“This isn’t something that happened spontaneously,” Zane said. “Every magic weapon that I sensed was at the first tier. The market doesn’t have fifty tier one magic weapons with similar abilities. I think they were brought to the village by a certain group.”

“The Purist,” Diana angrily interrupted.

“Okay, and who are the Purist?” Sam asked.

“A group that opposes the system,” Zane answered. “They refuse to obtain a class and ignore all quest. Since they can’t rely on the system, they are only able to rely on meditation methods to become stronger.”

“What does this have to do with anything?” Britney demanded in an angry tone.

Zane ignored the anger in her voice and continued his explanation. “The problem with the Purist is the lack of strength their path gives them. Without the benefits that come from having a class the Purist need to use other methods to obtain greater strength. Those methods are always bloody.”

“How do you know it’s the Purist and not some other group?” Sam asked.

Sam’s question made Zane pause. He couldn’t be one hundred percent sure that the Purist were behind the attack. In fact, he couldn’t even be one hundred percent sure that there weren’t fifty of the same weapons at the market. After all, Zane didn’t speak to all of the merchants at the market.

“Of course, its them!” Diana shouted. “Who else could it be!?”

“Diana’s right,” Zane agreed. “We should treat the enemy like their members of the Purist until we learn something different.”

“Okay, so they’re forcing people to kill each other to increase their power.” Frank said. “How does that work?”

“Don’t know, don’t care. The benefits they get can’t compare to what the system gives. What we need to do right now is stop them.”

“Then let’s go,” Jason said.

“We should be cautious as we go forward,” Sophie said. “There might be people guarding the magic weapons.”

Taking the lead, Zane led the group to the location he sensed one of the weapons. They walked through a grass area and passed by a few places where people could rest. After Zane arrived at the area where the weapon was located, he didn’t see anything strange in his surroundings. However, after he took a few steps forward Zane felt the anger he was repressing vanish.

Immediately, Zane felt his entire body relax. Although Zane should have been alert and looking for the enemy, he couldn’t stop himself from closing his eyes and enjoying the feeling of relief that swept through his body. After a few seconds, Zane opened his eyes and noticed three things.

First, was the magic weapon that was a few meters in front of him. It was a staff made of dark red wood, covered in magic symbols with a red gem at the top. The wand hovered slightly above the ground in a circle of magic symbols. The next thing Zane noticed was a giant tree.

Looking toward the forest, Zane saw a giant tree growing out of the ground right at the edge. The bark of the tree was obsidian black, covered in magic symbols that glowed red and its branches were without leaves. The final thing Zane noticed was the two groups fighting near the tree.

Focusing his gaze Zane could see that only humans were in the two groups and most of the people fighting had a warrior-based class. It didn’t look like any side was close to losing, but Zane knew that a battle could change very quickly. Turning to his friends Zane saw that many of them were still immersed in the pleasure that came from the removal of anger. Zane woke them up and directed their attention toward the tree.

“So, I guess were fighting a demon tree,” Brad said.

“The magic symbols on the ground by the staff are connecting the tree to something inside the area we recently left,” Jason responded.

“Great, so we destroy the magic staffs, and everyone stops killing each other.”

“Right, but the magic staffs are protected by the symbols on the ground. The symbols on the ground are connected to each other, so we would have to destroy all of them simultaneously. Also, we might need to destroy the tree as well.”

Zane observed the magic staffs that spread out to his left and right while he listened to Jason’s explanation. Zane and the others didn’t have much to add to Jason’s explanation. Nobody in the group could compare to him when it came to magic.

“I can attack all the staffs at the same time,” Shawn proposed. “However, it will take me some time to prepare.”

“Great!” Brad shouted. “It’s good that we have someone capable of unleashing multiple attacks. I thought we ran into a dead end. So, the rest of us are going to help those guys over there attack the demon tree?”

“It’s not a demon tree,” Diana replied.

“If it’s not a demon tree then what is it.”

“More importantly, how do we kill it?” Britney asked.

“I think it’s-” Diana started.

“We should continue talking as we move,” Zane interrupted.

Everyone agreed and started moving toward the two groups that were fighting. Shawn was the only exception. He sat down and began channeling his mana into the ground beneath him. Zane took a brief look at the growing grass before setting out with the rest of the group.

