Chapter 17: Chapter 17: Escaping the forest
Her sword ignited in flames and she jumped and slashed at the treant’s neck. The wood creature raised it hand blocking her sword.
She has expected it to start burning but it merely shrugged off the flames. She realised her mistake a bit too late.
It raised it massive fist and was about to punch her. " Freeze." Khali’s eyes shone with golden light as he looked into the treant’s eyes.
It froze, with the strength of his soul he could easily put something like this in an illusion. The only downside was his lack of mana.
He couldn’t maintain the illusion for long since the treant was stronger than he was but that second was enough to allow her to dodge.
He freed it and it punched the ground where she just moved creating a massive 4 meters wide crater.
He drew his sword and ran up to the treant, it created a wooden club and swung it at him, he dodged to the side and ran behind it.
The creature was not very fast, it clumsily turned around trying to hit him but that was merely a mirage clone.
His real self appeared out of thin air behind it slashing at the joints behind it knees, this was one of the only few weaknesses they had.
This was an ability he discovered later, using mirage he can actually turn his body invisible.
It was still possible to discover him since he couldn’t hide his smell or any sound he made while using this ability.
" Air give me fire, burn and pierce through the wicked heart: Fire arrow." Four arrows of fire appeared Infront of Viona.
They shot towards the treant barely stabbing a few centimetres into it back. Flames ignited on it back causing her to grin.
It roared with pain and tried to put out the fire to no avail. Khali was amazed that she managed to awaken more than one spell from her technique after just opening one node.
That was rare, even he only managed to awaken a single spell. Unfortunately the spell she awakened was a common spell that could be learnt by anybody.
Her Inferno cyclone was much better. The treant turned and ran towards her with rage burning in it eyes.
Khali looked back and saw the forest closing up quickly. " Viona we need to go." The flames on the treant’s back were gone but there was barely any scratch on her.
Even Viona realised how tough this thing was. They were never going to be able to defeat it fast enough.
" How far do you think they’ve gone?" She asked him while dodging a club larger than her entire body.
" Far enough." He responded, she nodded and was about to attack again when the treant froze.
" We need to run, I can only hold it back for a few seconds." She didn’t waste a single moment and started running.
Khali kept his eyes on the treant for a while longer, he needed to keep it in his line of sight for his ability to work.
After she ran a few dozen metres away he turned bank and ran after her. The treant now freed from it illusion roared with rage.
Khali continued running but he felt heavy footsteps behind him. He knew the treant was chasing after them.
Then he heard more footsteps coming from the sides. Viona seemed to have heard them too since she started running even faster.
Khali knew they couldn’t allow themselves to be caught. He directed his mana to his legs in a very specific manner through specific mana veins.
This was a basic physical enhancement battle technique of warriors. He was yet to master it, he still couldn’t get the mana flow perfectly but it worked well enough.
His feet shone with blue light increasing his speed by more than two times but because the mana veins were incomplete, the mana expenditure was much higher for a lower effect.
He caught up to Viona, he was about to grab her when flames exploded from the sole of her feet.
Her speed increased matching his. The treants were already slow creatures, they had zero chance of catching up to them now.
Eventually the two of the caught up to the others, they found standing in an open field without any trees.
The field was only about 10 metres across. Some of the vines could still reach them so that were fighting them off.
When the two of them arrived, Viona cut the vines with her flaming sword setting them in flames.
The passage down was only a metre away so they immediately went down. After they entered the passage everybody took a breath.
" Forests are dangerous." Complained one of the warriors while wiping the sweat off his face.
He realised they were all tired and had drained their mana. He didn’t know what they will find down there and wanted them in their top form.
" Let rest here, Lucy." He looked at Lucy but she just looked at him without blinking. " Water please."
" Oh yeah right." She nodded. One of the female warriors took out a huge clay pot from her back. " By the sacred flow, water rise and quench my thirst: gently stream."
Water spilled out of Lucy’s hand into the clay pot. Everybody took out their own cups and drank.
Another warrior placed a skin sack on the ground. Inside it was dried meat rations. Although warriors needed large amounts of food, they couldn’t afford to be wasteful here.
Everybody ate enough to have enough energy to at least fight. The mages were better off.
They needed way less food so they were already full, the warriors on the other hand were still very much starving.
But he had nothing to give them so they would have to be patient, hopefully they find something to eat in the next layer.
After they ate they went to sleep, taking turns keeping watch except for the mages. They needed more mental energy to cast spells.
So he allowed them to sleep for longer and more peacefully. Eventually they woke up and they continued.
As they went down he felt the temperature rise, when they reached the next layer he sighed.
" Well, ain’t this a lovely coincidence."