“Ready?” Hethe asked the group, staring at each of them.

Silvy had decided to fight with them, even if there was a risk to have her secret exposed. The group was gold rank, formed only by women. Hethe, the captain of the group, had opened a structure in the city that helped and sheltered women in need: from there the name of the group.

Thelma had met Hethe there, as someone in need of help, while Veremi was a mage that had studied in Franginia, the capital of the empire. Thelma had lost his husband, another adventurer, a few years back and had been left with a small child to maintain, who was currently in the establishment, attended by helpers. Veremi, on the other hand, had come to the city for money and had joined them for the same reason: the frontier in Ivirill was a good place to fight rarer monsters, already culled or driven far away in the more civilized Grumira continent, which meant making a lot of money from the materials if you knew the right buyers.

Even if their reasons were quite disparate, the group seemed close; Hethe was clearly the one in charge, but she did not refrain from listening to Veremi or Thelma, and they, on the other hand, did not make a fuss about orders, listening and advising Hethe when possible. Silvy had been accepted, momentarily, in the group, and she had not been put in the first line with Hethe, staying instead in the back with Thelma and Veremi. Veremi would be the one farther back, completely concentrated on damaging the Treant with fire spells. Silvy and Thelma would be in front of her, blocking branches managing to pass through Hethe, who would be in the front line and taking the brunt of the assault, stopping as many attacks as possible.

Silvy was fine with this arrangement; she would be able to see how the Treant acted, and how to respond to it from Hethe; at the same time, she would be relatively safe, as Hethe would be the one making most of the work.

The dark tunnel in front of Silvy was ominous, but she gathered her courage and nodded to Hethe, together with the rest of the group. Hethe went through first, disappearing into the darkness, followed by Thelma, Silvy and then Veremi.

In retrospect, Silvy should have expected it: this was not a tunnel, but a door of some sort. After taking a step through it, the darkness disappeared, revealing a huge room, even bigger and taller than the boss one on the fifth floor. It was still made of dirt, of course, but most of it was covered by ivy, hanging from the ceiling and covering the upper half of the room, hiding whatever was up there. A gentle light came from above the ivy, illuminating the whole room uniformly, leaving no shadow. The floor was covered with wet, slippery leaves; losing balance was a real possibility. The trunk of a tree was in the center of the room, the biggest Silvy had ever seen. It was beautifully white and smooth, with no cut or imperfection; was that really a tree? Its branches were hidden by the ivy, making it appear as if it did not have any.

Hethe had already moved forward, with Thelma five steps behind. Silvy moved closer to Thelma, following the plan, Veremi behind her.

Nothing happened for a few seconds, until a sphere of fire passed above Silvy, directed not to the trunk but above, disappearing into the forest of ivy.

The ivy swirled around, and Silvy caught a glimpse of a leafless branch smacking the bolt in mid-air, dissipating it.

The whole room was humid, tree included; the plan was to use fire projectiles to dry it out as much as possible, and then end with style.

Without warning, five branches shot out of the ivy, followed by three more. Hethe moved to meet them, cutting two and blocking two more of the first five, and blocking all three of the second wave. Only one branch passed her, which was cut down by Thelma, who had stepped forward, shortsword in hand. She would not be using a bow, as it would be of limited use, using instead a sword. Another fire bolt reached the tree, which responded with more branches, blocked or cut by Hethe. She was fast: given her build and height, Silvy had thought she would be slower. But that wasn’t true at all: she could move from left to right in a flash, cutting, blocking or diverting every attack. Well, almost all of them; sometimes, a few branches managed to pass, but Thelma was ready for them, cutting them down. Fire bolt after fire bolt was thrown from Veremi, which was completely concentrated on the task, ignoring every branch coming her way. Even when a branch passed Thelma, Veremi didn’t move, trusting Silvy, who was ready and swung at it.

She expected to cut it in half, as the other two women had been doing, but the branch was tougher than she expected, and the sword only managed to reach half of its width.

The Treant withdrew the branch, trying to hit Silvy again, but before it could, Thelma cut it down.

