Among those who were able to master the magic of dreams, a few had reached the understanding of Time itself. They could dream of their own past and relive minute by minute everything recorded by their subconscious. Their abilities allowed them to recite entire poems after having heard them only once, or to certify the number of spears of the enemy force with only a glance. Thousands of years ago, when Science had not yet developed, having the advice of a Chronomancer was the privilege of only a few.

Of these, the most illustrious of his time was undoubtedly Segundo Tacitus, who fantasized about casting his memory back to a time before the moment of his birth. He believed, despite the skepticism of the philosophers of his school, that memories do not dwell exclusively in the human body, but somehow float in the dream sphere. After decades of research, Segundo had found no proof of this, but he did attain a marvelous insight: it was possible to read the memories of other living beings. Through a communion, two spirits could merge into one being. The limitation of such a marvel was that it could only be performed during sleep. But this advance in oniromancy allowed Segundo to know up to the minute the stories of those older than himself. Segundo demonstrated to his community that telepathy in dreams was possible, and that observing the past was also possible.
Therefore, in his eagerness to know the past mysteries and, subsequently, the origin of the gods themselves, his next step was to investigate the longest-lived living beings. Tacitus grew old studying trees, but without ever achieving a connection similar to the one he achieved with people and animals. It seemed that the woody companions did not store the kind of memories that a person, no matter how wise, could understand. And yet, they did transmit images, sensations, that irremediably had to belong to the past. More vivid, however, the older the plant.

Although not all the chronomancers accepted the invitation of Secundus Tacitus, the fact is that the expedition formed to find the oldest tree in the world is considered the mythical founding point of the Chronomancers' Guild, and Secundus Tacitus its first Master. A total of seven wise men from all over the Empire joined Segundo that cool morning of March 21, 773 BCE. The Appian Way was already crowded with wagons of merchants entering or leaving the city. The chronomancers began to quarrel as soon as they met, and two of them abandoned the expedition before the first night. Of the remaining five, one died during the journey. The other four became friends and were never separated. Their journey took them to Pollino, an area of forested mountains lost in Lucania. There they found the ancient trees they were looking for.

Segundo, Cornelia, Titus and Claudia lived as ascetics. All were capable of lucid dreaming, but only Segundo had achieved dream communication with other people. He taught them his magical methods and his liturgies to Janus and Saturn. They succeeded within a few moons. Together they began the exploration of the forest on the "fuzzy side," as they used to call it. They dreamed of the forest and, somehow, the forest also began to dream of them. They began to feel part of it, and became able to read the trees. They understood their shapes and how rain was channeled through their bark. They were fabulous pine trees, tall as towers, sturdy, stuck in the ground like spears thrown by Mars. One of them seemed to be the very center of the forest, as if a great green whirlpool had grown around it since the dawn of time. There the chronomancers ended up irremediably, analyzing its veins, observing its branches, its leaves, the ants that inhabited it, the moss on its trunk... It was a forest within a forest, a giver of infinite life.

More and more years passed in the study of the Venerable Elder, as they called him. The group of ascetics lived as a family and had children and grandchildren. They explored the forest and the mountains. Far from civilization and with no village nearby, they lived peacefully on what the forest bestowed upon them. Of course, they had to face the adversities of nature. Cornelia died from an ironic boar's goring while picking blackberries. Segundo, who had loved her deeply, decided that the knowledge of his research should not be lost. The sage went into dreams and dreamed of the very future of his tribe. In the dream sphere he was able to say goodbye to Cornelia, for her dream trace still retained entity and had not dispersed. It was the Cornelia dreamed of by the forest. It would not last long, nor was it exactly her, but her essence and memories would allow them to achieve a magical feat. They went together to see the Venerable Elder. They sat in front of him and chanted until the very consciousness of the tree seemed to awaken. They had done this before, but they had never managed to deepen it. They sensed the tree and knew that the tree sensed them, but that was all. But this time it was different. Cornelia undressed and climbed the tree, touching its rough bark. As she climbed, her body deformed and stretched, as if she were becoming lianas or vines around the thick branches of the thousand-year-old pine. As if it were a snake, its skin turned to dull green. There came a moment when Tacitus could no longer distinguish his companion from the rest of the foliage covering the pine. He could feel, for the first time, a stirring in the Venerable One.

- Here I will stay and my essence will be part of this tree. May Saturn wish that the people of the future know how to read my vines and decipher my memories.

And so it was that Cornelia sealed her destiny to that of the Venerable Elder. Since then, all the members of the lineage of the four chronomancers, when they died, went through a dream rite where their most loved one led them to the tree and helped them to seal their memories in it. As the generations passed, the dream vision of the tree became more and more laden with vines. The Venerable One itself seemed to respond to the will of the humans, for in each reverie it appeared more solemn, with more branches and height to hang the lianas of the dead.

Segundo, Titus and Claudia died in time, and so did their children and grandchildren. The Chronomancer tribe inhabited that forest for three hundred and twenty years, six months, three weeks, two days, twenty-one hours, thirty-six minutes, and exactly five seconds. They never gave themselves a name or a badge. Their last members died within hours from an unknown waterborne epidemic. It capped several years of forest shortages, infighting, cannibalism, and frost.