12.

Santi crawled out of the tunnel, spitting mud and blood out of his mouth. The bright light of the sun caused tears to stream down his face. He couldn’t tell if the blood he was spitting out was his own or one of the damned squirrels. The creatures had infested the tunnels, more and more of them appearing the closer he got to the treasure.

He had been forced to race up and down the tunnels dodging the squirrel’s gnashing teeth and claws. At first he had killed the squirrels, but he had nothing to gain. They simply plugged the tunnels and what little experience he gained from them was wasted as he was level capped.

So he ran up and around them, simply using his superior stats to go by them when possible. When it wasn’t, he led the dumb brutes into intersections and then around them. Until it got to the point he couldn’t do that either.

Then he started cutting his way through them. Literally. Which was messy and inconvenient. Which had led him to being in the current state he was in. Covered in blood and viscera from head to toe. The loose soil clung to him and made him look like a mud monster as he finally got free.

The wind here was dull and muted more like a gentle spring breeze than the hurricane force winds he had been forced to walk through on the outer edge. It was calm and refreshing close to the trunk of the tree. Soothing.

Natural treasures always had an aura. Some were weak, some were strong, some were subtle, some blatant. This one was both strong and blatant. Santi looked over the tree, trying to find exactly what it was that was the treasure. If it was the entire tree the power would have leveled the city. It was likely a fruit or even a branch of the tree.

Standing to his full, if unimpressive height, Santi continued to observe the tree. The red brown bark, emerald boughs, and the thick scent of pine. It was like standing in a forest. The breeze here was gentle but by just looking a few feet he could see the flattened grass as the hurricane strength wind savaged the area.

He didn’t think the treasure was in the grass around his feet. There was nothing that stood out anyways. The tree had dozens of branches and wide pine cones that hung like bowling balls from the thick branches.

The thing that stood out were dancing wood chimes. They fluttered like streamers, dancing in the wind. Each time they struck each other a musical note played out. It took a moment to listen to it, to truly understand that the music interwove itself with the sounds of the wind.

Each of the six chimes were a foot long and bent and twisted with every gust. They were beautiful, ethereal and alien and yet, at the same time, natural. Santi had to rip his eyes off of them or risk being lost in the music they played.

“It’s a big ‘un,” Santi muttered. While localized, its power was immense. It should be plenty strong enough to push his affinity higher. Now he just needed to go and get the damn thing.

The branch they dangled from was thin and rather high up. He had never been much of a climber, but he could do it when needed. The bark was soft and his fingers were able to get a strong grip and he scaled the tree quickly. There were scratches and marks where the squirrels had run up and down the trunk. The squirrels had been decent enough in that regard.

It took a minute and twelve seconds for him to climb nearly forty feet. He grabbed the branch and levered himself up and to his feet, walking crouched down with a hand running across the rough bark to keep himself steady. The chimes were near the end of the branch and Santi stopped right before walking over them. It took a single swipe of his blade, transformed into an axe, to send the branch crashing to the ground. The soft wood of the tree offered almost no resistance.

The breeze stopped.

Overhead the wheeling birds cried out in rage and began to sail downwards. Wings tucked tight they flew like missiles, streaks of feathers as they came for the wind chimes. Santi cursed as he leapt off the tree’s severed branch. The morph blade spun into a razor tendril that he lashed the air with.

The long spool of razor wire snaked through the air and severed anything it touched. Wings, claws, beaks, nothing could slow the morph blade. In the half second it took him to hit the ground he had painted the sky crimson.

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Blood and viscera and feathers fell like rain as Santi landed in a crouch. All the feathers were red now as they fluttered free. Santi used Gust to send the tendril whipping wildly overhead, severing body parts right and left.

It took less than a minute before the swarm of birds had been cleared front he sky. They were scattered about the park in broken heaps. The feathers would be nice if they were cleaned up a bit. Some feather mattresses or maybe even fletching for arrows. Fresh meat too. He should have brought a few more people with him.

The chimes were still attached to the tree, but he could already feel the power of them leaking away. Without the proper tools to harvest a natural treasure you lost some of its power. The longer he left it the more of the power would leak away. It was just leaking out much faster than he had expected.

The limb was heavy, but he carried it with ease. Running to the bike he hopped on and started to ride as fast as he could without breaking the bike. Even then the bike groaned under the strain.

The streets whizzed by, Santi’s speed creating a breeze. The chimes started to sing again, the wind from his ride enough to stir them. Santi could feel the power loss slow as the chimes rang and wanted to roll his eyes. It was almost too predictable.

The ride didn’t take long before he started having to weave around the myriad of poorly constructed defenses they had erected. Most guards knew who was and simply ignored him as he rode past them. The few who wanted to make an issue of his passage were ignored and he was moving too fast for them to do anything about it.

It really was like being a god amongst mortals. His stats were so inflated with his title that nobody could equal him right now. In time the physical classers would level and have stats that could match him physically. He planned on being the strongest Mage in the world. That meant nobody would be matching his mental stats if he could help it.

It was with those advanced mental stats that he started planning out everything he needed to do. The ritual to evolve to Acolyte was easy enough. Nothing compared to the behemoth ritual that had turned him into a regressor. It would take him an hour or so to complete in optimal circumstances. These weren’t optimal circumstances though.

His new house reared in sight and Santi poured on the speed, not caring about warping the bike for the final push. The damn things were everywhere on the college campus and he could replace this one as easily as he had the last time.

Metal shrieked and his speeds reached that of a car as he fought the speed wobbles with only one hand. The other hand was gripping the end of the branch with white knuckled tension. He didn’t think dropping the stick would harm the chimes any more than cutting it free of the tree had, but why take the risk?

He bounded off the bike, letting it go flying into the garage door with a thunderous crash as he bounded up and through the door. Again. Literally. Wooden shards showered the entryway and even as he got to his feet and started to move there was a scream of startlement and fear from somewhere in the house.

“IT'S JUST ME!” Santi screamed as he headed toward the backyard and the tubs that had been placed outside. While he hadn’t expected to have to come running and start the ritual immediately, there were still plans to get it done quickly.

He leapt over a couch and through the fully loaded kitchen table and his friends and family were staring at him in amazement. Or fear. Maybe a bit of disgust. He was still coated in multiple layers of beast blood and mud. With some pieces of internal organs everywhere.

“TANK! I NEED YOU!” Santi yelled as he barreled outside and began to start stripping in the middle of the yard. Buckets of water were filled to the brim and he began to wash as fast as possible.

“SANTIAGO! Why are you naked?” Mom started at a scream and ended in a furious whisper. Santi had left nudity as a form of embarrassment a long time ago. Still, having his Mom glaring at him while he washed squirrel bits off of his…bits, wasn’t exactly normal.

“Mom, I need to be clean to do the ritual to advance. Can’t be contaminating my spell with monster pieces in it. So, please, let me do this. Just you and the others can wait inside if it makes you uncomfortable.”

Tank and Cameron came out of the door behind his mom. Cameron whistled appreciatively while Tank just rolled his eyes.

“Can you help me out? I need to be Clean Clean before I hop into the tub,” Santi pleaded.

“I thought you’d never ask,” Cam said with a wide smile. He reached down and into a bucket and pulled out a stiff, coarse, brush. The type one used to scrub thick built in grease and caked in dirt off of something.

“Tank?” Santi pleaded.

“You’re a little ripe Santi. The brush won’t hurt you. It’ll just be…uncomfortable.”