Chapter 9

“Kill her!” Juchil screamed. “Kill her now!”

The boy held the sword above the prisoner’s face, trying to keep himself from crying. The fungus woman not much older than him looked up with a tear stained face, her otherwise red body with blue spots covered in the green fluid that was the blood of fungus people. More than half the red mushroom atop her head was gone, torn away after growing back during these painful months. Her wrists and heels were chained by honeysuckle vines to the ground, the ends sharpened to protrude deep into the floor beneath.

Causing him to shiver in fear was his father standing behind him as his son held the black venom sword to reach near her throat. Surrounding him in the thirteenth floor of the Tower Fungus were his father’s advisors, veteran members of the Red Fungus. Many of them served as both administrative positions in the mob as well as swordsmen who fought to conquer land needed for Juchil’s ambitions. They all stared at both him and the prisoner they had taken, their eyes boring holes in him with disappointment.

Melsil’s sword wavered in his hands, unable to control his arms as they shook in fear. He was crying just as she was but her expression came from a sense of tiredness, as if there was nothing left for her. Female mushrooms were not born with coverings over their mouths so the young man got a good look at her full expression and from the bruises on her lips and sullen eyes, he could see this woman had been thoroughly brutalized. Each blow that had struck her physical body had also damaged her soul.

Her face, however, was pleading with him not to kill her. Despite her hopeless situation and at death’s door, she obviously still had some amount of hope instilled in her. She was still looking up in hope at him, her courage not totally destroyed or lost as she looked at him with a hope of saving him. Melsil had spoken to her last night, the woman chained in the same place.

“My name is Teres,” she said.

Those were the first words she spoke to him, five months ago when he decided to visit her. Melsil sat across from her, sitting on top of one of the mushroom heads that grew along the floor to form soft seats for anyone. As he sat across from her, his sheathed black venom sword resting against his shoulder, he could only look at her broken and torn body. She was bleeding from several places along her skin and covered in different bruises.

He decided to visit her during the night. The Red Fungus soldiers specialized in inflicting pain were through with her from dawn until dusk before returning to the next. After they left, she was left alone with guards positioned outside her door through which anyone of the main branch of the Duchil family was allowed to visit her whenever they wanted.

“Teres?” was the first thing he asked her once they met. “That’s...a name from the western fungi clans, isn’t it? It means…strong bloom, I think?”

“Powerful blossom,” Teres corrected. “My father named me because spring was his favorite season, the season I was born in.”

Melsil could not go to sleep that night, the story of Teres’s family having to be assassinated bothering him. Normally he’d just have to look at the stars to go to sleep but the news of the Ghilroy family being assaulted was too much. The Ghilroy family was the second most powerful family in all of Ushujin, the only competitor to the Dushil family.

Juchil had successfully eliminated all of the competition of other tribal heads with the support he gained after the massacre at Yellow Spore, a slaughter that took place a few weeks before Melsil was born. The massacre that had not only killed thousands of innocent civilians but destroyed the fungus people’s economy by the head of the Knife Claw army had sewn deep resentment in the mushroom people's hearts against all other species. While their race would never have been dragged into the war had it not been for the Red Fungus allying with the people of the oak, Jushil had taken this opportunity to unite his species against all of Wassergras.

Support had come forth in the hundreds of thousands over the past few years, the Red Fungus’s swordsmen outnumbering the Exploratory Pincer brigade recently. Juchil had not only used the infamous, parasitic red mushrooms that the mob derived their name from to take back control of the land they lost during the most recent war between the oak and pine people. The fungus people who had been trapped in poverty and had many relatives lost when Yellow Spore was destroyed now cheered and celebrated the crawfish’s land being stolen from them. Even more, they threatened to take even the territory of the ants, the most powerful species in Wassergras.

But these victories were not without consequence to their own people. While the Red Fungus were now the most powerful force in the fungus country of Ushujin, they still had rivals who were reluctant to ally with a criminal force that would only stir up resentment against other species. Jushil, knowing this full well, had gone out of his way to depose any royal family in Ushujin that would not ally with him. After they were defeated, their soldiers, land and resources became the Duchil’s and they grew stronger.

Jushil was able to convince so many fellow fungi to attack their fellow mushroom people because of one key element: foreign fear. With the fungus people now fearing and hating every other species in Wassergras, he painted every tribal leader and royal family not saber-rattling against the crawfish, ants and pine people as cowards so fearful they would not defend their mother country. While it was true the other royal families in Ushujin didn’t want to war against rival species, it was because they did not want to sacrifice anymore lives for pointless bloodshed, instead trying to curry favor with the ants who now restricted their military. Duchil despised this and said they were race traitors, turncoats who hated their own race enough to sell them out for the illusion of peace. And the fungus people at it up as angry as they were.

The Ghilroy’s were the last piece that had to fall before Jushil was virtually unrivaled by any military or political force of his own species. They were a family tribe that was notably hospitable to other species and trying to act as peace brokers between the fungi and the ants. With the Ghilroys using what military the Red Mountain ant colony allowed them to have to target the Red Fungus, the chances for war from breaking out were mitigated. And Juchil hated this.

So he began targeting the Ghilroys. Juchil was able to capture their daughter, Teres, in a meeting. Juchil paid off southern tribe fungus peoples to pretend to be politicians. Luring Teres Ghilroy, both a mushroom swordsman and a diplomat for her family’s royal lineage, Juchil sent soldiers in place to ambush her. After capturing her, Teres was tortured for five months before revealing the hidden location of the Ghilroy family’s whereabouts.

The first few months she stayed strong, saying nothing, even while she was brutalized. Melsil could hear the screaming all the way from five floors up. He had to no longer sleep in the same room, it disturbed him so much. The pleas of Teres begging that her family be kept safe and not be harmed not only hurt him but made him genuinely curious about her life.

Melsil visited her many times a night, wishing to know about her family, unable to sleep knowing the girl’s torment was immeasurable. Those guarding her allowed him in, not thinking much of Juchil’s son talking with a prisoner, probably convinced he was trying to coerce information from the captured girl. However, that only made him respect her. After months of egregious violence shown to her and not only were the Red Fungus no closer to getting any information from her but Teres still having the ability to talk correctly was something beyond comprehension for him. Melsil wanted so badly to release her but with her wounds, she couldn’t escape.

“You certainly earned your name,” the mushroom swordsman said. “Powerful...only someone with an intense spirit could resist so much pain.”

She looked at him silently, not blinking, afraid to speak anymore. Teres was trying to speak as little as possible as it was clear she was doing her best not to divulge anything that could be used as information to find her family. Melsil could only feel immense appreciation of such a courageous heart.

“My family,” she said. “Is my strength...they mean everything to me.”

She lowered her head, obviously uncomfortable with looking him in the eye. It was at that point Melsil felt too agonized by her sorrow to stay in the room any longer. He left that night, resisting the urge to stay awake and forced his eyes shut. It would be another week before he would return. The question that plagued his mind is something Teres confronted him with.

“What?” she asked as she looked away. “Would you not do the same for the Juchils?”

The question hurt him in a way no sword piercing his flesh ever had.

“I don’t know if I could,” Melsil said. “As much as my father has trained me in the art of the sword...I don’t know if I could go months on end without saying anything incriminating.”

“That’s because you don’t care for the path your father has set you on,” Teres said.

“What?” he asked.

“Parents often have difficulties raising their children,” she answered. “They want their children to follow the path they think is most beneficial for them. But, for whatever reason, their generation rarely ever follows the route their elders wanted them to take. Whether it be stubbornness, immaturity, lack of gratitude or whatever...children hate being told what to do, especially as they get older. You seem to be the person who doesn’t want to follow the path of destruction your father put you on but didn’t realize how much you hated it.”

Melsil narrowed his eyes.

“I don’t hate my father,” he said. “Or the path he put me on. I want the best for my people.”

“Then why visit me?” Teres asked. “You could be like all the others who destroy my body and break everything in me...but instead you ask me about my personal life. And it’s because you don’t want to torture people or kill others...you’re not willing to be tortured for your father’s ambitions because you don’t care about your father’s goals.”

Melsil stiffened at her words, shaking his head.

“No, no, no…” he said. “I-I love...love my father. He’s-he’s a good man...he’s doing what he needs to for the people of the fungus…”

“If you believe that,” Teres said. “Then torture me.”

Melsil’s shoulders went limp.

“N-no,” he said. “I can’t...why...why would I-?”

“Do you think it’s wrong?” Teres asked.

“Yes it’s wrong!” he said as he stood up.

And he immediately regretted saying what he did. Melsil looked down at the prisoner as Teres looked up at him with solemn eyes. Her expression was so dispassionate, the woman not even feeling proud she caught him in his words. All Melsil could do was sit back down and frown beneath his face covering.

“Therein lies the dissonance between your father and you,” she said. “You would never want to torture an innocent person, yet you are his puppet. Why do you continue to go down a path you know you hate?”

Again, it was a question that Melsil could not stand to answer. He’d always been burdened with the idea of what he would do if he was Teres’s torturer. Or if he had to be the one to assassinate rival families.

Melsil despised this so much he rarely ever thought about it, preferring it to be a nightmarish what-if scenario rather than a physical reality he might be tasked with. He went to bed that night, even further dismayed by her inquiries. Melsil resolved to not return to Teres again for three weeks, hoping she would say something different. Instead, he turned over that night trying to think of something to say that would defeat her rebuttal. He came up with one after two nights before returning.

“Because it’s what must be done,” he said. “If my species is to survive in this increasingly violent era then we must become violent ourselves. When Yellow Spore was destroyed the Knife Claw general knew that there was no need to destroy the capital of our commerce. He did it out of fear of economic rivalry. And if we don’t fight back we’ll be slaves to the ants and crawfish forever. The Red Fungus is our only hope.”

