Before Alex and Claire could think about scaling the mountain, they had to actually get to it. Between them and their best guess at freedom was a forest of trees stuffed chock-full of human faces.
The two of them peered out of the doorway of their temporary shelter and studied the pathways of roots spanning the chasm over to the forest. Luckily, there didn’t seem to be any monsters in the immediate area.
“How are you with balance?” Claire asked. “Those roots are big, but they aren’t huge.”
“The less you talk about it, the less I think I’ll worry about it,” Alex replied. “Some things are best done without thinking. This is one of them. It’s not like we don’t walk in straight lines all the time. It’s just that now we’re going tohave to.”
“The roots aren’t straight.”
“My point remains the same,” Alex grumbled. “I say we just sprint. Sneaking isn’t going to do us any good when we’re in the middle of the open, and the sooner we can get across the better.”
Claire nodded. “Yeah. I’m with that. Just be ready for there to be a whole bunch of ugly little shits waiting around on the far side. That forest is way too creepy to be empty.”
“Who knows. Maybe they’ll be just as creeped out as we are,” Alex said with a smirk. “Come on. The coast is clear right now.”
They stepped out of the house and took a second to scan the sky to confirm it was clear before making for the chasm. Adrenaline started to pump through Alex’s veins. At this point, he was surprised his body had any left to make.
“You realize there’s a good chance the forest is alive and will try to kill us, right?” Claire asked.
“There are faces in the trees. If it doesn’t, I’m going to be disappointed. That means we just have to be faster than the forest. We can see the whole base of the mountain, and the forest surrounds the entire thing. There’s no other way up there. If I’m going to die, I’m going to do it doing something, not just sitting around. Besides, maybe we’ll get lucky and the faces will just be decorative.”
Neither of them believed that, but there was nothing to be done. They couldn’t just stick around and wait until Alex died of dehydration. With him gone, it wasn’t like Claire would last much longer on her own.
Alex broke into a jog, then a sprint. Glint ran in front of him. Alex wasn’t so sure running across the wood would actually be safer than walking it, but the less time he spent suspended with nowhere to dodge, the better.
His foot landed on the trunk of the tree and he was off. Fortunately, it had good purchase and the branch was still as wide as two people laying side by side. There was enough room for him to run relatively normally — and that was what he did.
If the trees really were aware, he needed to get to land before they started moving their roots around.
I just hope it doesn’t wake the whole forest up. If it does, we’re going to be sprinting for quite —
The roots shuddered. Alex’s footing slipped.
“Glint! Arm!”
The monster spun, digging one claw into the wood to increase the speed of his turn as he stuck his hand out to ward Alex. He grabbed onto the monster’s grey flesh and Glint yanked him up, tossing him onto the branch.
It continued to tremble beneath Alex, but he didn’t wait around to see what else would happen. He lurched to his feet and scrambled the rest of the way across the gap before diving onto the ground.
Claire was just a few steps behind him and Glint. She pulled him to his feet, panic in her eyes as loud creaks echoed out from the forest around them.
“The trees!” Claire hissed. “They’re—”
Alex grabbed her by the arm and took off. “Stop wasting time talking and run! Are you really surprised? We already covered this!”
She didn’t bother wasting words on a response. Their feet slammed into the packed dirt as the trees cracked and groaned. The faces in the bark worked and blinked, low moans picking up like howling wind.
Roots twisted through the ground in their path and rose up before them. Alex ducked and weaved past them, not letting himself slow for long enough to take a proper look at what the forest had to offer.
The faces went from moans to howls, and it quickly became quite apparent why there weren’t any other monsters there. They’d been correct. The forest was the monster. There wasn’t even any form of identification to reveal what kind of monster it was, but Alex didn’t care.
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A root whistled past his head and he dropped to the ground, skidding a foot on his knees before launching back to his feet and breaking back into a sprint.
“Cut anything in front of us!” Alex yelled. Glint accelerated, bounding past Alex despite his shorter legs, and tore into a root as it lifted to bind the monster’s legs.
Unfortunately, the small monster wasn’t anywhere near enough to actually take on the entire forest on his own. There were hundreds of trees in their path, and every single one of them seemed to have woken up at the same time.
Roots reached for Alex and Claire from every direction. Their only saving grace was that their enemies, no matter how numerous, were still trees. The roots moved slowly and the trees weren’t close enough to each other to completely wall off his path.
With Glint tearing up the path before them, it was manageable. Alex bounded over an extending root and twisted out of the way of a brittle, leafless branch that reached for his neck. His breath came out in short bursts as he pressed himself, moving as fast as his body would allow him to.
