The slope gradually steepened, the low grasses giving way to gray rockslides and bare patches of earth battered by wind. The barely visible trail wound between eroded granite boulders that stood like silent sentinels.
Maggie led the way, her gaze scanning the ground with hawk-like intensity, evaluating each foothold, each shadow cast by the rocks. There was no more walking in a straight line: they had to weave between unstable zones, loose stones, steep inclines where a single misstep could be fatal.
Élisa, just behind, had become their living compass. She no longer walked, but floated a few centimeters off the ground, her body tilted forward slightly, carried by her spear pointed like a rudder. Her eyes were half-closed, and her sigil pulsed with a steady, almost peaceful emerald light.
She perceived the world differently now that she had awakened. Her elven senses had sharpened somewhat, and all the training she'd undergone before becoming a hunter now proved very useful.