“But the Ghilroy family was already doing that,” Teres said. “My family was going out of its way to be a peaceful buffer between our two races in an attempt to consolidate peace. We knew the ants were stronger than us and had to adapt. There would be no need for the Red Fungus if we had our way.”

“But we wouldn’t even be a real nation,” he said. “Merely subservient bondservants walking on eggshells in attempt to not incur wrath of-”

“Wrath of our overlords,” she said. “Yes...I’ve heard this exact argument before. The Red Fungus spread that exact propaganda everywhere in order to create obedient soldiers for their cause.”

“Well it’s true,” Melsil said. “And how do you know if you chose your own family’s path back?”

Teres laughed.

“Because,” she said. “I would live, die and be tortured for my family. It’s one thing to serve your own kind because they’re your kind...it’s another thing to do so because you prefer them over anyone else.”

“So…” Melsil said. “What you’re saying is...you’re not serving the Ghilroys because you were born into the Ghilroy house?”

“No,” she said.

“But that…” he said. “That’s...foolish. Who would not want to serve their own kind?”

“Someone who sees past such foolish division,” Teres said. “My father and mother taught me to look beyond the special differences of one another. If we all live, think and breathe then there’s no reason not to treat the other as equals. The Ghilroys have a long history of facilitating wealth that would help not only the people of the oak but the pine as well. They’ve been the first to attempt to establish good relations with even the ants.”

“I know,” Melsil answered. “And the Ghilroys are traitors for their historic betrayal to our race.”

“The Ghilroys were not always seen as traitors,” she said with a smile. “In the country of Ushujin they used to be seen as tolerant, civil and very helpful to the mushroom peoples. It was the Red Fungus who were thought of as the more sinister of the fungus species. Us losing the war with the crawfish and ants changed all that.”

“Is that true?” Melsil asked.

Teres smiled up at him, now feeling clever at his instinct response. Melsil felt tricked, like how she got him to admit that he thought it was wrong to torture people. He shrugged, embarrassed at his response. Now it was revealed that he didn’t know much about history between the fungus, crawfish, ants or anyone else. Or at least he knew very little past what his father told him. Melsil had never read a history book on the subject, even though he knew they existed. He never had access to such a thing and even if he did he felt his father’s explanation of the world was sufficient for understanding Wassergras.

That would explain why he never told me of the Ghilroy’s reputation before the Yellow Spore massacre. He thought. He wanted to convince me they’d always been seen as traitors by the fungus. NO! NO! That cannot be the case!

“And after the evil species of the crawfish destroyed our people’s pride and heart, you still don’t think it’s useless to compromise with such malevolent races?” Melsil asked. “You’re proud of their history?”

“No race is inherently evil,” she said. “I love my family and yes...I am proud of their history.”

“Dis-disgusting,” he said.

But Melsil wasn’t thinking that. Instead he was thinking that was both smarter and more beneficial to everyone in Ushujin than the Red Fungus taking control. He didn’t dare say that but not for fear his father or his underlings would hear. He was afraid of admitting it to himself than anyone else. It meant everything Melsil knew was wrong. He stood up with the intent to leave the room but just as motioned for the door, she asked him something else.

“Can you say that you’re proud of your family?” Teres asked.

Melsil was asking himself that same question as he pointed his sword at Teres’s face. She looked so sad, yet so pleading, her eyes begging him not to kill her. She was so brave, not giving up on the hope that she may be able to live. Melsil admired that more than anything his father had ever done. He knew definitively that if he killed Teres he would stain his conscience with innocent blood. Not only did he want her to live, he couldn’t stand the thought of her dying, even as the eyes of the Red Fungus attendants burdened him.

“I honestly have barely ever met anyone outside the Red Fungus,” he told her the next night. “Many of them are relatives. I’ve never been proud of them...just that since they’re my kind I should obey them. It’s the natural order to look after your own.”

“My father told me that if all we did was obey the natural order,” Teres said. “We would be like nothing more than the animals we hunt. We’re allowed to kill certain creatures because they are not equal to a sentient creature. All grass frogs and cicadas know is how to kill for food and flee for danger. If we did that then we would be no better than that. So is the natural order really a life philosophy we should adopt?”

Melsil could not answer that. He had no knowledge of how to answer. It was as though she asked him if he shouldn’t drink water or eat food to survive. How could Melsil go against something so natural?

He didn’t talk to Teres anymore that night. Each night he visited her was after she was tortured, not daring to do so before. And each night she was still strong enough to speak. Over the passing months where Teres refused to give up information about her family’s hiding place, it only drove a deeper wedge in his mind. Here was a rival family member, an enemy, acting more noble than Melsil ever had for a cause and a family he had been taught was evil. And she had proven to be more moral than he was.

Why? He thought. Is this a curse? Some punishment I’ve been given by a higher being? Who has stricken me with this plague of moral guilt?

He then turned over on the mushroom bed he slept in, angry at her words.

Doesn’t she know that it’s necessary for us to be violent? Melsil asked. We have to be! We’ve been oppressed for centuries by other species! The Red Fungus was meant to fight the ants when the Red Mountain ants invaded all those hundreds of years ago! Why...why should I have to defend the fungus people’s anger?! Teres is just brainwashed...the Duchils...we know the truth.

However, the downfall of the Ghilroys was not their daughter giving up information about them. It was their daughter herself. Jushil, fed up with Teres’s resolve, publicly announced that his forces had captured the Ghilroy heiress.

With this, it was a declaration of civil war that was meant to lure in the remaining Ghilroy family. While the ants were a numerous force in their own right, the fungus people allied with the Red Fungus were far more numerous than those standing with the Ghilroys. The latter were seen as traitors who aided the occupying enemy while the former as heroes rebelling against a foreign nation that was pure evil. When the ants attempted to fight the Red Fungus in their home territory of Ushujin with a few fungus soldiers at their side to find the Dushil stronghold and retake Teres, they were crushed.

But the worst was yet to come when the rest of the Ghilroy family had been captured. Jushil knew that once he announced to all of Ushujin that he had taken the Ghilroy’s daughter the royal family would have no choice but to personally save their daughter. It was a tradition of royal families of fungus people to be fighters in their own armies. The leaders of the fungus clans were trained from the youngest age possible to wield weapons and fight in battle. Those that didn’t were seen as cowards and not taken seriously. While other species like the oak, pine and ants did not do this it was a tradition both the crawfish and fungus held as a carry over from ages past. Dushil used this to draw out his only remaining competition.

The Ghilroy family were captured in battle during the war. Melsil was present when Natun Ghilroy, the patriarch of the royal family of the western fungi clans, was captured. He was a mighty warrior who slew dozens if not more than a hundred Red Fungus black venom swordsmen with the thorn mace, a large, thick vine full of sharp spikes that extended forward with a large ball at the end. Mushroom people could wield botanical as well as fungal weapons due to their ability to send nutrients into living things.

Melsil purposefully withdrew from fighting Natun, not out of fear of being killed but fear of Teres’s father being killed. No longer able to stomach the guilt the girl had instilled in him with, he fled to the outskirts in the mushroom forest they fought in to observe from afar Unfortunately, Natun was eventually subdued after growing fatigued from the battle. Weakened, bloodied and bruised and his mace torn into pieces, Natun was bound with honeysuckle and brought to the Tower Fungus Dushil lived in.

Melsil was horrified to find that not only was a weakened and crippled Natun bound but also his wife Fugil, their youngest daughter, Cedra, eldest son, Vukil, and Teres, the youngest child. The entirety of the surviving royal family of Ghilroy was bound before the Duchils. Jushil laughed and smiled at the sight of his rivals killed. Duchil’s wife and Melsil’s mother, Golar, Melsil’s youngest brother Toride, his eldest brother Kuseen and sister Shujeen looked like ravenous wolves, wishing to tear into the prey before them. Only Melsil looked the least bit reluctant to attack or harm them, standing in the very back so no one else could see the sorrow in his face.

“Oh,” his father said. “I have a very special surprise for your daughter. You see, she was so stubborn about not giving up information after half of where you race traitors were that I decided to draw you out into the open. And my anger for her has...reached maddening levels.”

Jushil then gestured for Kuseen to approach him. The eldest of the Duchil children approached and drew his blade as every member of the Red Fungus in the room looked in anticipation at the blood about to be drawn. Juchil pointed at Vukil and Juchil immediately slashed down at him. His severed torso went flying, the entire Ghilroy family screaming as it did. Kuseen then began cutting up Vukil’s body even further, no longer satisfied with just killing him but utterly decimating his form. His strokes were so wild the green blood of the eldest son began splashing on the other members of his family, Kuseen laughing the whole time.

Juchil couldn’t stop laughing, bawling in mirth as he slapped his knee. It was as though the slaughter of their child was the funniest joke he’d ever seen or heard. The rest of the Duchils were laughing so much it flooded the room but none more so than Juchil. His hatred for his enemies was intense, beyond anyone in the Duchil family history. After Vukil’s body had been sliced beyond recognition and his blood slathered his family, Jushil looked directly into Natun’s heartbroken eyes with cruel delight.

“I am going to have each of my family members,” he said as though savoring his own words. “Kill one of yours. You will die second to last and your youngest daughter...she will watch every bit of it. I hated you, Natun, for being friends with the species’ that lost us the war but your daughter...she has irritated me so much during these last few days…”

He laughed, bellowing in pleasure before erupting into intense anger, glaring before shouting in hatred.

“Your daughter!” Juschil said. “For wasting my time for half a year! Half a year of wasted endeavors...I-I hate those who waste my time. Time is precious...especially as old as I am...if I am to cement our race’s supremacy into Wassergras permanently before I die I must use each moment to its fullest potential! Your daughter will die covered in the blood of her precious family she wasted my time in protecting!”

He then turned to Golar and pointed at Natun’s wife.

