The ‘office’ was a small, three story building similar to the ones in the main square. The outside was covered white paint and black timber. No expenses had been spared on the details, every window was made from glass. The mayor had clearly done well for themselves recently. A small sign hung from a wooden post with ‘Mayor’s Residence’ painted on it, along with opening hours for the weekdays. The door was open. This ‘Miss Greene’ wasn’t worried about visitors in her abode.

“This looks like the place,” Ryan commented; there was a slight tremor in his voice. His right hand held the hilt of his katana tightly. The revelations about the insidious nature of the town had put him on edge. I didn’t blame him – I didn’t even know that I’d been screwed over until he and Stigma woke me back up.

“I don’t know what’s going to happen in there, but be careful.”

“I got your back, buddy.”

I wasn’t counting on it. I didn’t know Ryan well enough to trust him with my life.

I was the first to go in. I stepped up onto the stone porch and through the open doorway into a large, open plan room. There was a desk by the right wall, a table in the middle, and bookshelves everywhere else. What little spare space was available on the walls was used for paintings and images of various places and people.

The thing that caught my eye on second glance was the table in the middle. It was a long dining table – but it was clear that it was being used for a different purpose. It was a diorama. A painfully detailed one. I approached it and bent down to get a closer look. I recognized several of the locations depicted from a bird’s eye view. It was a plan for the neighbourhood.

“Is that… a driveway?”

Ryan moved past me to the opposite side to have his own look at the table, “What? A driveway?”

I pointed to one of the houses, which were all the same. They were all one floor, single family homes with what looked like a driveway and a garage. All of the roads were also very wide and well-paved. It looked just like a modern American suburban neighbourhood. The real town didn’t look like this though.

“You’re right, it’s just like the place where I grew up,” Ryan nodded, “But what does it mean?”

It seemed obvious to me, “Whoever made this model must be an outworlder.”

“You think it was the Mayor?”

“I don’t know. She might have just commissioned this from someone else.”

Ryan scratched the back of his head, “Don’t exactly need a driveway around here. I heard some people talking about engines being built and tested in a few colleges…”

“A prototype engine is a long way from building a car. Not to mention that the average person can’t afford one, not even if they bought a nice house like this.”

There was no sign of Greene. The desk had been vacated. I tried to shuffle through the documents, but anything of sensitive value had been removed. There were a few other objects, like a bottle of ink and a well-used quill. Despite the little touches, the impression of the living space I got was decidedly fake. This room was a finely crafted piece of theatre.

“Where’s the Mayor?” Ryan pondered. “Hello!” he shouted out up the stairs. There was no sound of movement in response. I nearly slapped him for making our presence known so blatantly.

“Keep it down. You never know who might be listening.”

“Come on man, you’re so paranoid! What’s the mayor going to do to us?”

“Run so we can’t get some answers out of her.” I ascended the stairs and checked every other room. There was nothing of interest in any of them. Another show-house. It wasn’t as ‘lived in’ as she wanted to portray.

As I swept the bedroom on the third floor, a sight through the window caught my interest. Down at the bottom of the long, grassy garden was a grove of trees and rocks. A piece of the landscape that hadn’t been demolished yet. At the foot of that trove was a small stone shack with a wooden door. If there was any place that she’d choose to hide a skeleton or two, that would be it.

I hurried back down the stairs and dragged Ryan with me, though the sight of the suspicious garden shed didn’t do any miracles for his anxiety. “Oh man, that’s a creepy ass hut!” he quivered, “This is some B-movie horror shit man.”

I removed the helmet from my belt and wrapped it around my head. It never hurts to be too cautious in times like these. The closer we got, the bigger the hut seemed to become. What fear had gripped my heart so? Did I expect to find something terrible inside? I drew Stigma and prepared for the worst. With my other hand, I took the ring handle and pulled.

The door released a long, forlorn whine as the rusted metal hinges worked.

“Ah… stairs?”

Indeed. There was a set of stairs, descending down into the bowels of the earth below. The walls were made from compacted mud and had wooden supports holding them up. A few lanterns had been placed by the entrance for visitors to illuminate the long tunnel. I brought my own. I poured some oil into the trusty tool and lit it.

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I turned to Ryan, “Ladies first?”

The joke didn’t land. I sighed to myself and started to walk down the stairs. I could hear the dripping of water coming from further down. The stairs were long and not even in construction. Just when I thought we were nearing the bottom, more of them emerged from the dark. Again, and again. I looked back past Ryan to the top, where a small glint of sunlight beckoned to a safer pasture through the still-open door.

Splash!

I shivered as cold water spilled into my boot. We’d reached the bottom but the floor was covered in water that had leaked through the soil. The darkness was all encompassing. I could not see the other end from where we stood.

“Seriously, what the hell is this?” Ryan asked again, “This is beyond just a murder basement man. There’s gonna’ be mole people down here!”

I shook my head, “Already killed one before.”

“For real?”

“Yeah, a genetically modified war mole. Broke my arm.”

“You’re pulling my leg dude.”

I smirked, “I say nothing but the truth.”

