I hate forests now.

I thought that the land beyond the glass prison would be safer. I thought that we had passed the main danger in the dense environment of trees. I was dead wrong. Our encounters with batshit crazy dangers only ramped up.

They ranged from just hurling fireballs at us all the way to giving us a blinding effect for a dozen hours. That one was NOT FUN.

We were completely lost at this point, and Allen had no response for it.

When he and his villagers roamed the forest, there were no traps of any kind that activated. Now, the forest was shifting deliberately, becoming a maze that looped them through endless dangers until they would inevitably be killed.

Now, I was back to back with Allen and Jane against endless waves of weed dolls. Their twisting roots formed vaguely human-shaped enemies that wielded swords and axes made of leaves. These weapons weren't objects of their own; fused to the root people's arms.

The worst part about them was the apparent impossibility of defeating them. A few minutes after one fell, a brand new one would pop up from the ground somewhere and hobble its way over to us, continuing the fight it had already died for.

I hadn't pegged either Allen or Jane for fighters, and by no means were they good at it, but they slowly built some grit after several days in this Turtle-god forsaken leafy hell. Conversely, Turtley was loving it; leaves aplenty for him to munch on while we fought for our lives.

Leave it to me little buddy; I'm the muscle and brains, and you are the cute. Together, we are unstoppable. And the other two help as well, I guess.

Each of them had picked up handmade weapons of their own. Jane had taken a liking to using a fairly straight stick as a pole. Her technique was absolute crap, not looking like martial arts movies at all. I couldn't say much more after that.

She had brushed close to my body and lightly run her fingers across my skin; then asking me to braid her hair like I had back on the island. It had fallen out a long time ago, back at her parent's house when she had taken a proper bath.

I obliged, making sure it was as tight as possible, knowing how dangerous loose hair was during a battle. Even the tied-up quarter meter length was probably too long, but it would have to do.

Allen also asked for some help with knots. He saw the superior craftsmanship of Mr. Axe and needed something similar for his weapon. He handed me a fairly spherical rock and asked me to tie it to the end of the two-meter length vine. It wasn't that difficult, just some tedious monkey's fist tieing.

His weapon is basically just a swinging rock.

I made them their weapons and I was glad I had done so. My mind and body were slowly giving up after days of taking forces head-on alone. Allen had stepped in one time at the last moment to take a steel dart to their shoulder. They were helping me; like, helping me. A little voice at the back of my mind told me that they still had a motive, but I tabled it with the rest of my currently tabled thoughts.

They have my back...for now.

The weed creatures were not letting up, and Jane suggested something radical and barely supported by reason. We had been operating on barely logical radical thinking for the last seven traps, so it was welcomed warmly.

"They seem to continue coming even though we keep killing them. There has to be some kind of thing that acts as the hub for all of them, like a city does for trade routes, uniting the numerous companies. We just need to find whatever is spawning these creatures, and we'll be able to stop them for good."

I liked the plan. It made just enough sense when observed through the lens of magic. With Mr. Axe, I killed two weed creatures at once, slicing their heads off and then making sure to eviscerate their chest.

Going for the vitals wasn't effective with them since they had no internal organs, or even any musculature. The only way they 'died' was to damage them enough so that they fell apart and were absorbed into the ground.

I'd really love to have some weed killer right about now.

Once the creature died, the three of us watched carefully for the direction it returned from. Two minutes later, we saw two weed monsters emerging from the south. They stumbled their way through the dense foliage and grouped up with the dozen or so other monsters attacking us non-stop.

Jane was already moving, so I had to tap Allen on the shoulder and fill him in, "South! Move it!"

He looked around him and saw us booking it to the south. He got the message loud and clear and followed us into the bushes. The dense brambles tore at our skin and created numerous bleeding wounds. We had to deal with it and keep moving if we ever wanted to make it out alive.

We didn't find anything on the other side of the foliage, just another small clearing. There wasn't anything we could do, so we killed more monsters; waiting to see the direction they came from.

Still south.

I decided that we would head south until we couldn't move south anymore. We pushed through thorns and branches and leaves. Our footing was uneven since there was so much decaying forest matter on the ground, like any natural forest.

It was two hundred meters south that we spotted a glowing green sphere. It glowed brightly and then assembled a new weed warrior to come to fight us.

*Smacks button* That was easy.

Nothing said 'target' like a nice glowing orb. we needed to destroy it as quickly as possible so Allen, as out range combatant, swung his rock and sent it sailing at the glass orb. It was made of glass since the moment the rock hit it, it completely disintegrated.

Without a moment of reprieve, 6 walls of fire a few meters tall appeared around us in a hexagon formation. We were trapped once again; though it was nice to see that the number of walls can change.

This time, any tree that dared touch the wall of fire was incinerated to a fine grey powder. This only continued to happen as the hexagon started to shrink at a slow enough pace for us to think of a way to escape.

The wall was only 5 meters tall, so all we needed to do was climb a tree in half a minute and jump over the fire wall and try not to die from either the fall or the heat. Simple. Easy.

A quick round of petting of Turtley envigorated the group. It was nice to see them taking part in my turtle culture; it brought the group closer together to overcome these fucking endless traps. All of our clothes were torn and tattered and entirely unsalvageable.

Up the tree we go.

