Chapter 5

The Scourge Of The Fair Folk.

I can’t explain the feeling, on the seat of a cockpit, controlling a mecha. The Mecha wasn’t truly bipedal, could not fly, or go really fast at its 5 miles per hour. But what is 5 miles to you, is 316800 inches to me. If you account for my walking speed, and how far I take a step, 2 inches would be a fair assumption for each step I took.

But inside my mecha, things were different. It wasn't luxurious, and it was definitely not safe. It is like riding on a monster truck if it had front legs like a gorilla and it’s back leg as a tank wheel, but circular. For the topography of the woodland was such bumpy terrain, especially for a small mecha centaur, going 5 miles an hour.

We walk through shrubs and into furrows, past trees, and over mounds. We were exhilarated by the motion, the speed, and the sound. Oh yes, the sound. Musical orchestration, vibrated all over, they were quiet... alone, but loud together. It was confounding and awkward at first, but the tempo of the instruments synced into playing a joyful melody of the “Ants go Marching.”

It was an anthem of piano string strums and musical box beats. Each together looping, when the action was met. Yes, it was repetitive to repeat pushing a few buttons, to constantly keep on the move. But those actions bred symphonies thus giving life and motion into the grass. It was a harmonic merging between biology and machinery, fuelled by music, which was the language of sound.

And I did not account for this. I’d hope the music all together would not be louder than an engine hum, but the engine was the body of the mecha. So the music got old really fast for my human mind.

“The Ants go marching, one by one, hurrah! Hurrah!” Peb sang.

I should’ve not told him the lyrics of this song. Like his passenger headbanging Pax, Peb was a constant. ‘Ah, Sink,’ why did I sing at the first iteration of the beat? I just couldn’t help myself, even if my voice was a shrill--I’d always sing along to the tunes and the beats.

Well, that was all yesterday, for now. And I had just woken up from a vibration on the ground. I was back home, at my oak room, covered in a clovered stitched grass blanket which my father had made for me. It smelt of fresh clovers that were stitched together with the grass. And the grass felt soft, not slick like what grass would usually feel, but as soft as the hummingbird feathers.

Suddenly, my father barged into my room, with a panicked expression.

“Sink?! Come with me! We gotta go!”

My eyes were still blurry, from my morning sleep. “Go where?” I said, sitting up to rub my bleary eyes.

“What's going on?”

My father looked at me anxiously and terrified. “It’s the Leviathan...It’s here...”

Startled, I stood up fast and out from my hazelnut bed.

“Where is Mother?” I hurriedly asked.

“She's doing her morning singalong with her friends.” Rint, my father said.

Barefeet I ran out past the living quarters with my father and out in the open exit of the oak tree that we were sequestered in. There were two other groups there in front of us, gawking and pointing at one direction of the grove. Above the fair folks’ tallgrass, above daughter tillers and the teff, near the thickets of the fountain grass, the Leviathan stood.

One of the biggest creatures in this forest, bigger than a hallowed moose, thicker than a black bear, and avaricious as a pig, the Leviathan stood in its golden fur. It was one of the Legendary Ranked creatures in this forest, an omnivorous walking natural disaster.

A wild and legendary, Boar.

With its tusk, it bashed the strength and steel out of the grass, aside. The boar would then snap it’s mouth over onto the grass leaf, ripping it out from the roots, as he munched through. And that's how this wild boar turned into a Legendary Ranked creature by eating the nutrients from the fair folks’ plant.

I watched it in horrified fascination as the Leviathan swallowed a few Grass Cultivators' lives work, gone...in one gape. Grass Soldiers dashed to the beast, with their grass spears, and their grass darts. It was their calling to defend the grove and the grass, brave to a fault, resolute to their end. As darts spewed out from the grass tubes to hit the thick golden fur, Grass soldiers began to jump using their grass spears to stab the sides.

The Leviathan, unworried and barely damaged, for it had done this for hundredths of time, destroying and swallowing the Grass of the fair folk. The scourge of the Fair folk, worshipped by the Mushroom kingdoms, and scorned by the Fae. The Leviathan, was ponderous, and daring, to wipe the nutrients and shelters of the small population.

A choir of voices began to sing a chorus into song, hearing this, I swiveled my head to search. The precession of Grass Singers was atop a mound, singing the Song of War. An ancient song of nature, a song to fluctuate green into violence. The tall grass, spectators to the feast of their brethren, suddenly went to war. Using their bladed steel edges to slash and cut all over the sides of the wild boar’s fur, they fought in rhythmic violence.

My mother was among the Grass Singers, with a tall wall of grass protecting them from the battlefront. Grass soldiers spun and twirled, trying to pierce the Leviathan’s thick hide. Ignoring the Grass defenders and the tall grass, the Wild Boar continued its massacre of the grass.

