Eofe traveled as quickly as she dared, which was not nearly as quick as she would have liked. Away from the protection of a Warden, the Green was safe for no one, not even the Surag who bore the Mark of the Wild. The further she traveled from the Fal, the louder and more decadent the sounds of the wild became. Predators stalked this forest, many of whom would not think twice about devouring a solitary young Elf.
Level 20 was far too low to battle most of the beasts that roamed at night. But Eofe was a [Scout] and her class was made for stealth and perception rather than for the violence of combat. She scurried from shadow to shadow, avoiding places that were unnaturally dark or shifted in her sight. She stepped around burrows filled with unspeakable things, avoided the twisting roots and grasping vines, and when the forest trembled, she buried herself under the detritus to escape notice of the tyrants of the Green.
The colors of the Wildwood grew more vibrant deeper into the wild, a sure sign of the impending Bloom. Eofe could feel it in her heart, the seed of something beginning to blossom, even though the bimillennial event was still years away. It was as if the entirety of the Green was holding its breath for some great exhalation.
The forest was just beginning to lighten with the first rays of dawn before Eofe finally slowed down. She had consumed half her rations of dried foods in a single-minded rush to put as much distance between herself and the Fal as she could, refilling her waterskin each time she came across a clear pond or spring. It wasn’t until she tripped over a writhing root that looped around her ankle, forcing her to hack it off and scurry out of sight, that Eofe realized she would need to rest before she got herself killed.
She found a spot where the canopy was thick and the forest would remain dark despite the burgeoning daylight. She carefully checked under a giant root that arched over the forest floor to ensure nothing treacherous was hiding within before she unrolled a sad stretch of bedding and laid down for a rest.
The early excitement of the journey gradually waned, replaced with the cold reality of her desperation. Eofe tried not to cry, but she failed at that just as she worried she would fail at whatever else was to come.
It wasn’t fair.
It wasn’t fair that she had to leave.
It wasn’t fair that she had to go alone.
But she was one of the Surag, born into the Greenwarden’s domain, the [Goddess of the Wild]. There was no space in the wild for mercy or pity. The Surag had been taught this from the first days they settled into the Green and learned that just because the Goddess had granted them leave to inhabit her lands did not mean she would award them her protection.
Eofe ignored her own tears and waited for sleep to take her. When it finally did, she slept briefly and restlessly, waking only a few hours later to the midday light peering down through the trees above. She gathered up her things and continued her journey in silence.
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Eofe settled into a routine as she traveled for the next three days. She scavenged for food as she hiked, picking berries and digging up tubers that she recognized, while ignoring anything she did not. She crafted snares for small game at night and more often than not woke to find a squirming creature to add to her breakfast. She slept better with each passing night even as she worried over how much time she had before Fal Tiren was rallied to drag her back home.
It was on the third day that Eofe encountered something new. While she may have lived in the Green her entire life, she had only experienced a small part of the Wildwood, which was itself a fraction of the Green. And with the Bloom approaching, even the familiar life of the forest would begin to change.
Her first instinct on seeing the unknown was to duck and hide, the most valid and natural response when encountering the unknown in the Green and the first thing taught to Surag children. Ahead of her, a dense white fog had settled on the ground, rising to the height of her chest. A sickly-sweet scent assaulted Eofe’s nostrils as she drew closer and she tasted something like honey in the air.
She did not even dare entertain the thought of entering the fog. The enticing smell and taste were enough to convince her it was a trap. She turned south instead to skirt the edge of the mist. If she had been a little cleverer, she might have guessed that just because something created the fog did not necessarily mean that the thing was inside the fog. As it was, she was so intent on watching the fog for danger that she only just heard the rustling and felt the displaced air before the attack came. She threw herself to side the so the attack grazed her cloak instead of flesh, then she tumbled to her feet and turned to face a creature that was unmistakably and unfortunately new.
It looked as if a pitcher plant had grown as large as a person before sprouting ten vines out of its base, each serrated with inch-long thorns. It opened a gaping maw that Eofe feared was large enough to swallow her whole. The plant was rooted to the side of a tree twenty yards from where Eofe stood, at a height just over her head. She realized it was one of those vine limbs that had just missed her as she watched them trail down from the plant and writhe across the forest floor.
