In the misted groves of the Dark Feather Forest, where bamboo towers whisper in the wind and moonlight drapes Scratch Hollow in silver, one figure is spoken of in hushed tones: Sir Kaelen Veyrda.

Born into the Veyrda Clan, Kaelen was not the strongest of his kin nor the quickest with the blade. But he was the stillest. As a chick, he could sit beneath the thorned branches for hours, eyes closed, listening to the hush of the Hollow. When others fought to prove themselves, Kaelen mastered the discipline of restraint. It was said the bamboo seemed to bend toward him, as if the forest itself recognized his patience.

The Verdant Gaze awakened in Kaelen not during a battle, but in a moment of quiet truth. A rival knight, proud and reckless, demanded he draw his blade in a public duel. Kaelen refused, standing calm though mocked. Only when his rival struck at an innocent bystander did Kaelen’s eyes blaze green fire. With a single motion, he parried the blow, disarmed the knight, and returned his blade to its sheath. His emerald gaze faded, leaving silence in its wake. From that day, the Hollow whispered his name.

Kaelen became known as the Emerald Shadow, a knight who moved unseen through the bamboo, guiding lost travelers, intercepting marauders, and mediating quarrels before they became wars. To enemies, his glowing eyes were a warning: that patience could strike faster than fury. To his kin, he was a living oath — a reminder that the Gaze was not meant to dominate, but to balance.

When fox marauders dared creep through Scratch Hollow, Kaelen stood among his clan with eyes closed, waiting for the moment when the pulse of green fire surged within him. At that instant, his gaze cut through mist and shadow, revealing every hidden foe. His arrows and blade struck true, but his greatest victory was that few blows were needed — the enemy fled, undone by fear of what his eyes revealed.

Now, his name is etched into the bamboo halls of Scratch Hollow: a guardian, a teacher, and a shadow who walks with patience, glowing only when truth demands it. And what chickens and foxes alike know him for? His eyes, powerful and piercing, staring into the heart, mind, and soul of anyone around him.

Born beneath a rare double dawn, Lady Ancluck Veyrda was said to have feathers that shimmered faintly even before her Gaze had awakened. The elders took it as an omen—two suns, one spirit destined to bridge worlds. From her earliest days, she was unlike the other hatchlings of Scratch Hollow. While they sparred with twig-swords and practiced balance upon bamboo rails, Ancluck would climb to the highest eaves and gaze into the endless sky, her eyes reflecting the horizon. She spoke softly to the wind, as though it were kin, and it was said that sometimes, when she whispered long enough, the air itself would whisper back.

Her teachers despaired at her restlessness. “The Hollow is our world,” they told her. “Our strength lies in patience, not pursuit.” Yet Ancluck believed that patience was not stillness, but motion at peace—a dance between restraint and freedom. She trained as all Veyrda did, mastering the code of Discipline, Loyalty, and Restraint, but her heart beat to the rhythm of the open sky.

When the Siege of the Eastern Hollow came, her destiny unfolded. Fox archers descended from the cliffs, their arrows blotting the dawn in a rain of death. The wounded lay helpless among the bamboo thickets as cries echoed through the mist. Ancluck, unarmed and unarmored, stood amidst the chaos and lifted her wings in defiance. In a moment of desperation—and perfect stillness—she invoked Feather Ward, not as a shield to block, but as wings to rise.

Emerald light exploded from her plumage. Each feather ignited with power, stretching outward until they formed radiant, living wings of the Verdant Gaze itself. With a single beat, she ascended through the storm of arrows, the glow of her feathers tracing circles of safety beneath her. The wind obeyed her. The sky bent to her will. The foxes fled, blinded by the brilliance of her light. From that day, the Hollow would know her name—the First to Fly.

In the years that followed, Lady Ancluck became a symbol of transcendence within the Veyrda. While her kin moved with purpose through the bamboo paths, she took to the air, showing that the Code was not about stillness but balance. To rise and return, to fight and forgive, to soar and yet remain humble—these, she taught, were the true marks of discipline.

She devoted her life to training the next generation of guardians, crafting a new form of meditative flight known as the Path of Winds. Through it, young Veyrda learned to merge grace with precision, to listen for the silence between gusts, and to let their Gaze guide them not only in battle, but in peace.