Had things truly changed much at all? He had been gone for years now, and the scents that weaved through the forest were different, but the trees and the paths he had walked long ago were still the same. It seemed as though he had done this often throughout the years, leaving and returning, but this time had been for far longer... and it had been different. Before, he had visited the mountain peak where his pack had resided, still covered in snow even in the midst of summer, and cursed the spirits that he had once revered. And his heart sank every time he passed the forest at the base of the mountain, which hid the grave of the old wolf who had taken him in for the year following the death of his parents and pack. And originally he had planned another simple trip to the gravesites that marred his past, but Fate, and the spirits, had had a different idea in mind for him.

Nord had remembered the words of the old medicine wolf of the pack, his coming-of-age ceremony at the age of two that he had never gotten to experience. He told the boy, at the time, of the spirit herbs that littered the mountain, and the crystal cavern in which the multi-faceted gemstones reflected the very essence of one's soul. The spirits would speak to you, then, and show you the purpose for which you were designed. They guide each and every one of through the stars, he had said, but this is when they will truly speak to you. Nord had forgotten about the ceremony in the wake of the death of his pack, but upon his return to the mountain he had remembered quite clearly the experience that he had never gotten...

Despite his hatred for the spirits and his almost spiteful disbelief, something drew him towards the old medicine wolf's den- old berries and leaves littered the floor, most disintegrating into dust when he touched them. But the leaves of the spirit herbs were carefully preserved, and Nord found them in the back of the den. He felt nervous when he approached the crystal cavern with the herbs in his jaws, but once he consumed them and began his meditations and prayers, he heard the spirits began to speak... he saw visions of things in the crystals, eldritch things, unexplainable things. but he also saw himself... not the future of his soul, but the presence of it.

But above all else... the spirits had apologized. After eleven years of waiting, the spirits had finally let themselves weep in the presence of the last remaining member of the pack that had relied upon them. His quest complete, his coming-of-age finally done, he had headed back down the mountain with renewed purpose and the mountain spirits at his back. He had come back to Moladion. This was where his visions had told him to return to, after all, and despite his renewed connection to the mountain peak, Nord knew that here was where his true purpose lied.

And so he walked through the trees, his wide, ocean-blue eyes inquisitive. He wanted to know what had happened here since he had been gone... where Celeste might be, or what might have happened to Taviora in his absence. He had been too shy to make many friends, but Nord felt like now his life had just begun.