That could mean many different things.
Like…-
Welcome to the Dead Land Dungeon
Objective: Cull the Root
Cull the Root or Become its nutrients
Huh, the objective took its sweet time in coming, but it’s quite simple, yet complicated. Cull the root? What root? Was the branch that slammed down the root? Or part of it? I have no idea.
And that last line.
I guess that means we can’t leave until we do the culling. But it’s interesting that it didn’t say we could leave through death like it did in the Tutorial…actually…now that I know about the existence of the Undead…I suppose things make a bit more sense now…
Anyway, I need to cull the Root to clear the Dungeon.
First things first, the branch that attacked me when I spoke. I wasn’t attacked when I entered the Dungeon, and I wasn’t attacked when I dodged.
Maybe it’s a sound threshold. Hm. It could also be that the branch had a certain range, and I left it when I dodged.
Well, let’s just see and test things.
I began walking forward slowly and carefully, with my spear at the ready to move at a moment’s notice.
Yet there was nothing. No matter how much I walked forward. Not only was there no attack, but I also couldn’t sense anything at all through all the fog. I couldn’t even see the ground that I was standing on. Yet I had no choice but to move forward. Hm.
Let’s try talking again.
“Te-…”
Voosh!
Another branch quickly came smashing down, only this time I didn’t dodge. I was ready and prepared, so I didn’t waste any time and brought my spear up to meet it.
The force of the branch slammed into me and the force behind it shook my body as it forced my knees to bend more than they already were, and my arms trembled more than I expected them to, but I held on.
Before the branch could pull back and potentially attack again, I unleashed a torrent of flames on it as I pushed back with my spear.
The second the flames got on the branch, they burned and tore into faster than anything I’ve ever seen before.
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“GRAAAAAHHHH!!”
A guttural scream sounded out from somewhere deep into the fog and I watched as the branch shivered in real time and as it shook about, as if trying to shake the flames off it, but of course since when were my flames ever so simple?
It continued to writhe and shrivel in pain, before I heard a snap, high above me and then the massive branch came crashing down next to me.
I watched as it continued to burn like wood in a campfire that was likely too large. It burned and burned until not even the ashes remained.
Hm.
I don’t think this ‘root’ will be very hard to cull.
It was right then and there that I heard a loud roar that felt like it came from everywhere around me.
“RAHHHHHHH”
It felt like it reverberated throughout the fog, and before I knew it multiple branches immediately began converging on this area and they dwarfed the one that previously attacked me in size.
These branches were big enough to be trees on their own, yet instead they were just limbs to what I now assume to be one massive tree somewhere in the distance.
All of them came crashing down with immense force towards me and no matter how much I dodged the attacks never stopped coming.
It seemed the tree did not like being burned by Eternal Flames.
Fair enough.
So, I will give it more.
Instead of just covering my spear in flames, I promptly covered my entire body in flames before willing them to expand to a massive height and forming a cylinder of flames around my body.
The branches, or better yet the tree in the distance didn’t notice in time and the multitude of massive branches still kept coming but this time instead of dodging immediately and allowing them to slam into the ground, or whiff in the air, I held my ground for a few moments longer just to ensure the branches would get caught in the flames and that they did.
The scream of sounding out once more, only this time it sounded even more painful than before. Maybe these bigger branches were more important to it than the smaller one before? It could also be because more branches are being burned so it’s feeling the pain from more places. I don’t know.
Anyway, as expected it wasn’t happy.
So much so that the fog around me began to clear as the branches kept burning and writing in pain as they slammed about the place without much aim.
So, is the tree controlling the fog then?
Must be, since it’s only now starting to clear after it had screamed in pain the second time.
I allowed my flames to recede back into my body, of course, not including the flames on the burning branches.
The fog continued to clear and eventually I could finally see what was standing in the distance.
A truly massive behemoth of a tree.
One that had a face on it, that was similar to the faces I saw on the branch monsters in the forest around this dungeon.
Wow I can’t get over how massive it is.
There’s no way there are trees that big that simply exist outside of this dungeon right?
That would not be fun to deal with it.
“Patriarch!!!”
“Patriarch!!”
I heard two separate shouts from two different places
I looked in both directions to see the boys running in my direction with determination. I’m glad they were fi…no. Why do they look so haggard? Is that blood on both on them? What the hell happened?
They’re suppose to be stronger than me, so if I could handle blocking a branch then they should be able to do the same thing.
Maybe the tree focused on them a bit more than I did because they were stronger?
My question would remain unanswered for now, since the tree didn’t plan on sitting still to watch our touching reunion.
“RAHHHHHH!!!”
Another roar was let out as a flurry of massive branches shot out in my direction. It seemed to be ignoring the boys and focusing everything on getting rid of me.
It really didn’t like that fire huh.
Whatever, I preferred it this way. What type of ‘Patriarch’ would I be if I didn’t lead from the front?
Not that I knew all that a Patriarch should be…but didn’t Elder Zal say I should be a pillar of power and strength or something along these lines?
Then watch me Lirian and Frian.
I will show you power.
“COME!!”
I roared back at the tree, and it was rapidly approaching branches and took off in a sprint towards it.
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