“Kill her!” he said. “Wife for wife!”

She drew her blade as she stood over the terrified mushroom woman, shaking in fear.

“With pleasure,” Golar said.

And another one was dead. As Melsil’s mother cut her to pieces, aching with laughter the entire time, the green fluid produced was what the rest of the Ghilroy family bathed in. And the nightmare continued. Melsil watched as everyone except him killed one of the Ghilroys. After Natun was dead, it was time for Teres to die.

“Melsil,” Juchil said. “Slay her.”

The girl was drenched in green liquid, her face blank as the horror she’d experienced so beyond evil she had no perception at that point. Melsil walked toward her, not even drawing his sword until close to her. His lack of laughter was very apparent, everyone else in the room cackling up at the decimation of their enemies. With Teres barely acknowledging him, he turned back to his father with pleading eyes.

“Why?” he asked. “Why me?”

His father’s dark mirth transformed into an angry scowl.

“Because,” he said. “I know you’ve been visiting her these past few months. I need to test if you are still loyal to me. Prove to me you are not poisoned by this vile woman’s ideology.”

He looked down at Teres, not sure what he should do. Not only was there no way she would survive this night but it almost looked as though she didn’t want to live. She barely acknowledged Melsil, almost as though he were not standing above her. Teres looked defeated.

“Do it boy!” Jushil roared. “Do it!”

“But…” he said. “But father...I have never killed a prisoner before. Only soldiers...soldiers in battle. I...I cannot-”

“You cannot kill traitors to our kind so long as they don’t greet you with a sword?!” Jushil shouted. “You feel you should show this fool any semblance of honor?! You want to pretend like they’ve done anything for our race?!”

“But-but-” Melsil said. “Is it right?”

“It doesn’t matter if it’s right!” he shouted. “It matters if our kind is destroyed by the cowardice and complacency of those unwilling to stand up for our species! Now kill her!”

Melsil drew his sword, reluctant to move it any further. As he pointed the blade at Teres he began shaking. He was trying hard not to cry with the emotional suppression warriors of the Dushil family were trained to maintain. A tremor was running through Melsil’s entire body as he did. He could hear his family behind him groaning in protest of his reluctance.

However, when he looked past his own shaking he saw something in Teres’s face. As much as she had endured from seeing her family die and being tortured for so long, something remained in her. Teres looked up at him with some sense of hope in her. At first he thought it was her wish to live but then, the closer he looked, he found it wasn’t that.

Is…? He thought. Is she happy...with me? That I’m hesitating?

He looked down at her bruised face to see that she was pleading in sorrow. And yet, paradoxically, there was something else. Something that looked like...victory. She had won in a way.

She won. Melsil thought. She never gave up her morals the entire time she was here. Never betrayed her family. Never killed anyone innocent. And so she can die with a clear conscience. That’s what I see in her face. Teres knows she can die never having betrayed her family.

“Kill her!” Juchil said.

He began to remember what she asked him about the path his father forced him down and, even moreso, asked Melsil if he was proud of his family.

“No,” he answered.

He sheathed his sword. A faint smile could be seen flash on Teres’s face. Just as one appeared beneath Melsil’s face covering, he was slammed in the side by a hard force.

He fell to the floor, skidding against a wall. Just as he winced in pain and looked up he could see Toride walk up and begin hacking away at Teres. Melsil’s eyes watered as he saw her torn apart, her blood splashing onto the floor to complete the lake of blood in the center of the room. Of all the death he’d seen in battle, nothing had prepared Melsil for the shock of such an innocent soul being torn to shreds by an evil man.

He didn’t have long to grieve, however, as Kuseen and Golar raced toward him and each grabbed him by the shoulder. As they lifted Melsil off the floor he tried to resist but Kuseen unsheathed his sword to point the blade at his brother. The laughter in the room had died down and nothing remained but an angry silence that Melsil knew the brunt of was placed squarely on him. He looked around with a hazy gaze to find every one of his father’s attendants glaring at him. Juchil looked the most hateful, his disappointment apparent. Melsil could tell he had hurt his father with his actions.

“You…” he said. “You’ve wounded me son...you’ve wounded me…”

His body was broken with repeated slashes from the swords of his family until he could no longer move. Bound with honeysuckle he was deprived of food and water for days in the same room Teres was put in. Melsil had lost count as everything around him faded, nothing in his mind except his father’s disappointment. The torturers that had brutalized Teres had been replaced by Juchil and other Duchil family members repeating the same things in his mind over and over again.

Teres… He thought. Your smile it...it poisoned me. I hate you...you tempted me to commit evil...to defy my race and my family. I should have never spared you...

He looked down in sorrow.

What did my father do to deserve such hatred and lack of gratitude I showed him? Melsil asked. To betray our race the way I did…

He looked up as the door opened for his father, mother and three siblings to enter. They all looked at him gravely, sorrow apparent in all their faces. Their hands were nowhere near the sword hilts, something very strange as Duchil family members were taught to always be ready.

“Do you know how long you’ve been here?” Juchil asked as he neared him.

“How…?” Melsil asked as he was too deprived of nutrients to say anymore.

“Nine days,” he said. “Nine days.”

He knelt down in front of his son to meet his gaze.

“Do you realize the amount of pain you’ve made me suffer?” Juchil asked.

“Y-y-y-yes,” he replied.

Juchil motioned for Golar to come forward. His wife drew her sword to cut the vines binding Melsil. He fell over, too tired to move any further.

“Gather your strength,” Juchil said. “You need to get back into the war effort. We have to counter an alliance between ants and the pines. They don’t like each other but they’re united against us. The ants are using the Venom Drench martial art to deprive the land of the red mushrooms we’ve planted and we need to stop them before they can go any further. Are you up for the challenge?”

He looked up at his father to look at him with a pleading expression.

“I will do anything…” Melsil said. “To redeem myself. F-f-forgive...my foolish...ness.”

Juchil gave him an uneasy smile as he ran his fingers across the dome shaped mushroom head that crowned him.

“You have returned, my son.”

Melsil held his sword forward at Geseer, the red mushroom swordsman pointing his own blade at the Duchil family member as well. Geseer was the captain of the Red Fungus swordsmen and the personal trainer of the Duchil royal family since Kuseen had been born. The captain had trained every of Juchil’s children in swordsmanship from their first year of birth until present day.

The mock battles between them were brutal as not only was Melsil only nineteen while Geseer was thirty-five but Melsil was also wearing weight vines. The vines dangled off his arms and legs with large seeds that greatly slowed his movements. And to make matters worse, Melsil had to attack first since he was the challenger.

He ran at the captain, sword swung to his side to strike his opponent. Geseer deftly parried Melsil’s attack but almost as he did the Duchil family member slashed at him again. This attack nearly landed on Geseer’s collar bone, not expecting his opponent to be so nimbly able to block the attack. Geseer then attempted to slash again but Melsil sidestepped the attack before landing his sword against the older swordsman’s neck. Geseer gasped, startled at such speed. Then he laughed.

“Getting better all the time I see,” he said. “Even better than your father. Took him twice your age to beat his tutor that quickly. You're a natural kid.”

Melsil sheathed his sword before bowing. He looked around to find his family standing around him and looking proud. After taking the weight vines off and throwing them to the floor, Melsil walked up to his family to feel a sense of warm gratitude flood over him. Everyone from his parents to his siblings looked so happy for him as he was the only one of his siblings, along with Kuseen, to defeat Geseer.

“Way to go, Melsil,” his sister said.

“To think I’ve raised such a fine warrior,” Golar said.

“I’ve waited for this day for so long,” Juchil said. “You have truly shown remarkable progress. If anyone else had been better than me at such a young age I’d be jealous but you...you’re truly a fine specimen.”

He smiled beneath his face covering, his eyes alone showing every emotion he felt. The event with Teres felt like a distant memory. His father had forgiven him for showing such foolish weakness for allowing her to pollute Melsil’s mind. He could now forgive himself for such a sin.

And yet he wanted to kill himself. Melsil had the desire to fall on his own sword in battle, to die in a way his family would think was simply another soldier lost in their war. He wanted to end it all and say goodbye to everything he knew. Every single night that Melsil slept he could see Teres’s face, staring up at him with an expression he still couldn’t figure out.

Was she pleading for me to save her? He thought. Or was she just happy that she died with a clear conscience? Or was she happy she got through to me? That I refused to kill her and that was her ultimate victory?

“Truly a wretched woman she was,” his father said. “To think they tempted my dear boy.”

“You can say that again,” he answered. “I only wish I could see her face again when her family was skewered in front of her eyes. Now that I think about...it’s hilarious to me.”

Was that what Teres wanted all along? He thought. To prove something to me? That there’s something beyond just fighting for your kind and immediate family? What am I to fight for instead? Nothing? Everyone? Those are the only two possibilities.

“It’s time to rejoin the war effort,” Juchil said. “I’ve gathered the strongest swordsmen to take back the land of Ushujin that the pinecone people have. Only question is do you think you’re strong enough to face up front the place the ants are most heavily concentrated?”

“If that will be what restores our people’s honor,” Melsil said.

It had taken months to reach the land near the pine tree. While the Melsil and the hundreds of other swordsmen he had traveled with did see many red mushrooms, it was becoming more and more apparent the ants had removed the majority. The time had been a wet one, the downpour slowing their movements. Juchil had hoped to surprise the ants and pinecone people with the hundreds of Red Fungus swordsmen but the element of surprise was ruined by the rain they’d experienced.

While it might have been a miserable experience for the entirety of the Red Fungus soldiers heading there, if it was sunshine and clear skies Melsil would have still hated it. Every night they would stop to rest, he would look up at the stars and shiver in a fear he had never before known. The entire time Melsil was thinking of why Teres was so satisfied with her death. Sure, she wanted to live and was destroyed by her family’s death but there was something there in her expression. Something that bothered the mushroom swordsman to no end. And he was beginning to figure out why.

