Ch 64: Floral Skies; Vild
It was time to begin the event, as Maeve and I waited to begin, I clenched my fist, feeling an ember begin to spark. Maeve gave me a thumbs up but her face was almost blank as if she saw a ghost kill her friend.
“Are you ok with this?” She finally asked with a bitter voice.
Staring at the flowers in front of me, I slowly nodded. “Not the way I wanted to announce it but…I can’t just let this happen.” I said with a low voice.
“If they don’t figure it out then, I’ll keep it a secret.” She promised me.
“On your marks, pull out, aaaannd! Take oooooooooooooooffffffff!” Cried the announcer.
With that, I shot out my mana construct, pushing and pushing, making it reach out, crushing flower stems as it raced out until my arm muscles started to feel like I was ripping them. Grabbing my arm I then swung my construct into a semicircle, snapping the stems in its path, creating a plain of fallen flowers.
Maeve then rushed over to the petals, gathering as many as possible, her body orange glowed every time her feet touched the floor before she pushed herself further. Slowly she began to start blinking across the field until all I could see was her steps between her dashes. While she did that, I lifted my construct in the air and slammed it on to the other side before clearing the other side of flowers.
“And it looks like the Home team are taking the lead in clearing all the flowers around their base!” Shouted the announcer while the audience clapped or cheered.
But suddenly when I hit my next semicircle a strange bolt of pink electricity raced across my construct until it slammed into me, shocking me in place. I couldn’t move, retract the construct or even shout for help, I was just trapped there in my own body being stung. Seconds seemed to stretch into eons as the pain kept me distracted yet at the same time something else started to hurt too. But before anything could be done, the shock stopped, making me take a few steps backward as smoke rose from my body.
“Pinepin! Are you ok!” Shouted Maeve from her spot.
“I’m fine! Focus on getting those petals! I’ll figure something out!” I called back, half in pain. Fuckers booby-trapped our field! I need to find these traps! Rubbing my chin I thought back to anything I learned until something popped up, could my mana sense these traps? This one activated the moment my mana construct touched it….Wait!
Pulling back my construct into myself, I started using mana channeling to push out mana in thick enough particles like my mother showed me. Only I made them cluster together into large bunches which I sent out into the flower forest. Please work, please get those traps!
After a few seconds then minutes, I heard a few explosions, some sounded like flying arrows, electricity or pulses, each one shaking the ground slightly. Did they just plant actual shrapnel bombs!? Those mother fucking insectoid shit stains! You’re playing with fire! You should apologize through punishment! And I know just how to cut you down to size!
Pulling back my hand, I circled mana into my palm, slowly closing my fist while my hand glowed red. Within my hand I could feel heat building up until I could feel the outside of my hand start burning, only pissing me off that I flattened my hand and swung it like a blade. The gathered mana raced off my hand in the shape of a blazing moon crescent. It flew straight into the forest scorching the floor before cutting through the stems and turning them into a charred mess. But watching it only made me feel insulted as I widened my hand, making the blade grow in size as giant stems began to fall, char or curl up. The fiery blade flew farther and farther, leaving a road of molten sludge and igniting nearby flowers not in its direct path.
“Wow! I didn’t know you had such great magic hidden away!” Maeve said, amazed. “You weren’t lying about what you said.” Her talking to me sort of snapped a thing in my head as I blinked and looked at my hand in confusion while the flame blade evaporates into nothingness. Looking around, I realize I feel a lot better except…… I think I did something big but….No, I gotta focus on cutting down more flowers.
“Wait! What’s happening?!” Cried the announcer. “The stampede isn’t supposed to happen yet!”
The fear in his voice caught me off guard as the dirt below me began to shift and move like an earthquake. Stems shot out of the ground like jets, while some shot straight up others ripped through the ground before quickly lashing at the air like whips. It looked like the plants were angrily swinging their whip like stems to hit anything nearby, actually a few lashed out cutting through a few boulders and other stems too. The growing stems, pulling themselves from the ground, while throwing stones racing around like bullets, in my eyes it didn't look any different to stampeding elephants wildly charging me.
