Chapter 5: Chapter 5: Forwards

The child clung to the trunk of a tree, cloaked in an illusion to look like an unremarkable patch of brown bark. Wearily its eyes scanned the skies above but found nothing flying overhead. The sight of a clear horizon gave the child little comfort, it only meant that it hadn’t been able to spot the relentless black bird. It thought back to how it got into this mess. 

It had all started when a curious black bird had approached it. Compared to the creatures it had encountered before the bird was massive, larger than anything it had ever encountered. The bird possessed a wingspan that stretched as wide as the length of a tree and a wicked curved beak that was almost as large as the child was.

The child had stood still, hoping to escape the bird’s notice; however the tactic proved ineffective. The bird drew closer and brought a massive yellow eye to peer at the child. In response the child lashed out and skewered one of the bird’s eyes before sending out three clones in all different directions to throw the beast off. 

Squawks of rage and plumes of feather flew out as the bird flapped its massive wings and ascended to chase after the white child that had dared blind one of its eyes. Leaping from branch to branch, the child ran away as the bird chased after one of its illusions.

That fateful decision had been a mistake. Although at first things seemed to go well. The bird, unsure of which illusion was real, had been tricked and drawn to fly a great distance away from the child. However, that had only been for a while. After some time passed, the child spotted the bird circling high above overhead, searching for it.

Although the illusions had worked to throw the bird off, it had only done so for a time. So the child had tried to stealthily sneak past the bird’s notice, dropping below a layer of branches and cloaking itself. This plan hadn’t worked. The bird had unbelievably sharp eyes and had somehow spotted the child moving from multiple tree trunk lengths away. 

With the bird barreling down on it the child again released clones of itself to throw the beast off and immediately began swinging from branch to branch as fast as it could to gain distance. However, this time the bird saw through the illusions even faster and the child could see the bird circling overhead not long after, searching for it.  

As time passed the child grew to realize something. The black bird possessed something the child could only describe as pure malice as it doggedly pursued the child through the jungle. The same scenario repeated a few more times, until the child was left with nearly no power in its reserves and no time in between usages of its powers to gain distance or rest, leading to its current situation, clinging onto a tree and at the mercy of the bird.  The situation now was even more frustrating as by this point it was close to its goal but was now forced into the current situation.

None of the tricks and tactics it could think of worked, clones only worked to buy it a little time, standing still certainly didn’t work, conjuring lights wouldn’t help with the sun present, waiting wouldn’t work, it had already waited what felt like ages, and it had a dwindling supply of power to keep in mind. All in all, things were looking really bad for the child.

In the current situation it would only be a matter of time until the child completely ran out of power and its camouflage disappeared, inevitably leading to the bird somehow spotting it despite being far far away and not being able to run away this time. If it couldn’t run away then it needed to fight but fighting it was a terrible idea, fighting was always a terrible idea.

If its normal tactics didn’t work it needed to think of something different, something new and smarter. Firstly, it thought of what it had at the moment. It had itself and its body, a little bit of power leftover, and the surrounding jungle. Hmm… It wasn’t a lot to work with but the child was smart, it was sure it could figure something out. 

What would work, what would work, what would work… 

Running away from it wouldn’t work, somehow no matter how far it had run away the creature always managed to spot it. If it climbed back to the ground it’d lose sight of the tranquil waters it wanted to go to and if it tried to climb back up later the bird would probably still be there, chasing it. Hmm… If the child wanted to progress it’d need to kill the bird.

Countless possibilities filtered through its mind before finally a brilliant idea filled its mind. It didn’t need to kill the bird, it just needed the bird dead! If it couldn’t kill the bird then something else would kill the bird for it! 

During its climb the child had beared witness to a pack of thirty fearsome looking hornet creatures destroying a colony of hundreds of funny looking bee creatures. Those thirty fearsome hornets should be more than enough to kill the bird, in fact it’d probably be a one sided massacre!

