“Everyone run! Something bad is coming here!” Resounded throughout the village.
First, the villagers looked up from whatever they were doing, visibly confused and not realizing the weight of the matter. However, at that point the black tendrils which were underground shooting out of the ground and piercing the yelling villager. He was hanging on the black tendril as a corpse.
This sight visibly shook everyone watching and they started to run. But the tendrils were faster and already prepared.
“Help! Save m-.”
“Arghh.”
“This can’t be real…”
“Mommy! We need to ge-”
“Noooo”
A voices of despair and anguish resounded throughout the surroundings. But their prayers and hopes were not answered. Everyone in there died, whole families slaughtered.
This whole ordeal took less than few minutes. The tendrils were terribly effective, especially after being prepared and hiding in ambush. After they killed everyone, the life force was sucked through them into the body.
Suddenly, there was a change. The crystal inside Pacon’s body started violently vibrating as if it was trying to get out. The whole tree inside his body started growing once again.
The trunk of the tree started growing and the branches followed. Pacon’s body was torn apart and he was laying around the tree in pieces. The tree was growing until it reached around 10 meters in height. It was monstrously tall and the tree trunk was around 5 meters wide. Some of the branches grew through the houses, destroying them. The roots were growing deep into the ground, completely entangling themselves in the land.
After that, there was nothing alive remaining but the towering tree. The tree had purplish color and it looked as if it was pulsating. It was an enigmatic sight. However it had a dense aura of death around it. It was as if the death itself breathed onto your face.
…
The city near the farmer houses several days later, City council meeting
“So.. Now let’s look into the main topic of this meeting.”
When everyone in the room heard this they tensed. Everyone attending knew what this matter was all about. Although they, as the city council, usually dealt with hard matters this matter was all too weird. There were rumors about the near farmer village being wiped out but that didn’t make sense. There was no unknown area in the surrounding several hundred kilometers. And there were mountains serving as a natural obstacle for the empire across the mountains. Some people sent scouts to the village but none of them returned. It seemed as if anyone who went there disappeared. However, there was one thing confirmed by numerous witnesses. There was a tree in the village. An extremely tall one and it seemed as if he had appeared out of nowhere.
“A new threat has appeared. This time we don’t know who or what it is. What we know though is that the whole farming area was eradicated, seemingly overnight. Is everyone aware of the situation?” Everyone in the room nodded in confirmation.
“Alright, now, what measures should we take to deal with this? All of the scouts that went to investigate disappeared. I think it’s safe to say they are all dead.”
One of the men at the meeting stood up. “We should assemble a force of 300 - 500 soldiers and send them to deal with it. We don’t need additional problems. Our neighbors on the other side of the mountains are more than enough!” Numerous people nodded in agreement to that proposal.
“Does someone have any other proposals?” The man leading the meeting asked
“What about sending the Guardians?”
Everyone in the room were shocked when they heard this. It was of course because of the proposal but also because of the person proposing it.
“Elder Peare, do you think this threat is this big?” One of the people in the room asked in a very respectful manner. Elder Peare was amongst the most senior members in this meeting. He earned great merits during the war and his words had a great weight in the city council meetings.
“I know that everyone is worried about the neighboring empire. We don’t know whether they try to invade us or not. However, this threat is all too weird. Don’t you think it’s weird that not a single farmer managed to survive and inform us? Even if it was a group of bandits or rogue mages, someone would survive. This however…. No one survived and on top of that every person we’ve sent to the village never came back. And on top of that that weird tree… I have a bad feeling about it. That’s why we should send the strongest force we have to deal with it throughly. Don’t forget that there are is over a ten thousand citizens in this city, what if the threat is bigger than what it seems?” Elder Peare said in worried voice to the other members of the council.
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Council members all pondered for a bit and all of them nodded.
“Alright, so that’s settled then. Let’s inform the Guardians.” The man concluded the meeting.
…
In the city there was a big round building. That was the place reserved for the most respected people of the city. The Guardians. A lot of the city citizens looked up to them and they served as idol examples. The Guardians was a group of 5 men and women who achieved great merits for the city. They were recognized by all for their achievements.
This morning there was a person who came to inform them about their next task.
“What the hell?! Why is there another thing we have to take care of? Since when is the army of this city so goddamn useless?!” A loud voice resounded throughout the whole building.
“Calm down Antar, it’s an important task that concerns the whole city.” A pretty woman shot Antar a cold look.