But before I could react a green blur shot up nearly hitting my face and throwing me off balance only for another stem branch out and slam into me. Sending a spike of pain through me as my body rocketed away from base and straight into another growing stem, pinning me while the growing stems pressed into me.
“AHH!” the pressure squeezing out a cry of pain. I could hear a creaking sound the harder the stems pressed into me, was it trying to destroy my incarnation!? “You sonofabitch!” I screamed in a mixture of pain and anger.
DO-DO-DO-DO! Rip-RIP-RIP! My mind began screaming as my body began to heat up giving me the pow-
CrEaCK!
“OH! It looks like we have our first faint! Crushed by the very thing we cherish!” Called the announcer as my vison went black.
………
…………………..
.....Wak……
‘WAKE UP’
Wait what?! where-?
‘
Fainted and taking up space in my room’‘BE THANKFUL’
The british construct! You’re Brittney right? It’s great to hear you again!
‘You’ve found out my name’
Yeah, a friend told me it but what am I doing here?
‘Keeping you calm’
What do you mean? Wasn’t I just at the launching of petals?
‘SIGH. You are respawning due to crushing defeat’
My team lost?
‘Stop making that sad face!...........no your team didn’t lose. You just got knocked out’
I see…………
Hey Brittney, how much longer until I respawn?
‘Two thousand years. Unless you call me Bri’
Wha-! Uh…you know if you wanted me to call you by a nickname you could’ve just asked, Bri.
‘.......You can’t see me can you?’
No. I can’t. Is there a reason why you want me to see yo-
‘Respawning complete. Watch out for that case. It might be what's making the event wrong’
Wait, what ar-
The world around me pulled away like strips and strands of white while color began stitching the flower dungeon in its place like I was loading into the world. Looking around I realized I wasn’t near my team base, in fact I was lost in the forest of flowers somewhere.
“Got you too?” Came a relaxed voice.
“Huh?” turning around I saw that taller pixie with the pink mohawk sitting on a nearby rock. “The stampede crushed you?” I asked surprised.
“Yup. Hit me in the back, right into a nearby rock. Ruined my wings too.” She said while pointing at her back with her thumb, her voice sounding sour and really hurt. Behind her I could see her left wing folded almost in half while the glass-like material was cracked or missing panels on her solar panel wings. “These were pretty useful but now I can't use them, so I'll be a half as good getting back to the path. Maybe even less....” She said calmly.
“What do you mean?” I asked confused why she’d give away improtant info.
“Guess Rez was right about you being new. Well it’s tradition that respawns have to work together to get back to our bases if we spawn together. we mostly have to cut a path out of here to a main path then we get transported to base.” She explained with a smile.
“Ok then…” I mumbled as I looked around the area. we were surrounded by the forest of flowers, the only area being empty was the round patch of earth around us. I was about to ask where to when I noticed a single stem tied with a red ribbon barely visible within the sea of green stems. “I guess we go though there?” I asked, pointing at the ribbon. She looked and nodded, slowly moving towards it before tapping it.
Following her I was confused why she was doing this but remembering that weird folded space door Phoebe made i wondered if there was one here or something similar? After another tap the pixie shook her head.
“No good. without my wings powering me I can't use my magic to open the way.” She said with a frown. While she said that I looked at her ruined wings, the folded wing had wiring and pieces of gold and silver hanging out of the cracked areas, there was only a single pair of wings but I've seen pixies with four wings. that’s when I noticed that she had a pair of holes below her wings, it looked like a dome or pimple but the thing was closed like a four panel door. Looking at where her wings attached, I saw the same domes except for something that stretched around the metal, going into holes in the base of the wing. “I know my wings are pretty but could you not look at them so closely.” She asked as her body shifted uncomfortably.
“Oh! sorry about that. I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable." I said as I backed up. “They just looked like something an enchanter would make.” I said, trying to make an excuse.
