As soon as he realised what they were, he screamed. “Crawlers! They’re crawlers! Do not fight them! They get more aggressive the more you hurt them!” He turned to the young woman now wrapped up in the vines. “Princess, stop struggling! They will only tighten more!”

Usually, all of them talked over him whenever he tried to speak. But his voice was - for once - full enough of confidence that they listened. Mostly. Clara and Evan paused in their movements and the Princess stilled, clearly resisting the urge to squirm.

“What do we do?” Evan - quite surprisingly - turned to him. “Should I burn them?”

It seemed erecting a wall made entirely of tree roots tended to build some sort of confidence in you - at least when it came to plant related things. He just hoped he wouldn’t prove them wrong.

He shook his head. “No, the fire will spread and will only harm the Princess.” Both Princess Umrao and Clara were paying attention, though Clara had her eyes on the dancing and squirming vines. “Crawlers can regenerate easily, especially in damp environments like this. We can’t attack this thing on the outside. We need to find its core and attack that. Hopefully, it will back off.”

“It won’t die?” Clara asked.

He shook his head. “No. Crawlers don’t die without a huge fight. If we break out into that kind of fight right now, we might not be able to win. Not without both us and the crawlers damaging this side of the forest. And we might not be able to get to the flags on time.”

“Okay, so what next?”

He frowned. “Okay. I’m going to do something. Don’t panic.”

And that something was pulling out the sword he had on him every combat class and running straight for one of the vines dancing in the air looking for its next victim. Slicing through it was easy, the vertigo from another vine wrapping around his leg and lifting him into the air was not.

“Emilio!”

“What are you doing?!”

“Are you mad?!”

All of them spoke at once.

“Don’t worry! I’m fine!” Apart from him screaming those words to his companions, he remained perfectly still. The crawlers deemed the danger mitigated and seemed content to slowly wrap around his waist and one of his wrists. Not his throat, thankfully. Crawlers didn't get aggressive until they felt as if they were truly in danger of being eliminated.

“Don’t do anything, guys! I just need to find the core!”

Hopefully, the fact that he was tightly wrapped by the crawlers and isolated from almost everything else except the mindless insects underground and the occasional bird chirping overhead meant that he was less likely to be overwhelmed by the onslaught of sounds as soon as he opened up his mind. Oh, he had no doubt he would be overwhelmed. But hopefully, he would be able to put it off long enough for him to find the core.

“Just give me one moment!”

Emilio closed his eyes and opened his mind. Sal was not here to distract him. He had to immediately grit his teeth at the cacophony of sounds invading his mind. It simultaneously infuriated and amazed him how nature could be so ceaselessly full of chatter. He concentrated, gently probing his mind into one of the vines tangled around his wrist. The thing wasn’t sentient, not in the way the Banyan Tree back home or the Bidhipa in the Academy fields were. But it had sense and more stimuli than the average tree. Well, all magical trees had that.

It - because the barest bit of consciousness that controlled these vines was surely condensed in a single core using these vines as its limbs - was surprisingly docile at his probing. It did not try to strangle him then and there for one. Instead, it seemed to curiously open a pathway for him, as if wanting to see what it would do. Emilio sighed in relief at not having the fight the damn thing both physically and mentally. Feeling slightly guilty at planning to attack it when it opened up its own ‘mind’ to him - yet shrugging it off - he set about finding the core.

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It didn’t take him long. The energy running across the vine practically led to it. He didn’t open his eyes as he shouted.

“Clara, Evan, five steps ahead of you and then two steps to the left! Clara, use your earth magic to find the core. It should be easy! It is a ball of energy lodged beneath the surface, a few steps down! Close the earth in on it. Evan, blast your fire on the earth in short bursts. Make it intense but quick. Don’t try to kill it, just agitate it enough for it to think of us as nuisance rather than food or danger!”

Even before he opened his eyes, he could hear Clara and Evan move forward. He felt a bit gratified that the two were following his instructions without question. To tell the truth, this wasn’t the best way to deal with a crawler. The best way was to stay still and soothe it until it let you go on its own. But that took time. This was the most time-effective method. It was a risk, but a calculated one. Hopefully, it paid off.

He watched as the two found the core and Clare placed her hands the length of a foot apart on the ground. After a long moment, she looked up and nodded at Evan.

“Count to five between each burst!” He called out the last-minute instruction just as Evan’s hands lit up, sending a quick stream of controlled fire in between Clara’s hands and yet not even dispersing to lick at them. The amount of control Evan had on his element was beyond impressive.

The boy looked up at him, nodded and then looked back down. He was clearly counting. Soon enough his hands lit up again.

And again.

And again.

And again.

It was the fifth time that the crawlers finally began to squirm, tightening their hold on him, and from the gasp next to him, on Princess Umrao. One more blast. He could feel himself begin to sway in the air, the vines tightening irritably.

The crawlers had deemed them a nuisance. Good.

“Your Highness,” he called softly to the young woman held up by the vines beside him. “We will need your wind in a moment. Please be prepared.”

The Princess looked at him curiously and nodded, keeping her face otherwise blank. She probably wanted to see what he was upto. More than that, she was probably able to build the image of a somewhat reliable person in her eyes.

“A few more!” He shouted at his other teammates. “Lower the time in between!”

Evan nodded and sent a few more blasts of fire onto the ground. And then… vines burst out from around the two.

It seemed the crawlers’ core had had enough. Crawlers usually preferred to spread out, keeping enemies away from the core. The core could only sense magic, though. If they had just drudged through the mud, they would have been able to pass it safely. But the Princess’s mana being channelled into the ground must have at least brushed past it. Otherwise, it would not have reacted so violently. That was the only reason those two had been able to stand just above the core for more than a few seconds. After all, they had walked on their foot, and their mana was not directly touching the core. Just like it had been with him, the core was trying to see what they would do.

But now that curiosity had turned into annoyance. After all, it was doing something it hated doing, using the crawlers so close the core. The crawlers yanked the two friends up. Emilio knew it was time. He opened his mind and pressed his conscious into the vines again, desperately thinking of the direction of the flag, hoping it would be enough. It was a gamble, but the only one he could think of.

Emilio felt his stomach drop as he was flung through the air. He kept his eyes shut.

“Princess!” He screamed, praying that she was in hearing distance.

A moment later, he felt himself slowing down as the air cushioned his fall and he finally opened his eyes, sighing in relief when he saw empty ground instead of trees and branches. He tried to gently set his foot down on the ground but ended up stumbling, gasping for air and shoving down his nausea.

“Florian, you son of a bitch!” The rough growl of Evan came from his side.

He turned around to see Evan panting with his hands on his knees and Clara retching. The only one who seemed unperturbed was the Princess, who was looking at him with an unsettling glint in her eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he gasped. “This was the only way I could think of that could get us here fast and make sure the crawlers didn’t ensnare us again.

He turned around and grinned when he saw the black flag on a raised stone dias placed in the middle of the field that made up the end of the plateau.

“See? There’s the flag!”

He made to walk to it with the intention of taking.

Barely had he taken a step when he saw the shadows around the stone take shape.

Evan cursed loudly and Emilio sucked in a sharp breath.

“We’re fucked.”

Emilio agreed with him.

The Duke had his damned Shadow Hounds guarding the flag.