Treeple-agents

Treeple-agents

Year 200

It wasnt very hard to identify the demon-infested kingdoms, since, with the recent events, they declared themselves quite publicly. The demons as a whole was not a functional kingdom, since the citizens, comprised of possessed demons.

They, sadly, cleverly used the population as a meat shield. The population all had demonic larva in them that were not fully infested, such that these populations could still interact and talk like normal, though, with some mental controls. Those who struggled or resisted the demonic control were quickly fully infested, or killed.

When I started offensively expanding my trees into these demonic-parasite kingdoms, I noticed a glaring weakness.

The demons could not detect my presence. They had some sense of their own, but as parasites, they mostly leeched off the senses of their hosts. And if their hosts did not notice me, they didnt either.

That meant, with Stella and void mages, I could observe the demons without outside intervention!

First thing I noticed was how absolutely ordinary some of these villages were, except for a few villagers who clearly had demonic appendages throughout their body. No one reacted to it, even those we could still detect the presence of a soul.

Even as a dormant or larva form, the demons were clearly able to alter or change minds. There was no other reason why these people, who clearly retained some of their own cognitive abilities, accepted these demons so easily.

I therefore classify the demons into three categories, though the line between the infested stage and transformed stage is very thin

The larva possession stage. Demon is embedded within a living person, and the demon parasite controls the host via some kind of mind control. At this stage, they are able to use skills, and they can still be saved. Multiple larva can actually be inside the same body, so the larva possession stage can still infect othersThe infested stage, where the demons have killed the host soul and the body started to breed other larvas. At this stage, they are essentially demons, but with the appearance of regular people.The transformed stage, where the demonic presence can be visibly seen.

On top of these three stages, we have the demon champions, who are at the larva-possession stage, but are able to either steal, or mind-control and simultaneously merge it with their own demon champion abilities.

Those who were still in the larva possession stage continued to live relatively normal lives, though they focused on eating. Now that they did not have to keep up any semblance of a society, they abandoned things like paperwork and trade. The demonic parasites reorganised their society such that the larva-possessed collected food centrally.

That said, they continued to produce weapons and equipment, which these demons used.

These demons were able to use equipment, including magical equipment. Could they use hero items? As we continued to observe, we noticed the transformed demons taking charge. We kept spreading our trees, and noticed even more cities infested with demons, and finally found the prey we wanted.

A champion.

No. There were two of them.

We knew they were champions, because the transformed demons deferred to them. The way all these humanoid demons obeyed their commands.

Both the human King and Queen had a champion in them, and if we strained our magical sensors a little, we could pick up their masked magical powers. Their strength was self-evident, it rippled outwards in little motions.

These human bodies are so fragile. The possessed King said to the Queen.

Would you rather possess a lizard, then?

If it is a big one, yes. The King laughed, strangely human. How did they speak? Or are you referring to the Lizardfolk?

The Queen did not respond.

No matter. Let us wait for the True King.

We knew, with certainty, that these champions could not possess me. I saw how the champions were torched by Ednas soul. I wanted to capture these demon champions, and so I asked Stella and the void mages to rest for two days. I needed them at their best when I pushed my powers through their portals.

It wasnt hard to find them after the two days. The two champions were incredibly confident. They walked about their kingdom with no guards, no defenders. Not necessary, when the demons as a whole respected and obeyed their inherent hierarchy.

I initially tested the concept on the demon parasites, the lesser larva to the effects of my mana. It killed them. They were just fragile to most things when not in a host. But I had a feeling it would work on the champions.

Alright, be ready, because Im going to attack a demon champion. I told Stella. I had my labs and everything on standby.

Ready. Stella understood my plans to study the demon champions, though she didnt quite agree with having a war of the parasites.

The two champions were apart. One was with some of the possessed, and the Queen was with a small battalion of demonic knights. These knights were no longer human, though they looked every bit like it.

I readied my artificial minds, and went for it.

Somewhere nearby, I immediately created two [Giant Attendant Trees]. These helped amplify my aura and power. Then, at the same time, roots shot out from the ground, and immediately wrapped the two of them. They reacted quickly, but their response was to attack my roots.

The two demon champions both released a huge burst of flame that burnt the entire city, taking down a huge number of other demons with it, but it failed to burn through my trees.

Heroes? The King yelled as it transformed, and the demonic appendages fought the hundreds of vines and roots that spawned from the ground.

It was like two masses of snakes or eels with different colors wrestling in shallow waters. They were no match for me. Not with my current levels of power.

They struggled hard, and they resisted. But I didnt mean to kill them.

I flooded them with my mana.

The eyes of the possessed King widened in fear. -no!

It was time for the corruptor to be corrupted.

Its time for reverse wololo~

Stella struggled, but she worked with a team of Void mages to stabilise the portals as huge amounts of mana was pumped through the portals. A few fainted, and they had to swap. But now, her school of void mages numbered in the hundreds, and this was within the same world.

My mana flooded the demon champions, and in the end, one of them decided to self-destruct, than to submit to my influence. The body of the King splattered into mush.

The champion that inhabited the Queen was not so lucky. My roots and vines penetrated the body, and found the champions true body. A large hairy worm-like creature lived in the husk, and my mana flooded it.

The champion struggled, and I sensed its panicked flailing. It killed its host at that moment, but the body was still alive. Shit.

