A stranger emerged out of the forest and greeted the humans with a simple “Hello!” and a wave.

The three axe men stopped chopping their trees and gave him an intense look.

“Do not be alarmed I come in peace.” He took his helmet off showing that he is human. “See, I am just like y…”

“Who are you? And why are you dressed like this?” One of the men questioned.

“His accent is kinda strange isn’t it.” The second whispered to the third.

“You see, I am a King.” The stranger said it like it meant the world to him.

All three began laughing, a third was even crying.

“Why did you stop working?” A man dressed in fancy robes approached and gave the stranger an odd look. “Who is this?” He asked pointing his staff at the ‘king’.

“He… ha-ha… He says… Ha!” An axeman just couldn’t stop laughing. “He’s a King!”

The robed man however wasn’t in the mood to laugh, he stared daggers at the ‘king’.

“You aren’t an illusion, right?” He asked the oddest question.

“What? N…” The stranger couldn’t finish.

“Trouble!” Yet another man came running out of the forest, shouting and flailing his arms. “Monsters!”

The robed man looked at the stranger and then at the alarmed labourer and then at the forest.

“Do I have to deal with everything here?” The robed elder shook his head in annoyance.

“What is that!” The labourer pointed his finger rudely his mouth agape.

The robed man ignored the labourer and instead bellowed a command. “Get more men and kill that forest monster!”

“Ah, about that. Don’t do it.” The stranger commanded it with the same authority the magus did.

“And why is that?” The robed man asked.

“He thinks he’s a King of us.” A third man whispered to the second and the two giggled like teenage girls.

“The spiders are my people. They won’t attack you, so please don’t attack them.”

“Your people?”

“I am the King of spiders.”

There was more laughter. “Did he eat some mushrooms or something?” The third man wasn’t bothering to whisper anymore. And by now more men were coming to observe the disturbance.

“Are you sure you are not under an illusion, King?” The robed man asked the stranger. “Wisps are prowling the forest, playing tricks on men.”

The knight who imagined he is a king shook his head. “No, I’m telling the truth. I am the King of Spiders, I command them.” He waved behind him and towards the dense forest. “Do not be scared. They are friendly.”

A monster emerged from the forest. Its skin was black like night, four soulless eyes stared at them. It walked on six legs and wore strange spiked armour and carried a spiked shield in its left and an axe in right. Everyone tensed up at the horror. Normally, monsters didn't wear armour or carry weapons.

The terror didn’t stop with one monster, another emerged from the forest and then another. The labourers grasped the axes tightly ready for a fight. Whoever was laughing before, now had an overly serious look on their face.

The magus raised his staff and pushed mana into it.

“Relax. I told you I come in peace.”

“What do you want?”

“To negotiate.”

A green fat wisp emerged from the forest and began to buzz something at the King of Spiders.

“Alright, alright. Ah…” The King sighed. “This forest does not belong to you. You must stop chopping it at once.”

The magus stared in disbelief. “Are you conversing with a wisp?”

The wisp flew closer to humans and began buzzing in a threatening fashion. The labourers backed off a step or two, afraid of the Illusion and other nasty mind spells.

“Well, I guess you can’t understand him.” The King shrugged. “The forest belongs to the… to The Spirit of the Forest. Well, anyway. It’s not yours.”

“The Spirit of the Forest?” The magus rubbed his chin in thought. “Not the elves?”

“So you knew it belonged to someone and still…”

“The elves don’t have rights to this forest! The King Aurelius Does!” One of the labourers shouted out a simple fact.

“Ai!”, “That’s, right!”, “Mhm.” Everyone seemed to agree.

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The wisp buzzed even angrier and someone took it upon themselves to swat it away.

“Look, you have to stop cutting the forest or there will be…”

“King of Spiders…” The magus said it with weird inflexion, “Are you working for the Elves?”.

The King of Spiders remained silent for a moment as if looking for the right answer.

“I am an ally of the Elves, but before you can misunderstand, they don’t guard this forest anymore. Amm, this wisp does.” He pointed at the angry green orb of light. “And I am its ally.”

Everyone looked with eyes telling that they just couldn’t believe a single thing. That and clear animosity to monsters present.

The magus had a different kind of look, it was worry. “I see…” He said it plainly to hide his emotions. “And if we don’t stop cutting the forest?” The magus added.

“You better do? Look, it doesn’t belong to you.” The King looked at a buzzing wisp and added. “I will protect the trees, so stop?”

“I see… That is not for me to decide, King of Spiders, but we will retreat for now.”

The wisp was still making that awful noise and flying around dodging all the axes which tried to swat it away.

“I can’t ask that!” The King of Spiders frowned at the wisp. The wisp flew to him and was buzzing annoyingly right into his ear again.

“Fine, fine. It wants you to return all of the felled trees…” He frowned and added. “The ones you haven't turned to charcoal yet.”

“That we cannot do. But we will retreat.”

The green orb pulsed spewing green sparks right into the King’s face. Oh boy, it looked annoying. One fireball would be enough to deal with an annoying pest, but magus knew better.

