The Axis Tree was so vast that it could only be perceived as a place, not as a thing. After all, it towered higher than the great peaks of Ariel's Game, which were already taller than any mountain on Earth — the branch Sunny and Kai were standing on was many kilometers long and as wide as a field, the ridges of the bark covering it more than spacious enough for two people to walk on.
A complicated tangle of similarly colossal branches extended far down and high up, creating a dizzying three-dimensional labyrinth. A whole nation could have made their home on the branches of this great tree… today, however, Sunny and Kai were the only people populating its desolate immensity.
The sun had just disappeared beyond the horizon, and although the sea of clouds still glowed with the last vestiges of a dreamlike crimson sheen, the night was already enveloping the world with a veil of velvet darkness.