There were folks besides me dropping to the ground, crying, and moaning this outrage of nature. Grass Cultivators who grew those plants considered them family, now watched as they were swallowed whole. For they were part of our family, they pod us, shelter us, and feed us. The source of the fair folk. For what is the grass people without their hallowed grass…?

I shut my eyes, knowing my mother is safe for now. But it won't be long until that grass wall defending the grass singer will be swallowed up. I need to find a way to save my mother and protect the grove. For the fair folk in this grove will not survive the coming winter if the grove has no grass.

Think! Think! I forced myself. Strategy, Tactics, how do I kill that Wild Boar. My Centaur? Too far away in my laboratory. The grove might be nearly destroyed by then. And what could it have done? Harpoon it? With that thick hide. No. Think!

Hit it with its arms? No, the Centaur would probably just be an after salad dessert after it’s done with its meal. It’s just that thick hide, how do I pierce through that hide, when Grass soldiers with their grass spears can’t even penetrate it with all their high strength of the strongest of the fair folk.

And what good would it do? A small prick? A mosquito bite to such a large frame? It will barely do any damage, for all the struggle it will take to prick it. Think. Trip it? With one the grass? If I sing to the grass to trip it. Maybe...But it will most likely chew it out of existence, with the ponderous pace it’s taking.

Go into the leviathan’s mouth and kill it within the inside? Huh, that only works in fantasy stories, the stomach acids would probably burn through my skin as it does to the steel leaves it’s currently eating.

"I got it!" I said out loud.

Inspired by all my thoughts, I came up with an idea to slay the beast. The idea was absurd, and insane, genius beyond its years. I turned to my father.

“Come with me dad. I need you.”

“But..we need to evacuate to the Banyan Tree. The vines will protect us.” He said.

“Father what about mother?” I argued.

My father looked at me with a terrified expression. I’ve never seen my father truly afraid until now.

“So come with me, I need your help.”

“Do you have an invention that will save us?” He asked, hopeful.

“Not yet, but I will. Come on.”

I ran back into the oak tree, into our compartments. My father followed behind me. I ran to my clover stitched grass blanket, pulled it off my hazelnut bed, and threw it on the floor.

“Dad, I need you to get the most delicate grass strings in the cupboard over there and make them into small grass balls, as many as you can. Then I want you to harden them into the strongest of fibers...”

My father was curious, nodded to my command, and headed towards my cupboard to do what he can.

With the grass blanket displayed full out, I went to the side of the blanket and began to fold the grass fabric into a cylinder. With it fully wrapped up, I tied the top half with a grass string that I had kept in my pockets. My father was still making more small balls, as I was doing the whole process.

I went to my table beside my hazelnut bed frame and took out the grass edge saw that was leaning beside it. I went back to my cylinder grass blanket, at the bottom point, I began to start sawing. I had sawed a long spiral from its point to near the center, like the spiral from a screw of a nail.

Making the blanket cylinder into a makeshift screw spear. I then opened my chestnut chest, to look for something that was essential. It was a prototype handle from my invention of the Nutted Bicycle.

I had a chuckle at the name. ‘Nutted Bicycle.’ It will never get old.

I went to my blanketed spear, and pierce a hole into it with my handlebars.

“Father, I need your help on this one.”

My father had finished nearly two dozen of those small wire grass balls when he came to my side.

“Father, I need you to make this the strongest spear in the grove.” I pleaded to him.

He eyed me, then at my weird spear I had just made. He then nodded. “I always wanted to help you invent something. Guess this is my chance.” He mumbled to me, with a smile. Putting his hands on the blanket spear, he crossed his legs then closed his eyes.

My father absorbed the mana out from the air and into himself. Then he sent it down his hands into the makeshift spear. The blanketed cylinder spear began to thicken and harden into the strongest steel hollowed frame. I dropped all the grass balls my father made, into my grass made bag. I also had grabbed a small pebble and shoved it into the bag.

With the makeshift spear done, I pulled it out of my father’s hands who nodded at me to take it. “What are you gonna do?” He asked me.

I grabbed a coil of grass ropes and my glider, then turned back to answer him.

“I’mma slay the Leviathan,” I said foolhardy.

I’m insane, why am I doing this? For my mother? For the mundane fair folk? Yeah...I guess…

I am insane…

The glider already had a combusting stone under it, so with that taken care of I hurried out. My father followed behind me. When I was in open space, I took another gander at the situation before me. The Leviathan was munching through the walls of grass, ponderously headed to my Mother who was singing her heart out.

