The rumbling of fissured earth. The splintering of wood. The wet slapping of the flesh-beast. All of it blurred together until the sensory encompassing din of battle seemed to peel away from reality like so much bark from a fallen tree. The world held its breath, as if time itself was uncertain how it could possibly move on after such a catastrophic revelation. Bushwhacker stared upward, humbled and horrified, as the spirit of the core dangled helplessly in the grip of the abomination.
The core’s crimson features twisted in agony as rivulets of Jasper sap began to pull from her skin, consumed by her eldritch captor. Bushwhacker didn’t know what this was, or how such a thing could be possible, but every fiber of her being resonated with a single certainty. If this thing wasn’t stopped, they were all going to die.
Feeling as though she were moving through the cloying muck of the swamp rather than air, she turned, looking for answers, looking for orders. Logan was retreating, staggering as red sap flowed from his eyes and ears. The core choked and sputtered above them. Rindguard was back in the grove. Her leaves dropped as the weight of worlds threatened to crush her last spark of hope. Then a hand grasped her shoulder, shaking her from her despair.
“…” Weavebriar’s susurrations were lost to the cacophony that rushed back in with it. Pulling her close, his leaves fluttered against her own as he shouted. “BUSHWHACKER! BUSHWHACKER!!! WHAT DO WE DO?!”
His eyes… She’d met them expecting fear or loss, but what she found in those windows of the spirit was trust. He was putting his faith in her. With a jolt she realized that she was all that was left. If she couldn’t lead them to victory… She shook those thoughts away as the last sparks within her blazed back to life. The Manglegrove’s eldest child pulled out her whistle, and prepared herself for war.
“We need to free The Manglegrove!” she shouted.
“How?” Weavebriar’s tone wasn’t wavering with uncertainty, only a need for clarity. Bushwhacker looked around the battlefield. She needed Mosstache. The mangrove was the only thing with even a remote chance of wrestling the mother from this beast. She spotted it to the east, still grappling with the cracked and lifeless shade of Igore. Snapping the whistle into the air she trilled the signal for the forward teams. As flytrap Leshies began to run to her position, a familiar goliath of a figure trundled up to her.
“Your command?” Siege hissed, towering over her.
“We need Mosstache! Rally your troops! Take down Igore by any means necessary!” She ordered, swallowing the guilt and grief it caused her. Weavebriar looked incredulous, but Seige only offered a firm nod and a single, determined word.
“Yessss…”
“Weavebriar! We need a builder!” she commanded. When her companion nodded she continued. “We need a clear path. Use your magic to bridge the cracks in the earth!”
“I don’t know if the vines will last-“
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“They don’t need to! Just get us there!” she demanded, pointing to where the lumbering giants that were the mangroves creaked and groaned in their mortal struggle.
Weavebriar took a moment, muttering softly as his gnarled hand passed over the head of his bone club. Then the twin sparks of his eyes flared as he cleaved the air, causing the shattered earth to bloom with woven mats of tangled roots and vines. The fibrous nets might not survive long if the earth kept shifting, but they only needed a few moments. Whistle shrieking in the air over her head, Bushwhacker charged forward across the living bridge, Weavebriar at her back. All around them, the massive shapes of the flytrap warriors barreled past them, some even running on all fours, battle-lust foaming at their lips.
“Don’t worry about Igore!” she shouted back to Weavebriar. “Leave them to Siege. Just get me to Mosstache!!”
“How are the flytrap warriors supposed to take down Igore?!” He panted. “You didn’t tell Siege a plan!” Bushwhacker said nothing. There was nothing to say. This was a desperate move, and there was no time. All she could do was delegate the job to Siege, and hope that he found a way to at least slow Igore down.
Leaping over the final jagged cliff, they arrived at the shambling roots of the two towering mangroves. There, she saw Siege throwing down his weapons and armor. Only once his green skin was bare before the light of the sun did he throw his powerful arms wide and bellow out a war cry. Bushwhacker watched in dread fascination as his warriors all threw their gear to the ground, inexplicably abandoning the advantages they offered. Then they struck. The legion pounced upon their leader, writhing in a heap of green tendrils and toothy maws. Maws which began to clasp onto each other while stalks twisted together.
“By all the ancients…” Weavebriar gasped. Before them, what had been many, became one. A hulking, headless form stood on two short legs and two absurdly long and powerful arms. It stood up and pounded its chest, with a roar that was felt from their roots to their leaves. It wasn’t as tall or hard as the mangroves, but its sheer bulk might just be enough.
Pointing upward to Mosstache’s patchy, green, beetle-like head she tore her eyes away from the legion and back to Weavebriar. “GET ME UP THERE!”
With one arm, the builder grabbed her about the middle, while the other held his cudgel aloft. There was a brief moment of crushing acceleration as a surge of life below their feet hurtled them into the air, followed by weightless free fall. Behind them, Bushwhacker could see how the core’s projection was beginning to dim. The Javelineers were throwing everything they could at the abomination, but with little effect. She had a moment to wonder why the beast wasn’t using spells to block the projectiles anymore, choosing instead to let them pepper its hide. Then gravity returned as another vine caught them, and swung them down towards Mosstache’s sorrowful eyes. They slammed into the massive trunk, hard. More than a few leaves fluttered down to the ground as the pair hissed in pain from countless little snaps and breaks. No time. There was no time for pain.
As the barrel chested flytrap amalgam grappled onto the twisted trunk of Igore, Bushwhacker pushed herself over the gnarled eye ridge of the mangrove she rode upon.
“LET GO!!” she rustled as loudly as she could, desperate to be heard over the thunder of colliding tree limbs. “MOSSTACHE YOU HAVE TO LET THEM GO!!” The great tree was slow to understand, turning one verdant candle flame of an eye upward to look at her, unable to speak and fight at the same time. Then it looked back to Igore. It didn’t want to leave.
“I’M SORRY. I’M SO SORRY.” She shouted, stroking the tangled root above their eye. “I KNOW. BUT IGORE IS GONE! THE MOTHER NEEDS YOU!!” A deep, wordless, creaking groan, echoed from the trunk of the mangrove. A sound that held no meaning beyond grief. Bushwhacker prepared to try again, to try to reach the massive being and convince them. But with a boom that felt as though it could shatter the very sky, the titan smashed a mighty branch into Igore’s broken face, shoving the other tree further into the embrace of the shambling amalgam and turning to face the core. The sorrowful flickers of its eye hardened into crystalline determination.
Bushwhacker stood once more, astride the head of one of The Manglegrove’s mightiest children. Pointing at the tentacled monstrosity, she unleashed a furious scream. Her leaves shook so loudly she thought surely they would all fall out as she roared her rallying cry.
“BRETHREN!!” She bellowed over the cacophony. All around them she saw the scattered pockets of her fellow Leshies looking up at her, waiting to see what words she had for them that could help turn this battle around. With a cocky grin to mask her shaking roots, the words of the mother sprang to her mind. “WHAT MAKES THE GRASS GROW?!”
Her fellows did not disappoint. Spears thrust into the air, the Manglegrove’s army rallied to the chant.
”BLOOD! BLOOD!BLOOD!”