Rooftops of the Common District
"Well? What will it be, Twiggy?" Dreroot playfully held a hand to his ear as he asked for Lu's answer to his last question.
"Mmh!" At the moment, all Lu could do was wiggle around as his whole body was tightly wrapped up by his brother's sickly-looking tree branches. "Ugh!" With the maws on some of them licking and nibbling at his skin.
"Huh? That's weird?" Dreroot muttered after some of his maws got a taste of Lu's blood and stopped them from chewing on Lu. "Your blood? It tastes the same as back then...before you met that Fairy Princess?" He trailed off as his blood-red eyes sharpened and looked into Lu's lime-green orbs to find something. "Are you really not a Dark Elf anymore?"
Lu stopped all of his movement as Dreroot drew near with some of the Dark Elf's branches starting to let up a bit. "NOW!" Giving him all the room, he needed to backflip away from Dreroot and swing his knee under his brother's chin.
"Gah!" And sent Dreroot staggering back with his branches stopping him from falling off the rooftop. "Heh! Let my guard dow-Huh!?" He was smirking at first when he was coming back up only to find Lu dashing at him. "What's he up to?" He shot his branches at the Elf.
"Araaah!" Lu went faster having the branches missing him by an inch as they either dug into the roof or clashed with eachother. "RAAAAH!" Then rammed his body into Dreroot's chest trying to tackle him down. "Ngh! Dammit!" But his older brother didn't move at all.
"Hah! Sorry, Twiggy, I got deep roots!" Dreroot had some of his branches still supporting him after Lu kneed him and was smirking down at his brother with his arms around his waist. "But it's nice to get a hug after so long! Now here's a pat on the head!" He clasped his hands together and brought them down on Lu's head. "ARRRRGAAAHH!!" Or so he thought if it wasn't for the ungodly amount of pain that was screaming from his back. "YOU BASTARD!" In a blind fit of pain and rage, he kicked Lu away the next second. "Ngh!" Then quickly checked his back to find some of his branches dug out of the open wounds on his back that bled in a mixture of red blood and green sap.
"Heh, still keeping your dagger under your cape like you taught me!" Lu held a dagger in each hand, one was his own while the other was Dreroot's and both were dripping with that same mix of blood and sap. "Too bad for me you didn't put poison yours, eh?"
"Lutwig! This is not funny anymore..." Dreroot spat out as a fire was lit in his eyes, slowly wrapping part of his slashed branches with other ones while the rest of them started to grow in size, matching that of fully grown trees. "...But I should have been careful. You of all people know all about my powers...and weaknesses."
Now the sickly trees of Dreroot had taken on nightmarish forms as they gained scales, teeth, eyes, fur, arms, legs, faces, and feathers. It was as if all the countless lives that were ripped apart and eaten by Dreroot's trees had come to the surface as rotting 'fruit.' "Some Death Wood, huh?" Its master muttered, picking a bleeding finger off of it. "I remember the taste of them at the moment of desperation...so please try not to die, Lutwig..." In a burst of sloshing meat and crackling wood, the Death Wood went after Lu looking to add him to its 'fruit.'
DREE-!" Were Lu's last words as the mass of bark and flesh surrounded not only him but Dreroot as well and left behind a large riving ball of rotting wood.
"Is it over?" Looking up from down below was Dewran after seeing Dreroot's last attack. "I can not tell what's going on inside there..." He thought, turning to the Dark Elves watching along with him and Voltar. "...heh, your best option would be killing him right now, you fool."
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Blake's smithy
"I can't do it!" Rena whined, sitting on the branch of a mango tree that was flanked by a pear tree and an evergreen. "Why does it look like that!" She threw her arms at a miss-match of trees all fused together like some kid's drawing of what all the trees of the world would look like if they all grew from the same spot and twisted around eachother.
"Huh? Not sure? Maybe you tried too hard." Blake answered, eating some fruits and nuts from all the trees Rena kept making along with Bread and Saffire.
"Shut you! This was your idea!" Rena flew right into Blake's face. "Uhmp!" And got a cherry jammed in her mouth that replaced her yelling with the sweet hums of joy. "~MMM~ I'm so good at this!" She forgot all about why she rushed up to Blake and took a break on his head.
"Sure, you are...don't get any of that stuck in my hair. It might be red, but that's a bit much." Blake warned the Fairy Princess as he went over to her 'tree' if it could be called that. "Why'd you make it out of other trees?"
"Cause I wanted it to be the biggest, bestest, and strongest tree ever!" Rena cheered while dynamically standing on Blake's head with her arms crossed and a cherry stem in her mouth. "And tastest too!" She pointed at the weirdly shaped fruit growing on one of its branches that fell to the floor like a stone and then cracked open to release this putrid stench into the smithy. "Uhm..." To which Rena started sweating endlessly.
