Chapter 33- Dryads.

"Let's do this!"

With my exclamation, I jump into action and instantly appear behind my foe in a split second by using Blink and promptly redouble my efforts to complete my already halfway completed sword draw to bisect the creature.

The creature turns towards me in surprise and before it even has the time to counter attack, I have already completed my attack and bisected the plant man in half at the waist.

With a high pitched screech the bisected creature starts falling helplessly down towards the grassy ground below, and I quickly follow it as gravity starts pulling me down alongside it.

Blinking once again, I reappear down on the grassy ground and look up at the still screeching creature that is now free spinning while free falling towards the hard ground. A few seconds later a deep thud follows as the creature hits the ground and abruptly puts an end to its screeching.

A shocked silence follows for a few long seconds as I look up towards the canopy in search of the hiding dryads and wait for the inevitable counter attack, and sure enough, after the first angry screech dozen upon dozen more quickly follow until the screeches blend into a crescendo of screeches.

"Uhh… Maybe I should've thought this through a bit more…" I mutter concernedly to myself as dozens upon dozens of the creatures continuously appear from their hiding places and gather in the area above me, until there must be hundreds of the things gathered to angrily mill about on the giant leaves and tree branches above me.

"Yeah… I really should've considered their numbers before I just jumped in like that... What now, smartass?" I mumble to myself as I take in the small army of green humanoids that are arranging themselves above me and are getting ready to attack.

"Where are those elder Dryads anyway? Those are the ones I need, not the spawns." I mumble to myself as I look around for any elder dryads. Obviously, I am unable to make out anything clearly in the sprawling mess of green humanoids above me, so I can only throw my hands up and do what I do best.

"… ...

F#uck it!

I'm just going to roll with it and go full offense here."

As I start gathering and condensing Mana, I ponder my options of attack. 'What element is the best to use here? I mean fire is the most effective, obviously, but what the hell am I supposed to do if I set fire to the whole forest?

… Will it even burn? I mean, magical forest and everything, you know?

Maybe it has some kind of anti-fire safeties?

… Yeah, I dunno. And I'm rambling. Let's just try fire, but hold back.' I decide and promptly get to work forming the Mana into a fire spell: Focusing its effect towards being a flash fire spell, rather than burning spell.

As I start forming my spell, the mass of bodies above me suddenly come alive and start attacking me in a frenzy.

"Can they sense the spell I'm forming?!" I exclaim as I duck out the way of a wooden spear that would have stuck in my head if I hadn't dodged out of the way. The deluge of wooden spears, branches and the occasional wood-type spell forces me to dance around on the forest floor as I frantically continue dodging and Blinking out of the way of the unending onslaught from above.

Finally, after a good minute of running around I am almost finished with the molding of my spell, so mentally aim it at the center of the cluster of green humanoids above me and get ready to release my magic load unto the green bastards above me.

"Alright! Here goes nothing!" I exclaim as I set the spell free on the mass of Dryads above me and immediately Blink multiple times in succession to get as far away from the soon to be explosion as I possibly can get.

As I finish my fourth Blink, I am hit in the back with a massive shockwave that throws me mercilessly 3 meters forward and tosses me unto the forest floor roughly. A split second later I am hit with the loudest damn sound I have ever heard and I immediately clamp my hands over my ears in a futile attempt to cover my ears, but it feels like it isn't doing much, as my ears are ringing and I can physically feel the pressure of the sound shaking my body.

Fortunately, the sound quickly dies down after a few moments pass. The ringing in my ears however, stubbornly remains until I shakily sit up and start meditating to heal my ears all the while I take in the aftermath of my flash fire spell.

The area around where the dryads were amassing is, well… Simply gone. There is basically nothing left of the tree trunk sized branches or it's big thick green leaves, except a few places where charcoal remains of the once mighty foliage can be seen: The now carbonized remains of the once enormous, thick and vibrant branches continue to trickle down towards the forest floor in a seemingly never ending stream of ash. The surrounding fauna hasn't caught fire either, which is

"Well, that worked better than I had thought it would…" I mumble as I take a moment to take in the aftermath of my handiwork.

Soon enough, however, the shaken, bruised and brutalized but still very much alive dryads starts crawling back out and milling to reorganize themselves for attack once again, this time, however, on the ground floor rather than up above me on the tree branches and their leaves.

A quick estimate tells me that at least half of the green bastards managed to survive the blast, and are now visibly regenerating their wounds, regrowing limbs, half blown away torsos and preplacing missing lower bodies within seconds. Their preparation work are an order of magnitude faster this time, however, and a quick sweep over their numbers reveal that there is a particularly large dryad that is openly giving orders to the others.

My guess? That is one of the targets that I am seeking: An elder dryad.

And it looks a lot bigger and meaner than the regular ones, that's for sure: With easily more than two heads taller and a much wider and likely denser body, the elder looks like a regular dryad on steroids and growth pills.

If that was all to it, then it would still be relatively easy to deal with, but the Mana density that I can sense inside the thing are setting off alarm bells in my mind: [This thing is dangerous!] It is screaming at me.

"I know I was told that they were danger and all but this… This is like telling someone to fight a damn grizzlybear with a blowtorch; Sure it can be done, but you'll more than likely have get torn apart by the first swipe of its paws." I grumble as I redouble my effort to fix my hearing enough so it won't get in the way when I fight.

Another moment passes befor my hearing finally returns to a state of somewhat normalcy.

Once it does return to relative normalcy, I promptly and quite awkwardly, stand up and get ready to Blink in and take out the elder dryad as quickly as I possibly can manage.

"I need to down that green bastard as fast as I possibly can, or I'm f#cked." I mumble as I take a sword drawing stance, take in a deep breath and hold that breath as I grab the hilt of my katana and exhale slowly as I execute my sword draw before promptly returning the blade to its hilth.

A split second later, following a rush of wind, a barely perceivable wind-blade suddenly materialize and hurls towards the group of green humanoids at high speed.

Just as the wind-blade reaches the first of the dryads I Blink in right next to the elder dryad and once again do a sword draw; Only to have my blade be stopped short of completing my intended draw, as a large and powerful arm grabs my sword and promptly rips the blade out of my grasp and sends it flying far away to my right.

"Shit!" I exclaim in shock as I watch my sword go flying away. Once the elder dryad turns its full attention unto me, I can feel the pressure in the surrounding begin to grow unnaturally heavy and stale as the very air starts resisting and slowing down my movements. "Double shit."

End of chapter 33