Silvy was shocked; the two women were cutting down the branches as it was nothing, but instead, they were tougher than normal wood, and Silvy didn’t have the strength to cut them.

Could she kill this monster alone? She doubted it, at least in this state. If she was able to cast magic while moving, probably; but as she was now, with only a sword and nothing else, she was not so sure.

Silvy awoke from her trance, seeing another branch coming her way. She gripped her weapon two handed using the pommel, swinging heavily from top to bottom. The sword cut deep, but the branch followed her swing, slamming to the ground. Silvy took this opportunity and stepped on it, trying to break it in half, but the branch shot backward, almost making Silvy fall.

Another branch was coming her way, with the almost broken one following. Veremi was right behind her: Silvy had to stop them! She drove her sword into the ground, grabbing the branch coming from the left, and then the one almost broken on the right, trying to stop them. They were fast but not heavy: Silvy stopped them after taking a step back, now in control. She jumped, using the branches as support, and kicked the almost broken branch. It snapped and broke, finally, and Silvy fell, still branch held in the left in hand, which now tried to withdraw. Silvy took a quick look around her, but no other attack was coming, all of them repelled by the other two women. She planted her feet in the ground, tugging the branch back and drawing a dagger, trying to cut it.

The Treant was having none of that, and danger came from behind Silvy, who left the branch and rolled towards her sword, picking it up. Another branch had come from behind, trying to impale her.

A fireball, bigger than the previous spells, passed over Silvy’s head, ignoring the branches; indeed, Silvy had not seen any bolt in a bit. All the branches retreated and shot towards the fireball, lashing at it. The fireball lost power from the lashing but reached the trunk nonetheless, with an explosion following the impact. The ivy on the ceiling caught fire, together with many branches, now attacking again.

Silvy could not grab the branches anymore, as they were on fire, but the two women in front didn’t seem to mind, slashing and blocking the attacks as they had done before, uncaring of the fire. But the branches were slower and less numerous, and Silvy was not reached by any more attack. Firebolt after firebolt flew through the air, hitting the upper part of the trunk or blocked by branches, catching fire right after.

The Treant seemed to lose its patience because the next thing it did was unearth itself and moving forward. Its roots were moving and scuttling across the ground, dragging and pushing the big trunk, reminiscent of an insect more than a human. The women didn’t seem to care about the development, so Silvy stayed put and helped Thelma as much as she could, who didn’t seem to need her help but whatever. The Treant moving forward, slowly but unrelenting, Hethe started to retreat, together with Thelma and Silvy, until the Treant was about five meters away from the group, now closeby to Veremi. She had stopped firing in the meantime, preparing a spell for this moment. The women moved to the side, leaving the front completely uncovered: Silvy knew what was coming, and she wanted to see it clearly.

Branches shot forward, trying to catch Veremi, but she cast the spell. A beam of orange and yellow flames shot forward, fanning out left, right, up and down, hitting every branch and the trunk. The light was dazzling and the temperature was high, so high that the group took a step back behind Veremi, where the heat was contained by the spell itself: Silvy couldn’t see what was going on inside the flame, flames eating everything in their path. Veremi kept the spell going for twenty seconds, and no branches attacked in that period.

The beam stopped after that and Veremi went on her knees, breathing hard. Thelma was beside her, helping her stand. Hethe and Silvy looked at the tree, or what remained of it.

Ashes littered the floor, probably the remains of the burnt branches and ivy; the trunk was charred black, with only a black hint of the branches it had before. Small fires were around the room, and the fire on the ivy was quickly spreading faster and faster.

“Let’s get out before we are burnt alive.”

Hethe lifted Veremi on her shoulder and started running for the exit, followed by Thelma and Silvy. Thelma stopped by the trunk and gave it a quick kick, crumbling a big chunk of it. A shining, untouched core bigger than Silvy’s hand was inside, and Thelma picked it up with the help of a cloth, running after them right after.