Eofe’s first thought was to flee—there was no sense in unnecessary fights in the wild—but as she looked around, she noticed that some of the vines were long enough to enclose an area around the base of the tree to which the creature was latched. She was caged in and she had no idea if the creature could detach itself from the tree and follow her. Even worse, a heavy white mist started to pour out of its open mouth, pooling on the forest floor. How long would it take before the mist reached her nose and mouth? Would it affect her even if it just touched her skin?
Eofe spent a small amount of mana to cast her [Assess] skill to evaluate the creature. The skill placed the creature at level 28, which meant it was certainly a winnable fight even being eight levels above her own. The skill could only estimate what a creature’s level would be, since ordinary monsters and animals had none. However, it did not account for strategy or favorable matchups. Plant-based monsters were rarely intelligent, acting primarily on sense and instinct, so Eofe favored her odds.
She shrugged off her pack to prepare for the fight, then immediately ducked as a vine whipped through the air above her head. The creature had no sensory organs that Eofe could see, but it still detected her movement somehow. She watched one of the vines slither over to her fallen pack and constrict it, piercing the fabric with its thorns. She eyed the remaining vines that continued to writhe across the forest floor like a nest of snakes, but none of them appeared to be targeting her. She hoped it couldn’t detect her so long as she didn’t move.
Eofe subtly drew her bow and nocked an arrow, all while keeping her feet firmly planted on the ground. In addition to having no sensory organs, the creature also had no identifiable weak points, being effectively a cylindrical plant with an open mouth. She aimed for center mass and loosed the arrow. It pierced straight through the creature’s body and thunked into the tree behind it.
The vines went wild, whipping across the ground. One whacked into Eofe’s boot and immediately curled around it. Eofe cursed and drew another arrow even as the vine tightened, and she felt pricks where the thorns tried to pierce her thick boot. Her first arrow appeared to have done little damage besides triggering the frantic response. A small amount of some white liquid dripped from the wound, but Eofe had no way of knowing how many such wounds it would take for the creature to die. But she noticed how easily the arrow pierced its frail plant-flesh, and realized that multiple weaker attacks would be more effective than a single strong one. She had a Skill for that, but she needed to get closer for it to be effective.
She tried to walk forward, but the vine that was latched onto her boot held her fast. She awkwardly shifted her bow and arrow to one hand, drew her knife, and executed her only knife Skill. The [Quick Strike] consumed a moderate amount of mana to accelerate her swing faster than she could with only her own muscles, easily severing the vine. The other vines immediately ceased their random thrashing and targeted her position, but Eofe had already dashed forward, taking leaping steps to stymie the creature’s detection. When she was within ten yards, she dropped her knife and lined up her shot. She focused her mana through the shimmering bowstring and into the arrow, draining a hefty portion of her reserves to cast [Scattershot] on the arrow. The moment the fletching cleared her grip, the arrow exploded into dozens of sharp fragments that continued forward in a cone to shred the pitcher plant’s body. White liquid splashed the tree behind the plant and rained down on the forest floor.
Eofe enjoyed a brief moment of exultation before a vine lashed at her midsection. Her heart leapt out of her chest as the vine wrapped around her torso and drove her to the ground, its thorns thankfully failing to penetrate her hide armor. However, the pool of white fog that had poured from the plant’s mouth lay just ahead of where she landed with her face in the dirt, slowly creeping forward with its sweet scent and honeyed taste. Eofe’s arms were free, but she had dropped her knife to take her final shot, so she had no way of freeing herself from the vine without bloodying her hands on its thorns. She pushed herself to her knees and looked around the clearing, where half the vines thrashed about like beheaded serpents while the other half had turned still. The plant had pitched forward, still rooted to the tree, now dripping white liquid out of its hanging mouth. It seemed it really was dead, with its limbs flailing about in its final death throes. Even as Eofe searched the ground for her knife, the vine that had wrapped around her torso loosened, so that when she finally found her blade it was a simple matter to sever its limp pieces, along with the bit that was still latched to her boot.
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Eofe looked around the clearing, seeing that the small pool of white fog excreted by the creature was dissipating. She greedily eyed the liquid still dripping from its dead body and went to gather up what she could in a spare flask. The Green may be a cruel place, but no one had ever said it was stingy with its bounties.
