Chapter 109: 94: Fertilizers

Auratic

Despite every attempt made to hinder them - excluding direct confrontation - the army proceeded on, which baffled Alicia because she expected them to withdraw, regroup, and reconsider their plans by now, given that they had suffered significant losses before any serious confrontation could occur. Rather due to the recent ‘accident’ involving certain river flow flooding and the loss of supplies, it seems now that they’re in a hurry to start their siege. She guessed that the troops’ morale had plummeted, and thought that any prolonged fight would not be in their favor and thus they redoubled their march. Abandoning fishing out any remaining supplies lost in the freshet or searching for survivors, they cut their losses, so to speak. Not before leaving detachment forces to scour the woods. Their objectives were simple: Find and rescue the soldiers of the forward forces that went missing in the forest and eliminate any enemies that could be hiding in it. The reasoning being that there must have been some form of organized militia or some armed village idiots acting out of place, seizing their men prisoner. After they wiped out any potential threats they would rejoin the main forces and assist the assault on Viveria.

In order to keep their spirits high, they had been given spurious information regarding leads that indicated that the flooding wasn’t a natural phenomenon but rather an artificial one, schemed by the enemy. While they didn’t know, they weren’t quite far off the truth either. There was little to be lost regardless of the outcome. Either they would find and destroy the enemy confirming the authenticity of intelligence or go around the woods slaughtering monsters before returning. Some couple thousands of soldiers stepped into the forest. In order to effectively comb the vast expanses of green. They broke up into smaller groups, some being given small horns to communicate and call for help from the others. So that they descend on any adversary from all sides with superior numbers. Alicia had to keep up with the main forces and brought with her only Alfred, leaving the majority of her Araneae behind with Alice entrusting the defense of their home to her. Alice was worryingly enthusiastic about potential people intruding on their territory… With zeal the detachment forces entered the Velauhart. It wouldn’t take a day until they would all be lost to the forest…

As soon as they stepped foot onto the wretched woods lieutenant Hagano’s group was attacked non-stop by filthy worgs and overgrown insects. Quickly dispatching such insignificant monstrosities they pressed on. Call for help? What drivel. His group, nay, he alone shall be enough to drive off whatever rotting curs that hid in these woods. And when he does, he will gain his overdue respect and rise in rank. Maybe then, after his martial success will his family finally acknowledge his achievements and see him more than as a spare body, they have to.

A scout ahead of them yelled. Such impertinence towards someone of higher birth. He couldn’t wait until he was done with these lowlives. They seemed to pollute the very air around him just by existing.

There had been suspicions of the recent disaster being orchestrated by the enemy. This could be a clue, a lead to bring him closer to his opponent, his glory.

And lo and behold, just as he expected the river had unusual wooden supports and raised earth by its sides. Clearly it was used to divert the course of the river. By now, he should have sounded his horn and called for the others. But what if they came to steal, his glory? It was a sign from the heavens above that only he himself has found the traces of the enemy. The gods willed his success. It would be a shame to squander such a divine gift. So they pressed onwards and upwards following the river.

In no time he and his men heard a humming song from ahead. Near a small cascade of water, pooling as it flowed, a woman sat on a small boulder. Her hair long and flowing as the stream beside her, blue as the water's hue, as though her hair itself was part of the currents. She cast a half lidded gaze towards them in an instant, where a cyan blues of the oceans peeked through. Scandalously dressed in something reminiscent of a nightgown. She would enchant many a men with her looks alone. If it were back in the cities of his homeland, he would have gone and taken her as his woman. But here… He and his men watchfully approached the woman. Bowmen at the back spread out circling around her. Spearmen held their weapons aloft. Swordsmen readied their shields, their hands resting ready on the hilts of their blades.

As the leader, Hagano stepped towards her. There was no doubt that she was no lost village girl. Despite his middling performances in many fields there was one thing he took pride in, his swiftness at the draw. Confidently he went to her.

An admission made in such a matter of fact manner stupefied all of them who heard it. After a brief time to process, a plethora of reactions were on display. But from the lieutenant came the most surprising reaction, that of triumphant delight. He would bring the head of the culprit behind the disaster. Though haughty and eager to prove himself, he was not a complete buffoon, feigning disbelief he invited the witch to show their capabilities.

He was closing the distance between her with complete disregard. Although it would be oh so easy to signal the bowmen to loose their arrows, it had to have been him to strike her down. He wouldn't give a chance for the lowborn mudsuckers to steal his glory.

She stood up from her lithic seat and the nearby waters started to shift.-

“ꡛꡨꡙꡍꡞ

ꡝ ꡠꡘ ᠂ ꡏꡠ ᠂ ꡑꡡꡛꡖꡠꡎꡜ”1Sylphi! ær me chosaibh.