A door made of darkness was in front of them, much like the entrance, and they passed through unimpeded. A small room with a hole in the ground was right after and the group stopped there to rest.

“Good job everyone.” Hethe said while Thelma deposited the core on the ground.

Silvy looked at it curiously: it was the biggest core she had ever seen.

“Don’t touch it; it’s hot. And valuable as well, but that’s another story. What are you going to do now, Silvy?”

Silvy thought for a moment. She couldn’t have passed this monster without their help; should she go back and fight it again alone? Even if she didn’t win and retreated, she would gain experience and maybe levels…

“I want to fight it again, but alone. Are you going to dive deeper?”

“Yes.” answered Hethe. “Well, we are going to rest for a bit before going; do you want to join us?”

“No, I can still fight. Uhm… should I wait for a bit before going back? How does it work?”

Silvy had no idea how monsters were recreated by the dungeon and how to get back and fight again; probably she just had to walk back.

“As with every boss, ten minutes after its death are enough. You won’t be able to get in before that time anyway, so don’t worry. You do know how to get back, right?”

Silvy looked at her curiously “I walk back, no? No one ever explained it to me…”

Hethe looked at her straight in the eyes while Thelma facepalmed and Veremi loudly sighed.

“You really don’t know much about dungeons, do you? You should have asked for information or searched for it; you are risking death for no reason. Well, what’s done is done; were you really going to walk back? Nevermind. No, you don’t have to walk back to fight it. There is a tunnel system that can bring people around to various floors, but only from a lower level to a higher one, never the other way. Look up there.”

Silvy looked up at the ceiling but didn’t notice anything strange.

“Before and after every boss room, there is a hidden hole right in the center of the ceiling; it’s hidden by an illusion, but it’s there. It’s not easy to reach, but that’s why most people bring ropes in a dungeon…”

Hethe studied Silvy, who was fidgeting in place.

“Right, you don’t have one. Here, you can have mine: throw it at the ceiling, right there.”

Silvy did, throwing the hook tied to the rope at the point indicated by Hethe. The hook went right through it but bounced off something, falling back down.

“Eventually it will grab onto something, and you’ll be able to climb up. Remember: you can go only in one direction. Every step you take is a step you can’t retrace, so be careful of not going too far and missing the entrance. It will be a hole right as this one, but you’ll be able to recognize it: the ground will be hazy and recognizable. Take care of not walking right into it, as some rooms are quite high and some people died from the fall. If you keep going, you’ll reach the first floor, close to the entrance. That reminds me: you can’t retreat from a boss for a number of minutes equal to the floor number; so, in the Treant case, you can retreat after ten minutes, not before. For the giant snake on the fifth floor, five minutes, and so on.”

Hethe stopped speaking and drunk from a waterskin.

Silvy then remembered how Hethe had moved through the fight, catching branches almost as if she had eyes on her back, even when the attacks were not aiming at her. Was that a Skill?

“Thank you for telling me. I have a question: how did you know when branches passed behind you? It was almost as if you had eyes on your back. And, Veremi, how did you use magic without a wand?”

Veremi and Hethe laughed, amused. Veremi pulled up her left pant leg, showing a wand tied to it. “I have a wand, it’s just not in my hand. A wand is a target for an enemy: if it’s broken, a [Mage] is useless. I just hide it: in the end, contact with skin is enough to use it.” Hethe spoke after that “Mine is a Skill, of course. Well, usually, I don’t like to reveal my skills to others, but as you have helped us out for free and it’s not an incredibly rare skill, I’ll tell you. It’s called [Sphere Of Sensations], or at least that’s the first level of the Skill. You can feel what’s going on in a sphere around you, about five meters in diameter. It’s quite useful, but it’s hard to acquire and hard to master; you can feel what’s going on, but not precisely. It’s as if something brushes against you, or whispers at your back, or you can catch a glimpse of something behind you, even if it’s impossible.”

“How do you get that?! It’s super useful, no?” Silvy was getting excited. Feel behind and around her? Yes, please!

