409 The heart of the jungle

"This is far enough," Lecter looked back towards the city. He was now outside the range of the illusion, which meant that the sensors wouldn't pick up his raft. If he used it inside the city, there wouldn't be any big problems. However, there was a chance that the interference of his magic would create a small gap in the sensors that would allow a monster to sneak by. As a failsafe, when that gap happened, the walls would trigger the strongest shock they could, and if anyone was touching the walls for any reason, they would get seriously hurt.

"Do we need to do anything?" Alex asked while looking around.

"Not right now. Just a moment," Lecter pulled a small pamphlet from his pocket. Hera tried to see what it said, but to her, it was just blank. The mage walked forward and opened the brochure putting some mana inside it. As he did so, the paper on his hand started to turn to ash, much more ash than it should be, considering the size of it. All particles flew off and started to swirl a few meters in front of them. Little by little, log by log, a raft started to form. Each of the logs seemed old and tattered. They were tied with vines, roots, and even what looked like strands of hair. In some places, there was a yellowish-orange wax plugging some of the holes in the wood. When all the base of the raft was complete, a smaller log appeared in the middle of the structure. It rose just 2 meters up, and there was some triangular piece of cloth tied around it, forming a makeshift sail with a few holes.

"That's the raft?" Alex glanced at Hera.

"I don't want to be rude… but can that thing actually hold us? It looks like it will fall apart if a bird lands on it," Hera added.

"I know it looks bad, but trust me. This little gal can do her job. Also, it's not done. I know how bad this looks, and I have a couple spells to help spruce it up," Lecter started casting the spells and using a few other items. He managed to set up some metallic rails on the outer perimeter of the raft and another to create three seats, "Hop on in."

Lecter opened, passed through the only opening in the rails, and sat on the chair by the mast. Hera and Alex looked at each other before carefully stepping in. Unlike how it was with Nimbus, this construct was solid. Really solid, as Hera noticed when she tripped in the log as she entered.

"Careful. If you fall too hard, the raft will take some damage," Lecter scoffed.

"My bad. I wasn't expecting it to be like this," Hera looked around. Even when standing on top of it, the raft looked like something out of a movie about castaways.

"That's what everyone says. Sit down and strap in. We have seat belts here," Lecter pointed at the straps around their chairs. It wasn't a simple seatbelt around their waist but one of those used in race cars that came from both shoulders and connected in the middle. After confirming everyone was ready, he unfurled the sail, and the raft started to slowly go up, "Instead of controlling our forward speed, the sail controls how high we go."

"So it's kind of like that fire thing under a hot air balloon?" Alex asked.

"Exactly."

"It's surprisingly smooth," Hera looked down to the raft, making sure everything was still stuck together.

"That will change as soon as we start moving. I hope you two are not the kind to get seasick."

"Oh no," Alex gasped as they kept going higher and higher.

"What altitude do we need to reach?" Hera asked.

"We are not a plane, but for this to work, we need to get around 150 meters high. That way, we can use the air current a bit better. It also helps avoid most of the monsters here. Only the birds would be able to reach us, and it's not like going higher would make any difference for them, so it's just unnecessary," Lecter kept changing the positions of the sail to adjust the speed they were going up. Around a minute went by before the raft reached the necessary altitude, "OK, then. Are you two strapped?"

Hera and Alex nodded, and the raft started to drift along the sky. However, it didn't take long for the ship to start picking up speed. Eight minutes passed before they stopped accelerating. The sound of the wind blowing through their ears was deafening. If any of them wanted to talk to each other, they would have to yell, and even so, it was hard to communicate. Using the tablets was also a bad idea since it would require them to physically pull up the device, and holding it in this place would be very dangerous. Neither of them wanted to risk losing their tablets in the middle of the jungle. Hera and Alex started using their communicators to talk, but even that wasn't perfect. Even if their voices were coming from an earpiece, the wind was too loud.

As they continued moving, Lecter had to use a spell to block off some of the wind every time he had to tell his passengers something. Unfortunately, he couldn't keep that spell up all the time, if he could, not only would the trip be much more comfortable, but it would also be faster since the magic would create a vacuum behind it by cutting the air resistance, almost like the tip of a rocket. Still, he was doing his best to make the trip entertaining. Each landmark they passed by came with a small explanation about the area and the monsters that were around. There was a lot of information and Lecter was very energetic. It was almost like he worked as a tour guide. Unfortunately, even with his best efforts, there wasn't much to show in the room. Not in the subject of landmarks anyway. Everything was just a jungle with occasional rivers or lakes. Lecter tried to make some of the more unique trees exciting, but it was a hard sell. The only thing that genuinely caught Hera and Alex's attention were the tall peaks to the north. In that area, massive rock formations rose high up in the sky, even higher than their current altitude. Looking at them made it clear that those peaks were like fault-block mountains. It was like they were staring at a large man-made structure built with smooth rock, and yet, not just the top but the sides were also filled with trees. Hera even could see some movement in the side of the mountain, showing that there were monsters living hundreds of meters above the ground.