My father then grabbed my arm. He was somber. “Come back, son…”

I turned back to him and smiled. I have completed my lifework of riding a mecha, so this time. I don’t have any regrets. I nodded to him with a sad smile.

Scratching the bottom of the combusting stone, I skyrocketed up with all my gear attached to me. The wind currents blew me, but I was facing into a direction I wanted, the distance between the boar and I suddenly became small. After the combusting stone was all gassed out, I glided around above the boar, looking for a spot to land.

Grass soldiers and Grass singers were pointing up. Teka among them, with a desperate look plastered on his face. I was perspiring from the pressure and the one chance that I had to do this right.

Hopefully, this stupid boar ignores me as he did with the spears and the grass. With that thought in mind, I found a spot on his back to land. Tilting my head down, I flew down to land.

After a few steps, I was safe atop the hide of the boar. I clutched on the golden hairs on his back, as the boar swayed to munch on another Grass wall.

Holding onto it like my whole grove depended on it, I latched on, with all my equipment attached. The Leviathan was happily chewing another Cultivator's dreams as I waited for my chance to run. The boar was standing ponderously still, with that, I ran on it’s back towards the back of its head.

Reaching the back of its head, just behind its ears. I latched on my grass ropes into the golden furs. Tying both ends to both sides, whilst the rope was wrapped around my waist to keep my balance.

I held out my makeshift spear up above and then pushed it down onto the back of its head, against its thick hide.

0 Piercing Damage dealt.

Ah, thanks notification for the moral support.

I then took the small pebble out of my grassy bag and slammed it on the top of the makeshift spear. I was slamming it like a hammer slamming into a nail.

0 Piercing Damage dealt.

0 Piercing Damage dealt.

1 Piercing Damage dealt.

1 Piercing Damage dealt.

After a while, I had finally pierced it. The Leviathan shifted from the disturbance, flicking its ears from the small bite. It probably has a huge health pool to be not worried about single-digit bites. With that done, I threw the rock back into my bag and gripped both my hands onto the handlebar that was pierced through the spear.

I then began to spin the spear clockwise in rotation. The bottom half of the spear, that swirly cut, like a screw nail, began to dig into the flesh.

5 Piercing Critical Damage dealt.

10 Piercing Critical Damage dealt.

15 Piercing Critical Damage dealt.

20 Piercing Critical Damage dealt.

The piercing damage I was spinning into the Leviathan began to increase the deeper I went into its flesh.

The Leviathan, confused by the painful sensation that was coming behind its head began to stop chewing the grass it had in its mouth. It started to panic the deeper I went. It tried to go past the wall of steel grass, but could not. It then started to move rapidly forward, slamming into an oak tree with few fair folk sequestered inside of it. The Wild Boar began to jump, trying, yet failing, to get whatever on his hide to fall off. But I was latched on by the waist with the grass ropes I had tied tightly on its hairs. If it had rolled over, I might have been affected, but it was after all a dumb wild boar, still panicked at the alien damage it was receiving.

For a Legendary creature such as it, it would never be brought low to be damaged by a mere fair man. I hadn’t noticed from my focus on the spinning the screw, that we were out of the grove. The Boar was running, hitting trees as it ran. It was frightened of what was damaging it. It won’t be long until it has the brilliant idea to roll over and crush me.

After a few more tense minutes, the makeshift spear was halfway through the Wild’s boar head. I probably have pierced through its skull I surmised. Not wasting any opportunity, I went into my bag and grabbed a grass ball, and threw it inside the cylinder holed frame of the makeshift spear.

I kept it up, throwing all the grass balls in, which were harden into wired steel. After all the balls ran out, I put my mouth into the tube.

'Oh god...I am really doing this…'

I activated my Active Skill, Invoke Song.

“Somebody once told me the world is gonna roll me

I ain't the sharpest tool in the shed,

She was looking kind of dumb with her finger and her thumb

In the shape of an "L" on her forehead”

The plethora of grass balls inside the wild boar’s skull began to spiral out from their wrappings. Then began to dance to my shrilling lyrics of ‘All-Stars’ by Smash Mouth.

100 Interior Critical Damage dealt.

200 Interior Critical Damage dealt.

300 Interior Critical Damage dealt.

“Hey now, you're an all-star, get your game on, go play

Hey now, you're a rock star, get the show on, get paid

And all that glitters is gold

Only shooting stars break the mold.”

The grass steel strings began to dance inside the Leviathan's brain, doing interior damage to its brain tissues and cells. ‘What a bad way to die.” I grimaced at the thought atop the Boar, while it hurdled through the forest. Leaves and branched tips slapped across my face as I grin throughout the day. Then I continued down to sing into the tube the rest of the song.