The path that her parents set her on was one that Teres truly chose for herself. Melsil realized. If she was able to decide her birthplace and birth parents, it would have been the Ghilroy family. And she was lucky enough to be born in it. She died as she lived, for the sake of others and not herself.

This revelation made him wish for death more than anything else.

She’s the complete opposite of me. He thought. In circumstances, not in personality or in intellect. If I could decide my birthplace and parentage…

He couldn’t say the Ghilroys, Melsil feeling he was not able to achieve such a noble level they had attained.

It would never be the Duchils. He thought. I would rather be born to the poorest family of the lowest class of any species than them. I hate killing...it took me so much to just kill soldiers in battle...I wanted to spare them but knew it would risk my own survival too much...killing and oppressing this many innocent people...it’s just too much…

He would turn away from the stars, afraid of gaining any further revelation from them.

But if I run away and leave...Melsil thought. My people would be oppressed...all I’d be doing is easing my conscience at the risk of letting the fungus people be destroyed by foreign invaders.

Melsil would then shake his head.

But it’s not as though my might alone would be enough to save the fungus people. He thought. As strong as a master swordsman is, he’s no match against thousands. Nuten and his family found that out the hard way. He thought that was invincible in both morality and power. And so he and his family fell by the sword. The result of confusing physical might with righteousness. If I fight, will anything change?

As much as Melsil dreaded the coming battle where more widows and widowers would be made, he almost felt it a relief. As any soldier will tell you, charging headlong into an enemy is easier than dealing with the complicated affairs of the heart and mind. The mushroom swordsmen finally met the wall of Red Mountain ant soldiers that had prepared for them.

The ants formed a long line to form a barrier past the grassy terrain that was strewn with fallen pine cones. With fungus soldiers’ movements slowed, word spread fast of the approaching fungus army and the ants were quick to mobilize a defense force. Melsil was at Geseen’s right side at the front of the army of fungus swordsmen drew his sword to signal to charge. The rest of the Red Fungus soldiers did so as well and ran at the ants ahead of them, splashing in the rainwater under the dark clouds as they flung themselves forward.

They’re soldiers. He thought. Just like me. If they die...no harm done. No innocent civilians killed...no blood on my hands of women and children. I need this.

And that was when the pinecone people leaped from the cones surrounding them. From the dark recesses of the brown pines launched forward several people of the pine at once. Melsil was the closest of the soldiers immediately around him to a pinecone to practically smell the resin that they naturally produced, almost pricked by their pine needles growing from their upper bodies. He looked around to find one was extending its tree limb for an arm at him, the green needles around his wrist threatening to poke his eye out.

The swordsman rolled onto the ground to avoid the attack, his body splashing into the rainwater and mud as he did. He quickly picked himself up, covered in mud and thoroughly soaked, to find that a mushroom swordsman next to him had been thoroughly skewered by the pine needles extending from his arm. Geseer was nowhere to be seen, most likely lost in the chaos as their formation had been destroyed by the surprise ambush of the pinecone people. Melsil couldn’t understand why so many swordsmen marching forward were destroyed by a simple surprise attack.

However, when he steadied himself to his feet he found out why. Strapped to the front of the pine soldier that had stabbed to death a Red Fungus swordsman was a living fungus person. They were a male, yellow drape fungus who was bound to the pine soldier with honeysuckle vine. Melsil was unsure if he was seeing things or not because he wondered how one could restrain a living person to themselves without being burdened that much.

That was before he noticed it was a child. The yellow drape was screaming and shouting for their parents, tears of green running down their face. All of the appendages that cloaked a yellow drape had been cut away, leaving nothing but stumps. While the fungus child was obviously in pain and writhing around on top of the pine soldier’s stomach, the warrior turned to face a Red Fungus swordsman that Melsil recognized as Shegel, the swordsman raising his black venom sword in defense.

He was a mighty warrior who was one of his father’s favorite assassins, slaughtering the entirety of three noble families all by himself. However, when Shegel noticed the child he lowered his blade. The fungus swordsman was obviously very reluctant to attack with the child strapped to the pine swordsman.

Shegel never hesitated to attack anyone before. Melsil thought. He’s slaughtered children without a second thought before. I’ve heard him brag about it to my father.

The pine soldier took the opportunity to charge at Shegel, the assassin quickly attempting to counter. While the swordsman was no slouch, he was so reluctant to attack the enemy combatant his defensive parry was too late. Just as Shegel raised his blade the pine needle growing from his opponent’s wrist speared his neck, immediately causing him to collapse. With Shegel dead, the pine soldier quickly turned to Melsil, the swordsman not even bothering to lift his sword.

So this is their strategy. He thought. Use children as literal meat shields to prevent them from landing the killing blow. They know our warriors are bloodthirsty enough to cut through women, children and the elderly en masse with a smile on their face, laughing the whole way. Unless it's their own kind...that hasn’t allied with another race. Our soldiers will wipe out anyone in their way they think is a threat to their own species...but what happens when it is their species?

It was not until the pine soldier lunged at Melsil he realized he was more focused on the child than his opponent. He wasn’t even conscious of the fact that he was lunging backward to avoid the sharp point of his opponent’s weapon growing from the pinecone man’s body. Everything in Melsil’s mind was racing with possibilities of how he could save the yellow drape child. As he was attempting to figure out ways to preserve the fungus infant’s life, his muscle memory was taking over and he was practically stumbling over himself to weave around the pinecone man’s strikes.

If I can cut the vines linking the two I can kill the soldier without risking the infant’s life… He thought.

He barely side stepped a stab from the pine needle that would have skewered his neck.

But such a cut would require me to not only be very precise but shallow. Melsil worriedly thought. I’d have to hold back every bit of force just to halve the vines...not to mention the child would fall and possibly be trampled by the advancing warrior. Could I catch him…?

That thought was immediately cut short by the pinecone man nearly stabbing him in the upper chest. He avoided it just in time to avoid a mortal wound but too late for the attack not to land at all. Melsil screamed in pain as the pine needle cut into the side of his chest, green fluid pouring from the area.

He jumped back, clasping the wound to find his already green hand becoming greener and greener as blood poured from it. He glared down in pain before turning up to find the warrior still charging at him. While Melsil could not see the pinecone man’s mouth due to it being covered in a beard of green pine needles, his eyes were full of nothing but bloodlust, the screaming infant splitting his ears.

“To kill a Duchil family member is a greater honor in my line of work than anything!” he shouted. “Die along with the rest of your devil race!”

It was now or never. Either decide to save the child and somehow live or abandon both goals entirely. Melsil, taught to make accurate slices with less than a second’s worth of time to act, slashed forward at the pine soldier’s upper chest. The honeysuckle vines carrying the child were cleanly split in two but left nothing more than a shallow scar across his bark plated chest. The yellow drape child fell to the ground before the pine soldier was fully aware of his hostage being gone.

But that didn’t matter as Melsil took the brunt of a pine needle to the chest. When the green foliage speared his body he felt a world of pain followed by a quick numbness that spread across his upper torso. He breathed a sigh of relief that the wound was not deep enough to almost reach the internal organs most vital for mushroom men to survive, the equivalent of their heart before falling to the ground. The slash of his black venom blade had deterred the enemy combatant from thrusting any deeper into Melsil than he did, expecting a parry to counter the needle spear rather than an attempt to save the child’s life.

The pine soldier fell with him to the ground, kneeling over him with his spear still stuck in his body. He glared, attempting to drive the weapon growing from his wrist even further in before Melsil’s instincts kicked in. He slashed upward with the black venom blade to slice the pinecone man in half.

One of his halves was flung to either side of the mushroom swordsman as he stood up, the arm of the dead soldier still protruding from his body. Melsil felt dizzy standing up, the pain inflicted too much to continue on. The fungus people were nowhere near as durable as the people of either oak or pine and a single good hit crippled them for days on end. Just as he grabbed hold of the arm of the pine soldier and tore it out of his body, Melsil almost collapsed in pain before finding the strength to carry on. While fungus people were weak, he had been taught to continue moving despite immense pain.

He staggered forward to lean over the screaming infant. He scooped up the yellow drape child as he wondered how long it would be before his drapes would grow back. The child continued whining in fear, flailing around in Melsil’s arms as he was threatening to throw himself out of his grasp. As he tightened his grasp on the child, he looked around at the remaining battlefield.

Everything was wrong. The Red Fungus swordsmen were clearly reluctant to attack anyone with fungus infants attached to them. Now that he had a clearer view of his opponents, both ants and pinecone people were strapped with fungus children. Many soldiers were safe from the more reluctant of the Red Fungus’s warriors while those who didn’t care as much could be seen slicing through their own kind’s children. This middle ground of concern between the forces where the entirety of the army was unsure to spare or sacrifice the children was clearly hurting the war effort and leaving many more mushroom swordsmen than would normally be slain. And the torn children littering the ground was truly sickening. Their green blood began to mix with the mud and rain of the ground beneath them. The battle was clearly lost for the fungus and their futile effort to turn the tide of the battle was only getting innocents killed.

And there wasn’t a thing that Melsil could do about it. Not only was holding a child in his arms that wouldn’t stop screaming and flailing in his arms while also attempting to hold his sword but his strength was half gone. The pine soldier managed to strike a vital place in Melsil’s body and he was now quickly becoming numb and limp from the attack. He looked down at the child in his arms, the constant cries for mother instilling indescribable dread in him. With his sword arm he sheathed his black blade before fully wrapping his arms around the child.

“This is madness,” he said.

He turned and ran toward the forest of mushrooms that surrounded them, never wishing to see this carnage again.