She noticed that the thick wall of fog that she had initially tried to avoid had not moved or dimmed in the slightest. Whether this was the sole creature responsible for the cloud or there was a garden full of them in there, Eofe did not want to find out. It hadn’t taken much mana to defeat the monster, but a few more fights like that and she would risk running low. She applied a conservative amount of sticky healing salve to her cuts before picking up her pack and setting out directly away from the fog, deciding it was worth the delay to avoid another encounter.
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The dangers of the Green lessened near its borders, as it drew further from the center where the Goddess resided. It was the Greenwarden’s touch that untamed the very land and drove the mad evolution of its flora and fauna. It was from her nurturing embrace that beasts unknown to the world outside were born to wander the wild places. It was from her gardens that greenery as valuable as it was deadly blossomed.
Eofe noticed these changes over three more days and nights of travel. The sounds of monstrous beasts dwindled along with many of the ever-present threats to her safety to which she had grown accustomed. Even the colors faded as the more exotic plants of the Green found little succor so far from the Greewarden’s influence.
She also felt her next level approach as she neared the end of the Green. The feeling bubbled up over several days as a growing certainty in the back of her mind, a slight nagging sensation that she had something important to do. When the feeling reached its peak, Eofe found a safe place to hide and began her meditation.
Within moments, she entered the Sanctum. Her consciousness was drawn into a place outside of her own mind and body, where she found herself standing in a placid meadow of soft grass and little flowers that was surrounded by the great trees of the Wildwood. One fruit tree occupied the center of the clearing, its branches laden with a wild assortment of unripe fruits of every shape and color.
But she was not alone in this space.
“Congratulations!” the Benefactor walked out from under the tree’s branches. It looked like a tall Elven woman with olive skin and golden hair interleaved with vines of ivy, her warm brown eyes lit with a radiant smile. The Benefactor, and the Sanctum in which it resided, appeared different for everyone. For most, it took the form of a beloved elder or parental figure. For others, it was a disembodied voice providing guidance from beyond. Aunt Maeve claimed the Benefactor appeared to her as herself.
Eofe looked at the face of her own mother, knowing it couldn’t be her real mother because she actually looked proud of her.
“I leveled up,” Eofe said.
“You did! After all that hiding, sneaking around, [Assess]ing, and fighting that horrid creature, you’ve done enough [Scout] things to earn it.”
“What did I get?” Eofe asked.
“Just a level for now, dear. But twenty-one! That’s quite impressive for your age, you know. For an Elf, that is.”
“No new Skills?”
“Not today, sorry! But you’re close, Eofe! Keep it up and you’ll soon be rewarded.”
Eofe looked to the tree, where a variety of immature fruits continued to ripen.
“Are there more fruits than there were last time?” Eofe had leveled to 20 only recently and the tree had not been nearly so full then.
“You’re doing new things, Eofe. Leaving the safety of your home, traveling the Green all by yourself. You’re going to see many more Skills and Classes become available to you in the future.”
Eofe stood under the tree and looked at all the hanging fruits. There were dozens of them, with only a few appearing close to ripening. Eofe always liked to play a game when she came here, ever since she was a child, to try and guess what each fruit contained. She pointed to one at random, a blue fruit with white spots in a geometric shape Eofe could not even begin to describe.
“What’s that one for?”
“Hmm, I wonder,” the Benefactor said coyly. “You’ll just have to wait for it to ripen to find out!”
The Benefactor was not known to be very forthcoming with information. Most of the Skills and Classes represented in the fruits would be things Eofe had never even heard of, earned through some esoteric requirement that someone somewhere might have figured out at one point and written into a book on the other side of the world. The only Skill she recognized for certain was a long, banana-like fruit that curled in a spiral, its skin a vibrant green with white stripes. It was very nearly ripe. Aunt Maeve had started her on training for that Skill over a year ago. She really had been neglecting that part of her training lately...
“There is one other, teensy little thing, however,” the Benefactor said, walking around the back of the tree. She plucked a fruit from a branch that had been out of Eofe’s line of sight and brought it around to her. The fruit she held out was fully ripe. Its skin was brown and rough, textured almost like wood. It smelled unmistakably like home.
“What is it?”
“[Wildwood Scout].”
Eofe was shocked. “But… I thought I had to be level thirty in [Scout] to unlock it.”