“I understand, you can retreat.” The King seemed to be more reasonable than this angry wisp.

“I’ll get someone to negotiate with you, King of Spiders.” The magus even bowed to show respect.

The strange King did the same.

“What are you waiting for? We retreat to the camp!” The magus commanded.

“...but the monsters.”

“Now!” He slammed his staff into the ground.

And then a hundred or so axemen slowly walked towards the distant camp. Now and then they would give a glance back. Some had fear in their eyes, others disgust on their faces and some still didn’t believe what just have happened.

Eh? The wisps don’t talk! And monsters?! The forest never spawned such weird creatures, beasts yes but never monsters. This King of Spiders, what the hell is even that? Plus who would even believe a single word coming from a ‘man’ commanding monsters? If it's even a man at all… And most importantly It was odd how there was no elf resistance for a long while. Did this mean that the elves were dead? The monsters ate the elves and now… So and such was what the humans thought.

…

It could have gone better, but it also could have gone worse. If he had to say something he would say he did his best.

“Kill em! Kill em all!” The wisp pulsed in agitation.

Wow, was it murderous; he didn’t know the Ancestral Tree had so much animosity towards humans.

“I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

“They have to learn a lesson!”

“They have stopped ‘killing’ the trees. We are good for now, I think.”

The wisp calmed down a little. “But for how long? Never trust a human.”

“I am sure we can negotiate a deal with them.”

The wisp was done talking and simply flew back to the depths of the forest, leaving him and his spiders alone.

A seriously large spider walked out to the cut clearing. “King. What. Do. We. Do. Now.”

“We wait. They will send someone to negotiate. However, we need to show that we can back our words with strength.”

He said he will protect this forest and the current enemy must see it to believe it, this was just the way the world worked and he knew that.

“Let’s put a show of our might. Tell all of the warriors to come out of the forest. We will make camp here in the clearing.”

“Understood.”

“But…” He wasn’t an elf and he won’t do it the elf way. “Where is that wisp when I need it.”

…

He found the wisp happily pulsing at an impressively numerous group of squirrels, it was odd, but wisp did the things the wisps did… talking with forest animals or something. He had a short chat with it and surprisingly the wisp was very understanding. Actually even bigoted in some ways, it was interesting how much it was just like a human in some regards. Some serious mental gymnastics were going on: It was an honour for the tree to give its life to protect the forest or such. To cut a long story short it allowed him to cut some trees and make defences.

First, the worker spiders dug a ditch around the camp perimeter. Then they used the wood poles to make tall fences. The fence was surrounded by even taller poles from inside, and then they were connected with blue robes. Rope-made webs dangled from the poles and on those webs were the spiders looking at the distance like scouts from their towers. It would have made more sense if his spiders had ranged weapons, but he left them to it; He assumed they knew what they were doing. Of course, he used [Reinforce] on all of the structures and even was making some good Building exp. The spiders had even made a large dome in the middle for him to rest.

The job wasn’t done by just making a camp. Outside the ditch and further away from the camp he erected a small open tent. Inside he set a large table and even made some improvised chairs. This was the place where he planned to do the negotiations.

On the table, he set a large bowl of fruit, a jug of slug jelly, a snack plate with cuts of dried boar meat and dried mushrooms. Well, he could have used the food from the forest, but he wanted to display his own produce; to advertise it as his trade. Then he put the roll of blue cloth on it, it was thin and with a textured design of loops and swirls; the best his weavers could weave. He might be biased but to him it was as good as silk if not better. Next to it was a thicker, sturdier roll of cloth which was good for making sacks and other projects; a tent was a good example.

He even put some of the arrows and weapons he had crafted in his spare time. They probably weren’t as good as the metal ones the humans had, but maybe they will be interested.

Lastly, he put some other materials which could only be extracted at his farm, like obsidian eggshells and thorns. While he would prefer to sell crafted goods, he didn’t know what humans would like so he was open to selling the crafting materials instead.

All of this was done with the Trade Alliance in mind, or even just shaky peace with some trade. He had to show that trees weren't the only thing available on offer. He had to show that his goods were better than some logs humans could steal from the forest.

He was even willing to give some stuff for free if they stopped going after the forest. You know, free for a while. They will get used to his produce, learn of its charms, and then he would start charging for it. That was the plan.

He had met the humans in the early morning and now the sky was orange. However, to build a camp in one day was impressive. He too was finished here in the tent and left a small group of warriors to guard it. He commended everyone for their hard work and went to sleep in his improvised house.

He woke up in the morning with the first rays of light. He walked outside the camp walls while replying to the spiders with a wave of his own. Outside the walls and in the distance he could see the human camp, he looked at it with wide eyes full of surprise.

It too had grown in size, it was many times larger than his and made in such a short time (Did they do it during the night?). But the real surprise was because now it was overfilled with humans; easily two thousand of them. Warriors, rangers and knights to be precise. There were even some mounts resembling horses pastured outside; horses but not quite.

“So someone important had arrived to negotiate. Good!”