Hello. I want to thank to all the people that had been reading this story, leaving comments and reviews, they help me a lot. I also want to apologize for taking more time with this chapter but real life has been acting lately. This chapter could be considered the end of the first arc sort off and it has made me want to change the title of the story a bit. I hope you don't mind that.

I hope you enjoy this and if you like this story, if you see something wrong that I should change, or just simply think there is something i could do better, please, leave a comment or something. I write this story mostly to improve. Thank you.

It was, if I was right, the last day of the merge and we had gone back to the forest for more water just in case we couldn’t do it after the merge was completed. Of course the forest didn’t look the same, it had been burnt and frozen over the last two days but just this morning it had grown back and it may be even bigger than last time

I breathed slowly following the same rhythm, not too fast, not too quickly, and assessed the situation.

On the one hand I had managed to use the Breath of the world, which was unlike any other abilities I had. I just had to think the name and it started. It had been very easy actually and if I hadn’t been blind by my druid skills it would have been very obvious.

On the other hand there was a pack of wolves surrounding me. So, not a very good day. The wolves didn’t saw me thanks to that ability. I was in a sense getting close to the world around me and that was camouflaging me, but it was not perfect or they would have already moved out of the way. Not that I was not going to last to much more before the exhaustion won.

So I needed a plan. I couldn’t fight all of them in time, John could because his ranger superpowers were bullshit but not me, and they were not here right now. I didn’t have enough space to run from them before they caught me so. My control over plants was not as good as it seemed when I used it for the first time, and after a few tries I had noticed that I needed to be physically touching the plants, at least the same kind of plants. I hadn’t had the time to try anything else but it was time to test something new and see if I survived, because if I waited more I wouldn’t be able to do it.

I went down to the ground very slowly, maintaining the breath of the world while I prepared the rest. The mana from all life around me opened to my command and flowed to me.

It was a nice sensation, one that I was sure would never stop being as beautiful as overwhelming, but the mana was not for me and I shoved it back into the plants. I told them what I wanted, it was more difficult that just telling them but it was similar, and charged them with as many mana as I could.

Nothing happened for a few minutes while I put more mana inside the grass and then when I thought they were sufficiently charged I ran without looking at the result.

The breath stopped working the moment I moved and the wolves noticed my presence, but it was too late for them. The grass grew all around them, not binding them, they were too fast to get trapped. It could only slow them down.

I ran between trees and the grass jumped to them taking the shape of webs in the paths I took. Sometimes the grass just appeared over their faces making them difficult to follow.

“Adam!” yelled my brother running at me followed by the rest.

“About bloody time!” I cursed without stopping. “Go to the forest, they said. I would be fun, they said.”

And then for a very stupid coincidence just because the universe decided it would be fun a wild blue window appeared.

Merge of the Blood element in progress.

“Oh, for the love of… Blood merge!” I yelled and ran towards them.

The announcement surprised them for a second but they didn’t stop. The wolves growled behind. I wondered if maybe they had also received an alarm about the merge, but that didn’t stop them.

I ran behind my friends while the grass jumped to embrace the trees around. One of the leaves stopped growing midway and fell. I cursed, the spell was starting to fade.

Rain started to pour over the forest then. I prayed that helped in some way to lose the wolves but I didn’t dare to look behind. I looked to the front and saw my friends running and the rain soaking their clothes.

Red rain or… perhaps… I stretched my hand to catch the rain and a single blood drop fell on it. Surprise, it was raining blood, not what was I was expecting but…

No, wait. I felt a strain in the spells I put on me before. They were active, trying to heal or suppress something. I could feel the same happening to my friends.

“Shit, we need to find some place to hide from this rain now, is doing something bad!” I yelled to them.

Sam and Knight were startled by that, but John didn’t lose his cool.

“There!” he pointed to a thick vegetation area.

The trees there had grown very close together forming a thick canopy surrounded by low branches. We run towards it without stop when a wolf growled again just behind me.

There was no time, they entered almost with a jump, breaking branches as they passed and I concentrated in taking mana from the ambient. There was no time for much, just a little mana.

I ran towards the branches touching them as I passed pouring every little piece of mana I had into them and asking, begging to seal the way behind me and just let myself fall in the interior of the forest.

Luckily the trees answered and the branches grew thicker changing position over the way I entered, the remaining mana I used in the grass before snapped between the branches. The first wolf that tried to pass through it slammed into a solid wall of trees.

