Maxime Legrand, a biology student obsessed with mushrooms, scours the forest every week to study the life forms hiding beneath the soil.
One day, he makes a troubling discovery: a specimen that resembles a small house, a living shelter, as if an invisible presence resided there. Maxime remains, unable to look away. He listens. He observes...
He digs, he digs for several days without respite, then suddenly...
An underground city is revealed to him; a network of tunnels inhabited by small creatures.
They cultivate underground gardens, transform biomaterials, and exchange messages through the root network. They were about 15 centimeters tall. Completely different from us, they used unknown plants. They spoke their own language.
They were bathing in marshes... they seemed perfectly happy. Maxime names these creatures the NōKs, short for "nocturnal", because they only come out after nightfall.
He chose to stay, to observe them patiently, to learn their language, to understand their knowledge, their vision of the living world, and their way of inhabiting the Earth differently.
It bears witness to a deeply moving encounter: a benevolent colony, in symbiosis with its living environment.
Maxime starts by setting up a shelter. A small cabin where he can live and continue his exploration. A bubble where he can take the time to reflect and try to understand the NōKs and their way of life.
To continue his exploration and complete his research, Maxime builds a lab where he can experiment. The laboratory is filled with emerging science and evidence of cellular intelligence. It also serves as an archive of conversations between the NōKs. Perhaps the most intriguing element of all.
Maxime then sets up a periscope. He will use it to discover underground tunnels where the NōKs are hard at work, growing mushrooms, communicating through the mycelium, and repurposing man-made objects scavenged from the surface.
The music draws us deeper into the landscape. As we move forward, the plants, rocks, and trees seem to gradually grow larger. Perhaps it's us shrinking, beginning to see the world like the NōKs. An intricate spectacle of chemical, molecular, and energetic life unfolding all around us.
The next turn reveals the heart of the settlement. Live art performances celebrate the forces of nature.
the sounds of the NōKs