She blended with the forest—roots and vines entwined around her long legs and slowly crawled up her body. Twisted branches served as arms, ending in elongated hands with sharp claws. Vines sprouted from her neck, forming a crown of branches and flowers that hung around her head, dotted with moss and leaves. From this crown, made up of green excrescence, a bundle of stems with leaves and flowers on the other end raised up over her head. All kinds of mushrooms peeked through her flowery hair. Two bright blue eyes gleamed in the darkness, surrounded by darkened skin for a sombre appearance. Though her gray-skinned torso and her visible face appeared as that of a woman, the roots replacing her limbs and her triangle-shaped teeth suggested otherwise. Vines trailed after her, unnoticed when she stood still.
Rooted firmly before them, she cracked a twisted smile and exposed her sharpened teeth.
“Dryad! No! Wait!” The young man fell down, crawling backward as he watched her every move with wide eyes.
X scrutinized her appearance: part monster, part female humanoid, and wholly demented. To his surprise, the humanoid parts looked feminine enough to trick the mind.
[In another context, she’d be a light-eyed, slender beauty.]
What weird tastes you have, because I simply don’t see how this beast could pass for a pretty female— hell, even just a female. But maybe. On a really, really dark night. Darker than this one.
[You’re jealous of the beings of these lands.]
“Ha...,” sighed X, struggling to regain his lost energy.
“Finally, it will end!” The dryad’s rough voice matched her semblance.
“No! Help me! You... yes, he did it!” Bryan pointed at X. “He told us to—” Before he could finish talking, her vines chopped off his remaining arm.
“Aahh!”
"I hate liars more than cowards," she uttered.
X's pulse quickened as scenes of past bloodshed flooded his mind, his body ready for a fight-or-flight decision he never made. He was left in awe, puzzled by her vine control and impressed by her butchering skills that reminded him of the best ones back home. A light, spoiled smile crossed his face.
“Ahh! My arm!” cried Bryan.
The dryad mutilated his legs at the knees.
“Arghhh!”
Between gargles and indistinct laments, tears rolled down his pale cheeks, and involuntary urination soon followed. A mutilated torso with its head still attached lay bleeding out over dry grass, jerking in pain. Meanwhile the dryad's vines snaked towards him, piercing his shoulders and lifting him into the air until her eyes met his.
“Ahh! Please... I... Clarissa....” muttered Bryan.
While the young man screamed and cried, her vines slowly gutted him. His entrails slid out of his stomach, and his remaining lumps of flesh flailed like an absurd caricature.
X chuckled.
“You find this man’s death funny?” questioned the dryad.
“I do...” X openly laughed, thinking about the man’s last moments. “You saw it too, how his legs moved... those little stumps. And his head full of pussy till the end. Can you believe that?”
“Mhmm...” In a quick movement, her vines retreated, and the abused flesh dropped over its own guts. She shifted her attention to the redheaded elf.
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“Women. He was thinking of some girl.”
“Is that strange?”
“It’s funny he thought of some girl he never had, who most probably is making babies with someone else, in his dying moments.”
She exhaled, looking down at the mutilated remains, then centered her attention on the elf. In a split second, her calm attitude turned into fury.
“You too want to burn my forest?! Crush my plants?! Cut down my trees?! Kill my creatures?!” exclaimed the dryad.
“Demon-gods no! I surrender. It is your forest, after all, isn’t it?”
“Yes! It’s mine!”
“Jeez, you creatures need to tone it down a notch. And no. I actually like nature.” X observed a mind tethering on the edge and tried to calm it down. “I haven’t done anything to your forest.”
“The trees tell me someone ate flowers a few days ago.”
“Uhmm... Couldn’t be me.”
Her eyes nailed to the languid creature before her sewing lies with truths while her vines slithered in his direction, surrounding him.
The dryad’s eyes narrowed. "Are you certain you didn't nibble on any of my flowers?"
“I’m sure I didn’t.”
Her lips curved into a grimace, revealing her sharp fangs. The dozens of floral snakes convoluted all around him.
“Wait! Just wait a second! Got a description of this... defiler?” swiftly questioned X.
“A human... a rotten soul.”
“Oh! Then—” Her cold vines, extensions of herself, reached his feet and began creeping along his legs. “Jesus! I said wait!” X quickly removed the rags around his head, revealing his long, pointed ears.“See, I'm an elf! You can see I'm not the one you're after."
