Wraithwood Botanist

Kline and I enjoyed our one-year anniversary in Areswood in a rickety boat, drifting down Cable River, a body that connected to the Brute, the forest’s second major river and the one that would lead us to the Fifth Domain.

We weren’t the same people we were before. We weren’t alone. Seven small foxes joined us in the boat, in addition to three pixies with colorful personalities, and each one of us was armed to the teeth with magical abilities and superhuman strength.

Kline could multiply his body into five independent clones with physical abilities, dozens of clones, and a trump card that could destroy a three-story building. I had wings and a soul warrior and could slow time to a crawl, move at intense speeds, and fire blinding arrows that could sink naval ships. Our furry friends could transform into the size of rhinos and cover their bodies with flames, and the pixies had powers and knowledge I couldn’t comprehend.

So when beasts the size of elephants charged at us, the animals would take turns killing them, and when pterodactyl-sized avians swooped down from the sky, I would practice flying with my to kill them—

—when I thought I could.

It was surreal, but not nearly as much as simply riding in that boat.

We were in a land beyond time, a return to the age of large leaves and dinosaurs where colossal beasts roamed poisonous landscapes that laid waste to monsters and men and modern technology. A place that had been abandoned as a death trap in centuries past—forgotten at the fringe of what people could conquer during a single week during the Harvest.

And so, while I had read books about the Last Conquer and the Black Harvest and the Jacksmore War, each depicting the efforts of people in conquering the forest, I didn’t believe it until we found a rune-tattooed boat with the Jacksmore crest on it. It was covered in moss and dirt and grime but was otherwise fully functional — protected by magic long past. It was an unnerving experience—

—because it proved everything I had read was true.

Reta, my illusion teacher, woke up after a two-day ride down the Cable and looked around sleepily.

"We’re getting close."

I snapped out of the thoughtless trance I had grooved into over the hours. The trees had opened up, and a deep meadow stretched out over the horizon. The area was so flat, and the trees were so sparse that I could see through them for probably almost a mile.

Seeing it brought back memories of the second half of Lithco reading me the History of the Jacksmore.

Fear of the Kana was so great he read beside my bed that the troops finally resorted to the Cable, a place of trauma and horrors that extended countless tomes from different generations. Many had bluster and enthusiasm, but as soon as the trees thinned on the river and Rall’s Fort came into view, broken and torn through age and battle, all were silent. They would soon reach the Brute.

I swallowed and scanned the area for the fort and lamented finding it.

It was terrifying to look at ancient ruins made of modern materials instead of stone. The eighty-foot walls were tattooed with arrays, but it didn’t help the soldiers from the beasts that came and ripped through the steel like can openers, exposing smaller buildings like internal organs, each sprawling with plants that even I felt apprehensive about getting near.

It was a ghost town the size of a small city.

A last resort in horror movies as the protagonist runs for their lives from dinosaurs, zombies, and thieves — seeking refuge only to find cannibals and cultists lurking within.

"Gods, it’s getting hard," Kyro said, sipping his flask as he lay on the bow of the ship. "I know you got books, but you still look like a spy when you do this."

"Soul pact," I said, reminding him that I had proven my story and intentions honest.

"Yeah, yeah," he said. "Still’s weird, though…" He took another drink. "What does your book say about this place?"

"It was built at the staring of the Jacksmore," I said. "People kept dying on the Brute, so they decided to breed soldiers. They succeeded for a time, leading to hundreds of expeditions, many fruitful to the Delta… a few to Aelium. And what those people found was super valuable. And well, people are people, and over the centuries, colonies sprung up with warring people and factions wanting to return to safety. So they warred over them. In the end, a leader named Kalibra Maxna destroyed the walls and lured thousands of beasts into the walls. The place never recovered. It was just a wintering spot after that."

"That’s interesting," Kyro said strangely. He took a swig from his flask.

"You’re so apathetic," I said.

"Is that so…"

"It is."

Kyro took another drink, unconcerned with what I thought.

We moved on.

It took thirty minutes of eerie silence to pass the once proud city and make it to Rall’s Delta, a full meadow.

One look at it left me with immense apprehension.

Beasts the size of triceratops lay on the ground like a pride of lions, watching us from the distance as other beasts spotted the land. Fast beasts, slow beasts — a whole ecosystem that could support the cycle of life were present, and we had to pick plants in the center of this open field.

"Hey, Trant," I said to my alchemy teacher, who decided to join at the last minute. "Can you tell me where these plants are?"

Trant shrugged. "Who knows where plants are? I haven’t been here for centuries. But I can point them out. They’re everywhere. Practically weeds, really. I remember one of the trips, we picked up some seela because my friend’s wife had a kidney—"

"Not now," I said. "Tell me after we get them, kay? ’Cause there’s… that."

I pointed in the distance, where there was a small army of beasts dotting the landscape, a swarm-type beast with large animals.

"This’s in and out. Fast. Brutal. Got it."

Trant raised his eyebrows and said, "Oh," before chuckling. "I do hate strangas." He rummaged through the gravity pack I let him carry around on a tiny string, and he pulled out bottles of crazed potions.

"What’re those?" I asked.

"Oh, you’ll see," he said.

Kyro snorted and took a drink unconcernedly. "You’re about to see how a true alchemist does battle." He pushed himself up and stretched, putting his flask into a pocket in his jacket and shivering.

"Okay, let’s do this," he said.

Kline jumped onto the boat’s railing, but Reta turned to him.

"Stick back and protect the boat," he said. "Not to be rude, but it’ll be dangerous for you to get near those things."

Kline meowed and rolled his eyes.

Reta yawned. "No, you can take him. It’s him…" She pointed at Trant lazily. "That’s who you got to worry about. Come on."

