An evil cackle resounded across the vibrant trees of the woods. A small cave mouth at the base of a narrow hill flooded the surroundings with a ghostly blue and the occasional miss-fired flame.

From these factors, one may conclude that a child had found themselves a magical artifact and gone crazy with power. Such a conclusion would be fair way to describe the 'child' in question.

With a gleeful grin Zeke summoned forth and flung a ball of blue flames to the cave wall. The ball hit the wall and washed over the surface like a tsunami, leaving behind a fantastic wall of flames behind.

Zeke was quite happy with his new toy.

He had been experimenting with the new spell since the very moment his birdsong alarm clock sounded.

He had learned a great many things about his first offensive magic, the most important thing being that the name 'Fireball' didn't do the spell's abilities justice. Almost every aspect of the flames could be manipulated if Zeke made an effort to do so. He could change the heat from a lukewarm to an intense magma, he could throw the spell or just hold in his hands, he could even adjust the duration the flames, all at the cost of mana. The only thing the couldn't be altered was the appearance of the magic, which to Zeke, was a blessing, he didn't want to sully it, it was already perfect.

For a harmless, short-lived fireball the mana cost would be around 7, a proper-fire temperature flame would cost around 12 mana, and a super-heated fireball would cost around 20 mana. So if needed, he could cast 2 super-charged fireballs and a harmless one, or, exactly 4 regular fireballs. The flames also seemed happy to burn through anything, even the solid stone of the cave wouldn't snuff the flames, this made the fireballs especially effective on armoured foes. He could cook them alive in their armour while the armour burnt to ashes, very scary stuff.

Zeke also developed a sort of failsafe from setting himself alight. If the fire was close enough, he could absorb the fire back into his body at the expense of pain. Absorbing his magic after already casting it couldn't be perpetually sustained, there was always a loss of mana in the process, much to Zeke's frustration.

Zeke shoveled in the last remaining cave moss into his mouth while he waiting for his mana to recover, he had 14 at present. In his magically induced trance, he had 'accidentally' incinerated most of his life-sustaining vegetation that the small cave provided.

Zeke went outside and donned his never before worn armour, strapped on his javelin quiver and picked up his trusty club. He was glad he had the foresight to evacuated the cave of all his hard-earned loot before he went on the pyromanical fireball spree.

Zeke gave his club a wistful look-over, the poor thing had been through a lot, literally, and was looking much more worse for wear then when he first found it. The branch was fully dead and becoming brittle, the knot at the end was tinged a pale red from countless victims and sinister splinters covered it's shaft. He would need to find another club, or just switch to a sword, which would be a shame as the bludgeoner class would be neglected. For now, Zeke would continue to use the branch untill it inevitabley broke, a sad day that will be.

With the sorrowful thoughts put to rest Zeke entered the slightly burnt forest, he had to do something about the impending goblin scouting parties. There must be a reason why they haven't already sniffed out his 'more than obvious home', it was strange, afterall, not two days ago had a group found his tree markings and made it half-way to his refuge. Surely by now he would have been discovered? Maybe they lost interest because I haven't attack their hunters in a while? or maybe i'm just not worth the body count to kill me?

As Zeke trudged through the humid bushes he suddenly paused mid-step.

"Status" he called aloud

Zeke Level 8, Survivor

Health: 224/224

Mana: 17/49

Skills: Avarice, Blood Regeneration, Mana Concealment, Fireball

Classes: Spearman 1, Bludgeoner 1

"Mana concealment" he spoke out loud and his mana flow slowed to a crawl in response.

"Whoops, shouldn't forget about that" Zeke said with relief, and then mentally chastised himself for voicing his thoughts again as he continued through the greenery.

As far as he was aware, only slizards had some sort of mana-awareness and Zeke was confident he could fight two easily, but still, he'd rather sacrifice a minor about of mana than a huge amount of health. Not to mention that slizards had a concealment skill to hide from something bigger and badder then themselves.

To be fair, he had only seen one slizard in the past week he had spent in the forest. Prehaps they were a rare-find and taking precautions against them was not worth the mana spent, it would be nice if he didn't need to use mana concealment while exploring, especially since he now needed mana for his offensive spell.

Halfway to the stream, the landscape changed. This was a path Zeke had walked many times, it was easy to tell something was off.

The first abnormality was the silence. The forest was never silent. The only sound was an eerie bone-chilling wind that bounced through the trees.

Zeke continued on to the next marked tree and felt the forest change again. The usual greens had dulled. A muted murky green now dominated the foliage, even a few dead patches could be seen. The cause of this change left Zeke stumped, it was like the forest had contracted an illness. A morbid curiosity pushed Zeke further into the diseased woods. Whatever this change was, it was probably keeping him safe from the goblins on the other side.

Another three marked trees were passed when Zeke happened upon the cause of the diluted forest. A tree.

This tree stood out because compared to all the dead trees around it, this one still had colour to it's bark and leaves.

The tree's thick sanguine trunk twisted around itself multiple times as it reached up to the dulled sun. The tree looked long-dead and somewhat hollow through the few holes in it's trunk. Despite this, it paraded a collection of blackened leaves amongst it's gnarled branches, it was like each leaf was coated in a thick black soot. The higher branches swayed back and forth in an non-existant breeze, as if tree was breathing with invisble lungs.

Compared to all this, one feature specifically had paralyzed Zeke legs and halted his breath. He stood there unmoving at the clearly unnatural tree, unable to tear his eyes away from the tree's centre.

On this trunk's blood-red bark, was a carving, of two triangles, one atop the other, the same he had carved on a hundred trees before. Zeke was sure that he would have remembered marking something like this.