Trial 2: Clear and Present Danger

Estelle watched the screen as John and the others ventured into the jungle. She had to give the clan credit: how they were seamlessly transmitting the goings on in the trial barrier was well put together. The witch could imagine the number of devices needed to maintain picture fidelity, signal strength, account for the possibility of arcane interference as battles unfolded. It was quite the feat.

‘It seems they were well on their way to having this set up for Tok alone, we just upped the number of participants,’ the witch thought as her eyes drifted from the screen to survey the room. After they saw off the participants, the clan leadership had brought them back to the ballroom from earlier to watch. And while she was excited to see John fight after the effort they put in over the last week, her attention at the moment was drawn to the clan’s resident cat girl.

It was clear to her, even without tools like her glasses, to see Lita was connected to the cameras following John, Rowan and Tok. For one, she was not looking at any of the screens, instead keeping her eyes downturned. And while that might not have been too outrageous, given all they were doing was trekking through the jungle right now, Estelle had noticed she hadn’t been paying attention during their quick fight against that lizard monster.

Beyond physical signs, Estelle could just pick out the faintest of magic pulses coming from Lita, flowing towards and from her in constant, quick surges. And she couldn’t help but be curious about it. So she walked over to Lita, not doing anything to hide her approach. The cat girl only dimly seemed to notice her presence.

“That was some opening fight, huh?” the witch asked casually.

Lita nodded and gave a slight grunt of agreement.

Smirking, Estelle put her plan into action. “Those camera angles were pretty intense. You got right up in there. Must have been hard.”

“It wasn’t,” Lita absentmindedly remarked. Estelle watched the cat girl’s amber eyes blink behind her glasses as her brain caught up to what her mouth had said.

“That wasn’t supposed to be a secret, was it?” Estelle asked, not feeling slightly guilting about her digging.

“N-no,” Lita answered. “I don’t think it is. It’s not that special.”

Seeing reflections of Kiera in the cat girl, Estelle felt a need to fluff her ego. “Not from what I can guess about it. You’re some kind of technomancer, right? Control the cameras and all that.”

Lita, to Estelle’s surprise, shook her head. “N-not like that. I c-can sort of possess things. See through them, m-make them move.”

“Sure sounds special to me,” Estelle said earnestly. “And that you can make it work from here is certainly an achievement.”

Lita flushed under Estelle’s praise and shook her head. “It’s not like it’s easy. There’s a lot of strain. I had to stop using anything else and focus on the camera drones alone.”

“Still, it’s a fairly strong link, yeah?” Estelle asked. “If the drones weren’t sending video, I imagine you could just control them without other equipment.”

“M-maybe,” Lita muttered. “I d-don’t think without the sending arch, I’d be able to link to anything a barrier away.”

Estelle nodded. That made sense. It was likely that Lita was piggybacking on whatever they had set up to transmit video. Likely a system similar to the phone network antenna.

“Oh,” Lita suddenly muttered under her breath. “They’re almost there.”

Estelle turned to one of the displays, trusting that Lita had just given her a spoiler.

---

John kept his eyes and magical senses sweeping through the underbrush as Rowan led them deeper in. A part of him wanted to send Candle out to scout ahead, but he didn’t want to upstage Rowan. He hoped she was right on the money with their direction, otherwise when he began to employ the fox spirit to seek out the dead tree, she was sure to take the blow to her pride all the harder. At least Arcane Sense was invisible.

“Anyone else on edge?” Tok whispered as they ducked under a series of vines bridging between two trees. “I kind of expected us to find something in our path.”

“It is not wise to look a gift horse in the mouth,” Rowan retorted. “I don’t think fighting in this underbrush would be easy for us.”

“It is a bit tight.” John chuckled. “And I don’t imagine either of you would like me lobbing fireballs around.”

Rowan looked back at John with a sharp glare. “Please refrain from doing that, if you can.”

“I’m with her,” Tok added. “Not looking forward to being a charred dwarf.”

“Don’t worry, not a fan of that myself,” John noted. “Just letting you know I’d prefer a bit more range right now.”

“I think that sentiment is shared,” Rowan said. “I think we’d be limited to your knife if we were to be attacked.”

Rowan had put a slight emphasis on the word knife and he knew she was referring more to Senka than the spirit’s vessel. It wasn’t a bad idea to call upon Senka’s abilities to deal with anything that ambushed them from the brush. Given her need to remain stationary to get the most out of her magic, she was well suited for quick, decisive action.

John, however, was a bit **** to lean on her aid. He knew that her presence was likely accounted for and she was considered just another part of his power, but he felt she somewhat violated the spirit of the trial. He wasn't so honorable to take her summoning off the table completely, but if he could get by without her assistance, he would try that option first.

