Joliver lay still, buried in the ashes of the old forest. It was a difficult task to stay calm in this environment, his old playground burned to a crisp. Though the village was on the outskirts of the forest, his people lived in a close relationship with the trees. As a child he had run through the woods and learned their secrets. As a teenager he had camped, matured, and passed his trials of age to show he was ready to become a full member of the community. To see them gone now was something that scoured his soul until it looked like the ruins around him.

He’d been out for four days so far, having been told to go out as far as he could to see if he could find any signs of enemy movement or signs of any plant life that may have somehow survived. Thankfully the ash on the ground was thick enough that he was able to hide when necessary by simply burying himself in it. On more than one occasion he had been saddened to find the charred remains of some poor animal that had been caught in the blaze, unable to escape.

When you weren’t required to trudge through thick ash and climb over tree remains, the Willow Mother Forest had taken a couple weeks to cross through its thickest parts, now Joliver had no landmarks, tree or otherwise, he could use to figure out how far in he had made it. The forest had originally been named for the Willow Mother tree that stood at its center, but people had started to believe it had died or moved because no one had seen it or any sign of a tree-born druid in centuries. For a willow, this was strange.

They estimated that Willow Mother Forest was one of the oldest, and much like the willow’s roots, it had grown wide and covered a vast area. The enormity of the task of burning it to the ground baffled the mind and more than almost any other incursion from the emptiness so far, this was the one that had spooked people far and wide. The Council of Druids was convened and members from almost every tribe had come to give their opinion on fighting off the spread of their largely unknown enemy.

As the sun began to shine over the horizon, Joliver stirred. He began to shake off the ash then unwrap the large blanket around him. Less for warmth and more for cover in this unique situation, the thin, lightweight, overly large blanket allowed him to wrap himself completely as he buried himself in ash, helping to prevent the grey remains from getting into as much of his travelling goods as possible. Then he would put a hollowed out stick in his mouth, wrap the top of the blanket around his head, lean as far back against a tree as he could, and effectively disappear.

After shaking out the blanket, he tied it around himself as a cloak, making sure the bottom would be at about knee height so it wouldn’t interfere or catch on anything. He pulled some rations out of his belt satchel and started chewing as he walked. The only good part of going on scouting trips was getting back home, at which point they would allow the scouts to eat their fill of whatever they wanted to get their body resupplied with nutrients.

Several hours of walking into his day, he stopped to rest against a trunk after testing it for sturdiness. At this point some would fall over the second you touched them. Standing there, something caught his attention moving under the ash. Kneeling, he blew gently so as not to create a dust cloud. What he saw next caught him completely off guard. A mana spider.

About three inches wide and four long at the leg tips while it was standing, with a domed abdomen that glittered iridescent mana spiders were highly recognizable. Their legs were long and spindly with a small thorax and a large abdomen, and other than the abdomen the rest of the spider was black. What made the spider stand out (and frighten even large adults) was the size and strength of the chelicerae, the large fangs on the front of the spider. If a spider or cluster had enough mana infused in their bodies, a single spider could hold down a struggling ten-year-old, while with the addition of a few more they could hold down a strong adult. On more than one occasion evidence had been found of large forest creatures being taken down that even a team of grown men had difficulty with.

While mana spiders didn’t eat their prey, they did suck out the mana of whatever they caught, which in some cases could kill, and in others, paralyze or cause permanent organ damage. All life has mana, the amount varying from life form to life form. As soon as he recognized what it was Joliver leapt backwards and pulled a small vial of liquid mana that glowed iridescent, the only way to distract and kill them. While mana spiders could feed off mana, no living thing could process it in this condensed, liquefied form. It would overload the body and tear it apart.

He watched as the spider headed off in the same direction it had been headed already, which made him curious. The only reason it would ignore him is if there was something with significantly more mana ahead, and as far as he was concerned, that was worth investigating in this desolate land. He reached into a small, leather reinforced pocket on his chest and pulled out a small, white stone. A moment of nervousness passed over him as he thought about how he would never find it if he dropped it in the ash, which is why he typically only used it at night while he was laying down and could hold it over himself.

