“Ah, more wisdom from ye, twig.”
He steps over to the chest and flips it open. The same white light glows forth, and a piece of lightly carved bark floats out and drops into his waiting grasp. Roughly oval in shape, it would be smaller than my palm, but in his hands it looks sized to be armor or something of the like. He stares down at it solemnly, then lifts his gaze towards me.
“Have ye any ideas, twig?” he asks, his face crinkled in confusion.
“Uh…”
Identification: Shoulderbark of the Green (Rare Artifact, Armor)
A piece of bark gifted from the Great Tree of the Otachai to her mightiest warriors. The wearer of this armor will gain increased strength and agility in natural settings.
Imbuement: Possesses a subtle enchantment to attract projectiles, magical or otherwise, in order to defend its wearer. Attraction effect less reliable the greater the level disparity.
“It’s armor. For your shoulder. It attracts projectiles to it so you don’t get hit and makes you stronger in nature.”
“What, twig? How can ye know such tales?”
“I—”
“Stop talking, Competitor.” Kora sounds closer, fiercer, like she’s pressing against the bounds of my consciousness. “You have already made enough insane, deranged, and indescribably stupid choices today. You will not steal what little advantage we still have. You do have a flying class, if he asks. You don't have Legendary abilities granted to you unfairly in a vindictive impulse by this man's very creator. Learn to deceive, learn to be ruthless, or I will go back to my interminable hell, and you will cease to exist.”
Holy shit. If she had lungs, she'd be breathing hard after all that. Her words hit like pummeling fists. I’m not someone to challenge an ancient spirit on how to win an interspecies tournament, but saving Threenut felt so right… damn it. In this, at least, I'll listen to Kora.
“I get, uh, feelings about some things. Most of my class is flying and stuff, but there's this light, uh, prophecy? Yeah. Prophetic subtheme? But it definitely doesn't work all the time. Hardly ever. Super unreliable.”
“Eh?” Threenut scratches the underside of his belly, frowning up at me. “Seems a stunted sapling, twig. Many sorrows.”
“It's fine,” I say hurriedly. “The prophecy part is really, really light. Almost nonexistent.”
“Well, then. More Challenges await!” He turns and gestures towards a ramp which has, as if by magic, unfurled from the final platform. “Shall we?”
The path continues after the Challenge in much the same fashion as before. For the first few minutes, Threenut seems content to walk in silence. The trees pass in an endless blur of alien edges and twisted limbs. The lilac sky deepens towards violet. Another night is falling. I’m able to relax a bit as time brings my soul energy back into the triple digits. There’s no sign of the dingos, or any other hostile alien species.
Eventually, Threenut glances my way. Once. Twice. By the third time, I meet his stare and quirk an eyebrow up. He cants his head in confusion, and I have to suppress a sigh. Of course he can’t read human expressions.
“What is it, Threenut?”
“Just wonderin’ what they call ye, twig,” he says. “I don’t know ye from the soil, but I’d measure ye no larger than a sapling.”
“That probably fits. My name is Sam.”
“Sam?” His face scrunches into a remarkable number of furrows, like the trunk of a gnarled oak. “And what, by the Green, does it portend?”
“Uh… it’s short for Samantha?”
“Better,” he grunts, though he still looks at me skeptically. “And that carries what weighty meaning?”
“I don’t know. I think it’s an old Jewish name?” I immediately regret the words, as the little man’s eyes light up. “Before you ask, I don’t know anything else. It’s just… my name.”
“There’s no story to be had of it? No tale to be told?”
“No. No story. I don’t even particularly like it.”
“Then ye should change it! For a name should grow with its bearer.”
That strikes way too close to home. Fighting a frown, I return my attention to the path and the trees. It’s hard to maintain a constant vigilance, but we theoretically could be attacked at any moment.
“Even by the creature at your side.”
Hush, Kora. He’s harmless. He barely comes up to my knee. What is he going to do, gnaw my ankle to death?
The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
“Looks can be deceiving. He is a Competitor, same as you. Did you not note his level?”
Uh, no. I didn’t. I give him a surreptitious glance to activate my Identification again. Level eight? He’s higher than me? This little tree beagle?
“Perhaps not higher. You have quite a bit of stored soul energy waiting to be spent on evolving your Skills and Class. We are delaying, as the choices you make now will shape your Unique Class into the future. But I imagine we have enough to evolve at least two, perhaps three of your Skills. That evolution will no doubt increase your level.”
Still…
“Yes. Careful.”
We walk for a few more moments in peaceful silence before I break it.
“What’s the story of your name then? I mean, Threenut? Seems kind of specific.”
“Ah, that tale begins at the moment of me sprouting,” he says immediately, as if he was waiting for me to ask. “When the Sapster drew me from the earth, he saw the size of me sprig, even as a wee sprout, and wondered if three acorns I had in the stead of the customary two, such was its thickness! Hear me a dozen times, me name has helped to draw the eye of many a fair sapling.”
“Acorns? Sprig?” I ask, hoping desperately that the direction my mind went is not the correct one.
In answer, he twists and thrusts his little hips up towards me, lifting the leaves covering his crotch. Part of me wants to look away in the false modesty my mother ingrained in me as a kid, but the larger part of me is curious about what the anatomy of a thirteen inch tree man could possibly look like. I crouch down to get a better view and…
Right, I’m not sure what I expected. His junk is literally a sprig of holly nestled between a pair of undersized acorns. It is cute, and strange, and almost forces a giggle out of me. I can’t hide the smile that tugs at my lips, and Threenut notices.