“That’s costly information, usually. It’s not incredibly rare, but it’s rare, nonetheless. But…”

Hethe stopped speaking, musing for a bit. “I can’t tell you exactly how to get it: my instructor would be quite mad. Buut… you know, you will be able to see something you shouldn’t see, hear what you shouldn’t hear, or touch what you shouldn’t feel… I can’t tell you more, sorry. Try to ponder these words, and maybe you’ll understand. If you do understand, I won't have to tell you.”

Hethe at this point closed her eyes, sitting with her back to the wall. Silvy thought about her words: see what you shouldn’t, hear what you shouldn’t, touch what you shouldn’t… what did it even mean?! She looked at Thelma, who stared back and aerate her clothes in slow and methodical motions. Silvy turned to Veremi, confused, and saw her plug her ears for a moment. What were they… Oh.

To see, hear and touch what she shouldn’t be able to, she shouldn’t see, hear or feel in the first place. Well, a blindfold and earplugs would resolve the first two problems, but how could she block her sense of touch?!

Hethe was still with her eyes closed, not paying attention to her surroundings. Silvy turned to Thelma, pointing at her body. Thelma rolled her eyes, pointing first to her head and then at Veremi as if she had a wand in hand.

Mind magic? That was a hard spell! That was probably why this skill was rare; there weren’t many mages willing to use a spell on someone for who knows how long.

I could help with that. Well, probably. But, what you had thought about levels could very well be real; this system does not take into consideration your cores, and it might apply to Skills as well: I can take away your sense of touch, so the problem is solved.

‘Good one, core!’

And the problem was solved just like that. Silvy nodded to Thelma, and Hethe opened her eyes. Wait, didn’t she see everything if she had the sphere?....

“I’ll go back and win alone. Thank you for the help and suggestion. Good luck.”

“Good luck to you.”

The women answered in kind, leaving Silvy to her grappling tries. After four attempts, the rope hooked to something, and, saying goodbye one last time, Silvy climbed, passing through the illusionary dirt.

‘Didn’t you say I was immune to illusions by the way?! It doesn’t seem like it!’

More precisely, undeads are immune to mind magic, including illusions, but this is not an attack to your mind: it’s an illusion created by changing the light. We are not immune to those.

‘There is a difference?’

The core sighed, exasperated. Of course there is. An illusion that changes the light hits every single person looking at it, but it’s harder because it has to be realistic from every angle and for different people. Mind illusions, on the other hand, attack only a single person and are easier because they only have to work for that one. On the other hand, it’s easier to defend from mind illusions than from general illusions, or whatever their real name is.

‘I still don’t understand how you know all this stuff.’

I don’t know it: I just pay more attention. You didn’t even realize there was a monster capable of bending light on the floors we passed, so don’t come crying to me.

‘What?! You are kidding me, right? Why didn’t it attack?’

That is beyond me. I don’t even know how it’s made, I just noticed some mistakes in how the forest looked a couple of times, but I didn’t mention it. Why should I cover for your weaknesses?

Sometimes, Silvy really hated the core. Yes, it had helped her, made it possible for her to be here and alive, but it was very unpleasant with his “I know it all” attitude. And it didn’t even know it all!

She dropped down from the illusionary hole of the previous room, having found it with no difficulties, back in the clearing before the boss, door of darkness still there. She wanted to learn the Skill to see around her, but it was probably not a good idea to do it in a dungeon; maybe she would speak with Jekhum about it. Or maybe Lindrl.

She passed through the door, ready to fight the Treant again.

The room was exactly as it had been at the beginning of the previous fight, with no sign of the damage the fire had created. The white Treant was still there, unmoving, his branches hidden by the ivy hanging from the ceiling.

Silvy waited near the door, unsure of what to do but looking above her. Last time, the fire bolt had marked the beginning of the fight and the retaliation from the Treant. But she had no firebolt to throw, so…

She just walked forward, keeping close attention to the ceiling. It was so hard to spot-

Danger came from above, left, right, behind: every direction. Branches shot forward en masse, coming from every direction at Silvy, who ducked and jumped backward, tilting her body sideway. A couple of branches brushed past her, hitting her armor.

