I Was Reborn in Another World, But I Awoke Inside a Corpse

Chapter 123: Beneath the Bark, a Shadow

[Council Chambers – Beneath the Tree]

The Council remained after Isaac, Sylvalen, and Lira had departed.

Gone was the ceremony.

Gone were the formal smiles.

What remained were rulers seated in silence beneath the living roots of Yggdrasil, their expressions heavy.

Aelira stood from the Thalara seat and placed a rune-sealed crystal upon the central pedestal. With a whisper of incantation, a veil of mana swept over the chamber. The walls pulsed—once, twice—sealing the space against all sound, all scrying.

"Now we speak freely," she said.

It was the Naelith matriarch who responded first. Her voice was like silk laced with thorns. "The foreigner unnerves you."

"He arrived the same day the withering began," said the Vaelorn general grimly. "You think I would ignore that?"

"No one is ignoring it," Aelira said sharply.

The Y'selaria high priestess raised her hand. "Let it be recorded: the western bough has faded by twenty paces. The mana that once surged through it now trickles like a dying stream."

"Two more root channels followed within the hour," added the Eryndros elder, his voice hushed with sorrow. "The song of the tree is faltering."

"The last time Yggdrasil withered," murmured the Lorienn representative, "our ancestors fled underground for a generation."

None of them laughed.

The Naelith matriarch narrowed her eyes. "And yet we parade the man responsible for the Blade through our sanctum. Tell me, sisters—brothers—do we believe this 'Isaac' is coincidence?"

Aelira spoke with forced calm. "He is not a coincidence. But he is not a confirmed threat. Not yet."

"And you think Sylvalen would warn us if he were?"

A heavy pause.

"She trusts him," Aelira said. "But she is young. And love blinds."

"Then what do we do?" asked Vaelorn's general. "Wait until the branches fall?"

The council fell quiet again.

They all knew the truth: the Tree was failing, and it had begun the moment he arrived.

[Elsewhere – Upper Courtyard of Yggdrasil]

Isaac stood at a moonlit platform midway up Yggdrasil's inner bark, arms resting on a carved balustrade made of living wood.

He'd felt it since leaving the chamber.

A subtle wrongness.

Like standing in a room where someone had just stopped breathing.

The tree was... quieter than before.

Not dead. Not dying.

But off.

He reached out with a hand, placing it lightly against the bark. Warm. Still pulsing with ancient energy. But beneath it—something stirred. A break in rhythm. A kind of fading.

And yet, no alarm.

No voices.

No warning.

He narrowed his eyes.

"You feel it too, don't you?" said a voice behind him.

Lira approached, arms crossed, gaze uncertain. "I kept thinking I was imagining it. But the air near the tree… it feels heavier. Slower."

"It's not just you," Isaac said.

He didn't speak further. He couldn't. Not yet.

Because whatever this was, it wasn't natural.

And the silence from the court confirmed it: they knew something.

He just wasn't trusted enough to hear it.

Yet.