Rune Seeker

Leaves shook as the branches rattled threateningly at the party, while a second wave of menacing bloodlust washed across the room. It was suddenly clear the other plants in the room hadn’t died of natural causes – or even the elemental kill switches that had been built in. No, this Fiendish Tree had slaughtered its competition, taking all the resources for itself.

It – and nothing else – stood as the alpha predator.

Hiral chuckled. “It’s kind of cute when it does that.”

More branches and leaves shook angrily, seemingly in response to his words.

“Do we even need to… fight this?” Seeyela asked. “Kind of makes me feel like a bully. Beating up a tree.”

“It’s not like it would have the Solar Core we need,” Seena added. “It looks like there’s another hall on the other side of the room… though the door’s closed. Then again, we have a few keys now. The realMid-Boss could be on the other side of that.”

“Actually,” Hiral said, spotting something within the twisted roots at the base of the tree. “I think I see the golem we expected.” Pointing, Hiral gestured to a crystal body very similar to the Guardian they’d fought back in the other building. Face-screen twisted to the side like it was broken, the body lay unmoving, with several of the roots wrapped tightly around it.

Right where the other half of the rune would be… does that have something to do with this?

“Did the tree eat the golem?” Drahn asked. “I want one.”

Yanily patted the tracker on the shoulder. “Been there. Let’s see what we can do about getting that for you. Hiral, cutting down trees sounds like an axe job. You have a few of those. We’ll wait here.”

“I guess,” Hiral started, only to be interrupted by some rather vehement branch-shaking.

“It is it still trying to intimidate us?” Seeyela asked. “We can literally just stand over here and it can’t do anything. Yeah yeah, shake your leaves all you want. You don’t…” Bamf! Seeyela vanished in a puff of purple flames even as a new field of gravity erupted right where she’d been standing.

Energy already prepped for usage, Hiral immediately reached out with his Runes and Edicts of Gravity and Sealing.

“Gravity tear,” Hiral said. “Just like outside.” And, just like before, the tear didn’t immediately fade under the pressure from his concept – something actively fought against him. No, not something. It was the damn tree! “It’s the Fiendish Tree trying to rip us apart with gravity. Be careful.”

Even as he said that, two more rips began to form, twisted gravity spilling out to pull apart whoever stood closest. The first tear already repaired, Hiral reached a hand towards each of the new ones, his will bending the breaches backwards until they began to close.

“I’ll keep the tree from eating you, cut it down!” he shouted.

“Way ahead of you,” Seeyela said, already right beside the tree, and her glowing daggers in motion.

Thunk, thunk, the two venomous Fangs of the Lady hit the thick bark of the tree trunk only to stop very abruptly.

“Uh… wow,” Seeyela said, staring at where her daggers had barely scratched the wood.

“Sis, lookout!” Seena shouted, a second before leg-thick, spiked roots tore through the ground to impale Seeyela where she stood. Or, try to, at least – the woman vanishing in another burst of purple flames.

“I don’t like this tree,” Seeyela said. “Yeah! I’m talking about you!” she added in a shout towards the offending plant. Its roots had sunk back beneath the ground, but each party member kept a tight watch on their surroundings. What was the range on those?

For Hiral’s part, he finished mending the third gravity tear, then sighed as a fourth began to appear. At this point, it was practically child’s play to slam them back shut, and he did just that.

“If knives and horrific venom don’t work,” Hiral said, “then there’s clearly only one option for this tree. Seena, you were looking for something to burn down?”

The party leader cracked her knuckles within the bulky gauntlets, a sadistic grin spreading on her face. “Li’l Ur, looks like we’re up. You ready?”

“Yes, Mistress,” the lich said, rising slightly off her shoulder while books floated to both their sides. Next to the lich, his books opened to glow the cold blue of a wintery grave. “This pathetic existence of a tree will bow before your absolute and oppressive might. It shall know a wrath so absolute its distant seedlings will become engulfed in a crematory – though short – existence of agony and suffering! With it gone, your path to conquest will open, promising…”

“Ur,” Seena interrupted evenly. “I’d just like to burn the tree now. Can we save the world domination for later?”

“Fine, later,” Li’l Ur said, blue energy surrounding his hands before spreading down Seena’s shoulder to draw lines across her body. Mixing with the fire of the flaming sheath, the new addition looked uncannily like the writing that’d been depicted across the body of the Remnant of Ur’Thul.

“No more circle?” Seena asked, looking at the same lines Hiral was staring at. It wasn’t quite runic script like he used, but there were similarities. Almost like… a child language. Something Ur’Thul created based off the runes Amin Thett taught him?

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“Why should my Mistress’s glory be limited to one place?” Li’l Ur said. Then, a little more quietly, “B-Rank improvement. Same effect.”

“Nice,” Seena said, her own floating books erupting in flames, and fireballs began to form over each of her hands. “Now then, lets see how well you burn.”

In the center of the room – if it was even possible – the whole tree seemed to lean away from Seena. Leaves fell as the branches shook, and the ground churned from roots moving underneath.

“Oh, somebody is looking a little nervous,” Yanily chuckled.

And that small comment seemed to piss the tree off, the shaking very suddenly stopping, and its branches jerked forward.

At the same time, Yanily lunged ahead, his spear intercepting one, two, three lightning bolts that appeared out of rapidly forming tears. Never stopping, the spearman quick-stepped in an arc in front of the party – Seena especially – as more and more lightning appeared. That wasn’t all the tree seemed willing to throw at them though, a nasty smell the only warning before a portal-fed-waterfall of terrible, acidic poison fell from directly above.