In an explosive burst of speed he shot towards her, eliminating the little distance between them in an instant, beheading the witch in a fluid movement before she could cast any hexes. Her head unceremoniously splashing into the water, causing the gathered troops behind him to erupt into cheers. Lieutenant Hagano turned to his men and basked in this moment, but it would not last for long as cheering turned into eerie silence.

A painfully slow clap, resounded. The men’s elated expressions quickly turned to frozen horror. Turning towards the source, Hagano saw the terror that made his men freeze. A headless body, without a drop of blood making its way towards them, staggering in a theatrically exaggerated manner, slowly clapping. With each step the headless body took towards them, the lieutenant took a step back in unison, stumbling and stammering.

A disembodied voice sounded all around them. 

The confused archers shot dead the center of the body, but they all went through doing no damage, like rocks thrown into a lake. From the neck, water bubbled and foamed up like a torrential spring, dousing all that was around the body, before the waters formed back into a face that she had previously. The garbled, disembodied voice vanished as she regained her form.

A wire thin stream of water formed within her grasp, unable to conform to a shape as was the case with Alicia’s blade, it was more similar to a whip.

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She lacked the expertise Alicia possessed with the blade, but how difficult could it possibly be, some sharpened stone shouldn’t be a challenge for the will of the water that grounded mountains to dust. Llynbel flourished the stream of whip to form a proper shape of a blade, in doing so she inadvertently smashed a sizable rock to pieces, further terrifying the opposition. ‘I always wondered why an Araneaemorph like her loves to swing around a sword in the first place.’

So close to the group now, she casually walked into the cutting edge of a spear, instead of digging into flesh, it passed through. A one sided slaughter was about to take place. In a desperate bid, finally a horn sounded… woefully, there would be none that would come to their aid…

Another group warily made their way through the forest. They were on edge, though they didn’t find a soul, not a living being and an unnatural quiet followed them. It seemed as though not even birds would sing. They jumped with each cracking of twigs underfoot and the woods creaking at the occasional wind. Why was it so…? They were being hunted. Many of them had taken grievous injuries from machinations possessed with evil intent. With each step they took forwards they braved a potential trap. Pitfalls, deadfalls, noose traps, swinging logs, stakes that shoot up to the face with poisoned tips. Many were on the verge of breakdown. It didn’t help that the trees ‘whispered’ among themselves. The only dissuasion from completely abandoning this cursed endeavor was that the last group of people to run and desert, throwing caution to the wind, had met their grisly ends at traps they had missed on their path. They were too deep now to run and flee.

Many of the traps didn’t even claim a life. It was the injuries that demoralized them, the poison, whatever it was laced with was sapping their strength, making the troops collapse with exhaustion. Tired and at the brink of collapse, they finally found something note. A shrine dedicated to some never seen before divinity, depicting an entity with a human's torso but with its lower half having multiple, segmented spindly limbs. Various offerings of charred fowl meat were placed in front of the shrine, indicating the presence of people. A heathen’s idol, they had it in their code to tear it down and torch it.

A whistling wind screeched and the Lieutenant’s orders were cut short by him gargling. An arrow had found its mark in his gaping maw. Followed by a barrage of similar shots. The shots came from all around them and above. It seemed as if the trees themselves shot at them, with the sudden attack and the loss of leadership panic quickly ensued. The arrows were primarily broadheads, but few had dagger sharp heads capable of piercing their armor. Still, arrows had a devilish aim, any area that was not completely covered by chainmail or plates of brigandine became a target. Even the gaps between the individual plates were mercilessly shot at.

Many who held a shield attempted to hide behind it, until the winds screeched once more. An arrow with such fierce speed that it punched through the felt and wood, showering their face with splinters of wood. Those dressed in cuirass over padded quilts and coif thought such arrows would never penetrate their fine armor, they believed themselves invincible. Until their prided plates took hits from the screeching arrows. They were possessed with foul magicks, such force behind them they could feel as though they were struck by a battle hammer. The arrows didn’t deflect, they spun when they landed, boring into the metal plates until the shaft shattered under its own force and the arrow head lodged itself into the armor. Making noticeable dents and weakening the armor, the metal dug into the internal padding. Once, twice, thrice and then there was none. The deformed armor could not stop any more. The subsequent arrows easily pierced the devastated armor piece. To add insult to their injuries their own armor turned into coats of thorns that dug into their flesh.

The invisible enemy massacred them, one by one, picking them off like some game. The rich and the privileged who could afford quality full plates didn’t suffer from such death. Though fully protected they could feel the power behind each arrow with their bodies, the force behind them causing bruisings. Those who survived the initial onslaught routed and fled. Forgetting the threat of the traps, many fell victim to their fear induced negligence. Then just when the few surviving in heavy armor thought they were safe, they were struck by a strange arrow as they fled. It was expertly aimed to lodge into the gaps between plates. In its shaft carried a hollow trinket that whistled when winds passed through it. It sang an eerie song with each movement they made. Still they seemingly managed to escape the terrors of the woods.