I grabbed Allen's swingy rock and threw it over the lowest branch two meters above our heads. It was difficult to grapple hook without a grappling hook. The heavy end wasn't willing to wrap around a dozen times and hook onto itself no matter how many times I evoked the dark knight's name.

I gave up trying to secure it and just grabbed the two ends. I quickly tied them together to make a foothold and ascended into the tree. The wall of fire was halfway to us now. I helped Allen and Jane onto the same branch I was on and repeated the process.

Throw. Tie. Climb. Help.

The wall of fire was a single meter from us, burning off the longer bottom branches. It was getting so close that I could feel the terrifying amount of heat contained within those flames. It was like a rectangular bonfire.

I was already on a branch that would be outside the murder zone, all that was left was to help them up onto it from their lower branch. The fire was getting too close for my liking, so I took off my backpack and threw Turtley and LL over the fire wall. The bag was singed a bit, but they landed safely on a low tree branch outside the fire wall's entrapment.

I now had to deal with my human companions. They were still stick on the branch below mine, so I had them tie the vine around them and I used my weakening muscles to pull all 170 kilos of persons onto my branch.

I tried to pull as hard as I could, but the wall of fire swept under us and incinerated Jane's and Allen's legs to a cinder. Everything below the pelvis was completely gone. From the upper section of their thighs, there was only a charred stump and two screaming children.

The fire continued on its path under us, and removed the trunk of the tree. Now, we were 4 meters high and in a freefall. I hugged everyone close and tried to use my body as a cushion 4 meters was a far drop onto solid ground.

A twelve-meter fall would definitely injure us, maybe even kill me. Right now, it didn't matter. We were a unit, so we would escape as one. I can't let the two non-shitty people I found die on me.

I hoped that there aren't any rocks down there. That would be bad.

I do a lot of falling from great heights without safety measures. By a lot, I mean twice, which by many standards is more than many others would consider survivable.

The ground sped at us and I braced for impact. The moment we were about to hit, I let all the air out of my lungs and relaxed my body as much as possible. It was difficult since I had to hold onto two screaming people who were in agony.

*SMASH*

Ow.

The ground hurt. A lot. Much more than other sources of pain. At least when I had hit the ocean, I died instantly and couldn't feel that. The pain was the most amount I could feel without it knocking me out.

Jane and Allen had been knocked unconscious. It was a combination of the fall and of the sheer agony they were in from their burns. I had seven broken ribs, possibly a ruptured liver, and multiple contusions. I was pretty sure that I also had massive internal bleeding, and also a severed spinal cord considering that I was staring at the sky, unable to move anything.

The pendent was trying its hardest to heal me. The first thing that came back was movement, allowing me to feel my fingers once again. I wish it hadn't restored my sense of touch, the pain I felt right now was beyond what I usually could shrug off. Every breath was agony. My liver made me double over in pain.

I never knew that a fall could be so painful.

I have to move. I NEED to move.

I rolled the injured bodies off of me and tried to stand up. Even that was a chore. My arms refused to leave my chest, holding onto the section of torn liver. The human body was forced into consoling a ruptured liver. It was so compact with nerves that any injury to it was debilitating.

Just what I need right now, a movement debuff.

I tried to fight through the pain, but my body fought me with every shred of power it held.

YOU. OBEY. ME. MY WILL; NOT YOURS.

I was able to regain some semblance of articulation and went over to the branch with my backpack on it. The strap was hooked onto an accessible branch, letting me retrieve my animal friends.

I made sure they were fine. Turtley was a little shaken, but LL was still unconscious. I wondered when he would wake up. He'd been sleeping for days now.

I put them on my head and shoved my backpack into Jane's. Her pack was filled with an empty backpack and now mine. I put it back to the side and started to get to work.

I ripped a flexible vine off of one of the trees and used Mr. Axe to pull off a massive section of bark from the tree. It was like a sheet of plywood once I got it off, the wood springing into shape.

This forest is so weird.

I cut out holes in the bark-plywood and tied the vine to it. My crappy sled was then loaded up with two unconscious bodies and two backpacks. Turtley was in his rightful place on top of my head and LL was with him as if he was superglued to his shell. I had never seen him fall off.

I tore off another piece of bark and used it to create something similar to a harness. The vines would dig into my skin without any protection, and it would also spread out the forces. It was just a piece of bark that I then wrapped the vines around and placed on my body.

I sheathed Mr. Axe into his skin holster I made from some unlucky rabbit and started to move.

The pain was immeasurable and my day was ruined. My broken ribs had yet to be healed when I already heard howling noises in the distance. We needed to get the fuck out of there.

Mush Max, mush.

I had no clue as to the direction I should go, but I knew I had to get moving soon. These traps didn't let up, so neither would I. I was simply too angry to die. Rage fueled my every action, it even fueled my calm periods. I had harnessed it into a fine dagger that cuts through all my problems.

Most of my problems. Ok, some of my problems.

I was in desperate need of rest. The pendant hadn't stopped glowing for hours at this point; keeping my corporeal body alive. My mind was chaos and my vision was starting to get a bit wonky since my brain was starting to short circuit from the lack of sleep.

Brain, I swear. If you let us die because you couldn't be bothered to let me see right...you know the rest.

I didn't get a response this time. Maybe Mr. Brain was also out of energy, unable to do his job properly. That didn't bode well.

Through swirling and sort of hazy vision, I started to push on. I would rather die than let my group get injured.

I always keep those who follow me alive.