"Greatest tree of all time, huh?" Saffire muttered, eying the sorry excuse for a tree then blew some smoke on its fallen 'fruit' masking its stench with the all too welcoming smell of smoke. "I'd rather burn that thing to the ground, but you'd throw another fit, gnat,"
All the Fairy Princess could do was drop down on Blake's head and held her legs to her chest while staring at yet another failure in helping Lu. "Hmm?" Then felt a finger tapping on her head that belonged to Blake offering to carry her. "What?" She grumbled after getting in the smith's hand and was brought to his face.
"Want some advice?" Blake offered, weaving through some of the trees and plants Rena had grown inside his smithy and came to the finished suit of armor he and Bread were working on. "Alright, see this?" He kept on talking even though all Rena was doing was staring off at space. "The kid and I did a pretty good job with this, and just like you, we tried our hardest to make something perfect, and it came out great maybe not perfect but usable unlike that..." He turned back to the 'supertree' which was starting to break down. "And the reason's pretty simple...Bread!"
"Huh?" Who was playing around with a giant Venus flytrap by flicking seeds and nuts into it to see if it would bite. "Oh? Uh, 'Stop worrying about making the best thing ever and think about the person who's gonna need it later' right?" He answered, turning to Blake, hoping he was right.
"I am kind of surprised that you remembered...good job, kid?" Blake was left shocked by Bread's answer and watched his student's face twist around after his master thought he wasn't learning anything. "I guess you can take a day off after this?"
"Kind of been doing that already." Bread shrugged going back to feeding the fly trap.
"Alright! Make sure you don't feed it anything I need!" Blake yelled at him before looking at Rena deep in thought after hearing Bread's words. "So? That's all you got to do...now try again with that Elf boy in your head...unless you do that all the time." He joked, watching her thinking in his hand.
"I got it!" Until Rena shot up, cracked her fingers and neck then went over to the failed attempt. "You suck! DIE!" She yelled at the thing, and it wilted on the spot, turning into dust under her voice. "Alright..." After that, she took a deep breath and closed her eyes as she exhaled.
"Be like Lutwig Of Naworth, oh young tree of my making..." Rena started softly chanting as she sprinkled some of her Fairy Dust on the remains of her last attempt. "...be warm...be kind...be mine..." She continued her chant while slowly waving her arms around the small mound of dust where the tiniest sign of life was starting to grow as a snow-white sapling appeared out of it with light golden leaves shaped like hearts.
"Look, look!" Bread whispered, coming around to Blake as they along with Saffire watched Rena magically performing a ritual of sorts; fluttering around her growing sapling as it glowed every time she waved some of her dust on it.
"Oh young tree of my making, be like my beloved Spriggan Lutwig...be strong...be beautiful...be mine to hold..." Rena was now being encircled by the growing white branches of her tree, and as she asked, they were strong, and beautiful and reached out to her as she reached out to it. "...but not for my wants...or my needs...or your duty onto me...but that you are simply with me..."
Rena slowly came to rest on the tree as glowing green lines appeared from its roots and went up to its branches almost as if it was engraved with mystical runes. "...So if anything else...become the one thing...I would only give to him..." She took one last breath as she pressed a hand to her chest. "...become my heart." With the last of Rena's words, some of her trees' branches entwined around her, forming a birdcage.
"Uh, Rena?" Blake walked up to the tree when nothing happened after a while. "You okay in there?" He reached a hand to the birdcage.
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As Blake was about to do that the tree's branches all snapped open wide like a flower in bloom with glowing Fairy Dust filling Blake's smithy until it covered Blake, Bread, Saffire's head, and pretty much everything else with small plants starting to grow.
"DONE!" Rena herself was perfectly fine as she was dancing around her newly made tree with its branches following her around like her perfect partner. "Hehe!" Twirling and guiding the giggling Fairy Princess around in the air. "Oh?" Until she came to a stop right in front of Blake's held out a hand currently green with grass. "Thanks, Blake! Now could you help me make that bow?" She asked after shaking Blake's hand and turned back to her tree to admire it. "Damn, I am good!" She pumped a fist all too satisfied with herself. "OW!" Only to get smacked out of the air by Blake's green fist. "What was that for!?" She yelled up at Blake after being caught by her tree.
"This..." Blake, Bread, and Saffire all answered in groans, starting to bear fruit until Saffire lit herself on fire and breathed some embers on Blake and Bread that charred what was on them. "Thanks!" The two smiths gave her a thumbs up now covered in soot which they were more okay with.