Holding it up to his mouth Joliver spoke at the rock. “Found a mana spider, it’s clearly attracted to something, going to follow, 7.”

While most message stones were one to one, it was possible to create a group set where multiple stones called back to a single base. These sets were rare and highly complicated to make, typically only used by large cities or military operations. In this case Joliver was holding stone 7 and made sure to always say the number so they knew who was reporting in.

Following an animal always has a certain amount of tedium to it but following a 4 inch spider that wasn’t in a hurry was something else altogether. A good scout was capable of entertaining themselves, the best was capable of emptying their minds and just focusing on their task. Joliver was pretty good. After a while he began to talk to the spider. It didn’t talk back. Thankfully this situation was much the same as heavy snow in winter in that sound didn’t carry very far, so he didn’t feel concerned about getting noticed by someone while talking low.

After a couple hours he noticed the spider start to pick up speed, making him smile. “OK scout 7.5, now we’re talking. Show me where we’re headed.”

He slowed just slightly 15 minutes later when he noticed a couple other spiders in the area all headed the same way. Another 15 minutes and there were many more, and he finally spotted the only thing that could be his target. On a small rise just a few feet higher than the ground he was on now was a trunk that, as best as he could describe it, looked bloated. Significantly bloated. And though many of the branches were missing, and the tips of some of the few left looked charred, the rest of the tree looked alive and fine, not to mention larger than any other tree out here.

Once he got past the size, he started to notice small catkins on the tree, willow blooms that looked new and very much alive. Then of course he noticed the spiders, hundreds of them clambering over the tree. “Great Mother…” He stopped where he was and started to quickly reach for the message stone when he stopped himself and took a deep breath. Rule 1 of scouting: hurrying makes mistakes and mistakes cause death. He calmly finished pulling out the stone.

“7, Willow Mother found, in bloom, size is out of control, can’t be human baby. Advise, will turn to beacon after response.”

He waited for an hour as the message slowly made its way back to the camp, they figured out a response, and then sent it back. Finally, a voice drifted up from the stone.

“Base, stay alert, stay put, all converging. Protect at all costs.”

As soon as the message was done he pulled a small vial out of another pocket that had orange liquid in it and poured a drop on the stone. The stone slowly turned orange and once it was complete he put it back in the chest pocket. Once the mana infusion changed to orange the stones could be used as beacons, pulling on one another. Whoever had the other 9 stones of this set would now be able to follow the pull of their stones to his location. In the meantime, he would set his bow and wait, hoping that the enemy didn’t happen to find their way here.

He settled in to wait. As he waited, he looked at the tree and tried to figure out what it could be growing. A normal Mother Tree would birth a tree born druid at the size and age of a regular new-born baby, to then be raised by the nearest community, however the size of this tree made him think that whatever was inside of it was significantly larger than a human child, which gave him other concerns as to what was happening. Would this be an enemy? Was that even possible? What if it birthed a forest animal or a monster with the powers of the druids? A being like that could lay waste to the world if not taken care of quickly.

After the first day of waiting, the number of mana spiders coming in finally seemed to stop. He estimated around a thousand, though it was hard to tell the way they were climbing all over each other. It was obvious they were being drawn to what was inside, however there was no way inside the tree. At one point for fun he chucked one of his small liquid mana vials at them just to see what would happen. It broke against the base of the tree and the spiders in the immediate vicinity started working on it, slowly dying off, but overall it had almost no effect on the numbers nor did it draw the attention of ones further away.

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Once the second day had passed by the other scouts started arriving. From west, south and east they arrived one by one over the course of a half day. They had all been far, but they had all moved quickly to get here. The possibility of a new tree born druid gave them a hope they desperately needed. Once they all arrived, Joliver took out his stone and a small white vial, poured a single drop on it, and turned it back to a messaging stone, turning off beacon mode. Other than various profanities muttered when they saw the tree, its size, and the spiders, they all stayed quiet until the last one arrived.

“I am 3, I’ll be in charge from here moving forward. 7, anything to note?” A middle-aged man spoke, but clearly looked like he carried the muscle and grace of a much younger man.

