Chaos, Ditto, and I headed back to the camp without much conversation. I carried the slime on my shoulder like some gelatin canary, and it worked rather well. It clung to my shoulder firmly enough to not disturb my balance, and the weight just felt like I was carrying a heavy strap around that arm; nothing new for an ex-businessman used to travel.

During the walk I tried charging other spells into Ditto and found that I could only cast Heal, Flash, and Combustion, according to Chaos. When we reached the coals of the fire and I set Ditto down so I could don my backpack, I wanted some questions answered.

“Chaos, what does Heal do? Exactly?”

Chaos glared at me, still pouting, and answered with, “It heals people, der.”

“I know… but how?” I let out a little sigh; this constant game of dealing with a haughty, spoiled, selfish Goddess was getting more annoying by the hour.

“A simple Heal spell advances and enhances the body’s natural reconstruction abilities. So really you aren’t healing anything, just giving the user’s body a powerful energy drink of sorts and speeding up the process.” She sat down on a rock and crossed her legs, looking bored now. Yet, she continued explaining while I finished preparing to start my journey. “That’s why if the body is too badly damaged, Heal won’t do anything. The body simply doesn’t have the capacity to speed up its healing due to the overwhelming shock. Also, if the Heal spell’s Mana is rejected by the receiver’s body, naturally it can’t work… like with what happened when I tried to heal you.”

I nodded while I picked up Ditto and set it on my shoulder. “And Flash?” I followed by sliding the staff next to the bed roll, making sure it was slightly tilted so it wouldn’t impose on my legs when walking.

“Just a Flash of light. Pretty much the same as the Flash grenades of your world.”

“Good to know. And Combustion?”

She clapped her hands, causing a small fiery explosion inside them. “Literally an Explosion spell, just a very weak one.”

“Noted… and how does casting these help me learn to use Mana?” I asked. Heal, Flash, and Combustion. Rather weak spells but they were a start, at least, and the Heal seemed especially potent.

“How does running make you a faster runner? How does cooking make you a better cook? How does-”

I held up a hand to quiet her, “I get it, thank you.”

“Hmph…” Crossing her arms yet again, she turned up her nose and looked to the horizon.

“Well… I guess I’ll head to Lonely Briar. Which direction?”

“That way.” She sharply pointed toward the northeast all too eager to be rid of me.

“Anything else I should know? And how do I contact you?”

“I contact you,” she hissed. “And just don’t use any more of your nuclear bombs. If you do, your kill streak will rise along with your hunters.”

That piqued my curiosity, though I dreaded to hear the answer. “I have a kill streak? Aside from the Mimic…”

“You wiped out a section of a forest. Dryads, nymphs, goblins, animals, and even a few Demon scouts turned to charcoal. That’s not the best rep right off. Especially Dryads and the scouts.”

My heart practically dove off a cliff at that one, its beat punishing my head while a sickening feeling tore through me. I had killed… it was so obvious, and yet, I hadn’t even considered it before. My wanton destruction had taken innocent lives. My life for theirs. What a horrible trade.

Chaos didn’t help my gloom. “Get used to it. If you want to survive in this world… you have to be ready to kill. Collateral damage sucks but it’s the way the cotton yarn rolls. If you don’t want to kill, then might as well kill yourself now and save your future nemeses the trouble. Run from this life too.”

Anger boiled in my stomach, but I knew she was right. Mortalis was vastly different from my own. Worse yet, it was undoubtedly far more wild and dangerous. On my first day alone I had nearly been attacked by two hunters and nearly killed by a Water Mimic. Beggars couldn’t be choosers and till I had enough power to avoid taking innocent lives, I just had to try and either work around it or put up with it. And if someone or something attacked me… I would have to kill. It was either them or I. And I wasn’t going to let myself die so soon.

I filled my lungs and puffed my cheeks, focusing on the feeling and then slowly blew out. It calmed me. I pat my cheeks and then gave Ditto a pet.

“I’ll be heading off now. See you later, Chaos.” With that I turned and headed off. It was a sour parting to be sure.

“I won’t be at your beck and call, boya, so if you run into problems, don’t expect me to fly in like your hero.”

I waved behind me, “Got it.” Of course I knew that already. She wasn’t a friend. A partner only. It was me against the world. If she deemed herself better off without me, she would get rid of me. It was that one dimensional of a relationship. To counter that… I would have to make myself essential. To make her have to keep me… and when I was powerful enough, then our relationship could change from partners, to master and servant; with me being the master.