Zane felt Jason’s mana surge as the group began to leave. The air in front of him became thicker for a moment before returning to normal. Jason told the group he activated a camouflage spell. Although the groups presence might already be known, the camouflage spell would give the group a small element of surprise.

Moving forward Diana began explaining what she knew about the tree. The tree was known as the Bloody Tempering Fruit Tree. The tree grew and produced the Bloody Tempering fruit by absorbing the blood of fresh human corpses below the first tier.

Each fruit required a hundred human corpses to grow and could only be eaten once. The benefit of the fruit was its ability to increase all normal stats by one hundred points. The drawbacks were the loss of one’s source, classes and skills.

“Usually, it would take weeks for the tree to grow.” Diana continued. “I think the Purist are using hidden methods to speed up the growth of the tree or they started a long time ago.”

“Isn’t that fruit a bit overpowered?” Britney asked. “They get a hundred stats and a chance to restart from level one. Even I might kill somebody for that fruit.”

“It’s not a restart if your level remains the same. Also, the system removes all your current skills, and you won’t be able to learn them again. The same goes for your classes. By consuming the fruit, a person is cutting off or narrowing their path.”

“I have some questions,” Frank said. “Do the corpses have to be below the first tier? If they do, then why are they manipulating people at the first tier to kill each other? Also why are the Purist even here? I thought they were against anything related to the system.”

“I don’t know,” Diana answered while shaking her head. “I told you all the information that I learned from my elders.”

“Those things don’t matter,” Britney said. “We just need to focus on killing those Purist and destroying the tree. That tree can be burned right?”

“Yes.” Diana answered. “It doesn’t have any special abilities or defenses.”

Zane was observing his surroundings as he listened to the conversation about the Bloody Tempering Fruit Tree. He didn’t know about the tree before Diana started talking about it, but he did know general information about the Purist. Therefore, he knew the Bloody Tempering fruit, like most of the Purist methods for gaining power, was harmful to those walking their path under the eyes of the system. Teacher Isabelle informed him the bloody signs that were indications of Purist activity and warmed him not to be tempted by their methods.

After a few minutes of running Zane and the others arrived at the area where the two groups were fighting. Zane recognized a lot of the people that were fighting, but Bruce was the only person he knew by name. Bruce was fighting alongside twenty-nine other people against a group made of one hundred and twenty people.

Bruce brilliantly directed the people he was fighting with into different formations. They easily maneuvered through and around the other group as they worked to slowly kill the enemy. Zane saw that Bruce’s group looked wounded and tired, but their fighting spirit was still strong.

Looking toward the Bloody Tempering Fruit Tree, Zane could see hundreds of human and elven corpses piled at the base. A few of the corpses were hanging from branches in the tree. The corpses slowly dried up and streams of blood flowed to the trunk of the tree.

“Stop!” A young man shouted. He had dark skin, dark hair and a scar over his right eye. “Fighting is pointless. The growth of the tree has passed the critical point. The only thing we’re doing is speeding up the final process. It doesn't matter how hard you fight you can’t change the final outcome.

“I don’t care about that damn tree.,” Bruce replied. “What I care about are the people fighting to death because of the ritual you set up. Take it down and we’ll back away.”

“What we set up isn’t complicated enough to be called a ritual.”

“I don’t care what is called!” Bruce charged forward with his group as he shouted.

“Let’s help them,” Brad said.

“Not a good idea.” Frank told him.

“They’re blocking them from reaching the tree, so there must be something there that can break the ritual,” Sam added.

Everyone agreed with what Sam said and began moving toward the tree. The menace and hunger the tree emitted increased as the group moved closer. The tree towered over them and its black branches casted numerous shadows. The group didn’t experience any changes as they moved forward until they were fifty meters away from the tree.

Suddenly, they saw a group of people in magical robes, sitting around the tree and the corpses. They were surrounded by a red glow and a red stream of energy was flowing toward them from the direction Zane’s group came from. The red stream of energy would then go from them into the tree. After a short mental communication Zane’s group immediately attacked. Mana surged, weapons were drawn, and blood flowed.