Melsil released the squirming child not long after they entered the mushroom forest. He would have liked to have gotten him to a safer location but there the mushroom swordsman was beyond drained. The yellow drape fungus person immediately began digging into the moisture softened ground and buried himself. It was common for young and immature fungus people to bury themselves often as adult fungus people only had to bury themselves in the ground around once every one or two months. This was due to young fungi not knowing how to properly absorb nutrients through the soil while matured fungus were more adept at gathering nutrients in shorter amounts of time.

Honestly, he wasn’t concerned about the child anymore. He had deserted the Red Fungus military in plain view of everyone around him. While Melsil had hidden himself from battles before, he usually was more discreet about it than he was this time. He didn’t hide or try to avoid fighting this time, he merely fled as soon as the battle had begun. If he returned to the Red Fungus forces he would be severely chastised at the very least. Being the son of Juchil, Melsil might get off easy as far as not being executed for this crime but his father would personally punish him.

But that assumed he even wanted to come back. Why would he at this point? His family were murderers, their enemies outnumbered them and he’d just watch more than half his fellow comrades choose to murder infants if it meant getting a clean strike in against their enemy. What was the point anymore?

Melsil tried to move on, wishing to find safe ground but every step he took forced him to stagger. Melsil knew he had to burrow in the ground to heal his wounds but didn’t want to. For some reason, he just wanted to walk. His feet were restless, as if having a mind of their own and refused to tire despite his lack of energy. He hoped there was no animal near him considering he’d be perfect weakened prey.

He thought that maybe the local inhabitants of his fungus species would take him in if he could find them. But by the amount of pine straw surrounding him and the fact looking up could reveal more pine than oak branches, he was still well within the territory of the pine. That Juchil said belonged to the fungus country of Ushujin…

That’s so confusing. Melsil thought. Our territory overlaps with the people of the pine and oak so much we were forced to make an alliance with the oak or else risk endless war. Why...why can’t we just share it? Is there not enough land to go around? Are we such animals we can’t just…?

His mind began to grow weary as his body did. He repeatedly thought of burrowing in the ground just as the yellow drape child did but would not do so. Melsil wondered why he continued to walk, completely aware he would make himself vulnerable to prey if any happened to spot him.

Why…? He thought. Why do I continue to go on? Why not rest? I’d risk dying if I did regain nourishment…

And then he realized.

And then what? Melsil asked himself. I can’t go back to my family...I don’t even want to...I think I’d rather die…

He stopped to himself. Melsil then laughed to himself. He began laughing so hard almost fell over, trying to stand up straight before keeling over from exhaustion. He collapsed on his back, chuckling to himself as he stared up at the canopy of mushrooms beyond. Melsil couldn’t stop, finding the absurdity of his situation maddening.

I’d rather die! He thought. I’d rather die! Die before becoming another murderer! Die before killing children! Die before killing prisoners of war! Die! Die! Die! It seems to be the solution everyone else in the mad, mad world has! Why not try it sometime if it’s so popular?!

He continued laughing the whole way until he grew tired, his eyes closing as a result.

He was awoken by the sensation of being carried. Melsil opened his eyes to find he was lifted in the arms of a blue mushroom woman. Upon seeing her cheerful face she looked down at him, clearly afraid of whom she had picked up. She immediately dropped Melsil upon him waking up, the mushroom swordsman groaning in pain as his back was once again plastered in mud.

“A Duchil!” she shouted.

“Yes…” he said. “Who did you think I was?”

“I only collect wounded fungus when I see them after the fighting is over!” she said. “My sister was helping what infants the pinecone people kidnapped from our tribes to find them homes after they recovered and...and I wanted to help the men...but I didn’t know you were a Duchil.”

Melsil almost shed a tear the way she said his last name.

“Why…” he said. “Why would that matter?”

“Because!” she said, tears staining her eyes. “Your family is responsible for this whole thing!”

The blue mushroom woman then began stomping into the ground with a mad fury, almost as if she wanted to do so to him. Her fury didn’t make Melsil flee for his life but only caused him to grow concerned for the woman. She had obviously suffered.

“The Red Fungus…!” she said. “They started this whole war with the ants when they couldn’t stand the idea of ending the bloodshed with the massacre at Yellow Spore! So full of bloodlust your people are...they decided to kill the Ghilroys! All of them…! The best family of any nation...dead!”

He groaned in mutual sorrow, not pain, as she sobbed into her palms.

“I saw their heads…!” she said. “We all did once their decapitated faces were hung from honeysuckle vines! Your family is nothing but a bunch of gutless murderers!”

“I agree…” he said. “I was there when Teres, their daughter, was slain by my brother. I refused to lift a finger to kill them...I would have helped them escape if...if I knew it wasn’t impossible.”

He expected the woman to give him a compliment for that. He expected the mushroom woman to show some amount of gratitude. However, all she did was kick him in the side. Melsil shouted in pain as she spat in his face.

“And you expect me to forgive you for such a pitiful showing you did for them?!” she said. “The blood you and the rest of the Duchils shed is on your own household! From son to son, daughter to daughter, you pass more destruction to the next generation until nothing remains! Your actions are like your swords...the blackest of venom! I don’t care if you never killed a single person in your entire life! You are still a vile demon who needs to die!”

She glared at him before gesturing to attack him before stumbling back.

“I…” she said. “I’ve seen too much death...I don’t want anymore...I can’t kill...just die…”

It was only after she walked away that Melsil decided to burrow into the ground below to collect nutrients. He almost wished he hadn’t been dragged out, the mushroom woman only reopening his wounds. He didn’t even want to heal, just an excuse to isolate from the world. As he was engulfed in wet dirt, cocooned in the soil, Melsil contemplated what she said.

She made it sound as though if I did nothing wrong my family’s murders would still be my responsibility. He thought. Does that even make sense? How can I be responsible for them even though I hated what they did?

He paused, attempting to go to sleep as he regained nourishment.

Is it because she sees us as the same being? Melsil thought. As a monolith...not separate individuals but...merely one organism that poisons this world? Could that be true…? If that’s true then everyone’s responsible for what their ancestors did. The fungus species are responsible for all the red mushrooms planted everywhere. Ant and crawfish civilians alike are guilty for the crimes their soldiers committed by slaying my kinds’ unarmed inhabitants. The oak and pine have waged wars against one another for years and we were caught in the middle of it.

It was this last thought that haunted him.

When I see a plant that’s poisonous, like the black locust...I regard them all as poisonous. Even if one in a thousand black locust does not produce thorns...it’s kind have been used as weapons to kill the two remaining trees in Wassergras. The fact that that thornless tree did no wrong does not replace the evil the other trees’ poison did to kill us all. In the same way...my family is a poison to this world...even our own kind.

Melsil did not know where he was going anymore. He thought he would head closer to the center between the two trees in Wassergras to find a tribe of fungus people he could blend into. Only after his encounter with the blue mushroom woman did Melsil realize his eyes gave him away as the spawn of Duchil, the devils of the Red Fungus. He merely walked further and further into the territory of the pine, no oak leaves in sight. He wondered if a pinecone person might find him and kill, thus avenging the people of the pine’s hatred of the Red Fungus.

But to his horror, no one dared near him. Most people of the pine he encountered were civilians, afraid of his Duchil eyes and fled in fear. And as he continued further, only found more chaos. Apparently, the war had gone beyond standing armies battling for territory. Now terrorist attacks had sprung up.

The old trick of stabbing black locust thorns into the near the tree by the opposing tree people was alive and well. As Melsil ventured closer to the base of the pine tree the more black locust thorns shoved into the ground became a common sight. The thorns darkened the ground pitch black with their poison in an attempt to poison the pine tree. The pine would absorb the corrupted nutrients and its growth would be slowed and would produce sickly pinecone children. There was little doubt this was the acorn people doing this to the people of the pine rather than the ants or fungi doing so, the acorn and pine using this conflict as an excuse to slow the other’s growth for their own tree’s health.

But that was nothing compared to what they did to the pinecone children. Melsil routinely found fresh, green pinecones that had not been opened or browned torn open, sliced by either sword or spear for the children inside to be dragged out. Scattered around these ripped open arboreal wombs were the remains of the fetuses of pinecone children. Melsil was reminded that people of the tree was born in acorns or pinecones dropped from above branches before climbing out, weird compared to how most every other creature was born.

The pinecone people inside, still light green from lack of maturity were torn to shreds. However, as immature as they were he could still make out distinct features. He could tell which children were male or female, he could make out their eyes, the limbs and even faces.

Melsil looked to find that those who tore the unborn children must have really gone out of their way to tear every limb from the still developing creatures, almost precise and careful about their destruction. It should have revolted him upon seeing it but in honesty, it fascinated Melsil. Not the gore itself, no, but the amount of hatred these murderers must have had for these people that had not even been born before they brought down their rage on them. It was awe-inspiring, the level of anger one could have for not a person but a species to such an extent they would take unnecessary time to tear off the undeveloped infants’ limbs.

I’ve heard of this. He thought. The people of the oak will find new pinecones and tear them open to kill the children inside. Weeds out future competition between the two species.

And that fascination ended when he saw one particular male pinecone fetus skewered by black locust thorns. Melsil walked over to find that one pinecone child that was almost near developed into a full grown baby stabbed so thoroughly with black thorns they stabbed through its flesh to imaple into the ground. Its body, if he had removed the thorns, was so full of holes Melsil could fit his arm into the cavities.

The child’s still developing eye sockets had been run through with the black locust thorns, its chest impaled with a dozen in the same area and its limbs so full of thorns its arms and legs were now segmented into pieces. One would have been enough to end its life but its body was so thoroughly darkened by poison that what could be called its body was almost pitch black, as if shriveled by fire and left out to dry.

For a reason beyond any explanation he could give, the mushroom swordsman began taking the thorns from the fetus’s body and throwing them aside. After removing them all, Melsil did his best to pick up the remains of the child, trying to keep it as whole as possible, only for it to crumble in his hands. Limbs, head, chest and all fell to pieces like a broken wood. The child’s body looked more like a collection of charred rocks than a once living being.