“Spiders stopped showing up yesterday morning, they’ve been as you see them now, just slowly climbing over the tree. I threw a mana vial to test, but it only distracted the ones that directly touched the liquid. You can see the spot there.“ He pointed to the spot at the base of the tree that was now slightly clear of spiders. The others looked and nodded.

“9 here, anyone know about Tree-Born births? Are spiders normal? If so, then I imagine there has to be a way to deal with them.” A young, bone-skinny boy spoke up. He likely had only passed his trial of age in the last year or so, but his eyes were sharp, taking in all the information he could. This was likely why they had chosen him as a scout.

“2,” an older, graying woman with a slight hunch introduced herself. “Spiders are normal, the tree normally takes care of them upon birth, however, there has never been this many, typically it’s dozens not hundreds. I’m guessing this is a side effect of the forest being gone. This is now the only mana source for many, many miles.”

Suddenly a woman that looked to be in her late 20s fell to one knee, immediately gaining the attention of the others. “5, Reader. The mana coming off the tree is out of control. I’ve never met a creature or spellcaster that felt like this. It’s getting stronger by the minute” From behind her a large, ape-like creature moved forward and picked her up, cradling her in its arms.

There was no scientific reason that anyone could find, but occasionally a person was born who was highly sensitive to mana. Lucky for them this almost always guaranteed them a job with a government entity as there were always jobs where mana levels needed to be measured, and in some cases, they were used to tell if large mana sources were on the move and people were in danger. These people were often taken young to the capital to train with other mana readers so by the time they reached their late teens they were ready to go. Since large exposure to mana was dangerous to the body, they were often forced of necessity to retire early and allowed to live out the rest of their lives in lavish comfort.

One of the most common tools given to them (often as a hand me down from a predecessor due to rarity) was a Repulsor skin. The name sounded more insect than mammal, but they were large, standing twelve to fifteen feet high when down on all fours, and in general form resembled an ape. They were incredibly strong, incredibly fast, but most importantly, their bodies naturally repelled mana. They trended toward the violent side due to typically living in high mana zones meaning their prey and predators were typically high on mana and very large.

Even more rare, from time to time an infant was found, and if raised correctly, would be gentle and could bond with a mana reader. These pairings were used for dangerous situations as the mana readers not only had a way to be protected from mana, but an ally who could get them away from the mana source and even protect them from physical danger. The fact that no one knew how a forest this size was destroyed so completely and easily had prompted a bonded pair being sent as part of the investigation team.

As the Repulsor pulled back with 5, there was a sudden wave of high energy mana that came off the tree. Seven of the other scouts hit the ground, but one, a very dour looking man in his 40s, stayed upright. “1, Caster, I’m sorry, but it took all I had to keep myself safe from that wave. I’m starting to wonder if we really want this thing to come out.”

3 responded as he slowly climbed back to his feet. “We were told to keep it safe, so that’s what we have to do.”

“No offense to base, but they’re not here, and they’re not seeing or experiencing what we are.”

Before 3 could respond back, a strange noise arose. After a few seconds of looking around they realized it was the spiders. They had been momentarily paralyzed by the wave, but now they were recovered and making a noise none of them had heard before. The noise stopped and there was a moment of stillness, and then the spiders began using their chelicerae to rip the tree apart.

3 yelled out, “they powered up from the wave and now they want the rest of what’s in there!”

Suddenly a voice, in pain, strained, and weak said so all could hear, “please, save my child.”

They all understood who had spoken. They all looked at each other helplessly as no one knew what to do about that many spiders.

3’s voice rang out. “Use all your mana vials! Aim high so the liquid will run down after it hits, that should at least help a little!”

With no other ideas coming to mind, they all began pulling out the small number of mana vials they carried and threw them as high up the tree as they could. As the vials broke apart, the liquid sprayed out and then ran down the trunk of the tree. The plan worked as well as it could, however they simply didn’t carry enough vials to make a big enough dent in the numbers.

1 started casting as he said, “if this thing survived the fire that took out this forest, it should survive my little flame. There’s only one good way to deal with spiders!” And with that he let out a stream of fire directly around the bulge of the tree, incinerating as many spiders as he could. After five seconds the spell started to peter out and then disappeared. He began to prepare a second blast when another wave of mana came off the tree. Being unprepared, he too hit the ground vomiting.