I fell to the ground passing through the trees and taking some cuts in the broken branches. Knight was already there when I tried to get up and I looked behind. The wolves were still trying to pass.

“It’s not going to last very long, I think,” I said breathing loudly. “We need to move out of here.”

“Adam, breathe, we are okay,” said Knight trying to calm my erratic breathing.

“No time,” I answered trying to inspect the place we were.

“What happened?” asked John.

I closed my eyes trying to feel the spells in them, it was easier that way and they had stopped healing them.

“The rain was doing something, hurting us. The seeds were trying to heal you at the same time. I didn’t feel anything and I don’t know what it was, but the rain was doing something, poison us maybe? I don’t know.” I said.

“Okay,” said John grimacing. “Thanks for the warning.”

“You are welcome,” I laughed and almost immediately breathed loudly again trying not to black out.

“I think using so much magic is not very good for you,” said Knight looking at me worried.

“It’s just tiring, I’ll be fine.” I said.

My breath started to become normal. We were surrounded by trees and only a few drops of blood managed to pass through the canopy above us. The wolves outside were howling loudly but didn’t manage to make the branches budge. We were safe for now, and my forces were starting to come back.

I moved back from Knight, keeping myself up without help and looking for a way out of the forest.

Instead something else drew my attention, the place looked almost like were we had fought the Alfa wolf, surrounded by thick vegetation and with lots of flowers.

Black dream

Crafting ingredient.Tainted by the corrupted energies of blood magic in another time these flowers brought sweet dreams to those that needed them, instead they now use their scent to make their victims fall and drain their life while they sleep.

Shit, I recognized the flowers, they were the ones from the other day but corrupted somehow. Sam was kneeling close to one of them examining it closer and John was asking something I didn’t catch.

“…be useful?” asked John.

Sam shrugged touching the flower. “Maybe, I haven’t done anything with the other flowers yet, but it’s worth a try.”

“No!” I yelled too late.

He stretched his hand and plucked the flower too quickly for me to say anything.

“What?” asked Sam looking at me, a tint of fear in his voice.

For a moment nothing happened and then the rest of the flowers released their scent, tiny black specks of pollen flew into the air trying to infect us. I ran to them, grabbed them and forced them to follow. I inspected around while running, surrounded by trees and flowers there was not much we could do. Only one way we could ran where there were less trees.

We jumped between flowers that kept trying to kill us. The scent, the spores or whatever they were using was affecting us, and the seeds were doing nothing like they didn’t with the Sam the other day.

“What is happening?” asked Sam disentangling from my arm but not stopping.

“The flowers are trying to kill us,” I answered. “Don’t breathe too much if you can.”

They cursed and we did a sharp turn around some of the trees. There was a straight path ahead with not many flowers that ended in a clearing. I could see the brightness of the sun lighting the way and I ran guiding the rest with me.

A howl from behind almost made me lose my footing. I glanced back enough to see the wolves charging through the trees. There was something more, the wolves had changed since I saw them, just slightly, a few stripes of different colors in their fur.

We jumped into the clearing. The poison of the plants was starting to affect me and I doubted the rest were better off. I immediately tried to find another way to go when…

Tainted Sacred tree Lv. 2The sacred trees are gifts of the gods of light to bring strength and life to the land. They are extremely rare and in other times they were symbols of peace and unity, bringing happiness and prosperity to anyone that was lucky to live close to them. The taint has poisoned this one into an abomination, a mockery of life and creation that wants nothing more than to hunt.

The tree was massive and wrong, red veins of something that looked like blood pulsed along its surface and long branches moved like if they were alive. The connection I had with the mana of life told me more, it was dangerous and it had seen us.

“Shit, there is no way out,” said Sam.

There was no time, I pushed Sam and Knight to the ground at the same moment I felt the earth shift slightly and a wolf jumping to attack us. John dodged out of the way just in time.

A large root emerged from the ground close to us ready to attack but instead reached to the wolf. The root attacked entangling around the body of the wolf, lifting it up and after a moment of moving it in circles launching it towards the trees.

The wolf dropped with a thud dead, or almost. The pack howled having found a threat and joined together to attack the tree. I got up taking both my friends with me and ran the way we came but the trees closed our way.

I launched my hand to the branches that were in our way, taking mana and trying to order them to move. They moved momentarily only to go back in place. I felt another kind of magic acting over the trees, something that was already controlling them, something…

“Magic the fucking branches away!” yelled Sam.

“I can’t! That tree is controlling these ones!” I yelled back pointing at the tainted tree.