“How interesting you thought that,” the Benefactor said. “Perhaps some of your people’s records should be updated?” she added innocently.
The Benefactor could be infuriating at times, but in this case Eofe would forgive her. The [Wildwood Scout] was an evolution on the basic [Scout] class only available to the Surag who braved the Wildwood itself. Eofe had given up on ever achieving it before she left the Green and the Wildwood behind.
“But you must make the choice now, before you leave the Wildwood. To either remain an ordinary [Scout] or—oh,”
Eofe had snatched the fruit out of the Benefactor’s hand and taken a huge bite. It was fortunate this place wasn’t real, or she may have choked to death as she took bite after bite of the fruit. It tasted like bark and victory, and Eofe couldn’t get enough of it. Within moments, the fruit was gone and Eofe was wiping juices off her chin.
“Well, that was somewhat uncouth, but I shall forgive you.”
“Thank you,” Eofe wrapped her arms around the waist of the woman who was not her mother.
“You have nothing to thank me for, Eofe,” the Benefactor said as she patted Eofe on the back. “The rules are the rules, whether you know them or not. You followed the path and satisfied the requirements. That is all.”
Eofe let go and looked down in embarrassment. “Sorry.”
“It is no matter. Now, how do you feel?”
Eofe almost forgot the most important part. She focused in on herself, on the feel of her body, and what she perceived through each of her senses. The smell of the woods was stronger than ever, and she could even pick out the scents of individual plants and trees. She looked to the forest beyond the clearing and her vision reduced the darkest places beneath the trees to mere shadows. She shifted her feet and could feel the woods even through her boots, like the Wildwood itself was speaking to her. It was everything she had imagined it would be and more.
“You won’t be quite as effective outside the Wildwood, but I think you’ll find your new abilities still superior to an ordinary [Scout]. And there are enough lesser wilds in the world where your [Wildwood Scout] abilities will serve you well.”
Each of Eofe’s previous levels in [Scout] had granted her increased perception, notably with her vision, and improved speed and agility. [Wildwood Scout] offered much of the same, but with a better awareness of the natural world, especially that of the Wildwood and similar environments. Eofe was a little sad that she would not be able to experience the full potential of her new class now that she was leaving the Wildwood behind, but it would be foolish to turn back now. She wanted to do so much more with her life than what was laid out for her back home.
“Is that it, then? Any more surprises?” Eofe asked, peeking around the tree hopefully.
“That’s all for now. And it’s about time for you to get back to your journey. I really am excited to see where your story goes.”
“You say that to everyone.”
“I do!”
The Benefactor famously took no sides. It loved everyone equally, from the lowest [Crook] to the highest [God]. And yet, the Benefactor leaned in and whispered to Eofe, as if it actually had anything to hide or anyone to hide it from.
“But we both know your story is going to be big.”
Before Eofe could protest that she didn’t want her story to be big, she was suddenly roused from her meditation to find herself back in the real Wildwood, which now appeared more vibrant than ever. She put the Benefactor’s words out of her mind and picked up her things to continue her journey, this time with a smile on her face.
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It was on the seventh day of her journey, with the morning sun warming her back through an increasingly sparse forest—though tree line had grown thinner, the trees themselves had not become any shorter—that Eofe came upon a fresh and marvelous sight. A swathe of gold peeked between the bland shades of brown and green that had become all that was left of the Wildwood. Eofe took a moment to comprehend the sight, for the color seemed to consume the land all the way to the horizon where it met clear blue skies. She continued forward cautiously, until for the first time in her life, the young Elf stepped out of the Green.
Before her emerged a seemingly endless plain of yellow grass, stretched over little hills and valleys, and interspersed with the barest amount of greenery. She sat down at the edge of the Green, where the grass met the forest. She watched the countless strands sway in a slight breeze, lit to a golden glow beneath a sun Eofe had rarely seen so bright and a sky she had never known could be so blue.
She wiped away a tear before she stepped into the plains. She didn’t look back. She didn’t need to. Not with the feeling of a pair of ancient eyes watching her every step, peering into her broken heart. Eofe felt the Greenwarden watch her leave her domain, and since she had not been struck down by the Goddess’ fury, she believed that Aunt Maeve had been right.
The Goddess would let her go.