Melsil began screaming at the top of his lungs. He brought his sword out without thinking, slamming the blade into the wet earth below. He couldn’t seem to stop himself, carving a trench in the ground until the soles of his feet began to shake.

This world...He thought. Its evil is like poison. Even when it’s gone, it’s not gone. It just continues. The person who did this...the death of them wouldn’t satisfy the penalty for all they killed. And neither would their family’s family. They all...they’re all so selfish to do something like this...but I’m the same way. I should never have been born. Just another branch in this poisonous tree...either choosing to continue what my ancestors started or ignore it for my own moral superiority. I’m nothing if not a devil...I don’t care if I never slew a single innocent...I’m a devil...just like the son of the person who did this...his child’s death...bloodshed...bloodshed can only be repaid with bloodshed…at least that’s what the world has shown me.

After tiring himself out with slashing his sword so much he collapsed again, unable to lift himself up after enough slashes.

And I am no unique case. He thought. I wish to die for my ancestors’ sins...I need to experience death...for Teres’s sake...I wish for the western tribe of the fungus people to slay me…

A smile spread across his face.

Yes. Melsil thought. I can die there...in the territory of the western clans of Ushujin...they can slay me...and they’ll be a hero...for killing me...that’s...that’s wonderful…

It was the plains near the heart of Ushujin that caused Melsil to reevaluate his goal of dying by the hand of enemy tribes. He passed by black locust trees, the thin, wiry trunks rising above him as it was decorated with slender leaves. The sharp, black thorns protruding from the bark that ran along the plant. Technically, they were not called trees by the inhabitants of Wassergras as they not only produced no people from their annual blossoms, were shorter than the pine and oak but their thorns disqualified them from such a qualification.

The people of Wassergras, no matter the race, refused to give them the official label of tree even though, locally, they were known as such. The thorns and pollen were so poisonous that when they fell from the plants they contaminated everything around them. Their usage as weapons was taken advantage of by the true tree people but still hated, despite their usefulness. Many called for the complete eradication but the black locusts were an invasive species that spread quickly and could not be truly destroyed.

It was said that the black locust was the closest living relative to the Black Poison tree, their thorns and venom proof of such. While most regarded the legend of the Black Poison a fable meant for children, its legacy was upheld by the horrid plant. When Melsil gazed up at it, a question rose from his mind.

If I die… He thought. Will I not be doing so to escape the responsibility my own kind have wrought against this world? Like the attempt to cut down a black locust...will not one just as readily replace it to plague the world with its venom?

He looked down at the black venom sword at his side, also said to be a close relative to the Black Poison.

We Red Fungus… He thought. We even use the power of poison to oppress our enemies unjustly. Despicable, my family is.

As Melsil traveled through the Ushujin he began realizing what a stupid goal that was. If he died it would make no difference to anyone. It would neither resurrect nor kill anyone. It was as though he gave up on his own goal after thinking just a little bit through it. Melsil traveled for days before deciding it was stupid.

What am I going on for then? He thought. Whether I live or die...nothing happens…

He went days without eating or drinking, possibly even a month until he realized he was on the outskirts of Ushujin. No longer in the pine or really the oak’s territory he had drifted far, far away from all that. In fact, Melsil was nearing the land of giants before he realized it.

The flat, gray stone wall that lay in front of him was the handy work of the Giants. The species said to once be the size of all the inhabitants of Wassergras before eating the Black Poison to grow tall and mighty now lay before him. He stood at the edge of the grass forest, pressing his hand on the wall of stone constructed by the Giants. They were so mysterious and powerful that they were no longer a part of the world of Wassergras, having transcended the plane the species of crawfish, ants, fungi and tree people lived in.

Amazing. He thought as he looked at the wall of stone that rose ten times his body length into the air. Everyone is taught to stay away from the Giants’ territory...their constructions form the very borders of Wassergras...Wassergras is a square...hedged in by these slabs they’ve built atop the natural ground. To the north is the Primeval World...but to the east, south and west is theirs...amazing...not even the industrious ants could make something so advanced.

Melsil felt the ground rumble, his body being lifted into the air. He looked to see towering above him a beast as tall as a tree to him, the mushroom swordsman nowhere near able to see the height of the creature. It was covered in clothing so he could not make out its skin. Its foot was covered in some sort of white shoe many body lengths his size. Melsil looked on as the Giant passed him by, the earth rumbling beneath him as he watched it move. It looked so graceful and lumbering at the same time, what little he could see of it that was.

Incredible… He thought. The species that spread the poison of the Black Venom by plucking its thorns...they cursed us all with evil if the legend is to be believed. Do I believe it?

He laughed.

One way to find out… Melsil thought as the Giant left his sight, the rumbling beginning to reside. I could go find the White Spore said to be on the very edge of Ushujin and the Horrid Cavern...if legend is to be believed anyone who has never killed an innocent life can touch it.

Melsil had a crazy idea.

Do I fit that description? He wondered.

The Horrid Cavern was too long a way to go without resting. Melsil spent days under the earth before gathering the nutrients needed to press forward. After weeks worth of travel he eventually came across it. Between a circular cave of black material from which flowed a wide river and the edge of the slab the Giants walked on was a bare spot of land where something white grew. Pure white. Snow white. It's unnatural color drew Melsil towards it.

From the perfectly circular fungus spread wispy spores that filled the air, the fungus person naturally drew to such a scene. As he neared it he found the mushroom had a stem that was coated in many different studs. As Melsil drew closer they almost looked like sword handles.

The wispy white spores that almost looked like dandelions floating through the air provided an aura of mystery and strangely comforting. However, as Melsil drew closer to the large mushroom that, unlike most other mushrooms, was not that much taller than he was, found remains of others near it. The charred bodies of fellow mushroom people were slumped against the mushroom, their burnt to black hands clasping the studs.

There were more than a dozen bodies surrounding the fungus, deeply disturbing him. However, what disturbed him even more was that it emanated from the mushroom that spoke directly to Melsil’s heart. He never heard the voice audibly but a warm sensation did fill his body, like the light of a clear sunny day after winter’s cold night. Spring filled his heart even though it was early autumn.

As he looked at, the sword at his side began quivering. Melsil looked down to find the black venom sword sheathed at his waist was almost alive as it seemed to want to refuse to get closer. The black venom blade was emanating fear in the presence of the white mushroom, something strange as it never exhibited such a sensation before.

The black venom cannot stand in the presence of its enemy organism.

He was blown away by the voice, the presence of the one who spoke blowing through him as powerfully as a storm of wind yet as gently as a comforting breeze.

Come closer.

Melsil did not question the voice. He slowly approached the white mushroom, feeling the delicate and beautiful spores that flowed like snow from it immediately giving the mushroom person a sensation of mixed feelings. The white fungus he could feel was an organism that, while not a plant, provided many plants to thrive and survive in quality that surpassed any natural fertilizer. Melsil knew that the mushrooms his kind naturally produced from spores that cyclically fell from their bodies and spread throughout the environment were good for Wassergras’s flora and fauna but this white fungus was the ultimate in such a quality.

How such a thing even existed was beyond him but the closer he got to it the warm Melsil felt. If he looked close enough he could almost make out a white flame burning around the mushroom, but that was impossible. If the mushroom didn’t burn, then what did? He was afraid to even touch such a thing.

The flame does not burn. He said. Test it.

The mushroom swordsman put his hand in the white flame to find that, just as he did that its warmth did not char but instead felt pleasurable.

Do you know who I am?

The fabled White Spore. Melsil said. The White Magnolia incarnated into the form of the fungi rather than plant. The holiness of the long forgotten paradise belongs with you.

You have answered correctly. He said. All life descended from me. I provide the nourishment for all that live. In direct opposition to the black venom that coats this world in filth.

Why have you called me here? Melsil asked. Why allow me to approach?

Who was it that called you here? The White Spore said. Your own innate curiosity or was it truly me?

He paused for a moment, predicting that his answer could determine the White Spore revealing information precious to him.

You. Melsil replied. You called me here. All the way even back when I spared Teres.

Correct. The White Spore. For I do not give life without implanting a desire for those that exist to live without being driven to find me. Most do not. Instead they turn from the benevolence and peace I have shown them and choose to destroy my creations. The strong oppress the weak and the weak oppress those even weaker. The few in this world that do not bow to their own vices have turned this lush paradise that was created by me into a cruel, formless world that knows no limit of the sin it commits. Filth. Filth. Filth. It is all I see every day. The Black Poison has so thoroughly contaminated this world that I no longer recognize it. I wish to choose a member of the species I choose to exist in to lead the people whose form I have taken.

You mean, one of the mushroom people? Melsil asked. Who? Where can I find such a person?

You are that selected one. The White Spore answered. You are to go and destroy the Red Fungus.

What? He asked.

You will take the weapon forged from the original paradise of this world itself and, with it, slay the poison of this world. The White Spore stated. Begin the destruction of Black Poison, rid it of this Earth and so will initiate the creation of a new world, the likes of which has never been seen. Even the Giants will cower as they realize the error of their ways for desecrating and exploiting this world that was once unblemished.

Melsil grew afraid as the white flame around him began to grow and further engulf him.

You will atone for the sins of not only the Duchil family but the entirety of wrongs committed by your species. The White Spore said. You shall begin the purging of evil carried down not only by your forefathers but usher in the destruction of the sins of others’ past generations. Through your acknowledgment of the chaos and sorrow wrought by each species you will be rewarded the right of slaying the evil embedded in every form of life. And after using this sword to slay your family, you will take your father’s place as the leader of your race.

You mean… Melsil said. I will become the head of the Red Fungus?