Dropping straight for Seena’s head, the woman didn’t even seem to notice. Good thing her big sister was already one step ahead of the tree – her own portal appearing to catch the falling toxins. Then spew them out of the other half of the portal above the tree.

Leaves and bark sizzled and popped beneath the green rain, the foliage recoiling at the touch, before goopy matter fell from the canopy. It took the tree a solid two seconds to realize what was happening before it cut the acid portal, and a new one appeared off to the side. Before anybody had a chance to wonder what it was, more caustic liquid gushed out sideways like it had been held under pressure.

Still, the tree was too slow, and Seeyela’s portal appeared to intercept the poison and spew it across the tree trunk. The damage there was far less than on the branches above, the thick bark protecting the tree from the worst of it. The sizzling and shaking of the tree indicated that didn’t make it much less pleasant.

Meanwhile, the whole time the venomous portals tried to melt Seena, Yanily circled the party, intercepting lightning bolts with a practiced sweep of his spear. He moved in his Dancing Spear Style, catching every single bolt coming their way like he knew where they would be before they even appeared. More and more of the electric energy ran along the haft of his spear with every movement, making it look like he carried a lightning bolt with him.

As for the half-a-dozen gravity tears the tree tried to open up, Hiral had those on lock down. In fact, the more the tree tried to open, the faster Hiral was forced to respond, each one pushing him to improve just a little more.

Then the ice shards came. Foot long spikes meant to impale the party where they stood. Racing for Seena’s chest, the first one was like a knife in the dark. Silent. Unseen. Deadly.

Also easily slapped aside by Right’s glowing fist. The second one he literally grabbed out of the air, his solar-energy gauntlet crushing it to dust. The third one? Left’s dagger cut it in two, stealing its momentum and sending the pieces out wide. Any that came after didn’t fare much better, the two doubles falling in step with Yanily to stop any attacks before they even got close to those in the middle.

And, Seena? Well, one look from Hiral made it very clear why the tree was getting more and more desperate with every passing second.

Six watermelon-sized fireballs hovered above each of her hands, churning like they heralded the end of the world. The glowing, blue, almost-runework across her body had clearly buffed her damage potential – like the circle had – and by the look on her face, she was ready to get things started.

Something the Fiendish Tree recognized as well. All at once, the atmosphere in the room condensed, solar energy flooding through the branches and even saturating the leaves. Fields of energy emerged around the hanging fruit – like shields to protect something very important to the plant. But, the Mid-Boss wasn’t just upping its defense. Ripples warped the air all around the party, like the only real thing in the room was the tree.

Everything else – other than the party – grew thinner. The boundaries that held back the kill-switches built into the room, the ones the tree had somehow taken over, frayed at the edges. Even the dirt around the tree itself grew transparent, the dozens of churning roots underneath clearly preparing to defend the tree if anything grew close. It was all fading…

No, not all.

Hiral’s eyes locked on the golem clutched in the tree’s roots. Energy pulsed along where wood touched crystal, and as he focused his attention there, he felt the unmistakable touch of a rune. Something about the golem’s power was assisting the tree with what it was doing. What it was – exactly – would have to wait.

The boundaries holding back the volatile elements commanded by the kill-switches had faded. Whatever was coming, it was coming now.

First were the ice-spikes, a dozen in quick succession that sliced through the air. From every direction, all at once, they came – aiming to punch through the party and stop their dangerous leader.

Left and Right had other plans. A column of horizontal flame snuffed out three of them before they’d even fully formed, and Right was already at the next set. Gauntlets of semi-solid solar energy – backed by the power of his Meridian Lines and pseudo-aspect – pack, pack, packed three more out of the air. A seventh he caught, then spun and hurled it, shattering the eighth. That only left four that somehow doubled back to eight.

A stream of water cut across the air, followed quickly by the Wing of Anella, freezing the water directly in front of those newest ice shards. A rapid-fire impact destroyed both of the ice constructs, while the jaws of four massive wolves with infernal flames leaking off them shattered the last. A fierce howl signalled the success – and buffed the party. So did the Banner of Courage that appeared in Left’s hand.

Like Seena needed more damage.

Still, the ice wasn’t the only thing coming, with crackling rips spawning by the dozens – then the hundreds. Yanily, contrary to what he’d done before, simply stepped to the center of the party and lifted his spear in one hand directly above him.

“Come here,” he said softly, and the lightning obeyed. Flashes lit the room as hundreds of simultaneous forks crashed into the spear, flaring until it looked like Yanily held a single lightning bolt stretching floor to ceiling.

“Show offs,” Hiral muttered, while he simply blanketed the area around the party in his concept of Gravity and Sealing. Tears mended before they even had a chance to burp out their payloads, and Hiral glanced at Seeyela, similar energy pooled around here. Pooled, but not going anywhere.

Apparently, the tree had learned not to bother with the deadly acid.

That just left one element – fire – and it flared bright enough it felt like the sun had suddenly risen in the room. Then got sucked into Seena’s fireballs, ballooning them in size to nearly comic proportions.

“Drahn, hit that tree with your pollen,” Seena said. “And, no matter what happens – even if you can’t see the tree – just keep shooting.”

The first of Drahn’s arrows was already away before he thought to ask a question. “Why wouldn’t I be able to see the tree?”

“Heh,” was all Seena said. Then she thrust her hands forward, and all twelve fireballs launched. Screeching as they flew, the projectiles warped the air even as the tree seemed to flinch back, before the entire garden was consumed in flames.