And he was endlessly grateful that Senka understood his reasoning and was going along with it without complaint. He really needed to take her out somewhere nice.

John’s thoughts ground to a halt as he sensed something ahead of them, a dark and cold presence that filled him with sudden dread and caused him to stumble. Before he could fall over, Tok’s heavy hand grabbed his arm.

“You okay there?” he asked.

“Yeah,” John answered. “But I felt something up ahead. Something dark and cold.”

“That fits with the story,” Tok said before clearing his throat. “‘The old tree was ancient when the jungle was new, and time had drained the life from it and the soil it sprang from. Brave Gef led his men into the cold clearing and beheld the dark void amongst the green.’”

“Was there anything about something waiting to attack them?” Rowan asked. “Because if there wasn’t, I wouldn’t put it past your fateweavers from putting something there to act as another enemy for us to deal with.”

“Not according to the story I know, but I wouldn’t put it past the aethersmiths to do that,” Tok answered. “The point of the story is about taking the journey, braving the terrain and elements, not fighting beasts and monsters.”

“Don’t think we’re going to be fighting a thunderstorm,” John said as he looked towards the cool ahead of them. “I think the brush clears up a bit. Give me a sec, I’ve got something I can use to look ahead, see if we’re headed for an ambush.”

With a quick tap through his equipment, he swapped his helmet for the Tinker’s Goggles. The leather strap wrapped around his head seamlessly, lenses already in place over his eyes. While the goggles made for poor binoculars, the lenses better for microscopic viewing, the aura revealing glass acted much like infrared vision. The jungle around them was faintly illuminated by pale purple light, the mixture of earth and water mana he’d come to associate with life focused magic, except for right ahead of them, which was clouded by a fog of wispy grey, seemingly emanating from one spot.

And something with a thicker grey and purple aura was shuffling around, disturbing the mist. From what John could make out, it was at least his height, but was hunched over and far wider than he was.

“There’s something over there,” John reported. “I’m going to see if I’ve got a good enough view of it to get it with Observe.

Gravetender
Lv. 15 Fungal Dryad
A large fungal colony in a humanoid shape. A single large mushroom serves as its body and head, while subordinate ones make up its limbs. Often found in areas blighted by ****, it thrives by recycling the decaying matter, leaving the area refreshed. It is, however, rather territorial.

“They’re definitely taking some liberties with the story,” Tok muttered as he read the info. “That wasn’t a thing.”

“If it was a one for one recreation, you probably could lead us through it without a problem,” John remarked. “Not exactly a great way to show our stuff.”

“I’m assuming we’ll need to enter the clearing to properly orient ourselves, right?” Rowan asked.

“The story has Gef and his men finding a trail to follow,” Tok answered. I don’t recall if they mentioned where in the clearing it started.”

“So going around the edge could take a while,” John summed up. “Assuming getting anywhere near the edge of it won’t trigger the tender’s aggression.”

“So, do we just barge in and deal with it?” Tok asked, fingers tightening around his ax.

“We shouldn’t be too eager to fight, especially against an enemy with a lot of unknowns,” Rowan cautioned before glancing at the still visible display. “That didn’t provide a lot of useful information.”

“I’ve got one way to test if it’ll start attacking anything that gets close,” John said. “Well, two ways, but I want to check something.”

With a small outpouring of mana, John manifested his wind spirit and Candle. The swirling mass of green wind floated above his head while the fox appeared at his feet, quickly racing around them excitedly before darting around Rowan and Tok.

“Heard you had a summon, but not three,” Tok said as he bent down to pat Candle on her head. The fox leaned into it, tail wagging.

“I’ve got four,” John said. “These two, a water one and Senka, who clearly you’ve heard of.”

“I suppose you’re saving her as a surprise ambush,” Rowan remarked.

“More like an emergency reserve,” John admitted. “I don’t want to upset the intended balance of this by being two players in one.”

“But Dad knew about her,” Tok pointed out.

“Which is why I’m not taking her off the table entirely,” John said. “I know there’s a chance that your aethersmiths have accounted for four people instead of three. If that looks to be the case, she’ll be out here fighting in a heartbeat.”

“That’s tactically sound,” Rowan remarked hesitantly. “I would say it’s likely they’ve set the difficulty with her in mind, even if that’s just a little more due to not knowing all our capabilities.”

“Speaking of tactics, what is your plan with these guys?” Tok asked.

“I’m going to send my wind spirit out into the clearing first,” John said, pointing to said spirit. “See if anything will set it off. If it doesn’t, I’ll send Candle in. I’ve got a feeling that an animal is more likely to trigger something.”

“To what end?” Rowan asked. “If it does act aggressively, what’s your plan from there?”

“If things go poorly, I can let Candle unmanifest, and see if that calms it down,” John explained. “If it does…”

“We can play off its reaction!” Tok excitedly proclaimed. “Send the fox out to draw its attention and strike from behind once we get it into a good spot! Or flank it with a pincer move!”