With a brilliant plan in mind all it now needed to do was find a group of the hornets to lead the bird to. Where there were bee creatures there were fearsome hornet creatures that would prey on them. It scanned the trunks of nearby trees, searching for the honeycomb houses that it knew the bees resided in.

Luckily, it didn’t take the child long to find a colony of funny looking creatures. It was easy to spot the telltale signs of honeycombs, and slightly yellowish white walls.

The child looked up to check where the bird was. The bird was quite a distance away, just a black dot in the sky but the child knew just how quickly that black dot could grow to turn into a bird and so it made a potentially dangerous choice to buy the needed time to reach the funny looking creature colony.

Dismissing the camouflage it had hid itself under, the child formed the last of its power into a clone and sent it running through the trees in the opposite direction of the colony. It was a dangerous gamble, with its current power it meant no more clones and therefore no more being able to run away or hide from the bird this time around. Its plan needed to work. However, the child’s plan was brilliant so when it thought about it, it wasn’t really a gamble. The outcome was guaranteed, its plan would work. 

The child waited until it was sure the bird was chasing after the illusion before scrambling to reach the colony. The clone could only buy so much time so there was no time to dally. After having run away from the bird so many times the child had gotten proficient at leaping from branch to branch and swinging from vine to vine.

It covered the distance in good time and managed to reach the colony well before the bird. It started triumphantly at the distant growing black spot. Now all it had to do was wait and its job would be over. The bird would fight with the funny creature colony for a while, then the fearsome hornet creatures would arrive and kill the bird and everything would be solved!

A distant buzzing filled the air.

Sitting down, the child let the feeling of triumph wash over it as it watched with smugness at the distant bird approaching. The bird had been smart compared to the regular jungle creatures but it was not a match for the child’s own intellect. 

Unlike the bird the child was a creature that had managed to trick every creature it had ever encountered. There were levels to intelligence and it was clear that the child was levels above the bird in terms of smartness.

The buzzing sound grew.

The bird was soo simple, sooo dumb, soooo stupid. It’d fall right into the child’s tricks just like every other creature before it. Although the child gave the bird some credit, it had managed to see through its clones, that feat was deserving of some praise.

The buzzing sound grew louder still.

Annoyed at the buzzing the child turned its head around and finally noticed something, a swarm of funny looking bee creatures were approaching it. The child then realized, far too late, that it had rushed over to the colony and had neglected to either stay still or raise up a net of camouflage. It tried raising up a net of camouflage then and there to rectify the mistake but its power had been emptied by its earlier summon. 

The child glanced up to see how close the bird was… It was still at least a minute away… It glanced back down at the mass of funny looking creatures barreling down on it. 

It had not thought its plan through thoroughly enough.

The child threw itself into motion, leaping from the branch it was perched on and away from the swarm of funny looking creatures. It stepped from tree limb to tree limb, trying to gain distance but the flying bug swarm drew closer. Memories of its first encounter with the evil bug swarm filled it with fear and drove it to act, to move, to pick up the pace.

However, while it was stuck jumping from branch to branch, the funny looking creatures could fly and while not particularly fast, they were still far faster than a child parkouring from tree to tree. The distance between was rapidly being shaved to nothing, the child needed to try something different.

Focusing, the child tried desperately to form a clone and a camouflage net but no good, it could feel that the only things its power could support at the moment was maybe a light and even then not for very long. 

Mind racing it had a flash of inspiration. When the child had first looked at the sun it had been so bright it was difficult to look at. If the only thing it could summon was light then it’d summon a light just like that! Exhaling and closing its eyes the child conjured forth a blinding light so bright it could see white despite closing off its vision.

A symphony of angry buzzing and what sounded like bugs smashing into things rang out. The child reopened its eyes and was greeted to the beautiful sight of chaos. The bees chasing it were flying around in blind circles, crashing into each other and nearby trees, no longer able to follow the child.

Pride swelled in the child’s chest but it remembered not to be too caught up in its own brilliant work. It glanced up, searching for the distant black spot that signified the bird and saw a massive set of talons opening up to crush it. 

