Cutting down bamboo shoots hurt the Princess more than she was expecting. No matter what, she couldn’t shake the feeling that she was killing her own kind. Maybe she was. No amount of research had ever been able to discover the exact physiological difference between people and the materials they were constructed of. Whether a boulder or tree or pile of dirt was animated and sentient seemed to be entirely arbitrary. There really wasn’t any difference between the Princess and the silent shoots. That was the root of her distress, she figured. After several breaks to dry heave on the beach, the Princess managed to tear down enough bamboo to create a raft of similar size to her one from before. She had considered checking to see if there was an Infection nest hiding in any of the shoots, but she quickly remembered that that would be a pointless affair. The Infection remained dormant around those who had already been claimed. Claimed. The Bamboo Princess hated the expression. She might have had swarms of insects tunneling through her body, but they didn’t own her. Not so long as her mind remained intact. At that moment, someone told her to search deeper in the jungle. The Princess jumped, alarmed by the sudden voice. It was so close! Was someone already living on the island? Wanderers? Pirate? There was nobody nearby. Nobody she could see. The voice urged her again. It was deep and raspy. Undoubtedly hostile. The Bamboo Princess called out, demanding the voice’s owner reveal themselves. No one came. Was she going insane? Was this some side effect of the Infection she wasn’t aware of? The voice assured her she wasn’t insane. How did it know what she was thinking? If anything, this was just further confirmation that the Princess was certifiably crazy. Again, the voice told her she was wrong about the insanity. However, it continued, she was right about the voice being a side effect of the Infection. The Bamboo Princess was confused. This voice was created by the Infection? After some further back-and-forth between the Princess and the voice she had assumed was the creation of her delirious subconscious, she arrived at the conclusion that perhaps it was indeed connected to the Infection in some way. The Princess had no solid evidence of this. It just didn’t sound like something that would come from her mind. It didn’t say things she thought her subconscious would say. It babbled about cartographic features, ancient magic and demons from the Depths, always eventually looping back into a demand for the Bamboo Princess to venture into the jungle. It took a fair while, and she didn’t know exactly what the voice said that convinced her, but eventually the Princess rose from the beach and plodded into the vine-ridden threshold.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

The Princess was running low on energy. There was no telling how long she had left on her feet. She tripped and stumbled through the thick underbrush, snagging her robes on some branch or root every few steps. The air was heavy and humid. Clouds of steam wafted about, likely expelled from some unseen vent. She had underestimated how oppression the climate of the jungle could be. The silence, too, became unbearable before long. The only sound was her rustling footsteps and the low droning of the voice. It gave her simple directions, left or right, but never anything more. She had companionship of a sort, but it didn’t feel like it. The Bamboo Princess was isolated. As each step became a battle, and each monotone direction a needle in her ear, the Princess longed more and more for her room in the temple, filled with scrolls and lit by sunlight. There was very little light this far into the jungle. The canopy stole it from her. The Princess hated the jungle. Hated its arrogance and its greed. She hated the voice too, but it didn’t seem to care. Eventually, the Princess found herself grasping onto any tree or vine she could find for support. The foliage was so thick she couldn’t see more than a few feet ahead of her. It all blended into one big green blob. The Princess staggered into a bamboo forest and fell to her knees. If she was going to die, it would be with her family. The voice insisted she continue. The Princess almost laughed at this. The voice sounded more invested in its quest that she was in hers. She couldn’t let that be. As the Princess fought back to her feet, she realized another noise emanated from further into the bamboo forest. Music. It was a melancholy tune, played on a stringed instrument. The Bamboo Princess didn’t need the voice’s encouragement to continue. She practically fell from shoot to shoot, gripping tightly onto each for support. Without them, she would be crawling. The music drew nearer and the Princess’ determination increased. A pinch of sunlight shone through the patchy canopy of the bamboo forest. She wasn’t able to absorb any more energy today even if she wanted to, but the Princess didn’t care. She didn’t need it. The music would be enough. She was almost there. It was so close. The Princess burst out of the forest into a circular clearing. In the center was a small stone shrine, its characters long since worn away with the edges. Near the shrine sat a dead body. It had been a soil person once. Now it was merely a dry lump of dirt, decades at least since it had been walking and talking. A decayed, Infestation-ridden lute lay beside it. There was no music anymore. The sunlight here was warm. The Bamboo Princess looked up to see a clear blue sky, ringed by pale green shoots. It was like she had stepped into a dream. The voice wanted her to touch the shrine. The Princess did as it said. She lay her palm on its smooth, grey surface. In her mind, an eye opened, and the world folded back on itself like paper.