She touched the ground and rolled, standing up, the branches turning towards her and attacking again. Silvy dodged right, trying to fight one branch at a time, but more branches appeared from the ivy, trying to overwhelm her with sheer numbers.

She dodged, turned and danced around the attacks, hitting and cutting. But the damage was shallow, and the branches kept coming, more and more. They started to hit her, too many to count, but blocked by her armor. Some tried to wrap around her arms, legs, neck, trying to lock her down, but she dodged those at all cost, even if it meant being hit by another branch. Being locked in place would be the end: she knew it, and the Treant knew it as well.

Her mind was fully focused on dodging at this point, not even bothering to attack. There was little point, as the branches didn’t break from her attacks, and only left her open to counters. But the number of branches was ever-increasing: Silvy was getting hit more and more, no matter what she tried. A small part of her knew she had to get out or die here.

The door was now twenty meters away from her, as she had to move around to dodge; she had tried to stay in the vicinity, but it was hard.

Now, she concentrated on getting towards it, even at the cost of getting hit a few times; her armor had lost a few scales, and branches had cut her a few times in those places; it was nothing serious, but that spoke about the insistence of these attacks: even if they couldn’t penetrate her armor, they had hit her so many times that it had broken, even if the Treant had sacrificed some branches.

Fifteen meters. Ten meters. Five. Three. Two. Silvy turned, abandoning her dodges, diving straight for the exit. Half of her body passed through, but her legs didn’t. Branches grabbed her legs, trying to bring her inside again; she drove her sword into the ground, trying to bring her whole body outside. She was slowly edging forward, but her legs were being battered hit after hit, and it took her thirty seconds to be completely outside: towards the end, the Treant had let her go, unable to pass through the darkness.

Silvy’s legs had deep cuts and holes into them, armor only a few scales remaining. She was still alive, but her legs were in bad shape, greaves destroyed.

The next minutes were spent removing the broken armor, as it didn’t offer much protection anyway, and it would only risk wounding her more. Her legs were moving fine even in this state, but they were not healing, confirming that it had been the elemental core responsible for healing her body.

Fortunately, no monsters had wandered inside the clearing; Silvy was starting to think this was a place where no monster could enter.

She had lost the fight, but she had trained her dodging skills incredibly; it was probably a level up, or at least she hoped for, closing her eyes.

[Beginner Death Dancer level 22]

[Passive: Basic Eluding Dance]

[Enhanced concentration]

Two levels and two new Skill: nice. She tried out Enhanced concentration, curious about its use.

Silvy felt her mind accelerate, processing her thoughts faster. Her body did not accelerate with it, but she could focus on something with much more clarity: it would be helpful in several ways.

The effect lasted only ten seconds, but that was expected: most active Skills lasted for seconds, not minutes, or a few or single hit.

Eluding dance… well, it probably had something to do with avoiding hits, which was something she needed right now. But she needed to be stronger as well: her hits didn’t have enough strength to cut the branches. Maybe her two levels were enough, but she doubted it…

Sitting down, back to a tree, Silvy just relaxed for a bit. Her legs would function even with wounds, and she could cover them with pants, but not now: there wasn’t much point to it, as the Treant would shred them to pieces.

She stood up again after half an hour, ready for round two.

This time she expected the surprise attack after a few steps, and she easily dodged it. She dodged and swirled and danced, every attack missing the target. How much of a difference could a Skill and a few levels make…

Silvy attacked back as well, hitting again and again at every possible chance. She was much better at dodging, and her offensive capabilities had gotten better through the level ups, but not enough: a normal swing still couldn’t cut a branch, but a two-handed one could.

So, she resorted to using only two-handed strikes; she cut, dodged, danced with the Treant, untiring, never losing concentration. Her wounds didn’t slow her, didn’t stop her; the Treant couldn’t hit her, no matter what he tried.

Hours passed: Silvy never tiring, the Treant not moving even once, conserving its energy to swing and thrust its branches.