“Bingo,” John said. “And Candle’s not some helpless kit. She’s got some bite to her.”

Candle bounded over to John and rubbed against his leg. She knew just what her job was.

“Let’s get to it then,” Rowan said. “I don’t want to keep running the risk of that mushroom hearing us and making a counterplan.”

John nodded and sent the wind spirit flying into the clearing. From a rough estimate of distance, John figured he flew it several meters into the open space. After a few moments with no detectable sign of movement, John flew it back and let it fade back into his aura.
“Guess a pure elemental spirit doesn’t trip anything. Candle, you’re up.”

The fox darted into the underbrush and John let a trickle of his mana flow into her. Over the course of the week’s training, he had leveled her to rank five, which not only gave her a massive seventy-five meter range, but had unlocked new powers. One of them being an upgrade to her Predatory Senses. Not only did his mana enhance them for her, but now he could see, hear, smell and feel what she did. Which meant Candle had become a key scouting element.

The shift between his human senses to Candle’s still took a moment for his brain to deal with and he found himself in her place, scurrying into the clearing. The moment her paws crossed from green jungle to dusty brown dirt, the Gravetender snapped its attention to her, giving her only a moment to take in the environment. It was roughly a circle, with a single dead tree standing about the center, dead grass all around it.

A fine mist of noxious green spores rained down from the underside of its wide purple cap as it turned its thick bulk towards the fox, sinewy limbs made of woven mushroom stems undulating to move the mass of the main body.

It pointed the staff it carried with one of its limbs at Candle, the spray of spores growing in volume, covering most of its body, before the cloud shot off at her like a fireball. Candle bolted at John’s command, dashing at full speed away from the cloud. He knew only a handful of what Anita could do with her spores and he didn’t want his spirit getting caught in a cloud that was likely far more deadly.

‘Though, if they’re spores for dealing with living things, would they even affect Candle?’

The thought crossed his mind, but John didn’t want to risk it. Instead, once Candle had darted a good distance away, he ordered her to look back. Candle did so, and John watched as the spore cloud flew towards her. It was dispersed enough for him to see the brown grass that filled the clearing wither away even more as the spores spread over them.

Seeing enough, and still hesitant to test if the spores had any effect on a spirit, John bade Candle to run back to him. It cost him less to keep her manifested than to repeat her summoning later.

John let his senses go back to normal and he sighed. “Well, it attacked as soon as Candle crossed the line. Spores that looked like they were decaying the already dead grass.”

“Doesn’t sound like something we want to get hit by.” Tok grimly chuckled. “So, how do we deal with this?”

“Given its fungal nature, fire likely will have a good effect on it,” John said. “I think the clearing’s wide enough that with the right set-up, we can blast it without burning everything down.”

“John, can you do more with wind magic than fire off blasts?” Rowan asked.

“I can do a bit of free form stuff,” John said, demonstrating by sending up a weak twister that kicked up a small amount of leaf litter.

“Do you think you could contain a fire around our enemy?” she inquired. “Ignite it and keep the blaze on it only.”

“I haven’t done a big move like that, but I think I can,” John said, considering all he could do. “The attack I can do with my fire wand can be solid enough to act more like an arrow, so I can hold off letting it explode.”

“So, feint with the fox, hit with the fire and trap it in a tornado to fry,” Tok grinned. “Sounds like it’ll work. And if it’s not enough, I can’t imagine it’ll be up for getting chopped down.”

“I think we should do it like this,” Rowan said, drawing in a small patch of dirt with a liberated stick. In a wide circle, she drew a cartoon fox icon to represent Candle near one edge, a mushroom for the Gravetender at the center, an ax for Tok and rose for her flanking the mushroom on either side and finally a flame for John at the rear. “John, you have Candle draw its attention while Tok and I make ready at the flanks. Then you hit it from behind and contain the flames. If it’s still alive after that, Tok and I can move in quickly to finish it off.”

“That sounds solid,” John nodded. “I’ve got a backup plan I can use with Candle if a follow up attack is needed so we can hit it from all sides if need be.”

Rowan nodded. “It’s good to have the option for a follow up attack in case the fire and strike plan fails to finish it off.”

“But I think we’ll be able to take it out on the first move,” Tok proudly proclaimed, smacking his fist into his palm.

“Let’s not get too confident,” Rowan cautioned. “It’s always a smart move to have a backup plan, especially against an unknown foe.”

To his credit, Tok nodded. “You’re right. Just eager, is all.”

“We should get moving,” John advised. “Not sure how smart that shroom is but giving it more time to be ready for us is a bad idea. I can have Candle guide you to the best spot to wait.”

“Let’s do this, then.” Tok grinned.