We followed the tunnel for two minutes. The waterlogged ground made it difficult to move at full speed, even so, it was a very, very long construction. It must have taken the people responsible a significant amount of time to build. I placed my left hand against the wall to brace myself, feeling the roots running through the compacted dirt.

I could see a disturbance in the darkness up ahead.

“You still there, Ryan?”

“Yeah. Right here.”

“I think that’s the exit.”

Something was waiting for us though – something that was brought into clear focus as the light of my lantern finally reached inside of the large, spherical chamber that lay at the end of the waterlogged path.

“…What the hell?”

Against the wall, covered in twisting branches and roots, was the form of a woman. She was restrained by them, held tight against it like a prisoner. But her body had been changed. Her skin was a deep, verdant green. Encroaching bark covered the sides of her face and covered parts of her body, where she was otherwise naked. She had no hair, just a crown of twisted wood.

“A dryad?” Her eyes snapped open. Ryan screamed right into my ear. I pushed him back and scowled, “Stop shouting!”

“Intruders…” she croaked, “Intruders in my home…”

After the shock of her odd appearance wore off, I noticed something else about the room. There were several unmoving bodies in the middle of the ditch, some of them had started to rot and decay. I knelt down by one of them and examined their injuries. It was a middle-aged man with a horrible red splotch on the front of his shirt – he’d been stabbed to death. The viciousness of the attack betrayed a sense of joy from having done so.

“Did you do this?”

The dryad shook her head, “Blood… blood drains into my roots… men and women slaughtered… an ailing flower blossoms…”

“Keep an eye on her Ryan.”

I investigated each body in turn. There was no rhyme or reason to the deceased I found. All ages and genders, and seemingly of different means and wealth too. They had all been killed in the same way. The wounds were deep and targeted areas where important arteries could be found. As I rummaged through one of their pockets, I brushed my fingers against a small wooden box. When I withdrew it, I noticed that it was gilded in gold metal.

This was an ornate piece of work. I undid the latch and peered inside, before I could properly comprehend the nature of the small dagger that resided within, Stigma yelled into my ear like an excitable child.

“A cursed item! This is it!”

“Really?”

I looked over the body again. This must have been the in-between contact that Adelbern met before he spoke with me. He had a rough complexion and old injuries that had healed over into scars. I closed the box again and slipped it into my pouch for later. That solved one of my problems, though Adel wouldn’t be happy to hear that his man got slaughtered by a serial killer before he could give it away to the intended target. Knowing how the inquisition worked, he likely had no idea what was going on. Just another pawn in their game.

Was it connected to what was happening here? Or was it a freak accident?

“I smell death on you… boy… the blood of a demon… a demon most foul…”

Ryan was pointing his sword at the strange creature, “S-She likes to talk.”

“Who are you?” I asked, “What are you doing here?”

“I am a spectre of your fear… a waking nightmare…”

“Without the poetry please.”

“A weeping bud… grown with calloused hands… bloodied hands… I was nothing…”

Deciphering her speech, I reached a simple conclusion. Whoever had killed these people had done so intentionally, and somehow their blood was causing this dryad-like creature to grow. “Those plants in the town, they’re yours?”

“She offered me life… in exchange for my power. Refusal… impossible…”

“She’s not attacking us,” Ryan said, “Can she even attack us?”

“I grow… I move… as a tree does…”

“I don’t think she can,” I noted, “What do your plants do? Why was I being controlled by them?”

“My gift… is freedom from fear and suffering… to live a life without worry…”

Well, isn’t that just lovely. Digging up some repressed, traumatic memories to keep me stuck in my ways. Too bad that the real world was outside, scratching at the door. Someone would notice what was happening here eventually. That carefully constructed fantasy would come crashing down one way or another.

I had only one demand, “I want Cali and Tahar back.”

Her face was sullen, “It will fade… given time…”

“Who is the murderer who killed these people?”

“I know not… her name… just her will and deeds.”

Without her offering me answers, I saw no reason to prolong the meeting any longer.

The dryad was the one creating the hostile plants, the one brainwashing everyone. If she no longer lived – they would wither away and die. I drew Stigma and approached her main body, stepping over roots and bones as I went. There was no fear in her eyes. She did not understand concepts like death or justice. Like a plant she was. She existed for the sake of existing. Cultivated and cared for by a human hand.

I felt no sympathy as I plunged Stigma’s blade deep into her ‘chest,’ she wailed out in pain.

“H-Hey, wait up, you’re killing her?!”

I whispered under my breath, “Consume.”

Stigma glowed and started to succour from the plant’s life force. The roots around us began to wither and die before our eyes. Her body slowly rotted and deteriorated into nothing but a black mush – compost. I pulled back. There was no blood on the blade.

“Problem solved,” I declared, “No more brainwashing.”

“But what about the person who killed these folks?”

“We’re gonna’ find them and haul them off to the nearest guard post.”

Ryan was disquieted by my straightforward approach. “If you say so man…” I pushed past him and started the walk back to the entrance. With one last look at the deceased, he fell in line and followed.