Speaker for the Silent

— The Elder Speaker for the Silent to Rei

The **Speaker for the Silent** is a "female" Umbra Elder. They died 27 cycles ago, together with their beloved. The resting place of the Speaker is under the Whispering Sanctum, at the very bottom at the Dead Archives, in the Eternal Garden.

The Speaker had a lover while alive, and when she died, her fingers remained entwined with her beloved's. The Speaker was of the opinion that Umbra must spread their roots in the heart of another, engage in communion, in order to achieve diffusiom across the great gradient of selves beyond, the mycelium network. She lamented the fact that Ahrric, the gardener of the Eternal Garden, hadn't done so every time he had come to speak with her.

The Speaker for the Silent is a character in Ahhric's story questline A Dark Pilgrimage, and is the first Elder Ahrric tells Rei to find and talk to, since she is the one closest to his gardener's home in the Eternal Garden.

## History

When Rei came to see the Speaker, using the Spore Song blessing to wake her and make her believe she was Ahrric, the Speaker at first mistook Rei for the gardener and made known her disappointment that he had not yet found a life partner. However, she then noticed that it was Rei and commented that Rei was not Ahrric but a soul that stands apart from their oneness, refering to the fact that Rei was one half of her original whole form and had been split from her other half, that she loved only ger own goals and said that Rei's quest did not concern the Umbra.

Rei asked the Speaker if she knew anythinf about the being called Echo, noting that there were lives at stake. Curious to hear more, the Speaker decided to ask "the Silent Ones" if fhey knew the origins of the entity of which Rei spoke, however the Silent Ones, answering the Speaker in inaudible whispers from the ground, told her that the Umbra had seen endless cycles of the being Echo's fruitless struggle, and that she had been removed from the cycles of life and death. However, she told Rei that the Umbra was hearing whispers from the ground "that they smell of null" and noted that Rei smelled of null as well. Then, at the end, the Speaker told Rei that the Silent Ones could offer Rei nothinf but contempt and that she had to comfort them and so ordered her to leave her cave.

## Physical appearance

The Speaker for the Silent's body is all violet. Out of all fibe Elders, her head and face is the most like other, regular Umbra due to the fact that she has a long pointy nose or
mouth jutting out from the area of her face where a human might have their mouth and nose. Howveer, no one knows if this is a natural formation, since Ahrric seems to habe it too but his is either covered by or is in fact some sort of face-mask
or rebreathing apparatus. The Speaker, like other Umbra, is very tall and lanky. A very tall and wide web of fungus juts up drom the top of the Speaker's head, pointing straight up into the air, making her resemble a humanoid version of the undereager fungus *Clavaria zollingeri*. When her mind is awoken, the Speaker's eyes glow white and her head is surrounded by a waving aura of orange-yellow energy.

## Personality

The Speaker for the Silent was an advocate for love, believing that in order for an Umbra to achieve diffusion across the great gradient of selves beyond, probably referring to the mycelium network, they had to "spread roots in the heart of another." She also called this "engaging in communion." For this reason, the Speaker was disappointed that Ahrric had never found someone to love the way the Elder had, and would point it out to him when he would reach out to her. In life, the Speaker had had a lover, whom she referred to as "my beloved." When the Speaker died and became a part of the mycelium network, the fingers of her hands were entwines with those of this person, and still is it to
this day as their conscuousnesses live on in the network but their bodies are immobile, the beloved's even being petrified.