After twelve hours of uninterrupted fight, the Treant was getting tired. It was baffled: how could such a small body contain so much energy to keep fighting for so long? He could replenish itself with mana and through its roots, but the human in front of it had more endurance than him: it was impossible. Was she using mana? Such speed of replenishment was incredible…

Nevertheless, the Treant understood that if it continued like this it would lose, or at least that losing was a real possibility at this point. Hundreds of its branches had been broken, and he had been forced to regrow them, using even more mana and tiring itself even more. It was time to end this.

Silvy saw the trunk of the tree moving, unrooting itself as it had done in the previous fight. She had no idea what was its plan, as it had been burnt completely in the previous fight. Going forward to meet it, Silvy started to aim at its trunk: the core was there.

The Treant did not stand and watch: its branches shot to the sides and behind Silvy, creating a cage. Its trunk lifting, higher and higher over Silvy, who had understood what the Treant wanted to do: crash her with its weight.

Should she escape the cage? The branches had formed a dense and compact wall, and it was unlikely she could break them in time. The roots were thinner and she could break them, but they were below the trunk: escaping under the Treant was not a good idea, as it just had to fall to crash her if she chose that route.

She chose the third choice: cutting its root so that it couldn’t lift itself. He was lifting itself slowly, as it was probably too big to be faster. Silvy started to cut them away, having way fewer problems in destroying them instead of the branches. The trunk started to wobble, losing more and more roots. With no other option, the Treant let itself back onto the ground, not trying to crush Silvy anymore. The cage of branches didn’t dissolve, however, and instead, some were used to attack Silvy. If Silvy had had difficulties before, now she had no problem whatsoever with even fewer attacks, cutting, slashing and dodging with more vigor than before.

Its branches pushed her back from the trunk nonetheless, but she was not worried: she could keep going for years, technically. However, the Treant was not attacking randomly, as Silvy thought, but was driving her in a trap. Its roots, too fragile to use in battle, were not standing still, instead digging below the ground between the trunk and Silvy, leaving just enough dirt to support the ground above, but not enough to support a human standing above it.

With fewer and fewer branches attacking, Silvy took the opportunity. She rushed forward, trying to hit the trunk and doing some damage, when the ground under her feet collapsed, dragging her down. Roots shot out from the dirt, grabbing and tying Silvy’s legs and arms; they were not strong enough to keep her still for long, but that was not necessary: the branches abandoned the cages and shot forward right after her fall, trying to tie her down. Silvy swung her sword, trying to free herself and climb out of the hole. But the branches were too fast and too many for her now buried body, and they grabbed her tightly. Her neck, arms, legs, torso: she couldn’t move anymore, there were too many. The Treant brought her out of the hole, pulling at her limbs, stronger and stronger. Silvy could feel her skin and muscles tearing, her bones cracking. She could do nothing but wait for the end: any movement was blocked by the branches covering her whole body. Slowly, her arms were dislodged and then tore out of her body, together with her legs, blood gushing out the now missing limbs. Her chest and head remained together, suspended in the air before the Treant tossed her out of the boss room: Silvy impacted with the ground with enough strength to bounce a couple of times and rolling for a few meters after that.

Silvy was now lying in the dirt, face down. She felt a bit worried about her predicament, but she mostly felt anger at her stupidity. How could she not expect the Treant to change tactics? It had already moved from the spot after hours of battle; of course, it could do something else. And now, she had no arms and no legs anymore. At least her head was still attached, but that didn’t change much about her situation. Blood had stopped coming out, and her armor was in shatters. At least mana was not coming out of the wounds; probably her regenerating Skill had something to do with it. What was she supposed to do now?!

“Well, we now know someone was indeed fighting for all this time. Should we do something about the body? I don’t have holy water on me.”

“I do.”

Voices came from behind Silvy, and she thought it was the best way to ignore them. After all, they would abandon her here, and she would just wait until the elemental core gave her magic powers again, together with the healing part. Wait, did he say holy water? The one used against the undead and to stop their creation?!