The walk was pleasant, thankfully. It allowed me to calm my emotions and refocus on what was important. Survival. Growth. Success. I stopped at the forest’s edge nearly half an hour later and had Ditto move onto my backpack to make it easier to carry. I noticed yet again the slime’s color was a far deeper crimson color than before.

“Say, Ditto… do slimes have genders?” I asked, knowing I wouldn’t get an answer. I didn’t know whether to refer to it as a he or a she. But since the thing didn’t even have a brain, I doubted I really needed to worry about that. I gave a shrug. Hooked my thumbs under the straps. Walked.

It was only after a while of traversing the forest I noticed something else. I had anticipated the staff to be difficult to move with through all the low hanging branches and waist high bushes and plants… and yet, I was moving as if it wasn’t there. Suddenly horrified, I slowly turned to look to where the staff should have been.

It wasn’t there! There wasn’t a staff strapped to my back!

I quickly threw off my backpack and looked to either side, above, below, everywhere. Sure enough… nothing. Ditto just sat on the backpack passively, with the staff that was once there, gone.

“You didn’t eat it, did you?” I asked jokingly, picking Ditto up and looking inside the backpack. No staff. Of course Ditto hadn’t eaten it… “Chaos removed it… that fricking little… grrrraaaa!” I growled and slammed my fist into the ground. It hurt, but I was too ticked off to even care. “Damned little brat! When I get my hands on you…” I grabbed the pack and donned it again, breathing out and in slowly to calm myself. There was nothing that could be done. I had to keep moving.

Chaos wanted me to be without the staff. There was nothing I could do to stop her. A betrayal? Definitely. But something I could fight? Nope… it was a vindictive little move that really would haunt me. But, that was that. Tough. Beggars couldn’t be choosers. At least I was basically done with her for the time being. No attachments beside the equipment and tome. But magically, we were disconnected. It felt slightly daunting. Freeing too.

Moving through the forest then on proved easy enough. It occasionally required some scraping and jumping from root to root, but it wasn’t thick to an uncomfortable degree. Birds chirped. Things bleated, honked, and howled in the distance. The rich scents of the earth filled my lungs and cleared my mind. Passing some yellow flowers, I paused to appreciate them and take a quick sniff of their cinnamon aroma.

I chuckled to myself, “Can’t forget to stop and smell the roses…” I continued walking forward. My only reference of direction was the sun, and though it was sometimes blocked by the overgrowth, I could still spy it by moving around to clearer sections. I made good time, I thought. Till the sun started to go down faster than I had hoped. I wondered if hours had really gone by? Probably? Maybe? I didn’t know, but it sure seemed that way.

“You know… this was not well thought out,” I said to myself. “I am trying to find a village nestled in a massive forest that stretches for possibly thousands of miles and now I have no staff to cast Scry with. Nice one, me… you really screwed yourself this time. Correction… Chaos screwed me over again.” I looked around, wondering if there was some tall tree to climb or something to frame my journey around beside a slowly descending sun. Heck, an informational booth would be a god-send too; but unlikely.

Spotting a slightly taller tree jutting above the rest of them I headed toward it. With a quick climb, I could at least spy some chimney smoke or a break in the forest, I wagered.

Swallowing nervously, relief filled me. “Phew… dodged a bullet there.” I focused on hastening. Slowly, I began to notice something sweet. Unnaturally sweet. Lustfully sweet. And its tantalizing scent urged me toward the tree. My mind began to cloud and I hurried my pace faster and faster, barely noticing the change. Closer and closer. The memory of the Mimic’s alluring and seemingly harmless appearance crossed my mind. Smacking myself, I awakened from trance.

“This is obviously something not good…” I muttered, keeping focused on maintaining control of myself even while the tickling sensations begged me to succumb to its pull. I still approached though. I needed that tree… and I wanted to find the source of the smell. Cautiously approaching, I peeked behind one of the trees to get a view of the largest.

An oak of unnatural proportions sat in a partial clearing, its thick trunk looked more a Sequoia than anything. The plant life surrounding it favored spiked vines, growing thick enough to practically make a hedge of pure spiky abominations. Rich flowers covered the ground along with clover and the random snippet of grass. I internally cursed at the vines. Getting through that would be a huge pain. Literally. And the sweet scent was so overwhelming I felt like vomiting.

