Joe stepped forward into the dungeon and found himself in a small glade. Bright son above and green grass below for the first time after picking his class he can feel the plants and animals around him. Dagda had stated after he picked his class that he was now the Shepherd of the Forest and defender of Nature. Joe had always preferred nature over the city. Both Chris and Shane had moved to the city when they went to college and Joe had visited both on numerous occasions. Always ready to get away from the sounds and smells in the city. The feeling of grass under his feet or the smell of a storm moving in was always more preferable. Being alone fishing or hunting was how he had dealt with the loss of their parents. Roland had thrown himself into work and building their fathers shop up. Chris dove into the books and classes to deal with it. And Shane had seemed to be a mix of Chris with the studying and added to that fighting whenever the occasion had presented itself. To the point Roland and Papaw had enrolled Shane into Martial Arts class from 12 to as far as Joe was aware the begging of the multiverse.

Joe looked at his class again Messenger of Crom Dubh. Dagda had not clarified who or what Crom Dubh was but only stated that the Message was all too easy, Anyone wanting to hurt or despoil nature shall become the fertilizer that nature will use to flourish. Looking inward towards his skill Joe activated the skill Messenger’s Protector. A fog like haze started to form in front of Joe building up to above Joe’s head the center of the haze started to condense into a shape Joe couldn’t determine. After a few moments the fog like haze seemed to be blown away by the wind and before Joe stood a large Brown bear if it stood on its hind legs he figured it would be over 8 foot tall. The bear walked up to Joe and nuzzled it snout into Joe’s chest. He reached up and scratched it behind the ear. Joe moved his thoughts to his other skills and activated the Armor of the Forest skill. Joes skin crawled as his skin became the grey and brown of bark his hair turning into leaves of deep green his beard matching his hair also. Anyone looking into that glad would notice the human looking as though he had turned into a living tree with bright almost glowing emerald eyes and bark skinned.

While Joe acclimated to his new armor he spread his senses out to the trees around him. When he came into contact with the trees they welcomed him as though he was along lost family member just found after years lost. They also let Joe know that there was a evil in the forest trying to kill the trees. Joe confirmed from the trees that the direction of the disturbance was from the north and Joe and Yogi, as Joe decided to name the bear, moved off toward the north. After walking through the woods for almost two hours Joe heard the sound of axes hitting the trees. Moving toward the sound at a faster pace they came upon what appeared to be tall muscular green skin creature in the process of chopping down a large oak tree. Joe commanded Yogi to charge the group of beast while Joe activate the skill Call of the Forest. Upon completion of the activation the grass roots and limbs of all the plants within a 50 foot radius around the green skinned beast Joe had targeted came to life and wrapped up 4 of the 5 beast squeezing them and holding them immobile. At about the same time that the plants came to life Yogi roared out and buried the greenskin with the axe under him. The greenskin tried to hit Yogi with his axe but the swing was deflected by the broad shoulder of the bear as the mountain of brown fur and muscle buried the beast. Once yogi had the beast pinned the first swipe of the massive claws was awarded with a spray of blood onto the green field. A pity wail came from under the bear and continued until Yogi’s jaws closed over the beast head and slammed closed resulting a fountain of brain matter and sickening report as the beast skull gave way to the power of the bear’s bite.

[Yogi has slain Orc woodsman lvl 3]

Joe looked at the name of the thing in his system alert and frowned. This thing looked nothing like the Orcs that were in that lord of the ring movies he had watched years back. Joe frowned and looked at the remaining the remaining orcs and noticed that 2 of the had limbs from the giant oak they had been trying to cut down wrapped around their necks. Joe commanded Yogi to finish the other two Orcs that weren’t being strangled. Joe asked the tree to straighten its limbs up till the orcs feet were around 6 foot off the ground as he watch the orc be slowly hung by their necks till they stopped kicking and Joe felt their energy enter his body as they passed from this world. Two swipes of large claws and a bite later and the remaining orcs joined their brethren in the sleep of ages.

