The Stone Garden

🌱 Room 4 — Earth Gate — Stability

You step into stillness. Raked gravel forms perfect concentric circles around three moss-covered stones — one tall, one round, one flat. No sound. No wind. The air is cool and heavy, like earth just before rain.

A stone bench sits at the garden’s edge. On it rests a small object: a round river stone, warm to the touch, with a hole worn through its center. It has been waiting here for a very long time.

Carved into the bench: WHAT ENDURES NEED NOT BE EXPLAINED. WHAT IS FOREVER IS ALREADY HOME.

Through a break in the garden wall to the east, you glimpse a white corridor gleaming with polished metal. South leads back toward the fire’s heat.

What do you do?

🔥 Follow the heat south ⚙️ Pass east through the garden wall into the white corridor 🌳 Sit on the bench and turn the river stone over in your hands — a path opens to the tree’s heart ⬆️ Return to the Waiting Hall