After running until their legs gave up, they noticed the whistling coming from their armor. Clearly it was meant to track their movements. But whatever that attacked them had not given chase… If so, then who was listening to their movements? It was not the best of ideas to attract attention now and have a noisy tracking arrow stuck to their bodies. Whilst they helped pick it off from each other’s armor. Until…

Even as they froze in place, not moving, there was a constant whistling coming from somewhere and it was approaching them quickly. Was it one of them that had managed to flee? Yet the sounds came from the skies, until suddenly something heavy smashed into one of them, cleanly piercing their body. White osseous bolts, rivaling the size of a ballista bolt, had hit him directly, from the sternum to the spine. He couldn’t even scream, or realize what had happened to him. The skies whistled more, and follow up bolts landed near them. Even as it missed, it gouged earth peppering them with dirt and stone. Even as they hid, the trees provided no cover for the bolts punctured them easily.

Eventually, different types of bolts were used, it was a fragile osseous missile that shattered against the ground, spilling faintly yellow odorless fluid all around it. It sizzled against the ground, withered plants and liquefied rocks and stones, a dangerously corrosive acid. Just a little splash on their armor it quickly started to eat away at it. One could only imagine what it would do to their bodies should it spill on them… Well, they didn’t have to imagine for long. A near miss had spilt the vile fluids upon another one of them, the metal plates of their armor hissed and creaked before crumbling off, the skin burnt blistering and peeling off with terrible screaming to bespoke the agonizing pain as they rolled on the ground. Their faces had become unrecognizably disfigured by the burns. His suffering did not last long as soon as he stopped running and fell to the ground, numerous rigid bone quarrels pulverized him into a fine red paste.

Only the lieutenant was left now, alone in this accursed woods manically fleeing. Along the way, the whistling arrow had fallen off of his armor, now to avoid attention he held his breath. Being exposed to the skies was a dangerous affair, so he looked for cover and thankfully he had found a cave entrance to hide until his pursuers lost track of him… In his panic however it had failed to notice the anomalously large feather around the area. An owlbear would feed well that day…

In the meanwhile, Apricot, following along a herd of Thunder goats, accidentally ran into another group of soldiers. Panicking, more so than she needed to; as soon as she saw the troops she tightly gripped her shepherding crook - that she herself fashioned out of a medlar tree she grew - and flailed it around yelling “Away!” over and over again. Unfortunately for her, what she considered a yell was only mildly louder than her normal speaking voice. And at the distance she was ‘yelling’ from, it was practically inaudible. The soldiers, unable fully see her inhuman characteristics - specifically her hooved feet, thought her some herder girl beckoning them thus they approached to investigate, much to her dismay.

Believing them to be charging at her and the herd, she steeled herself to protect the goats as an Epimeliad ought to. Though it was more often than not the other way around. The goats very much enjoyed her presence while grazing, as it felt that the grass flowered and tasted better with her around. So when some group of unknown creatures clattering around clad in metal, distressed their caretaker, it was a given that they would react negatively, bolts of lightning jumping between their curved horns. Most importantly, Ramiel, who was quite protective of his herd, quickly heard the crackles in the air and rushed to their side… On that day, it is believed a dry thunderstorm passed through the area. Mysteriously, the trampled armor and equipment with hoof marks from some soldiers of the Empire were found in the grazing grounds of the Goats in the mountains weeks later, though their bodies were never found… On an unrelated note, more berry bushes, shrubs and fruiting trees had grown spontaneously in the same area…

Alicia was monitoring the movements and preparations of the Empire’s main forces towards putting Viveria under siege. They were swiftly cutting down trees and building scorpions, catapults and mangonels just barely out of sight of the town. At the same time Alfred noticed the unease brewing within her Mistress.

Auratic

But enough about me. How  do you like the mystery magic script? I intend on using it more often, to keep the mystery of what the magic entails, that is used by everyone else who is not part of the main cast. They do have syntax and some structure but often I just make it up on the spot, so have fun trying to make sense of my inane thought process.

Trivia; both the dryads represent the family of trees that they are in. Dryssia being a traditional Oak Dryad, represents the Fagaceae Family which includes: Oaks (Black, Red, English, White, Water, Willow and more) Chestnut and beech, whereas Apricot represents the Rosaceae family which obviously has the tree species of her namesake, but did you know that the genus Prunus of the rosaceae also has Cherry blossoms? Might become something to remember when the Archipelago down the line comes to picture.

Additionally, you might have made the connection or not but remember the Hawthorne tree leaves Alicia tried to eat way back, before she had gained the power of bipedalism? Also part of the Rosaceae family. I would say ""Planned"" but, it just coincided nicely as a foreshadowing of Apricot's eventual introduction since I knew they weren't part of the Oak Family and almost oddly random.

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