*BANG*
*BANG*
*BANG*
Arvell continued to chuck several of his homemade Molotovs at the treant, allowing the flames to engulf it.
"KYAAAAAAAAAAH!"
Some of the branches burned away, revealing a gnarled face that seemed to be carved into the tree's bark.
'It hid its face behind its branches? I guess that's the least it needs to do to camouflage itself.'
Arvell aimed one of his incendiary bombs at its opened face, causing his flaming concoction to enter its wide-open mouth.
*BOOM*
"RYAAAAAAAAH"
Flames escaped from the Treant's eyes, nose and mouth.
Almost comedically in fact.
However, its bestial cries of pain would stop anyone from laughing at its almost comical plight.
Unless the said person was named Arvell.
He had a maniacal grin plastered on his face, as he mercilessly chucked more Molotovs at the screaming treant.
It was almost like he derive some kind of sick pleasure from lighting it on fire.
After realizing he only had a few incendiary potions remaining, Arvell decided to cease his ruthless barrage.
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He needed to save some of them in case of an emergency after all.
But at that point, most of the treant was a charred mess, covered in what appeared to be a layer of black charcoal underneath the raging blaze.
The treant was completely helpless to resist the flames, having no effective way to put them out.
All it could do was writhe in agony.
Arvell watched it with a neutral expression.
Having felt he'd finished getting his 'revenge' on the treant for its earlier antics, Arvell felt that finishing the treant off as soon as possible was his main priority at the moment.
[Inventory]
Arvell pulled out what appeared to be a flask of foamy water, and proceeded to douse it on himself.
'This should be enough'
Arvell kicked off of the branch he was standing on and began barreling towards the treant.
[Temportal Manipulation]
Time began to visibly slow down for Arvell as he dashed towards the flaming treant.
[Inventory]
Opening two separate portals for his inventory, one for each hand, Arvell pulled out two swords, one for each hand.
One of which was his prized magical sword.
[Haste]
Activating the Hasty Iron Sword's skill, Arvell's speed increased once more.
At his point, he was a blur of silver as he raced through the tree branches towards his flaming adversary.
Without wasting a single breath, Arvell jumped off a branch and plunged both of his swords into the bark of the tree.
Due to his momentum on top of the damaged bark, the two swords cut through the tree's bark like hot knives through butter.
*SHHHHHKKKK*
Hanging from his two embedded swords, Arvell began to slide down the height of the tree while holding onto the swords, leaving 2 long slash marks on the bark of the tree.
After the swords finished sliding downwards, Arvell pulled out the sword in his right hand and impaled it into the tree a little higher than before.
Repeating this process with his left hand, Arvell began to scale the length of the flaming tree.
While the flames were bothersome, he'd already doused himself in water, so it wasn't too much of a concern for Arvell.
He continued to rapidly scale the length of the treant as if he were climbing a mountain.
Realizing that the cause of its current agony was the small human who was impudently trying to climb it, the Treant lashed out in a fit of rage.
While its mind was consumed by the immense pain from being burned alive, it wouldn't just let the perpetrator of said pain go without making them experience the same hell it had to undergo.
Countless flaming branches flew toward Arvell's head.
However, unlike what one might expect from someone in Arvell's scenario, Arvell didn't fall into despair while watching the incoming branches.
If anything, he was calm… almost too calm.
Just as one of the branches was about to hit Arvell, he positioned himself so his feet were flat on the trunk of the tree.
Kicking off of the tree he pulled both of his swords out of the bark, landing directly on the flaming branch that was poised to hit him just moments ago.
Without waiting a moment, Arvell began to run up the flaming branch, in an attempt to reach the treant's face.
The place where Arvell presumed was its weakness, considering how effective throwing an incendiary potion into its mouth was.
Seeing Arvell run along the length of the branch, the treant desperately tried to shake him off, but that seemed to be to no avail.
Arvell's balance wasn't something that would be rattled that easily.
Since it couldn't shake him off normally, the treant decided to change up its plan of attack.
All of the branches near Arvell snaked their way towards him, in an attempt to hit him off of the branch he was standing on.
As the closest branch neared him, instead of trying to dodge, Arvell repeated his earlier strategy and proceeded to jump onto the branch.
Which caused the branch he transitioned over to, as well as countless others, to hit the air instead.
Without pausing for a breath, he resumed his frantic run towards the treant's face.
As long as he could reach its face he would win, but if the treant could knock him off, he'd need to use some of his more costly techniques to get to safety.
Something Arvell wanted to avoid at all costs.
'This… This is fun!'
Arvell's mouth curved into a maniacal grin, as he continued to dodge branches left and right, occasionally swapping branches in an effort to confuse the treant.
This was the thrill he was looking for!
A fight that pushed him to make countless decisions on the fly, a fight that pushed him to the very edge.
While he wasn't able to use all of his strength due to the concern that some nearby examinee might see him, he was able to go all out within the power constraints he set for himself.
For Arvell, even this is something worth being elated over.
He'd managed to finally find a beast that could let him have fun.
Jumping onto one last branch, Arvell was finally within striking range of the treant's face.
"It was fun while it lasted, but now… It's over."
Arvell readied his swords to strike at the treant, but a loud noise that came out from behind him caused him to reflexively turn around in an attempt to identify the source of the noise.
"SQUEAAALLL!"
A brown boar-like beast entered Arvelll's field of view as it dashed through the forest, heading in their direction.
But what surprised Arvell wasn't the brown-coloured beast.
It was the person that was running after it.
It was none other than the boy that broke the carriage door!