Trees whipped by. Blood pumped, more adrenaline than oxygen, and the edge of the forest drew closer with every step. Alex pushed himself even harder, unable to keep a grin from starting to form on his lips.
There was no doubt in his mind that if even a single tree managed to trip him up, he was dead. The roots would have him bound completely in seconds. But, despite that, racing through the forest was fun.
Alex let out an involuntary cackle. He dove forward, clearing a branch and hitting the ground in a roll. Roots rose in his path and he launched himself forward in a slide. He slipped just beneath them and Glint carved the path ahead open as he leapt back to his feet.
Claire’s footsteps marked her presence behind Alex as he broke back into a run. The edge of the forest drew closer and closer — and then he was upon it. The trees gave one last desperate attempt to hold him back, but Glint carved a path through them.
He launched himself through the thin hole and landed on the other side of the forest, rolling across barren dirt and scrambling until he was at the base of the mountain. Alex turned back as Claire skidded to a stop beside him. The forest continued to creak and in moan in fury — but the trees didn’t seem like they could actually rip themselves free of the ground. They slowly fell silent and the forest returned to its former state.
“Goddamn,” Alex breathed, as flopping back on the dirt and pressing a hand to his hammering chest. “What a rush.”
Claire dropped down beside him with a disbelieving huff. “That’s not the word I’d use, but it sure did get my heart beating.”
A grin pulled across Alex’s face. “I almost want to do that again.”
“You’re insane,” Claire said, but she couldn’t keep a small laugh from slipping out from her lips.
Alex took a moment to catch his breath before he rolled over and pushed himself to his feet. Glint stood beside them, waiting mutely for more orders.
I wonder if I could have him just go kill some of those trees. Would that count as challenge? There are a whole lot of them… but given how they were acting, would killing a single tree even count? It seemed more like a hive mind.
If that’s the case, I’d probably have to kill all of them to get the reward. No point getting Glint killed here and wasting a ton of time waiting for him to come back when there’s more than enough challenge still waiting for us. I’ll eat my socks if this mountain is any less riddled with monsters than the rest of the Mirrorlands.
Alex brushed the dirt off his clothes and blew out a breath to steady himself as he squinted up at the mountain before them. The storm crackled in the distance. They were fortunate that the mountain wasn’t restrictively steep, but it still looked like it would be at least a day of climbing before they reached the top.
“Well, might as well get going,” Alex said, adjusting his ruffled shirt and blowing out a breath. “That mountain isn’t going to climb itself.”
“Why do I get the feeling you’re somehow already bored?” Claire asked.
“I haven’t the faintest idea.” Alex grinned. “You aren’t telling me you want to sit around here longer, are you?”
Claire started to shake her head, but they both froze as a loud crack split the air. Alex spun back to the forest as a branchy hand wrapped around a trunk and pushed, causing the wood to creak and groan until it let out a crunch and ripped in two.
A crouched, wooden humanoid stepped out from the forest. It straightened, gnarled body unfurling to easily eight or nine feet tall. It had long, spindly fingers and jagged growths protruding from all over its chest. The monster had no eyes and its mouth was nothing but a rough hole in the center of its face full of jagged spines.
Ent Harvester (Novice 4)
A low moan escaped the monster’s mouth hole and it started stumbling in their direction. Claire let out a curse and lowered into a fighting stance.
“I knew that was too easy. Shit. Get ready.”
“Hold on,” Alex said, squinting at the monster as it lumbered closer. It was a relatively high level, but it wasn’t all that fast — which was made apparent by the fact that it had only shown up after they’d gotten out of the forest.
“What? Do you want to run?”
“Run? Hell no.” Alex kept his eyes on the monster. “Glint, get closer to that thing, but focus avoiding getting hit.”
Glint scampered to follow his commands. As soon as the Shardwalker grew near the Ent, the tall monster swung a spindly arm. Glint hopped back, easily avoiding the strike. The wooden fingers raked through the ground and cut through it like butter.
“It’s pretty slow, isn’t it?” Alex observed.
“Yeah. It does look like Glint is perfectly matched against a monster like this. Just have him finish it off. It’ll be easy energy for you.”
“That would be a waste, wouldn’t it? Back on my world, the apocalypse only just started — that means that every scrap of energy now is way more valuable than normal. Getting ahead early means you can stay ahead.”
“We’re not on your world,” Claire pointed out.
“No, but I plan to get back. I’m not going to plan for failure. That does nothing. I’m going for success, and this is a way to get some extra energy. If we’re faster than it is, then we have a huge advantage as long as we don’t get hit. That means we can try something.”
“Try what?” Claire’s eyes narrowed in suspicion.
A grin stretched across Alex’s lips. “Making the fight a little more interesting.”