"Hehe, sorry! I got a little excited cause of this guy!" Rena rubbed the back of her head as she petted one of the branches of her tree. "Hehe! Stop it!" But had to fly away from it when it started to pet her back uncontrollably.
"So, is this one good?" Blake muttered while wiping some soot off his face. "Thanks?" And got some help from Rena's tree.
"Yep! It's perfect! I can tell! It's better than that dumb Naworth's Pride!" Rena gave Blake a thumbs up along with some of her tree's branches doing the same. "Stop it!" She waved a hand at it which it copied back at her. "Hehe!"
"So, what's the name?" Bread asked, coming up to the tree as its branches moved around him to poke and grab at him. "This thing is wei-ow!" At his words, the tree poked him with a thorn it grew instantly. "It stabbed me!"
"That's because you hurt its feelings!" Rena yelled at him and came over to rub a hand to her tree. "Let's see a name...a name...a name...hmm?" She tried thinking something up but had steam pouring out of her head instead. "Ugh! Lu's better at this than me..." She grumbled with puffed-out cheeks.
"You said something about it becoming your heart, so how about that?" Saffire pointed out, inching her head away from Rena's tree's grabbing branches. "And tell it to back off, or it's back to square one for you."
"My heart...? Heart. Heart? Heart!" Rena repeated the word a few times until it finally came to her. "Got it! Heart Of Renaissance!" She declared, dramatically pointing at her tree, which glowed with a magical light after being named. "It likes it!"
"Alright! Time to chop it down then..." Blake muttered, looking around for an axe to get started maybe he'd go get Gram to make it special. "Huh?" Until his arms and legs got tied up by the Heart Of Renaissance's branches. "Uh, problem, tree?" He turned it as it was slowly starting to grow thorns that went up the branches holding him down. "Rena, tell your tree to stop, or I'm gonna let Saffire torch it."
Rena stared at Blake then at Saffire looking about ready to burn something. "Let him go Hor..." She ordered, and the tree obeyed.
"Hor?" Blake, Bread, and Saffire all stared at Rena, and her tree bit confused.
"What? You think I'm gonna say that name every time I'm talking about it?" Rena asked, pointing at the Heart Of Renaissance currently waving its branches at her. "Hmm?" Then stopped the moment she turned around to it. "And you don't need to chop it down. I'm smarter than that, hammer boy." The Fairy Princess put on a cheeky smile as she winked at Blake.
"Okay? Explain?" Blake was out of the loop on whatever Rena did to her tree that got around needing to chop it down. "Huh?" But before he got his answer the door to his smithy opened with Vasha coming through. "Hey, Vasha, what's up?"
The Goblin looked around her boss's smithy and found a Dragon's head sticking out of a cave: normal, Blake and Bread covered in some soot: normal, Rena floating around a plant: normal, a branch of random trees that weren't there this mourning along with the place covered in every kind of plant she could think of: not normal. "I'm going back to the front desk to look this over, and I'll be back in an hour...fix this." She finally spoke up while waving some papers at Blake
"You know, I'm your boss, right?" Blake muttered up at her as he was being felt up by the Hor. "I can explain that..."
"No. Don't. Just fix it." Was all Vasha said as she closed the door behind her.
"We're gonna have so much work later..." Blake patted Bread's back a few times as the boy nodded along with him. "...but first, how are we getting a bow out of that thing?" He pointed at the Hor.
"Get some paper and a pen!" Rena cheered, fluttering over to a worktable, and waited for Blake to come over.
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Lu inside Dreroot's Death wood
"You're lasting a lot longer than last time, Twiggy," Dreroot was sitting like a king on a throne made of his twisted plants.
"Ngh!" While Lu was fused with a wall of decay as all of its bits and pieces were digging into him.
"If you don't do anything, you'll die..." Dreroot warned, holding a hand out as his Death Woods made a ripe apple for him. "...you might look alright from the outside but on the inside..." He crushed the apple revealing a vile mixture of blood and bile. "...you're as good as fertilizer."
"Ngggh!" Lu struggled against the Death Wood feeding off him. "Aguh!" Only to get a bear paw slammed into his gut and coughed up blood right into the waiting maws on the wooden floor under him.
"Still the same as always, Twiggy, getting pushed around by everyone and everything..." Dreroot muttered, playing around with the featherless corpse of a bird with one of his branches stabbed into its head to make it move around in unnatural ways. "...you just need a little backbone is all." His voice came out of the beak of his bird and then sent it flying at Lu's face.