A bit over three hours had gone by when the raft finally started slowing down. Lecter guided his ship to hover above a small clearing on the ground, "OK, this is your stop."

Hera confirmed that they were in the right area, "Do you know what tree is the actual heart of the jungle?"

"Not really. I'm not even sure that there is an actual tree that counts as the heart of the jungle. I think it's just this area," Lecter replied.

"OK, then," Hera turned to Alex, "Are you ready? You can still go back with him if you are not up to being in the middle of the jungle."

"I'm with you. The last time you jumped into an uncharted land, it was with Blue. It's my time now," Alex smiled.

"Oh yeah, because spending a few months in a room where people instantly loved me just by being human is the same as jumping alone in the middle of the jungle," Hera rolled her eyes and called Daskka. Since she had the mist glide spell, the snake could fly to the ground without any issue. Adding to that, she could also help them if any monsters tried to attack.

Lecter cleared his throat, "Right, then can I cast the spell? I'll wait for you guys to get on the ground and give you some cover fire if needed since you won't be able to move all that well."

"Please do. What do we need to do? We jump?" Alex asked.

"Wait for me to cast the spell first," Lecter picked a mana stone from one of his pockets and waved his hand around both Hera and Alex. What looked like a soap bubble formed around them, and Lecter gently started pushing them to the edge of the raft. He had to deactivate the railing that he placed before they left, but soon Hera and Alex were falling through the sky at a very slow pace, "You guys should reach the ground in five minutes. You can still use spells from there, but try not to move around too much. And don't use projectiles that start on you."

"Five minutes? That's a while…" Alex looked down as they slowly moved closer to the ground.

"Yeah…" Hera didn't say anything else. It felt awful to be so exposed for so long. Sure, five minutes didn't seem that long, but in a situation like that, it might as well be a lifetime.

Hera and Alex just kept staring at the ground as the tension rose in the air. Hera was holding her griffon whistle in her left hand, just in case. Every ruffle of the leaves and every odd noise that came from nowhere made the two bubble girls flinch. They wanted to be ready for anything, but not being able to fight back was terrifying. Daskka felt Hera's unease and went down faster to look around the landing area and make sure it was clear.

The clock kept ticking, and the bubble kept moving. In three minutes, they were already more than halfway to the ground, but if something went wrong now, it was still a 60-meter drop. With a lot of luck, they might be able to survive, but they wouldn't be unscathed. Hera suddenly felt Daskka in distress and tried to locate the snake. She was wrapped around a branch, staring at the opposite side of the clearing where something was moving. For a moment, Hera thought it was just the leaves of a tree, but little by little, more of whatever was moving started to appear.

First, a large root seemed to tremble. It was connected to a moss-covered trunk that bent backward, vanishing under the other trees. Then, a second set of roots connected to the same type of moss-covered trunk appeared to the side of the first. Another large piece of wood came into view, and on top of it, there was a massive red and green flower bud with small yellow feelers coming out of the middle. Another set of two trunks appeared behind the thing, showing that all those roots were actually the creature's feet. It slowly moved to the middle of the clearing and opened the flower bud revealing larger blue tentacles that stretched out to the air.

"Shit!" Lecter yelled from the raft and started sending spells at the monster.

"What is that?" Alex asked

"One of the worst things we could find. Those fuckers specialize in hunting birds, and since they are plants, the other monsters just leave it alone," Lecter was using some ice spikes to try to pierce the creature, but the bubble was in the way, and he wasn't able to get a good shot.

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Jupiter Birdtrap - Level 28 (Plant affinity)

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Hera looked down to the monster, "Daskka, fire!"

Understanding what her owner wanted, Daskka started spewing fire towards the creature. The snake right now was a pocket-sized flamethrower thanks to Hera's grease fire spell. The monster started to flail around as soon as the fire hit it. One of the tentacles inside aimed up, and seeds started being shot out of the creature. A number of those seeds hit the bubble that was holding Hera and Alex, making it pop right away. In an instant, Hera blew the griffon whistle, and Nimbus appeared right under her. She grabbed Alex and put her on top of the cloud griffon, but the mount wasn't going to hold them both for long. They quickly plummeted another 30 meters into the ground when all of the feelers pointed at them. Without any warning, the Jupiter Birdtrap sent out all its tentacles towards the incoming food, managing to grab Hera's leg and pull her out of the mount when they got just 15 meters away. Hera spun in the air, trying to get a hold of herself, but the last thing she saw was the massive petals filled with large thorns making this flower bud look like the maw of a giant carnivorous monster.