“You have good eyes!” She said, watching me for a moment before continuing. “These babies suck up neutral mana and leftover influenced mana then I absorb it to power up my magic.” She proudly announced.
“Think they’ll work enough if I give mana to them?” I asked her.
She just looked at me like I asked to let me dissect her and her little sister. she gave me a hard look, almost pissed for a long time before shaking her head. “Sorry, you really don't talk with pixies if you’re doing what you’re doing.” She said with a sigh. “We can get protective of our wings, well…” She seemed like she wanted to say more with her conflicted eyes. “Alright give me some mana and we’ll be on our way.” She said changing topics.
Deciding not to push her further, I began to move mana into her wings, aiming at the wires and metal bits which started glowing faintly. This made the pixie straighten her posture with a jolt as moans started to escape her mouth and her back arched. She quickly cleared her throat before pressing her hand on the stem, her palm glowing a light red, this made the stem tremble and shake like someone was trying to pull it out of the ground.
nothing changing led me to pushing out more mana over channeling it, slowly my mana construct appeared from my palm which i pressed into the wings. This made her whole body glow a bright red, leaving her a black silhouette as if she wasn't a pixie but a glowing fairy. the blazing pixie started screaming and moaning as if she was getting pounded in all the right places, even her wings twitched. realizing that i might’ve given her too much mana, I quickly pulled back my mana construct before preparing to catch her if she fell over from all the mana I gave her. it’s completely possible I made her orgasm from this but I don't really know if this was a me thing or something normal that happens because I wasn't thinking about anything lewd or strange….
The glowing around the pixie vanished after a few short seconds but not before she moaned so loud that I thought I saw her eyes roll behind her head and her skin moved. It rattled and squirmed like wind blown leaves and bugs crawling under sheets. That couldn't be right, probably some mana settling or some weird heat wave thing! no way is there a thousand bugs under her skin! NOPE! HEHEHEH! The forest isn't going to eat me and replace my bones with bugs!
“Hey guy, the douuur’s open an-and I-” She began reaching out to me with a Sinister face with a creepy smile.
“AAAAAAHHHH! DONT TOUCH ME!” I shrieked in panic as I jumped backwards into the nearest bundle of giant flowers. The pixie face turning into a irritated scowl as I escaped her grasping hands and into what felt like iron bars. The impact sent a spike of pain through my body and woke me up from my panic, only to realize that I was just outside my base as Maeve zipped around collecting the petals the stampede didn't ruin. Was it darker the last time I was here?
“Pinepin! What took you so long?! We have to get back to cutting down these flowers!” Maeve called out to my stupefied face.
Right, the event! jumping to my feet i ran over to a few flowers before using my mana construct to crush the flowers around me. Whatever that pixie did must’ve made some folded space, Yup! it was just her awesome magic that made me jump and nothing else!
“How long was I gone?” I asked Maeve as she came to get more petals.
“About ten minutes, ugh, in real time but the dungeon sun is starting to set and we don't have a path to the middle yet!” She panted out in panic.
“What do you mean?” I asked as I knocked over more flowers. Maeve was really looking burnt out, was she going full force while I was….uh occupied?
“That’s where the best flowers spawn!” She said with a nervous sweaty face. Taking a quick look around I realized that all the flowers here were white or yellow. really ordinary looking plants you’d see anywhere.
“New rule?” I asked as I began to focus on making a path to the middle.
“Old one, the announcer just added it while you were gone. Pixies used their second allowed prank to do it. I half think they’re just trying to make it better for the other team but who’s to say which person is in who’s pocket. But I know for sure it can't be Miss Cecania, she’s too busy training her successor to waste time in messing with people.” Maeve said as she began helping me cut a path deeper into the middle of the forest.
“Maybe but it’s the perfect time for someone else to come in and screw with things while her back is turned. She did seem important after all.” I pointed out.
“Yeah! She's the whole reason this town and dungeons exist! without her then only part of the town would be here. So when you say that, well, it makes me nervous that someone is trying to forcibly change things. I hope you’re wrong, like very wrong.”