Chapter 153 Nest Spore 1

“No way…” Dan said, slowly raising his axe as he gazed at the treeline.

A new monster was emerging.

“What the-? What even is that?”

“Huh, didn’t expect to see one of those here.” Paul brandished his cloud spear once more.

The creature was as tall as most of the trees. Its body was kite-shaped; large logs made a teepee shape around a glowing green core, with smaller branches and sticks filling the gaps in between.

Four thick tree trunk legs attached on each side of it, each of them thumping into the ground, every step slowly driving it forwards.

There was an opening at the front of its body, allowing green light to wash out from the glowing green core inside.

Its body was like a walking wooden furnace – of course, there was no fire inside, only the green ball of a plasma-like energy.

Jay was not reacting to it like the other adventurers; he was quietly analysing it, trying to figure out its weak spots and planning an attack strategy for his human troops – he didn’t picture himself attacking the creature, but others working together to bring it down.

A necromancer was a natural leader and strategist, and it seemed that his mind was becoming more like that.

Of course, there was some conflict in his subconscious human thoughts – a human-necromancer both wanted to work together with others, but remain elusive and solitary..

Jay could think of a decent strategy in his mind, but verbalising it and getting the human troops to perform it was another thing. Skeletons were much more efficient in this regard – they would respond directly to his thoughts, carry out the tasks Jay wanted, and would not question them at all. They would only ever disregard one of Jay’s thought-commands if Jay had verbally commanded them – his words held more weight.

“Wait here. We’ll finish the nest spore” Paul said confidently as he walked past the adventurers with the other guard in tow.

“Nest spore huh…” one of the girls mumbled.

The other guard followed him, they knew this was something only they could deal with – it was the whole reason they were here, waiting behind the young adventurers.

Technically they were meant to deal with the treant’s too, but if the young adventurers wanted to test their mettle, they had no objection.

Jay wanted to analyse the nest spore, but he was simply too far away.

Paul and the other guard marched towards it, slashing leisurely at the stick-balls and nestling gatherers as they went.

The nest spore reacted to the approaching threat, stopping its march forward as the green ball of chaotic mana in its belly began to glow brighter, filling with energy.

Paul and the other guard paused their march for a moment.

“It’s harmless.” Paul said as they kept marching – it seemed they were analysing its skills, checking that it wasn’t a threatening spell.

*Bdooooo~*

A pulse of bright green energy suddenly rippled out across the battlefield – all the wood elementals froze. The nestlings stopped skittering and the stick-balls stopped rolling.

Paul didn’t seem to worry too much, he kept clearing a path right to the large wood furnace.

Next, the whole battlefield changed – the balls and nestlings all suddenly began moving towards the large furnace, at first they moved slowly and orderly but it wasn’t long before it turned into a mad rush, trampling and rolling over each other.

Everyone could guess what would happen next – they tossed themselves straight in.

As their bodies entered into the furnace they immediately disintegrated. Their bodies turned into floating bits of sticks and twigs before dissolving in the green energy.

The green ball of energy inside raged chaotically as it hungrily ate all the elementals that rushed in. The more that entered, the more it hungered and glowed.

Suddenly, the furnace structure closed as multiple branches covered the front, stopping anymore elementals from entering.

Still, the nestlings and stick-balls were trying to get in, it was like they were magnetised to whatever was happening inside.

Paul didn’t look too worried as they continued to approach it, though they were forced to walk a little more slowly as the swarm of elementals had grown thicker around the nest spore.

*DOON!*

With a deep thud, the nest spore’s four legs suddenly dropped its body to the ground, crushing other elementals beneath it.

Finally, the branches across the front opened. Its internal green-fire had died down back to normal.

From out of the mouth of the furnace, a large tear-drop shaped seed grasped at the edges, clawing its way out. It had four of its own legs supporting it, though these were much more spindly and skinny, like young saplings. It seemed that it wasn’t meant to walk very far before its legs would become redundant.

As it exited the furnace it had to push back against and even crush some of the stick-balls so it could leave – it was the only elemental that was moving away from the belly of the nest spore.

It fought against the elemental tide as it walked away from the next spore. Finding a nice piece of earth it thrust itself into the ground. Each of its skinny legs then poked up into the sky, sprouting small leaves.

“Quick, before it grows” Paul pointed, gesturing to the other guard.

The other guard nodded, quickly slicing through the tide of wood as he made his way towards it.

He reached it just as the leaves began to grow from its upwards-pointing legs.

The guard didn’t use his personal weapon for this, it was below him – he merely relied on his strength as he swatted and slashed at the elementals with his heavily-abused metal spear that all the guards were given.

*DOON!~*

A vertical slash made a large dent in it, pushing the large seed deeper into the ground.

Next, a piercing thrust – he easily bore a hole straight through it.

This seemed to do the trick, as all the leafy legs which were pointing into the sky fell to the ground and wilted. The seed was killed before it could even grow.

Paul was already casually slashing at the outside of the nest spore, chunks of wood were cleaved off with every hit – only to be replaced a moment later.

Paul didn’t panic though, he simply kept slashing.

“Another one,” he called to the guard as another 4-legged seed exited the furnace, while more stick-balls and nestlings hopped right in as if on queue.

The guard intercepted the second seed before it even planted itself, ending it in one hit.

It seemed like he knew what to do as the guard made it to the mouth of the elemental furnace – the next seed was pierced and destroyed before it could even leave.

Next, he began to kill the stick-balls and nestlings before they could even dive into the chaotic swirling green energy inside.

Paul only nodded, continuing to hack, stab and slash at the outside.

Chunks of wood continued to rain off the creature, though they still healed right back.

The nest spore was dying though, as the energy inside it got less chaotic and less bright. The more Paul hacked at it, the smaller it got too.

Soon enough, its wooden body stopped healing. All four of its legs were hacked off and the light inside it dwindled.

With a few final slashes, parts of the furnace wall opened up, allowing some nestings to jump in.

Finally getting to consume more wood, the green light at the centre of the furnace grew brighter for a moment, but healed the walls of its body up.

Paul looked somewhat dissatisfied seeing this, realising he had to use more power.

He didn’t want to use an ability on such a weak creature, but it seemed he had no choice; It simply regenerated too fast.

***K, my holidays have just started. Let’s do a new challenge: 3k power stones = 5 bonus chapters. 1 Bonus chapter for every 100 golden tickets over 500.

Alternative smaller goals = 1 bonus chapter for reaching 750 golden tickets or 1 for reaching 2.7k power stones.***