And with it the ruler of the fungus people. The White Spore said. With the responsibility of using your might for the sake of repairing the countless years of war and blood your family has wrought against the world I created.

Melsil shook his head, inciting anger at the White Spore.

No. He said. You...you have chosen the wrong man! I am unworthy of such a duty! Choose someone else!

Melsil could feel himself begin to lose contact with the ground, as though he had lost weight and was becoming as light as the snow-like spores surrounding him.

My family will never listen to me! He uttered. I am the least respected out of all my father’s children! And not only does my own race hate me for being related to them...so does the entirety of this world!

The anger of the White Spore had reached its breaking point. Melsil was flung across the bare ground, skidding across the earth. He looked up but found himself to be blinded by the flame arising from around the fungus. It was no longer a soft breeze but an intense feeling that Melsil could not decipher whether it was painful or pleasurable. It was neither, so beyond normal sensation for his experience that it was though the experience went beyond his nerves. His soul itself was standing in the eye of a storm.

Before he could apologize to the being, he was lifted off his feet. He felt completely weightless at this moment, only able to look at the snowy spores surrounding him, the fungus emanating an intense white flame as the mushroom swordsman hovered above the mushroom head. The more Melsil looked up to find that, from below, the mushroom stem was growing taller and longer. He saw the mushroom stem expand past the oak tree as the hardwood could be seen out of his peripheral vision before disappearing. He wondered if he would ascend past the clouds themselves, almost hoping it would.

As the mushroom grew endlessly to the point he could see the constructions of the Giants larger than even them beneath him become nothing more than specks of dust, Melsil feared he would grow insane from such a sight. However, from beneath the head of the mushroom sprinkled countless spores of white that danced around Melsil. He looked around to find that they formed a circling pattern of snow-like particles that encompassed him. The spores danced around him, seeming to grow limbs and heads of fire that looked like sprites. They danced for what felt like hours, all in very rhythmic and synchronized gestures that only produced more white fire.

The sprites sung a hymn into his mind that caused Melsil to sense he was being driven mad if madness could be called wondrous joy. His body began to dance in rhythmic harmony with the sprites' song and gestures, almost against his will but that would imply he would have resisted in the first place. For what felt like the first time in his life, Melsil felt that he had truly understood where Teres gained the power to resist her father’s torturers all those long nights and still continue to hope.

Who do you think grew all this? The White Spore asked him, his voice roaring like a wildfire that encompassed all of the wilderness. Who created the Giants before they were mighty and tall? Who grew the plants? Who attached six legs to each ant and gave the crawfish fins to swim with and limbs to crawl on land with? Who taught me the knowledge of the cosmos so that I may know how to construct each creature? Is there a being beyond me that I may learn from him? Then consult him. Tell him to send another in your place. Because I have chosen you and you will do so.

A sword hilt grew from the white exterior of the mushroom’s stem.

Draw from it. He said. Like the others you saw.

But they all died. Melsil said.

Only one who has never slain an innocent person before may draw this blade. He said. Those who perished before you came to me seeking a new power to defeat their foes with, wishing to use me as a weapon for their foolish and unrighteous ambitions. They were punished with unquenching fire. Only one not cursed with the iniquity of innocent blood on their hands may draw the sword and live. Now.

Melsil reached forward with his right hand, grasping the sword’s hilt. As he reached forward and grasped it, he immediately felt a wreath of fire surround his arm. Before he could even decide it if burned or not the spiral of white flame coursed around every one of his limbs before the blinding light became too much. Melsil was blinded by such a spectacle, the flame reached the sword sheathed at his side and burned it to a crisp. The already black blade was charred beyond recognition.

Have nothing to do with weapons formed by the Black Poison. The White Spore commanded.

Melsil drew the sword from the stem of the mushroom to find its blade as white as the spores produced from the fungus. He could see his own reflection in it, the man staring back more recognizable than ever. He was shocked at its clarity as he hovered in the air.

I grant you the White Spore Sword. He said. Forged from my very own being. Its reflection is so clear it shows the very heart of a person in their innermost being.

The flames and sprites disappeared, the mushroom now shrinking back to its normal size as Melsil fell back to Earth.

Now go and redeem this world...my chosen.

Melsil was having trouble countering five swordsmen at once while the flames spread. The fire around him burning only sapped him of strength that made the already difficult task of fighting such powerful Red Fungus soldiers more taxing on his strength. Melsil would have unleashed the full power of the White Spore blade on the remaining swordsmen but he had spent most of his nutrients to grow his blade during the previous portion of the battle. He would have simply dodged their sword strikes but their black venom blades would pierce the pine trunk behind him if he did not parry them.

And the Red Fungus swordsmen were taking advantage of that. Every time they extended their black blades at him, Melsil had to quickly not only block the strike with enough force to divert it from its linear path, but do the same to a black venom sword coming at him from another direction. The long blades were less like solid weapons and more like sharp tentacles that lashed out at him continuously as he faced them, his back to the pine tree.

The grass around him was hurriedly being doused with mud and water from the remaining crawfish soldiers of the Knife Claw army as they were not strong enough to take on the Red Fungus soldiers around him. While there were only three or four crawfish soldiers remaining, there were far more remaining pine cone civilians that had backed against the trunk of the pine tree as they were trapped between the two rows of flames that crowded them together, leaving Melsil to be the lone fighter defending them.

The dozens of pinecone people behind him hugged their adopted children as they crowded around the pine tree, either screaming or too terrified to open their mouths as they watched as one man attempted to do the work of five. Melsil had to constantly step over body after body of dead mushroom men, almost slipping in their blood. While trying to fight the remaining mushroom swordsmen he was waiting for one of them to make one false move, to extend their black venom swords just a little bit too long.

Black venom swords can stretch an incredibly long distance. He thought. But the more they are stretched, the weaker their blades are. The difference between an experienced and immature swordsman is how far they can stretch their weapons before they become too vulnerable.

Vukal was in a pretty good mood as he made his way to the pine tree at the edge of Ushujin. Underneath the large branches and needles of the plant he and his mother, Golar, walked side by side. Their plans were going along rather swimmingly.

While the war over the past near year had been costly for the Red Fungus, especially with the loss of his older brother, they had actually found the weakness to one of their number one enemies. The pinecone people that were enemies to the oak and, thusly the Red Fungus, had lost a decisive battle in effort to protect their pine tree from being overrun. The line of combined ant and pine people forces had been destroyed to pave the way for a small group of Red Fungus swordsmen to arrive and get close enough to touch the pine tree.

They would use their new weapon: fire. They had acquired it after an alliance with a mysterious benefactor named Garret Treborn who claimed to be a Giant shrunk to the size of before their species ate the Black Poison tree. While Vukal wasn’t sure if he believed in the legend of the White Magnolia and Black Poison, Garret was both powerful and mysterious enough to lend credence to such a far out idea.

And providing material that could start fire proved beyond helpful. Now, with the ability to burn, the pine tree the pinecone people used as a lifeline was about to come crashing down. Vukal could even see the smoke arising from the base of the tree into the air right now. With the pinecone people out of the way there was nothing the ants could do to prevent them from conquering Ushujin. And with that their amount of territory they controlled would rival that of the ants. With that many resources the fungus people, so long as they allied with the Red Fungus, would be a superpower capable of being on equal footing with the crawfish and Red Mount colony.

“And you doubted Garret’s burning machine,” Golar said. “Don’t you feel foolish now?”

“Garret thinks we’re foolish that our enemies keep destroying his burning machines,” Vukal answered. “He says if this one gets crushed he doesn’t trust us to give us anymore. They’re expensive to make, apparently…”

“Don’t you see the smoke?!” Golar said. “We’ve finally gotten to the pine tree this time!”

“Of course,” Vukal admitted. “But when Duchil revealed he had kept a hidden ally for a long time away from even us I thought he was being duped by a cunning con man. However, with this amount of power the Treborn family has proven to be an invaluable component to our success. I thought fire was something that has proven far too dangerous and unreliable but with his technology it’s a greater weapon than anything...how did Garret acquire it?”

“You know the Giants are beyond us in every way,” Golar answered. “They’ve built dwellings even taller than they are. I wouldn’t be surprised if they could travel to the moon and back as wild as their advancement has been.”

“Yes, well I wish father had informed us sooner about the Treborn’s alliance with us,” Vukal said. “The family of devils to be a savior to an oppressed people...what are the odds?”

However, once both he and his mother reached the pine tree they were stunned at the defeat of their own forces. The entirety of the army they sent was lying dead at their feet, almost a hundred mushroom swordsmen corpses. And all of them had either been sliced or stabbed to suggest it had been a bladed weapon that had done this.

The smoke that was rising was revealed to be just the smoldering embers of grass, the tall green stalks lying wet with water and matted in mud. The tree base that Vakul expected to be on fire was instead perfectly fine, the bark unharmed in every way. The giant mass of wood in front of him wasn’t even scratched. There was no one around, save for the green mushroom head of one fungus person while the rest of their body was underground. Vakul figured it was one of their swordsmen recovering from their battle wounds.

“Wha-what on Earth-?” Vakul said.

“Who killed all these soldiers?” Golar asked. “Who killed our men?”

“The-the crawfish…” Vakul said. “We know from our reports they were the only soldiers in this area...the pinecone soldiers and ants were away from this part of the tree, as it was the weakest guarded part of the pine-”

“That’s impossible!” Golar interrupted. “Not only do crawfish not leave blade marks like this but there weren’t near enough for them to defeat a force of a hundred! There were five crawfish soldiers here at most from what our informants told us! How did the most vulnerable section of this tree become the doom of almost a hundred of our best swordsmen?!”

“Maybe I can shed some light on your predicament.”

Vakul and Golar looked at the green mushroom head buried in the ground and jumped back as the fungus man jumped out. To Vakul’s shock stood his brother, Melsil, who he and everyone of his family members thought was dead. Golar couldn’t stop screaming at the sight of while Vakul was so aghast at the sight he almost went blind.