I guided the book to the shore and tied it to a stump as Kline and the lurvine jumped onto the beach. Then, I summoned Nymbral, and Kira picked me up under the arms as the pixies took to the sky.

"Handle the skies," Kyro said as we took flight. "The ground’s taken care of."

That was hard to believe. There was a stampede of stranga in the distance, six hundred strong, and a hundred other beasts. God knew how many insects, birds, and other creatures were hiding out in the wide canopies, shading the ground.

I brushed up on strangas using Deadly Beasts in the Areswood Forest book.

—

Name: Stranga

Description: A freakish blend of the wildebeests that killed Simba’s father in The Lion King, porcupines, and 19th century Apaches, strangas are warm creatures that travel in packs of five hundred or more and scream and shoot arrow-sized quills out of their backs from the front like arrows. Their sonic screeches and stomping hooves and large horns scare off even the strongest of beasts. Yet their major weakness is that they are remarkably stupid and easy to herd like sheep, a fact that beasts exploit to herd into natural barriers for their territories.

But as interesting as this information is, it’s basically worthless because if those vials are what I think they are, they’ll all be dead within the hour. So just keep your bow trained to the sky and learn why no one survives the winter in Areswood.

—

"Now I’m curious," I thought as Kira soared over the land. It seemed ridiculous, but the description was apt. Because things got terrifying the second we passed the trees into the open field, the strangas were.

Five hundred doesn’t sound like a large number, but when half-ton of animals are in a field, they blot out the land and give the illusion that the beasts will continue forever, stretching out like a black and silver ocean.

"If you wouldn’t mind," Trant said to Reta.

She covered her face and let out a long, protracted yawn before releasing her hands and waving them in an X.

The whole world changed.

That’s the only way I could explain what happened.

The skies darkened and shows cut across the land and all the beasts that were uniform suddenly changed.

Half of the beasts shifted and morphed into different animals, clumped in clusters and various sizes and shapes, each releasing different cries that seemed to startle themselves.

"And now a little confusion," Trant said, opening two bottles, drawing out the blue and red liquid at a distance, then covering us in a barrier and oppressive domain as he mixed them.

The liquids turned purple and sizzled like metal-eating acid in movies, bubbling and popping and turning into a thick mist that caused instant panic in the strangas, who were already panicked and screaming from seeing their mortal enemies mere feet away from them. Then, Trant whipped his hand, and the mist blew out in a fine fog that almost disappeared instantly.

It didn’t look like anything.

Like perfume sprayed into a house fan.

It just disappeared despite the smell remaining and circulating in the room—

—and the effects were instantaneous.

Beasts started coughing and sneezing and screeching for a few minutes in a chain reaction that spread a quarterway through the group.

Then we waited.

"And now," Reta said, lifting her hands like a conductor as the animals panicked and started running. She looked like she did that day when she conducted the symphony bugs, but the effects were devastating.

A chorus of screams and ripping sounds and squeals and panic spread through the ground, and when I looked down, I saw dozens of beasts in all directions, killing and eating each other.

"That’s all it took?" I asked in horror.

"No," Trant said. "That’s an illusion, but…"

A stampede broke out with strangas running from mortal enemies as massive clumps of strangas worked together to trample the different beasts.

It suddenly became clear what had happened. This wasn’t like the situation with the lignan bugs, where I poisoned them, and they started killing themselves haphazardly. Reta, at a glance, had set up the battlefield so that large groups of strangas would act like strangas, fighting and herds to kill lesser groups of beasts. And those beasts were lone strangas who were unprepared to fight for themselves.

They fought back, but they were out of their element for swarm beasts and got lost in confusion, wondering why their kin were suddenly trying to kill them. They ran but quickly got pierced by quills and horns and trampled upon by the swarms of their herd.

It was tragic.

Many fled in the direction of the boat, and I panicked, but Reta yawned and whipped her hand, and thousands of different beasts suddenly populated to the north, creating a wall. The confused and terrified beasts panicked and turned to flee from the illusions, only to get mauled by a wall of stranga. Then, the maulers turned and fled.

"What the hell’d you give them?" I cried.

"Deliriants," Trant said. "Simple deliriants. Create some confusion and paranoia and beasts can’t tell fact from fiction. They just see their mortal enemies. Then you add a tiny drop of something to make the beasts a little more aggressive, and it’s over. Once your friends start killing each other, everything breaks down."

Kyro unscrewed his flask. "That’s why so many people die in Misty Row. ’Course, this witch couldn’t just show you this to get her lessons across. She’s gonna throw you right into the hell pit."

My heartbreak checked against my ribs when I realized that the hellish illusionary death pit and stampede spreading out below us was a microcosm of Misty Row.

"Spare me your grumbles," Reta said, rubbing her eyes. "Misty Row is nothing so crude as this. I’m almost ashamed to resort to such petty tricks."

"Petty?" Trant said. "I apologize we can only immobilize hundreds in seconds."

"Of mindless swarm beasts," Reta said.

I was having a hard time processing what I was seeing. True, they were mindless herding beasts that would take a long time for most to actually die of their injuries, but it didn’t change the fact that Trant and Reta devastated an entire army of them in minutes. It made me realize that illusions, poisons, alchemy, and perhaps even a bit of soulmancy and killer beast companions were a powerful and flexible combination that could truly challenge full armies.

I thought Reta was being dramatic and elitist in her assessment of this powerful demonstration, but I couldn’t have possibly known then just how terrifying illusions could become. But I would, soon.

I turned from the skies and looked toward the Brute River, and I would’ve sworn I saw a trace of mist from the side of a bend. My heart was shaking, but I couldn’t help but be excited.