But the flowers, vines, and grass didn’t quite explain the scent, so I looked more carefully amongst the foliage. Maybe something was hiding. Or maybe some really big flower… I looked over the scene several times, trying to look through the foliage to what was hiding within. Nothing. Flowers here. A bush there. Nothing unnatural save for how overgrown everything was. I started to think it was just a natural scent coming from the vines or the tree itself.

But then, I spied it.

A bulbous plant hidden amongst the thickest of the vines. Shaped like a massive green pumpkin, it moved slowly as if a muscle, with veins shivering along its outer skin.

‘Now that is quite the oddity…’ I thought to myself. It seemed alive. Maybe some man-eating plant? Was the sweet scent meant to lure in prey, with the vines meant to capture them so the plant could feast?

A disgusting thought. But, it was one I didn’t shun. A mermaid turned into a monstrous shark thing… so anything was possible.

I picked up a nearby branch and aiming, chucked it at the plant. I missed. But, the branch hit the vines and made a decent racket as the vines shivered from the sudden landing. The plant shuddered and its top opened a little, as a bud spreads in bloom.

Slipping out of the top was a tiny flower of pink and yellow, along with green leaves and vines. Beneath them were long, light green silken strands, straight, slightly moist, thick, as if hair. The more the flower opened, the more I realized it was actually hair.

An attractive face appeared. Thin, purple eyes. Pointed ears topped with glowing flowers. Sharper features that matched her slightly shy appearance quite well. It was a woman. A plant woman with green skin, flowers and vines growing off her, and rising from a plant. She looked around curiously for anyone nearby, only rising enough for me to see her head and neck. I quickly slid further behind the tree to stay hidden. Seeing no one, she descended back into her bulb and it closed.

‘Wait a second… I know what this is…’ I quickly moved fully behind the tree and quietly pulled off my pack and fished inside for the massive tome. The chains jingled a little at the sudden intrusion and I hissed, freezing. I peeked around at the plant woman again and sure enough, she was curiously looking around for the source of the noise.

‘I am going to toss these tome chains someday,’ I promised myself. Moving painfully slowly while keeping said chains from banging, I opened the tome and moved to the Mortalis Races section. I knew it started with an ‘A’. ‘Absolver, Aknar… no, no, no…’

I turned a page and grinned, recognition hitting me. ‘Alraune. Known as the Succubi and Incubi of the Forest, they are a sentient race of plant folk who…’ The next part turned my grin upside down, ‘…who drink the Spirit and fluids out of their victims till nothing but a husk remains. The husk then becomes fertilizer for their bulb. They often use scents to lure victims in close enough to grab them.’

I continued reading, now much less pleased with my discovery; but dully thankful I didn’t blindly walk into her sight. ‘Using vines and their humanoid bodies, they pull their victims into the bulb and close it, trapping their prey. If you’re lucky, they’ll ravish you with love as they drain you dry. If you’re unlucky, you’ll just be a paralyzed battery being drained for days.’

‘Having genders, they use their bodies to help entice others in. They gain far more energy from opposing sex victims. Male Alraune thus favor capturing females. And female Alraune favor capturing males.’

I couldn’t help but sigh. I was noticing a trend already. The Mimic lured me in by being a sexy mermaid… and now I found out that Alraune lured victims in through enticing scents and their beauty or handsomeness. Their races had adapted to capture humans and humanoids. Glorious… Flipping through a few pages, I solidified my guess as I saw that many other more bestial races used the same tactics of enticement, among things like fake treasure, promises of greatness, double-edged powers. It was a dangerous world, Mortalis.

Looking back at the Alraune’s bulb, I had a decision to make. Look for another tall tree to climb… or try to deal with the Alraune. I had no staff, so my magic was horrifyingly limited. I had a few hours before the sun was dangerously low… but considering how many dangerous things waited in the forest, I didn’t want to be trudging through the trees when the shadows were long and deep. Worse yet, the further the sun fell, the less I knew my direction of travel. Heck, for all I knew I could have mistakingly passed the village. And eventually the sun would be so low that even higher vantage point would be useless…

Glancing back at the Alraune again, I looked to the tree. I could probably climb up on the other side… though the book mentioned the Alraune occasionally possessed magic, second bodies, or even super long tentacle-vines. It would be a dangerous venture. I could be climbing up and then suddenly a thorn would gore my back. Or a vine would yank me to a deathly fall. And yet, I really needed to climb that tree.

I asked myself… ‘How brave are you, Chaon?’