truth?"
The words of the woman in the black veil dripped with contempt, yet her tone remained unwavering.
The old man, addressed as the God of Truth, scoffed. "Knowing what I am, you yet dare to speak to me in such a manner. Do you think I am powerless to deal with you?"
"You are naught but a band of cowards, cowering in fear of calamity. What is there to be afraid of? You have countless devout followers, supplying you with an endless wellspring of power, yet you choose to abandon them. You are unworthy of the title of god."
The woman in the black veil's tone remained constant, as if merely stating the obvious.
The God of Truth fell silent. Finally, he spoke, his voice tinged with resignation.
"No one can withstand that power, not even the gods themselves. Should a new world come into being hereafter, we can, of course, seek out new believers..."
With that, the God of Truth faded from view, his form dissolving into nothingness.
The woman in the black veil did not linger long, soon departing from this enigmatic space.