The child threw itself off the branch it was on, having no time to leap to another. The bird’s talons destroyed the patch of tree it had been on, a massive crash ringing out. The child fell a good distance before managing to right itself in the air and dig its sharpened hands and feet into the body of a tree, scoring long lines that bled sap as it slowed itself down. 

A thin shower of splinters rained down on the child as it looked up to see the angry visage of a massive black bird. The bird’s remaining yellow eye gazed at the child with hatred burning in its iris. Using the bird’s temporary stupidity the child used the new trick it had just learned, it exhaled and conjured a light that flashed like the sun, blinding the bird temporarily.

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Squawks of rage and frantic wing beats were left trailing behind the child as it rushed back to the beehive, still intent on making its plan come to fruition. Rushing faster than it had ever done before and with an agility it didn’t know it had, it bounded from branch to branch, closing rapidly on the massive colony of bee creatures.

Unfortunately, its flash of light earlier hadn’t worked nearly as well as it had against the bee-like creatures. With a screech of pure unadulterated fury the black bird barreled through branches, snapping them into saw dust as it roared towards the child. If that wasn’t enough a new batch of bee creatures had arrived, trying to cut the child’s path to the hives off.

Surrounded on all sides the child was faced with two options, fight the bird or fight the funny bee creatures. It picked to fight the funny creatures because it knew that they were weak. The child merged its fingers together and turned both its hands to spikes, no longer concerned with dexterity or finesse and smashed into the nearest bee trying to stop its escape. 

The bee’s carapace was weak, almost squishy and the child’s spikes were easily able to eviscerate the insect, spraying amber colored blood in all directions as the child continued towards the hive. With its back now turned one bee managed to jab its hand sized stinger into the child, causing it immense pain but the child pushed through it.

Luckily, the bee’s attention was only drawn to the child briefly.  The approaching massive black bird had quickly become the more pressing threat rather than some small white child. With a certain buzzing pattern being relayed the bee creatures that had been chasing the child switched their focus to the large angry squawking bird behind it. 

The small swarm of bees moved to assault the bird, burying their stingers through its feathers but in response the bird let out a hiss and for a moment turned red hot. In a flash the two score or more bees had their internal organs roasted and they fell from the sky, lifelessly.

That had not bought as much time as the child had wanted, although now closer to the hives it was still a good distance away. There was however, good news as pouring out from the hives was more bees and in the distance it spotted the sight of the hornets. Its master plan was coming together, it just needed to survive for a bit longer. 

It jumped off a branch and let itself fall a few meters to dodge the massive speeding body of the black bird. The canopy above was roughly pruned by the heavy mass of flesh, bones and black feathers that wanted it dead. The child fell and hit a branch running, not wasting a moment.

From branch to branch it hopped and fell, only barely avoiding the angry bird before thankfully managing to reach the hive unscathed. The child left the bird behind as it leapt from a branch it was on to land on top of the colony roof. Triumphantly the child turned around to stare as the bird was busy fighting off an army of the bee creatures.

With a flash of red, the army of bees that had made to strike the intruder fell, lifeless with faint smoke wafting upwards as the mass of burnt corpses rained down to the ground. That had really bought next to no time at all!

Without being slowed down the slightest the bird smashed into the hive the child was standing on, sending waxy debris and globs of golden honey everywhere.  The whole structure buckled and the child was forced to dig its hands and feet into the tree as the hive below it disappeared.

In just one blow the bird had destroyed the whole colony of bees! The child knew they were weak but it didn’t realize they were that weak!

The child looked around and realized that all the branches around it had been sheared off, leaving it with no further ledges to leap to. The only potential escape was a fall straight down to the ground. A glowing malicious yellow eye peered at the child. Now all that stood in the way of the child and bird was air. 

It had just been tricked! Out thought! Outmaneuvered!

A lump formed in the back of its throat as it stared at the hateful beast. It checked the distance between itself and the hornets, it only needed a few more moments for them to arrive. Argh there was only one thing left it could do! One really bad thing, the always wrong decision, fighting. 