“Like what ye see, twig?” he says, shimmying in an odd little dance that is probably supposed to be sexual. “Too bad. Yer not one for Threenut, so slim and pale as ye are. Perhaps, if ye can evolve to bear the bark of the Tree, we could speak again of this happy look in yer eye.”
I burst into laughter, loud and long, stumbling and planting my palm on one of the bordering trees to remain upright. Just when I start to master myself, my mind offers an image of the tiny man’s suggestive little jig. I really do lose my feet this time, leaning cheek to the bark and crying helpless tears.
Threenut stares at me like I’ve gone insane. Part of me thinks he’s right. The constant tension, the absurd stakes, this whole damn situation… I’ve been holding all of it in with a tight and desperate grip. To let it go, even for a moment…
When I finally get myself back under control, I meet Threenut’s wide stare, still grinning. He scratches his belly, then his head beneath the crown of leaves. I come to my feet and gesture down the path.
“You know what, Three?” I say, feeling the laugh dancing in my heart like a candle’s warming flame. “If I ever get barky, I might take you up on that.”
“If I let ye, twig,” he hedges, his bright green eyes flicking my way.
Before night can fully fall, we come upon another clearing. This one looks similar to the last, though boulders pair with the twisted trees to make an obstacle course that looks relatively tame compared to the last. Platforms of wood and rock ascend gradually in a gentle curve, almost like a spiral staircase built for a giant. Knowing that the true danger of the previous Challenge was hidden by an invisible shield somewhat tempers the hope that blooms in my chest.
“This looks remarkably easy compared to the last one.”
“Looks can—”
Yeah, Kora, we get it. Deception and obfuscation and whatever. I’m not a total idiot.
“Ye recovered, twig?” Threenut asks carefully.
“Ready as I’ll ever be,” I say, trying not to sound glum.
Even an easier obstacle course is still a fucking obstacle course. All it makes me think of is suffering through field days when I was in elementary school, beat about and left behind by my classmates under the blazing summer sun, trapped in suffocating plastic obstacle courses so hot they burned the skin. The tears…
“This is truly pathetic, Competitor.”
Thanks, Kora. Way to cheer a girl up.
“Then let us uproot the weed before night steals the day,” he says, stepping forward confidently. I follow after a reluctant half step behind.
Challenge! This is a minor Toughness Challenge! The goal of this Challenge is to stay on the obstacle for as long as your endurance can last! The longer you stay on, the better your reward will be at the end of the Challenge!
Simple enough, and for once not dangerous. Just a—
Addendum! So long as you meet the minimum time, you will not be erased from existence.
Fuck.
It's a challenge of toughness. Endurance. Pain, probably. I turn back, but there’s no sign of the forest behind me, merely a blank wall of white. Quite clearly, I don’t have a choice on this one. Threenut, ignorant of or ignoring my dread, hops happily towards the first step. I hurry after him, unsure if him touching the obstacle will start whatever insanity is in store.
I reach the first step a beat after Threenut. Good thing. Light, lurid red and definitively unpleasant, springs up in a wall behind me. There is a faint sizzle as the last trailing bit of my ripped graduation dress vaporizes into drifting ash. I hurry upwards several steps to join Threenut, who, again, doesn’t seem to have noticed a damn thing. What kind of low statistical nightmare does he live where he can’t seem to hear even the simplest things?
“You were granted Legendary Perception, Competitor. It is an advantage to which you have already grown accustomed.”
Right.
The too-large spiral staircase is remarkably smooth considering the material of its construction. The bark feels grippy under the soles of my aching feet. I flex my toes, admiring the remnants of the chipped white polish still clinging desperately to my nails. If I manage to survive all this, I’ll have to leave my salon a fantastic review.
The warped tree at the center groans and then lurches into motion. I stumble, but catch myself before I fall completely. A crystal blue timer appears in my vision, counting down from twenty minutes. Threenut doesn’t stumble. His little legs blur, and he scrambles up to the next step effortlessly. I move to follow, lifting a leg painfully high to reach the next step.
Time seems to slow. A faint sizzle and gentle clink sound behind me. As if something impacted the burning wall.
Impacted, or passed through.
Distracted, my foot misses the next step. My shin scrapes painfully down the edge, and I nearly smash my face on the corner.
The air hisses. My hair stirs.
A blade, long and curved, blurs past.
Stumbling saved my life.
The wielder of the blade is already moving on. A tall, thin man wearing black armor decorated with serrated points, he powers up the stairs, devouring the distance to Threenut in seconds. He flicks the sword into a ready position with terrifying ease, then leaps, point leading, to skewer the little man.
Gravity Shift.
He grunts in surprise as his flying leap suddenly reverses course. He falls over my head towards the death wall, limbs flailing. I get a good look at his face. Dominated by a cadaver’s grin, his hollowed cheeks are decorated with too-thin skin hanging half-rotted from his bones. His eyes glow a terrible red. I feel like a mouse beneath the shadow of a hawk, knowing beyond doubt that death hangs overhead.
Jane never planned on being an apocalyptic babysitter.
But more than half the world’s population disappears in the blink of an eye and magic starts surging, leaving her with a game system in her head and a nine-year-old kid in her party. Soon Jane’s days are filled with fighting mutated Earth animals, arguing with a stubborn system, and keeping the kid alive. But with it comes a peaceful sense of purpose that Jane has never experienced before… assuming they can survive the end of the world.
What to Expect:
- Lite LitRPG with a system that likes words more than numbers
- A found family dynamic that grows slowly but consistently
- Character development-driven story
- A little action/adventure at first but evolves into mostly cozy/slice of life
- Short, bite-sized chapters (1.5-2k words) getting posted daily for Writathon!