Completely forgetting his hunt for the prehistoric salamanders, David stood up and swung his light forward. The pulsing arachnid highway extended straight out into the pitch-black woods, slicing a direct path toward the oldest, most overgrown section of the valley. Driven by pure scientific curiosity, he checked his camera gear and cautiously followed the impossible trail.
As he pushed deeper into the forgotten hollow, the environment altered drastically. The normal, comforting nighttime sounds of the backcountry forest—the rhythmic chorus of crickets and clicking tree frogs—abruptly dropped into a suffocating, dead silence. Not a single branch snapped.
David killed his headlamp to let his eyes naturally adjust to the heavy dark. That’s when his heart skipped a beat. Rising from the split, hollow trunk of a colossal, ancient oak tree was the exact phenomenon he had mocked over dinner. There, bleeding through a thick, shimmering shroud of fresh silk, was a faint, pulsing, neon-green luminescence.