She had a word stuck at the tip of her tongue, but let it go unspoken. Her hesitation traveled along her body, and her vines slowly receded. The tension in the air dissipated.
"My forest now!” The dryad narrowed her eyes, surveying the area with a possessive gaze. “It wasn’t mine then, but it is now. And from now on I protect everything in it. I’m watching you.” She looked, talked, and acted like a recently escaped lunatic.
X forced a weak smile, easing the tightness in his muscles. "I see...so that's how it is. Not that I’m complaining, I’m still alive. You protected your forest from... what did you call them? Demon spawn? And his equally criminal family, of course. It’s perfectly reasonable.”
"Nature's enemies," she snapped, "face the consequences in my forest!"
“It is your forest. Do with it what you will. I'll stay clear, wouldn't want to cross someone who protects their forest... so fiercely. But first, could you tell me the extent of your forest? For everyone's sake."
“This time it will start at the Felpein River, hugging the riverbed, to the border of foul elven Silifran, along the main road until two days before reaching disgusting human Saint Jaulea... Then across a vast expanse of hills and a valley brimming with,” her eyes shined, and a gentle smile adorned her softened factions, “the most amazing, colorful, delicate, and friendly flowers one could find in the vicinity. And back to the Felpein River."
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“Ah...” he got lost in her description. “I'll stick to the main road then.”
“As long as you behave towards my forest... we’ll have no trouble.”
X took a step, ready to depart, when he paused. A question popped into his head. “Before you go avenge some other weed... a question has been eating me inside. Why didn't you let the farmer family know that this is your forest, just like you did with me?"
“I told you, it’s my new forest. When I arrived and took command, they were defiling it!”
“How does that make sense?”
The dryad's eyes darted as she struggled to form a response. Nature doesn't explain itself, doesn’t lend itself to mundane considerations. It acts. Or so it seemed to the redheaded elf.
“Forget it.” X realized he was wasting his time. He took the creature's actions at face value, a self-sufficient answer in and of themselves, a will to violence. For truly mad beings, any superficial reason or lack thereof would suffice. Any deeper, logical explanation bores the minds of the deranged. And only those fascinated by the inner workings of disturbed minds would try to understand them. Half deranged himself but still sane enough to be curious about the demented creature before him, X felt the need, a burning passion, to probe her thoughts. "You said this time... Is this a new forest for you? Have you had others?" he asked.
“Yes.”
“What happened?”
“I... lost them.”
“Better luck this time.”
She stood impassive, her victims already bled dry under her justly retribution.
“So... you are like a monstrous apparition that kills whatever perturbs her forest. Plants, trees, flowers... you can’t stand them being... crushed?” inquired X.
She tensed, baring her teeth, and her vines crawled and rose behind her.
“Whoa there, I get it! Some people killed your herbage and you're out for blood. I understand, I really do. But it’s not mine you want.”
“Don’t you even think about it. Not in my forest,” she threatened.
“Never crossed my mind.”
X treaded carefully around her capricious personality.
“What kind of creature are you?” asked the redheaded elf.
“A dryad, protector of nature.”
"A talking collection of grass and moss?"
"No."
“I get it, you’re an overgrown talking plant that kills nature things pretending they’re not nature things.”
"You... and others like you, conscious beings?"
“Aha,” he nodded.
"You couldn't possibly understand."
"And I don't want to. You keep your conflicting thoughts to yourself and and I’ll keep myself out of your forest.”
Instead of bothering her, his talk slightly amused her. She strolled in a circle around X, studying him. Her gaze jumped to her recent hunt.
"Why are you, a weak being, not running in fear? Others would be begging for their lives," stated the dryad.
"You told me, as long as I don't hurt your forest, you have no quarrel with me. And you strike me as a creature who means what... she says."
"Indeed."
Night advanced with no care for the restless. The elf’s body craved to lay down and close his eyes. He could no longer entertain himself with the dryad.
“Well, dryad... protector of nature. I’m freaking done for today.”
He sat down.
“Not over that grass!”
“Really?”
“It’s brazenly green, babies, recently sprouted... If you have to, sit over there, where there’s nothing.”
“Over the cold hard ground?”
“Yes.”
“Your forest, your rules.”
He changed his chosen spot.
“It’s so strange that your psychopathy has rules and stuff... or maybe not.”
“Psyc...”
“Yeah, your demented brain, your actions are not normal. You should talk to creatures first.”