“Let’s try from another place,” said Knight moving away towards other trees who as soon as he got close snapped their branches closing his path.

“I don’t think he is going to let us simply walk away,” I said with a grimace.

“What the hell do we do, then?” asked Knight.

John summoned the crossbow and said. “We kill it.”

I stared at him dumbfounded. “How? Is a tree, unless you have developed a way to breathe fire I don’t think we can kill it with arrows or hitting it with bats.”

John nodded but said nothing, at a moment notice he was already walking closer to tree ready to enter combat.

“Great,” I sighed.

The wolves surrounded the tree, and the tree answered by lifting several roots that tried to attack the wolves. John moved closer trying to do something.

I just watched, not knowing what to do. My mind knew there was nothing to do, killing a tree was not something that was going to work. Maybe if we had something to cut it with and the roots weren’t trying to kill us…

John launched an arrow, it was clearly one of the modified arrows that Sam made. I hoped that could do something. The arrow embedded itself on the tree and for a moment nothing happened, I close my eyes trying to think of another way. I tried to dive into the druid memories and found nothing.

Then there was a loud sound, like the sound of bark yelling and dozens of more roots joined the fight. Most of the new roots moved towards John that dodged incredibly quickly and an idea came to my mind.

I dropped to the ground and used commanded the grass. It responded quickly not being controlled by the tree and I instantly most of the roots found themselves attacked by thousands of green tendrils that tried to bind them.

It was not much, but it gave an opening to the wolves that take advantage of the situation charging straight to the tree and ramming their horns into it.

The tree yelled again and I could feel the pain coming from it.

“The horns are hurting it!” I yelled to John. “Use the black arrows!”

John nodded and launched the other nine black arrows that Sam had managed to make in the last days. I looked at the tree hoping it would die now, but instead it reacted wildly, moving the roots back and taking all the wolves that were attacking it, lifting then and launching them in all directions.

The wolves stopped moving and I cursed. The tree was not dead but it was angry. So angry I didn’t notice when the branches got close to my leg and entangled around it. Suddenly I was being yanked over the grass by a root taking my closer to the tree.

“Adam,” yelled my brother who caught my hand trying to help me.

The root was to strong and it pulled us both.

“Don’t!” I said snapping his hand away. “The horns hurt it! Use them!”

Knight didn’t protest, he simply walk towards Sam and snatched a horn the moment he summoned it from his inventory. Then went running towards the tree. I cursed silently, that was not going to help. The roots were already moving to stop him.

I concentrated my mana again and moved my hand down to the root that was dragging me. The sensation was overwhelming. I briefly touched the mind of the tree and found intelligence. It was not just like the other trees, this one was thinking, making plans, and analyzing his enemy. It was as I imagined it would be to enter the mind of a human.

And it felt me. I released the mana inside his mind, not trying to order it but to confound it, to make it lose a few precious moments.

It worked, for a precious moment I stopped being dragged away and my brother ran to it. Knight nailed the horn to the tree and before it could react used the steel bat to make it go completely inside.

The tree didn’t like that and yelled again using his roots to launch Knight to the trees, but it was too late. The tree yelled again with the sound of branches breaking apart and bark cracking. It tore the roots around trying to attack wildly and doing nothing and after a few moments stopped. The roots fell to the ground and started to become ashes that flew into the air.

You have reached level 10.

“Knight!” I yelled getting up and running towards him. He was not moving and I could feel the seed working.

“I’m okay!” he said quickly still not moving.

I dropped close to him and checked. He was bent backwards, an arm was dislocated and some his ribs were broken.

“You are not okay!” I cried casting the seed again over his ribs.

The spell was fast, and the ribs were in place in moments but not in a perfect state. They were a bit weaker still. The spell was still working and I didn’t know if it was going to do something more.

“I’m fine, seriously,” he said trying to get up at the same time I put his arm back in place. “AAAAAAAAGH. Son of a- Did you have to do it like that?”

“Yes,” I snapped at him. “Don’t get yourself killed doing stupid shit.”

“I was trying to save you,” he grunted.

“Do it better!” I yelled.

“Guys!” called Sam from behind. “You should see this.”

I grunted still a bit mad for my brother but helped him get up. The clearing was still surrounded by trees and branches but it was safe. The tainted tree wasn’t there anymore, it had burn quickly and disappeared without leaving the ashes behind. The wolves were piled around the trees were they fell and John was making sure they were dead.

I walked with my brother towards Sam. He was kneeling in the ground in the same place the tree had been. I smiled.