Tell me more about how you steal powers?

As infestors, we attach to the Soul Springs of our hosts, and hijack it. We are all innately able to confuse the soul spring, into thinking our commands are the souls commands. We exist on two levels, at a physical level, and at a soul level, we can inject ourselves into the soul. This injection process, of course, drains a lot of magical power, but, we also simultaneously steal power from the soul springs of our host. When we kill our hosts, we grab hold of the pieces of their soul spring, and attach them to our own. But, it doesnt always succeed, and using these powers require mana like normal.

Wait. Get into the biolab.

Ally nodded, and got into the biolab as commanded.

I saw a constantly shapeshifting, bloblike creature that resembled a jellyfish. It was hollow in the middle, like it was waiting for a power unit, or a soul spring to power it. There were smaller rocks that floated in between the multiple blobby tentacles of the Infestor Champions, and realised these were the stolen skills.

Skills taken from the Queen.

I couldnt see how it interacted and inserted into another soul, because, in its current state, it lacked the means to do so.

The tentacles and the blobs moved constantly, and there was no permanent form to the body. This was unlike how the others had a defined shape to the lake of their soul.

I doubt the shape was what gave it the ability to possess another, and I probably would have to insert a Titan Soul in order to fully understand what these demon champions could do. That, of course, sounded like a waste of a titan soul.

Well, maybe not, because from what I observed, Titans are most useful in a utility role. Patreecks usefulness has exceeded Hytreerion by a lot, so to use Titans for combat roles was frankly a waste of time.

In that case, would using the Titan Soul on Ally, an infestor, be a waste? Do I have other, better uses for the Titans?

Meanwhile, the kingdom which the champions once ruled turned into a frenzy, like a zerg swarm without their cerebrates. Wild, primal, and they rushed towards us.

This was strange behavior, as each parasite is able to some degree of thought and self-regulation. Surely, they did not require a champion to function. But it did.

-

While the war against the parasites continued, Lumoof was still in Threeworlds.

Sir Lumoof, this way. A merchant led him to a large room that displayed one of the largest, most detailed maps of the Threeworlds. Lumoof had a sense something was off, but he wasnt worried. No. If anything, he wanted them to bite. It was something he had planned for a while.

The three merchants gathered and started explaining the map, and Lumoof looked at it intently. This was helpful, at least, to strategize where to plant my [clones]. There were dungeons, magical ley lines marked, to the best of their knowledge.

It was a commission that took the past two years, and a lot of our treasures. Lumoof nodded, as the merchants started to furl up the map. It was made with some kind of magical cloth, and with shrinking spells such that it shrunk to the size of a regular scroll.

The merchant passed it to Lumoof. Payment, Sir Lumoof.

Lumoof nodded, and withdrew a magical sword from his pouch. The other merchants all stared, some seemed to be mouthwatering.

The goods exchanged hands, and the merchants stared at the magical sword. They used some inspection abilities, and some kind of merchant-valuation ability. Yet, at that same moment, the doors slammed open, and about forty mages walked into the room.

Lumoof quickly held the map, and in an instant, it vanished, sent back to Freshka. The merchants looked around, and they were all clearly puzzled at the mages. They stared at each other.

Whats happening?

Weve known something was up, especially when we detected a few failed [Inspection] type skills. Lumoof had a cloak that confused such skills, but it wasnt perfect. So, it was a matter of time before the Maelas priests sensed something was up.

In fact, I was surprised that they took so long to even attempt to arrest us. Heres an old man walking about asking for information, learning spells and so on. The mages were armed, and one pointed his staff at Lumoof. Lumoof, on the orders of the council of High Priests of Maelas, you are to be detained on the suspicion of espionage.

Lumoof lifted his arms. We were ready for this, and we would go along with the capture. The mages used a kind of crystal shackle, and shackled Lumoof.

But all that happened was...

[...detecting attempted skill-control. Domain overriding.]

The crystal shackle shone, and then, like a whimper, it crumbled. The mages stared at each other. One of the high mage-priests immediately walked over, and took out another shackle.

The second shackle crumbled too.

Thats... not supposed to happen.

Lumoof smiled. Anyway, gents, its fine, come, lead me.

The mages stared at each other, unnerved at how easy Lumoof went along with the capture. No, we wanted to be captured, because it was a convenient excuse. From what we know, the High priests questioned their suspects within the depths of the Crystal Mountain, where they keep their strange artefacts, and that was somewhere we wanted to go anyway.

The mage-priests were shocked, of course, because it now seemed like they were escorting Lumoof, rather than capturing him. Dont worry, I have no intention of resisting.

Eventually, we entered a cave, high up on the Crystal Mountain. Here, we took a look, and it was beautiful.

Can I just appreciate the view for a moment? Lumoof paused.

The mage priests looked at each other uncomfortably, and then glanced towards the high-priest for guidance. The high priest nodded. No more than two minutes.

Lumoof nodded, and just looked at the view. It really was beautiful to see the entire city of Maelga, with crystals everywhere. It was part-crystal mine, part-magic academy, and the glowing magical crystal lights paired with the faint fog and haze from the dusts only gave it an eerie, mystical aura.

Alright, lets go.

Lumoof nodded, and we went into the mountains.

Spaizzer

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