[Hahahaha.]
Laugh all you want, but I do. Like now.
A twisted, spectral smirk colored his shadow’s darkened semblance.
[You’ve got no choice.]
Fair enough.
“It’s my forest and I protect it,” spoke the dryad. “Any creature can pass freely, given they don’t hurt my forest. But if you do, I’ll kill you and impart the same pain.”
“Yeah, you’re completely gone up here. Gotcha.” He yawned, extending both arms. “As amusing as this talk had been, I’m tired. My eyes are closing. And you’d better not kill me in my sleep or I’ll... haunt you.”
*
Next morning, the redheaded elf opened his eyes and looked around. The dryad was nowhere to be seen. He moved his limbs and checked his body, letting out a relieved sigh. "Still in one piece."
Glimpsing a blue sky through the dense foliage, he decided to head towards the main road, hoping to reach a place called "Foul elven Sili... something. I’ll try my luck there and meet whatever strange creatures populate it.”
[You don’t think you’re a strange creature yourself?]
The vision appeared standing beside him.
“I like you more when you go away.”
Stretching his neck by moving his head in circles, X’s eyes caught a peek of the young man’s remains resting in the same place she had cut him down.
“Better be off before the crazy plant returns.”
Not wanting to risk running into the dryad again, X took his bag, leaving behind the unfortunate soul’s corpse, and made his way to the main road. As he slowly strolled, tired and hot, he munched on his remaining food and drank copious amounts of water to combat the heat. An hour later, he found the road, slipped between the bushes on the other side and followed it, keeping a safe distance from it.
[Hah. She got you out of her forest.]
A specter strolled beside him.
“Now that’s a true creature of the wilds. Nothing like the weak freaks back at Saint Jaulea. Oh no, she’s crazy for blood with a special disdain for life under the mysticism of protecting nature.”
[Do you find her actions morally reprehensible, or does she scare you?]
“I prefer more stable characters.”
[Don’t you say mister sanity.]
“Who? Me? I’m the only one sane in this mad world.”
[Keep praying, maybe someday you’ll be right.]
“My prayer for you to get the hell off me, sadly... goes unanswered.”
With a monstrous thirst constantly plaguing him, X's parched mouth screamed for water. He sipped sparingly, aware that each drink could be his last. He pushed on, driven forward by necessity. During his journey, he sought refuge from the scorching sun under the shady branches of lush trees. He rationed his dwindling supplies carefully, uncertain of how much farther he was from the elven town. As carriages passed by throughout the day, he kept himself concealed, observing the magnificent beasts that pulled them. With elongated necks, one head stacked atop the other, their mouths filled with rows of sharp teeth, some even sporting horns or beaks. The beasts trotted on six legs, their scaly bodies rippling with muscle and their fangs protruding menacingly.
The redheaded elf slowed his pace as dusk approached, comforted by the fact that he no longer walked in the dryad's forest. Sitting under a large tree, he let out a deep breath and reflected on his days since his arrival in this world. A fantastic journey those vapid demon-gods imposed upon him, akin to slurping mind-altering drugs, but without any of the delightful consequences. Worst of all, every monstrous hallucination was real.
Upon lifting his gaze to the sky peeking through the leaves, he smiled broadly. X craved raw emotions, an adrenalin surge, the thrill of the fight-or-flight instinct, burning himself to the ground. A flame before extinction. Against everything that came before him: a pariah. For that moment in the future when a decided few leave behind all comforts and submissive inclinations: an example. Not one made for patience nor obedience, a short but exciting life, nothing else mattered.
Leaning against a tree, his gaze landed on a flower on the forest ground. The plants and creatures, even the talking ones, had a mix of similarities and differences from Earth; eyes, ears, legs, fur, horns, colors, and much more. And magic. A fully vibrant alien world, yet with beings resembling humans. Wasn’t it too much of a coincidence? The demon-gods should know. Those thoughts left him with a bittersweet aftertaste.
He cupped the flower with two fingers, examining it. No scent, but at the same time arranged with other properties anyone could expect from a flower anywhere on Earth. He needed more concrete information, like he did in his previous life when he experimented a lot. What he did as a pastime then became necessity here. His curiosity had helped him keep his head straight amongst the demented. And it would again.
Just as his fingers clenched the flower’s stem, ready to pluck it, he heard faint footsteps and a familiar voice broke the silence.