"AAAH!" Which was when Lu got one of his arms free, still holding a dagger that he used to slash at the bird, and covered himself in green sap. "And you're still a creep that plays alone!" He shot back at his brother, trying to get his other arm free. "Shit!" But a mass of rotting limbs held his arm back down.
"That's only caused my baby brother left his family to go off and keep our home from dying..." Dreroot stood up from his throne and was moved along the ground by some roots until he came up to Lu's face. "Good job! On that Spriggan!" Right after that, he gave Lu a backhand.
"Ugh!" The moment the Lu's head hit the wall holding him up, it pushed him back. "Argh!" Right into a quick jab from Dreroot. "How is any of this a rite?" The Elf spat blood in his brother's face and started to feel his mind drifting in and out.
"Would you rather I cut you open and let some bugs lay their eggs inside you then see what happens? Or how about a tree? Or would you like to go a few days without food until you eat your own friends!?" Dreroot answered in a mocking tone, listing off the other ways this rite could have gone. "Just give up, and we're done here!" He drove a fist into Lu's gut, raining more blood down on his roots. "That's right keep feeding me more...I'm gonna get every last bit of that bitch's 'blessing' out of you and see what's left, Twiggy."
Lu whispered something weakly as a trail of blood streaming off his face.
"Huh? What was that?" Dreroot brought his head close to Lu's with a wooden hand coming to his ear to get a better listen. "Come on, speak up?"
"She's not a bitch!" Lu yelled in Dreroot's ear. "Ngh!" And if it weren't for a scaly claw holding his head back, he would've bitten it off.
"Oh? That's new? You've never really gotten mad at anything! You usually just act all the cool and calm!" Dreroot smirked at the reaction he got out of Lu. "What's not bitchy about her, Twiggy? From what I hear she's a complete princess that likes to get her way with everything! Which makes you just right for her, eh? The princess' dog that follows her around on a short rope." He kept his insults going to eat up the look in Lu's bloodshot eyes almost as if they were the same red as his. "What's this?"
"Shut up!" Lu yelled at Dreroot, thrashing about as wildly as he could despite more branches and arms holding him down. "She is Princess Renaissance of Naworth! Nature's Princess! And next line to be the Fairy Que-guah!" He was silenced by Dreroot, grabbing his head and headbutting him.
"Where are you in all that!" The Dark Elf screamed in his brother's face with their foreheads still rubbing against eachother. "Princess of Naworth? That place felt like a prison for years! Nature's Princess?! I can feel that bitch's ass dust all over you, and it makes my trees shiver to my spine! Next Queen Of the Fairies? That's fucking funny cause from the way Dewran's been showing her off it feels more like she's a brain-dead stump than anything else! Kahahaha!" Dreroot laughed up into his Death Wood as it let out the same laugh back at Lu. "Now Twiggy, I know you spent nearly 2 decades with that gnat so you can tell me what's she's really like? Unless everything I said was true! Come on! I'm right, aren't I!?"
"You're wrong..." Lu whispered as Dreroot's woods repeated everything it said back down on him.
"I'm not! You're just letting that little duty of yours get to your head! It owns you!" Dreroot shot back, forcing Lu to look into his eyes. "Isn't that right? You're only saying I'm wrong cause that's what you have to do! Not what you want to!"
"You're wrong..." Once again, Lu denied Dreroot's words.
"Hah! What if she picked someone else? Would you still say that? Eh, Spriggan!?" Dreroot questioned as Lu was being pulled more into his Death Wood with Lu's strength nearly spent from being inside of it for so long. "Come on, Lutwig! If you don't break out now, you'll end up dead."
"Stop it!" Lu begged with tears coming to his eyes and tried to move something! Anything! That could get him away from Dreroot's words. "Stop it!" But a pair of skulls came to whisper into his ears made it all the worst.
"Make me..." Dreroot and his Death Wood demanded as branches were covering Lu's face. "...or sit there for that little Fairy to come to your sorry ass..." He watched his Death Wood take Lu into its mass of twitching limbs made of flesh and wood. "Guess you lose, Twiggy, back to Naworth you go along with that little Fairy...can't wait to laugh in her face when I tell her dear Spriggan couldn't do a damn thing."
Dreroot eyed the spot where Lu once was and waited for anything to happen. "You really are holding out long aren't you, Twiggy?" He muttered, scratching the back of his neck after sensing that Lu was still conscious in there...and scratched...and scratched...and scratched. "The fuck!?" He brought his hand to face to see if anything was crawling on his neck, but all he found were flakes of his own skin and blood. "Huh?" The next thing that happened was the sound of crackling wood as the wall Lu was in was breaking apart.
To be continued