“All I want to know is why couldn’t the army take care of it? We are supposed to deal only with the most serious threats concerning the whole city yet there is no enemy in sight, only a fucking tree that looks a little bit different than usual.”
The woman looked at him as if he was stupid. “What the hell are you talking about?! That fucking tree killed all of the farmers in that village. It might not even be a fucking tree. You goddamn moron.”
Antar’s expression turned ugly as he glared at the woman. “Fine…” The man gave a deeps sigh “We will go a deal with that tree…”
The woman’s expression turned livid and she yelled out “What did I tell you it might not even be a tr-” However she stopped mid sentence as someone else entered the hall.
“What is happening here? Karyn, can’t you stop arguing with Antar at least for one second. I’m trying to work on a spell but it’s very hard when you are this loud.”
“I-I… Alright… I’m sorry.” The woman said apologetically
When Antar saw her expression he started loudly laughing earning the woman’s angry look once again.
“You too Antar, you aren’t any better!” Antar immediately stopped laughing and looked at the man.
“I’m sorry Eldrich, but this task is just outright ridiculous!” Complained Antar.
“A task? What is it?”
“It just came in. It says that we should deal with the tree that appeared at the farmer’s village.”
“Oh, so they want to send us instead of the army? That’s interesting.” Eldrich was deep in thoughts for a bit
“Alright, we will set out tomorrow morning. Inform the other two.” Eldrich said as he was leaving the hall.
Both Antar and Karyn then left the hall and went back to their own rooms to prepare for tomorrow.
The next day all five of the guardians were already at the hall, prepared to leave.
“Alright, everyone ready?” Eldrich, who was the leader of the group asked.
“What are we fighting, were there any more reports?” A gorgeous woman suddenly asked.
“I wanted to brief you on the new findings as we make our way there but I guess I might as well do it right now.” Said Eldrich
“So, Zenan and Ornan, I don’t know how much you know about the whole matter since you weren’t there when we got the task. Basically there is a huge tree and everyone trying to approach it went missing. We don’t know what it is capable of or what it actually even is. However, overnight it seems that the tree had undergone a change. It had grown bigger and there are fruits growing on it. You can even see them from the distance which is how we were able to actually get that information in the first place.”
“Fruits?” Karyn said to herself unconsciously
“Yes, fruits. Now, I know that some of you aren’t taking this task seriously.” Eldrich glanced at Antar for a short moment but Antar didn’t respond. “But this matter might be very dangerous. So be careful. We don’t know what is out there.”
The whole group looked at Eldrich with serious expression and nodded. Then all of them set out to the farmer’s village and after around an hour of traveling they arrived near the village.
“Let’s continue slowly, from this point on no one has ever returned.” The whole group slowed down and carefully observed their surroundings.
They were still at least 2 kilometers from the village but all of them could clearly see the giant tree. It was giving ominous aura and even looking at it felt as if it was some evil being.
“It feels… off.” Karyn said loudly.
“I thought this task is a joke but It seems you were right Karyn.” responded Antar in grave voice.
Zenan had a complicated expression while she looked at the tree. “Yea… It really feels weird…”
Eldrich interrupted the rest of his group “Let’s go, we can look at it closely when we are nearer.”
The Guardians continued to the village and after a few minutes they were within few hundred meters of the tree. One thing was creeping the group out though. The tree started flickering. First the tree had a purplish color, but now it started turning dark purple and it was flickering. As if the tree was responding to their presence.
“Fuck, why is it flickering?! It’s creeping me out..” Antar cursed as the tree was giving him a really bad feeling.
The group has long took out their weapons and were now almost at the tree. There seemed to be no danger in sight. The only thing the whole group felt was a really bad feeling. It was almost a suffocating feeling where you feel that something is watching you but you can’t see nor hear anyone.
After a few minutes, they were finally at the tree. It was gigantic and way past its original 10m height. It must’ve been almost 30 meters now. The tree was violently flickering as if it was getting excited.
“Zenan, use protective magic and fry the tree.” Eldrich commanded as even he was getting nervous.
White specks of light flew out of Zenan’s hands and covered her whole body. Then a ball of fire formed in front of her and she pointed at it. The fireball flew at the tree.
The fireball hit the tree. It looked as if the whole story about the dead farmers and scouts was a big lie and the tree actually wasn’t dangerous despite the ominous aura around it. However, when the fire started burning the tree there resounded a loud bloodcurdling scream.
The whole group was taken aback since the last thing they expected was a tree screaming. After the scream, the branches of the black tree started bending and turning more into something that looked like tendrils. The tendrils hurled at the group.