A loud, thunderous roar came racing from the south, and suddenly 5’s bonded repulsor hit the tree like a thunderclap. Using its large hands, it began to squish the spiders against the trunk and scrape them off, jumping up and down, crushing as many below its feet as it could. Since repulsors reflected mana, the mana spiders had no way of reading any mana within the creature and so ignored it. 1 sent off another channel of flame over the large creature’s head and burned off a chunk of the spiders that were still tearing into the top portion of the tree.

Suddenly, everything became still. The spiders and the repulsor both stopped, the latter turning to look north, a low growl escaping. The scouts all turned to look in that direction to see if they could see what had caused the change. As one, the spiders that had torn massive chunks out of forty percent of the tree began climbing down and heading north. Starting low, the ground began to tremble ever so slightly, building up more and more as each second passed.

A short, stout man just beginning to grey at the temples spoke up. “4, manazoologist…I don’t know how to tell you this…but…mana worm.”

3’s eyes went wide, and he turned abruptly to look at the man. “How certain!?”

“95%. Good news is it should take care of the spiders. Bad news is the only reason it would be here is because of the waves coming off the tree. To it this must feel like a leak coming off the grid that needs to be tapped and closed off.”

With a massive explosion of dirt, rock, ash, and burned-out tree husks, a mouth big enough to swallow a small house whole attached to a long slimy body came out of the ground a hundred yards from them. The spiders moved like a wave hurrying to what now seemed to them like the most accessible and large meal in their vicinity. As the worm moved swiftly across the ground another massive wave poured out of the tree. The humans hit the ground, a couple of them twitching in what looked like a seizure. The spiders and their new pray both stopped momentarily as the wave passed and then crashed into each other.

Having soaked up vast amounts of mana from the tree the wave of spiders looked to the worm for all the world like a tasty treat headed straight for it. It became slightly confused when they finally spread out and started surrounding it, trying to reach for any section of the body they could reach. As it lived underground its whole life worms had no sight, but they could sense mana to a very precise degree, so when one large patch of mana became hundreds of tiny patches of mana it had to pause for a moment.

The nearly six hundred spiders still alive started grabbing with their mana infused chelicerae and trying to pin down the giant worm. It would be fair to say that more than likely a fight of this caliber had never been seen in the long history of this world, as that many spiders in one place was something no one could conceive of, and while the spiders put up a fight for the record books, there is a reason why there is no creature more feared than the mana worms.

Mana worms were ancient creatures, living millennia, and almost never coming above ground. They lived deep in the earth and lived off the mana grid, the large network of artery and capillary like structures that carried mana all over the planet. One of the tasks that they naturally performed was to act like platelets, blocking off leaks that occasionally occurred in the grid, using their bodies to plug the leak until it fixed itself, all the while feeding off the mana trying to leak out. Due to this function, they had long ago learned how to soak up mana using any part of their body. As soon as the spiders grabbed hold, the worm began to suck them dry, a task requiring little effort on the part of a creature that stemmed deep mana flows under high pressure.

Within thirty seconds the spiders began to fall off and let go, dead from having all mana drained from their bodies. With that, the worm refocused its attention on the tree. The six scouts remaining upright looked at each other. There was nothing they could do against a monster of this caliber. Only a Tree-Born could hope to stop it, and they couldn’t even kill it, just get it to turn around. Suddenly the same voice from earlier whispered “thank you”. With that the tree began to groan and crack as the blooming catkins that remained on the tree began to glow brightly iridescent. Near the bottom of the bulging area a large crack opened, easily big enough for a person to climb into. A second later fluid began to pour out, coating the tunnel in the tree.

Then, much to everyone’s surprise, a full-grown man came sliding out, curled in the fetal position, wrapped in a bubble of mana, and landed in the ash at the base of the tree. As he hit the ground, there was a loud crack and the Mother Willow split down the middle and before their eyes dried out into the husk of an old and long dead tree.

The Willow Mother was gone.