It vaulted from its position on the tree and onto the hateful black mass, gouging its spikes into the bird's breast. However, given the bird’s size it wasn’t so much gouging rather scratching would be a more fitting term. 

Retaliating, the bird let out a flash of heat, turning red hot for a moment to flash fry the nuisance that had first blinded it in one eye then dared to ruffle its magnificent black feathers. Although the attack had proven effective against the bees it only tickled the child’s hands. In a happy learning experience the child had just discovered it was quite resistant to heat!

Furious at its attack not working and the child still somehow being alive it craned its neck to try and peck the child. The child let go of the bird, letting itself fall back on to the tree. It had stalled for just enough time for its plan to take effect. Thirty buzzing ripping fearsome hornets had finally arrived!

The fight began with thirty stingers and mandibles biting into the bird’s flesh. Still though, the bird was simply so massive that any individual attack that pierced through its flesh were merely annoyances although thirty attacks repeatedly being made would deal some serious damage. The child watched on as the bird fought with the mass of hornets, biting the head off one and slashing the wings of another with its talons.

To the child’s instant worry it realized that the bird was winning. Even after destroying the bees and being stung and bitten well over thirty times it was still somehow winning against the hornets, seemingly not diminished or weakened in the slightest.

Although the hornets fared better than the bees, their numbers still were dropping fast. Every snapping of the bird’s beak, flashing of its talons, and flare of red hot heat ended the lives of a few hornets. 

The child looked around for an escape but there was no escape, all the branches had been destroyed, the only way out was a plummet straight to the ground. 

The child thought and thought hard.

Powers? Gone.

The jungle? Everything it could think to use had been used.

Its body? What use was its body when confronting a bird that size!

Actually, wait! Its body was resistant to heat or whatever that bird thing emitted and when it had climbed on the bird it couldn’t reach over to attack it!

With little time to think as the last of the hornets fell it threw itself back at the bird’s form, landing on the back of its neck. The bird screeched in rage at the child that simply refused to die easily. The bird turned to try and peck at the child but couldn’t reach the spot behind its neck the child had taken refuge in.

Now worked up into a proper thoughtless rage the bird dived, spinning through branches and flying, letting itself turn red hot and increasing the heat. The child hung on for dear life as the bird crashed through the jungle. The bird’s temperature rose and continued to rise until just maintaining a hold hurt the child’s hands.

Smoke rose up from the foliage the bird smashed into and a brilliant yellow-orange dancing light began to grow. The jungle around seemed to groan as a fire, the first fire the child had ever seen began to spread.

The world around the child seemed to bend and distort, though it could’ve just been the spinning of the bird. A low groan began emitting from the trees and for a moment reason returned to the bird. It stopped its wild flight and heat generation immediately and tried to fly out of the jungle foliage however, it was too late, the jungle had found a threat.

A thousand branches speared the bird, a few piercing the child as well. The bird gurgled a stream of blood before quickly turning limp. Hanging from a thousand wooden spikes the bird unceremoniously died. 

For its part, the child lived, though grievously injured. Holes riddled parts of its torso and legs and it was forced to break a few wooden spears impaled in it to escape. It climbed off the bird and slumped onto a nearby spike, hurting badly.

Again, the idea of not fighting was hammered into its head. It had been forced to fight and this was the result, horrible injury and tons of attention drawn. On the good side though, the bird was dead and the path to the tranquil waters was clear, or was hopefully clear, it was so close.

Through the trees, the child could make out light and shimmering blue waters. It seemed that the fight had accidentally brought the child closer to the tranquil waters. It climbed down to the jungle floor, which thankfully wasn’t far, and walked past the remnants of broken branches, smoldering flames, dead insects, and destroyed hive remains. 

With shuddering labored steps it emerged into glorious sunlight. It continued forwards stepping through sand, the rough texture tickling its feet and for the first time in its life, there were no trees in all directions, instead ahead of it for as far as it could see were churning blue waters.

It laid down on the sandy beach and admired the view, content with where it was.

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