“Something dropped?” I asked walking excitedly.

He laughed. “Yes something dropped but I can’t take it.”

He moved back showing two objects lying in the ground. One was a red spear and the other looked like a glowing white orb.

Spear of redemption

Weapon.When a sacred tree is a miracle, a tainted one is a disease that spreads across the lands killing and corrupting everything in its path. The gods of light recognize your efforts in cleansing this tree before it could grow in strength and swallow the forest and reward you for this action.

Bind only: Knight.5% Fire damage to all enemies.

25% damage to tainted enemies.

Seed of the sacred treeThe seed of a sacred tree, rewarded by the gods of light to their druid for cleansing the taint of one of its kind. It can only be planted once. The sacred tree does not give more seeds. Misusing this seed can cause antagonism with the gods of light. Bind only: Adam.

“What are they?” asked Sam.

I stood there open-mouthed staring at the rewards for a moment before moving to the orb, the seed, and taking it into my inventory.

“A magic tree seed and an overpowered weapon that only Knight can use,” I answered and said pointing at the spear. “That’s yours.”

“Mine?” He asked looking at the spear with something akin to bewilderment.

“Yes, it says you are the only one who can use,” I nodded.

He looked at it for a moment and finally moved to take it. His hands barely touched the spear when it lighted briefly recognizing his owner and letting a little flame escape over the tip.

“Whoa,” yelled Sam backing off. “What was that?”

I stared at it for a moment. “I think the medical term is premature ejaculation. I recall your past girlfriends mentioned something about it, and you should-”

Knight hit me in the arm smiling. “Let’s not talk about ‘girlfriends’ shall we?”

I winced. “Yes, okay.”

I explained what I discovered about the spear quickly to them.

John walked to us then, the crossbow still in his hand.

“I have the wolf carcasses,” he said not surprised in the slightest for the big spear in Knight’s hands. “Can you open the… trees?”

I looked back at the trees closing our ways with branches and nodded.

“I think so.”

“Good, I believe there is water around here, so we should move,” he said glancing around.

“Wait. You are not even remotely interested in the flaming spear?” I asked.

John turned his eyes upon the spear briefly ogling its magnificent form. Then shock his head and walked back towards the trees.

I stared at him for a moment and sighed.

“Someday, probably just a second before he dies in my arms I’m going to understand him,” I said following him.

***

The sun was still up in the sky when we made our way out of the mountain that had protected us for so many days. The place was becoming too dangerous to keep living there. We drove in silence, too tired for words or relief. After all this days of constant changes it seemed like an end to a nightmare but we knew it was just the beginning.

The roads were still there, or at least part of them and I could only imagined how the hell they survived everything that had happened. I sighed. It really didn’t matter, sooner or later we would have to abandon the roads.

I glanced outside just a moment and my heart stopped.

“Stop,” I said getting up and walking to the door.

Sam stopped without asking anything, perhaps because he saw the same as me or just because he was already accustomed at my odd requests.

I walked outside, some trees were covering my sight and I walked past them. The sight made my breath deeply.

“What are you…?” started to ask Knight but shut up at the sight.

Bloodmoon lake, the place where the military had been set up was there. It was not the same lake, this was enormous, huge, mind-bogglingly big. So big we couldn’t see the end of it. Yes, okay, we hadn’t move so far from the military camp but it was not the same lake anymore.

One part of it was normal, calm waters drifting in tune with the air.

Part of it was frozen, a thin sheet of ice glinting on the sun covered the west.

Another part was boiling, steam floating through the air with deep glowing lava at the bottom.

In the last part, just at the center of the lake where a tiny island lied there was a whirlpool gnashing at the lake and glowing with purple light.

We didn’t talk, we didn’t whisper or said anything. We just let the moment and the sight sink in silence. Then just to finish the moment the last piece fell in place. A roar broke the silence and the wind shocked with a sharp sound knocking us down to the ground.

I looked up when the wind started to move faster and saw it.

Dragon Lv. ???Three are the reasons why the gods of light gave birth to the dragons.

To protect light.

To protect life.

To protect order.

Pity to the ones who dare attack those things for the dragons never rests and the dragons never fail.

The dragon flew above the lake looking briefly at it and then with a loud shock of his wings run over the horizon.

And we just stood there in the ground, knocked over just by the power of its wings.

“Let’s go,” I said after a minute of staring, getting up.

“Where?” asked Knight still openmouthed.

I sighed. “Somewhere safe, somewhere to call home.”

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