“No,” he finally breathed.

“Me-Melsil!” Golar screamed for what had to be the eightieth time in a row. “I thought you were dead!”

“You assume because I left that I was dead?” he asked.

“We never found your body,” Vakul answered. “It’s uncommon that we never find a soldier after each battle. We just thought you had...been captured and killed with your body buried in a secret location. It’s happened before.”

“Well I hope you know that I defected,” Melsil said.

A grave silence fell over Vakul and his mother, the former wanting to reach for his sword but too panicked to do so. Very few, if any Duchils ever defected from the Red Fungus and the few that did did so for the sake of money. He’d never heard of one of his own growing a conscience and suddenly leaving for the sake of moral squeamishness. Vakul would have been angry if he were not so confused.

“So,” he said. “The Ghilroy girl got to your head after all. The discipline you were shown did nothing to knock some sense into you.”

“It didn’t,” Melsil replied. “Only Teres could have started me growing enough backbone to abandon your cruel and indignant pursuits. I can’t forgive myself for not leaving you sooner but the past is the past...and now it's time to make up for my prior cowardice and destroy you both.”

Vakul was trying to think of something to say that would get under his brother’s skin but while doing so, he finally noticed what was in Melsil’s hand. He was so surprised at seeing his brother alive and well after being thought to be dead nearly a year that he didn’t notice the valuable piece of technology in his grasp. In his older brother’s hand was a shiny blackcube almost the size of Vakuls’ head with red stripes on it. There was a hole in the top of it that led to the hollow inside.

“The burning machine!” Vakul said as he pointed to it. “He has it!”

“What?!” his mother cried. “Wait...he does!”

“Yes,” Melsil answered. “The weapon given to you by the Giants.”

“How-?” Vakul asked. “How do you know that?! No one knows that! I didn’t know about it until recently!”

“You’d be surprised at what all the White Spore knows,” the mushroom swordsman answered.

“Give it here, Melsil!” Golar screamed.

“Certainly,” he said. “But, before I give it to you...I need you to know it has a peculiar problem.”

“What’s that?” Vakul asked.

With his free hand, Melsil grabbed the sword hilt at his side before whipping it out to reveal a long, white blade. The sharp edge sliced through the burning machine multiple times until it was sliced evenly a dozen times, the shards of the metal box falling to the ground. Parts of the destroyed box sparked with red heat before going dark.

“It’s broken,” Melsil said. “You know where I can find another one?”

“You monster!” Golar said. “So you’re the one who's been destroying the burning machines!”

“And...what sword even is that?!” Vakul said. “What happened to your black venom sword?”

“It was destroyed,” he said.

“You destroyed the pinnacle of our people’s military might?!” Golar shouted. “Do you have so little pride in your people’s ways that you’d throw them away, even your best weapon for your deluded sense of self-righteousness?!”

“I did not destroy it,” Melsil answered. “The flame of the White Spore did.”

“The White Spore…?” Vakul said. “The legend of the fungal incarnation of the White Magnolia?”

“That’s a myth!” Golar said. “But...if it is then...is that the sword of the White Spore?”

Melsil turned the blade of the sword in his hands to show the reflection of Vakul. His mirror image seemed to show him something that he was uncomfortable with seeing. It didn’t show him the prideful, handsome and strong warrior he saw when looking at his reflection in clear water. Vakul saw a monster that killed anything it saw as prey. Normally, he’d take pride in someone acknowledging him as such but the way the sword presented it was deeply disturbing.

“The White Spore…” Vakul said. “Something said to be at the very edge of the region of Wassergras? But that’s beyond lunacy! No one who has ever set out to go there has returned! The Juchils have even sent our strongest swordsman out there to see if the legends of the sword were true but they never came back! It was so close to the world of the Giants we thought they were stepped on!”

“Even our enemies of the Red Fungus have tried,” Golar said. “Attempting to create a crime organization that surpassed ours they announced they would travel there but nothing ever came of it. What gives you the right to think that you of all people could attain the White Spore’s power?”

“Simple,” Melsil said. “I was chosen.”

“Chosen,” Vakul said as he drew his black venom sword. The black weapon extended to several times his body length, the weapon growing fangs and a large eye at the end of the blade. “My foot. You couldn’t be chosen for a children’s game, much less the wielder of the White Spore.”

“I was,” he said. “Believe it or not but the sword is proof that I am. And now…”

He pointed the blade at Vakul.

“I’m going to kill you,” Melsil said. “The White Spore desires your blood for the Ghilroy family’s most innocent member. Enjoy your last moments of breath because this day, you die.”

“Oh please,” Vakul said. “You may have been better than me at swordsmanship back then but I’ve gotten far more experienced due to this war.”

“And you’ve never beaten me in a fight,” Golar said. “So prepare to die, son.”

“I look forward to having your head mounted on my wall,” Vakul stated.

Vakul laid on the ground, bleeding profusely, so exhausted from the battle he could not lift a muscle. Both his legs were cut off and his sword arm had been lost midway through the battle. Most of his fingers had been cut off and his sword was broken. While Vakul’s vision was blurred with blood he had a clear vision of his mother over to the side, lying dead with a long slash in her chest. Vakul could still not comprehend his own brother murdering their mother.

As he laid dying, he used the last of his energy to turn to face the glaring scowl of his brother, his Duchil eyes that were normally intense and fear-inducing beyond terrifying. Melsil pointed his white sword at Jushil’s temple, the older fungi’s body severely wounded from the fight with their mother and Vakul but not nearly as much as either of them. Vakul would have glared had he not had so many cuts along his head.

“Wh-why?” he asked. “Why...did you...abandon and kill your family for...this delusion…?”

“Because,” he said. “I have seen beyond the cruel tribalism of this world. Ants fight ants, crawfish for crawfish, plant people and fungi...they all fight for their own kind. Not me...I choose not to follow such foolish evil and selfish delights.”

Melsil stepped on Vakul’s head, the younger brother screaming in pain as he did so.

“Just so you know,” he said. “I will destroy the remainder of the Duchil main branch and take over the Red Fungus. Afterwards I will use the power given to me to heal this world of all the evil plagued by not only our kind but all who act upon the wicked ambitions implanted in them by the Black Poison. I will be the head of our species and work tirelessly to undo everything that has gone wrong.”

“You can’t!” Vukal said. “You’re crazy...you’re delusional! No species has ever survived being this selfless! No species could exist on such self-destructive habits!”

Melsil once drove the sword into his brother’s head, until the blade came out on the other end to impale into the ground.

“I don’t care about survival anymore,” he said. “Only that which is objectively good.

“Gug-ugh,” Vukal gurgled as blood filled his throat.

“Goodbye brother,” Melsil said with clear enjoyment of his brother’s pain. “And enjoy the next life.”

Vukal could feel himself growing as he awoke to his new existence. He was surrounded by a field of dark thorns and bristles, a cornucopia of sharp needles and short, shrubby trees surrounding him. Vukal looked down to see he was no longer a fungus person. In fact, he was no person at all.

He was a branch of a tree that was extending from yet another branch of the same tree, the bark as black as can be and the thorns a deep purple. The thorns were so thick around and sharp they could be used as knives. He could feel a viscous liquid course through his new body that seemed to seep and burn into his new form. As the thorns emerged from his body outward, it felt like they were growing inward, sharp end first, instead. The barbs felt like they were digging into his skin, both piercing and irritating his very nerves. Vukal could not escape the burdensome pain.

“Make it stop!” he screamed. “Make it stop!”

He was not only entrapped by the feeling of sharp objects worming their way into his body but he also felt himself become disgusting, like he was the dung of some animal that had fallen to the ground. It was as though he desperately needed a bath, his body more repulsive than any filth or mud Vukal had rolled in. He wanted more than anything to be clean and to stop feeling pain but he just felt more excruciating sensations.

How can I see or feel anything without an eye or a body? He asked himself.

He then looked down to see he was not the only one. Vukal could feel the rest of the tree, from the massive trunk to the branches themselves screaming in pain. All of them were tortured souls that desperately wished to escape the pain but it only grew worse. The torment would not end no matter how much they protested. Vukal was not only tortured by his own pain but their pain as well.

He not only felt them but felt his entire family of ancestors in the tree. He could feel the dead Duchils crying out, tormented for the blood they spilled. And when Vukal looked down further he could feel the entirety of the dead fungus people along with them.

I…! He thought. I thought our family was royalty! That we were noble and proud! How did we fall so far!

The further he looked, the more numerous the pain was. He felt that not only did the tree consist of the souls of the dead fungus people but crawfish, ants and tree people as well. Even the souls of the Giants were inside the tree but they mostly made the base of the tree, the numerous Giants making up the trunk of the Black Venom. All of them were here and crying in pain.

This...He thought. This is what our ancestors were fighting for?! For this?! To be a part of this evil tree?! We were tricked! No! This can’t be possible! It’s not fair! I was lied to! I was lied to!

No you were not.

The voice came out of nowhere yet he heard it as clear as day.

Your conscience was defiled numerous times. The voice that was as soft as the wind said. You knew the difference between good and evil, and yet you chose not to abstain from evil and do good. From the time you were young you have been nothing but a destroyer of the innocent and deceiver of your own kind. The blood of the innocent you contaminated my Earth with will forever scream out and cry for your name.

And then Vukal realized that the voice was right. He knew that good and evil were not playthings of the overly conscious but real, hard truths. The paranoia of survival could not justify all that Vukal had done over the course of his life. He had ignored it in favor of fulfilling his family’s wishes. His entire life was nothing but poison to those around him, much like the poison he was filled with right now.

I am… He said. The tree. The tree of Black Poison. How long have I been nothing but an extension of the evil of this world?

Always. The voice said. Always.