They ventured deeper, and the silence grew increasingly suffocating.
It was no longer an empty silence; it felt like a thick blanket covering their mouths, noses, and ears all at once. Every breath they took felt heavier, as if the air in this forest had decided to no longer be friendly. The trees grew denser, their trunks pitch-black and veined like hardened dragon sinews, their branches intertwining overhead to form a natural dome impenetrable to light. The underbrush, which earlier had merely been a nuisance, now felt like invisible hands trying to drag their feet downward.
