Lila had always loved the woods. Growing up in the sleepy town of Eldridge, she spent countless afternoons exploring the sprawling forest that bordered her backyard. The trees towered high, their branches intertwining to create a living canopy that filtered the sunlight into gentle dapples on the forest floor. But as she got older, the woods began to take on a different character, one that was darker and more foreboding. One autumn evening, as dusk began to settle over the town, Lila decided to take a walk in the woods. The air was crisp, the leaves crunching beneath her feet like fragile bones. She had heard the warnings from the townsfolk—stories about shadows lurking between the trees and strange sounds that echoed in the night. But she brushed them off as mere folklore, relics of a bygone era when the woods were seen as enchanted rather than dangerous. As she ventured deeper, the trees seemed to grow closer together, their gnarled branches stretching out like skeletal fingers. The ...