A homely urban area, called Standart City, dimly shone in the pitch-black night, its twinkling lights from inside the towering buildings reflecting in the water of the coast. The calm waves hit the beach area where almost nobody was left playing in the water, and yet the moon kept smiling upon the sea to accompany the lonely earth.
Besides, Standart was nearby to care for the ocean beside them, along with its districts that divided the whole city.
The districts of Standart: commercial, neighborhood, market, industrial, civic, whitford, and lackful. These seven areas' contributions to the infrastructure were vastly different from each other. For a while, it maintained the order needed to defend itself from the chaotic destruction caused by the Fadens' attack, somehow, not to mention the ongoing construction to defend itself from an event like the Green Catastrophe.
Whereas the overlooking view of the whole infamous Vivid Forest, from the Lone Site to Lilac Pond, was eerily calm, especially after the recent events at a school called Standart High in the main city. Its unmoving, connecting canopy of trees covered what's inside from above, and the few howls and coos were made by the critters that roam in the forest.
Those who walk the pathway teetering to the edge of Vivid Forest, those who gave in to the fear and rumors surrounding the area and willingly decided not to enter directly from one of its entrances, would feel tense, spine-tingling feelings like somebody was watching them from afar or that their bodies were actively warning them of what was coming.
Perhaps they were right to avoid interacting with Vivid Forest as a whole, because something was churning within tightly packed oaks. A swirling vortex of pure negative energy sat at the heart of the forest, grabbing and pulling everything alive to infuse it with total apprehension.
Even the most aggressive of the natural animalistic predators residing around Vivid Forest would dread getting near what was there. Not from what would be prowling around on the ground, but from what was underneath all the dirt and soil that supported the planty growth.
Something was underneath the Vivid Forest. Somewhere deep within the Vivid Forest.
From below, a large group of Fadens, currently inactive, unbothered by the lack of light for any normal creature to traverse around. At a simple glance, it would be easy to assume that these creatures were dead, or even easily mistaken for random inanimate objects that shouldn't have made anyone nervous, but they were there... all tightly packed to give off the image of one large monster kaiju with enough devastation to flatten cities.
Like all of its other brethren, not one was identical to the other, like the varying formation of countless snowflakes. After all, these Fadens were monsters definitely born from the negative energy of those living by with beating hearts, alive just by feeding off others. Their goals seemed only to wander and kill everything that was not themselves.
The Fadens that were found by Nate and his friends from the group, the Quad Four, were only just the beginning. What lay in their future might not just affect their personal lives, but everything in Standart City and beyond might be at risk if the potential problem at Vivid Forest wasn't taken care of.
A possible outcome was that this large group of advanced Fadens from underground would carve up the hardened dirt and rock—inevitably leading these monsters to charge through the city with utter fierceness. Something of that scale would be just as destructive from a few years back, with the Green Catastrophe ravaging through the city.
Only the power of the Theomic might be their saving grace if it were to happen, the power for those capable enough to become Theomic Beings. The little green crystals, the unforeseen, awaited miracle gifted to the ordinary people of Standart City.
* * *
Two individuals in gray pushed the leaves and flora out of their way on their hike in Vivid Forest, their long-sleeved sweaters and thermal pants shielding them from the cold of the falling autumn. Both of their bags were filled to the brim with anything to prolong their survival, with no unnecessary extra things that would slow them down in the process.
Both of them, the man and the woman, looked like they were related fraternal twins with their light-brown hair and their icy blue eyes. Their serious and weary faces looked ahead at the ground in front of them, their way of traversing assisted by their battery-powered flashlights.
The guy behind her stopped suddenly. "Henrietta, the energy here feels dark. There's no question about it: the large gathering of Fadens was definitely in this forest, not aboveground but deep below."
"I feel it too, Henri. For this many to be in one place... it was right to check this part of Standart City—somehow a large number of them were completely unnoticed until just recently, like their power grew to such a degree that even you could sense them."
"It is definitely connected to that time with the green gas hovering above the city," Henri stated to her. "Probably the green gas itself was actually some type of material related to the theomin crystals, so that is why so many Fadens have been appearing recently."
Henrietta pointed her flashlight above her into the sky.
"That time when both of us were watching the whole city in the buildings when the green gases were right in front of us, moving through each of the roofs of the towers with your auric strings, I always wondered if their defense was properly maintained after so many years since the Green Catastrophe, but I had my suspicions when it was suddenly weakened around Standart..."
"You mean... the Straventer Barriers... the ones that kept the Fadens away from attacking the city outside?" Henri asked.
She nodded. "Yeah, but I felt that something was wrong when we entered back into the city, like something changed in those barriers, something that affects you, like your mind..."
Henri moved on ahead of his companion.
"Even so, right now, we have to focus on investigating the dangers here in this dark forest before we move on to other things. Stay on your guard; look out for anything that might seem suspicious."
"Of course, I'll be watching," she said to him.
The two continued to walk under the lightly star-sprinkled sky, which limited their visibility compared to if the moon and stars were right above them. Their careful eyes scanned the area around them in case anything prowling nearby, especially the stronger types of Fadens that hide well, might jump them.
Their search throughout the deep parts of Vivid Forest remained grim, with sleeping Fadens lingering somewhere underground.