[You have slain Orc woodsman lvl 3 x2]

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[Ding you have reached lvl 2]

[Yogi has slain Orc woodsman lvl3 x2]

Joe looked at the system message and grinned as Yogi started eating the orcs he had killed. While Yogi enjoyed his dinner Joe looked over at the tree the Orcs had been cutting on and concentrated on it noticing that he could sense the pain of the tree. Trying to find some way to ease the trees pain he realized that the other skill he had Healing Fountain said that it would heal all allies. Sensing that he was correct in the assumption he made Joe activated the skill. When the skill activated a large white marble fountain appeared in the air about 15 feet above Joe and started to spray what looked like water into the air that turned into a soothing mist as the mist came into contact with the tree Joe felt the tree’s pain start to dissipate and Joe watched as the meat of the tree that was missing start to grow back and once it was all there the bark started forming around the new flesh of the tree. Once that was done Joe and Yogi moved out keeping toward the north. They came upon a pond in the middle of a clearing something about the pond didn’t feel right to Joe so he tried to stretch out his senses toward it and found that the entire pond was devoid of all life.

Joe started looking around trying to sense or see what had caused the desolation before him. He noticed a dark line on the east side of the pond. Joe moved around the pond till he got to the spot and noticed a dark grey tendril coming from the forest into the pond. His senses told him that the tendril had a connection to the loss of life and he moved east following the tendril. Everywhere the thing touched all life in plants and animals was dead and it appeared that the zones of death around the tendril were growing the longer it was in an area. The longer he followed the thing the more death of the forest became obvious. Bones of deer and other woodland animals were scattered along the trail as they had succumbed to the death field around it. As the desolation got worse Joe felt he was closing in on the reason for this problem his senses told him that it was about a hundred yards ahead.

As Joe looked upon what seemed to be the heart of the problem. He saw that the tendril was a large tree. Or more precisely the tendril was a root of the large tree. Looking over the tree he sensed hate for all things with life in it. In the branches of the tree he saw skeletons with vines wrapped around them some animals some humanoid. Sending his thoughts into his staff to find a way to harm the tree Joe found that there was an attack that the staff held that he could use. Focusing on the staff he activated the attack five large thorns about three foot long and a foot wide appeared in the air above his head. With a thought Joe sent one of the thorns into the trunk of the tree.as soon as it hit a scream drowned out all thoughts. The thorn had done damage but the tree was far from dead. It began to thrash it limbs trying to vent its rage at being attacked. That’s when Joe realized that the tree could not sense him or Yogi. Joe sent Yogi around the tree to attack it from the side as he sent more thorns into the same spot. Yogi was struck by a branch as he moved in and roared his anger and pain as some of his life force was taken by the tree. Over and over Joe and Yogi attacked the tree. Joe had to summon the fountain of healing to heal Yogi wound for as long as the wound was open life force from Yogi was drawn out into the tree. But once the mist from the fountain landed on any part of the tree the scream intensified in Joe’s head as the Life energy damaged the tree more than Joes thorns. Yogi was ripping out large portions of bark and wood from the tree.

After fifteen minutes of summoning thorns and the fountain Joe was all but spent on energy the trees thrashing had slowed as the efforts of Joe and Yogi Attacks drained the unholy life from the tree. Finally when Joe thought he would have to let Yogi finish it the last of his thorns hit and destroyed the core of the tree. With a finally feeble scream the tree appeared to collapse in on itself and a rush of energy flowed into Joe telling him that the tree had died.

[You have slain Juvenile Ya-Te-Veo lvl 7]

[Ding you have reached lvl 3]

[Ding you have reached lvl 4]

[Ding you have reached lvl 5]

[New class skill available]

Class skill- Lashing Vines (common)- Summon a 10 foot radius around you filled with lashing vines to ensnare and damage enemies.

Summon Swarm (uncommon)- summons a swarm of insects to attack you enemies

Renewal of Life (Rare)- Bring down a pillar of Life energy to heal or empower new plant growth in area. Size of pillar is determined by mana spent on skill. More mana used in the skill the more years of growth is rapidly replaced.

Joe looked over the choices and picked Renewal of Life. Looking at his status bars he noticed when he had leveled his mana had filled all the way back up. Activating the new skill burning three quarters of his mana bar a 100 foot radius pillar of emerald green light bathed the area in its healing light. Within the light Joe could see trees and grass growing at a phenomenal rate replacing the dead area around the Tree and disintegrating the tree at the same time. When the light finally winked out Joe was standing in knee high grass and with 10 foot tall tree all around him.