Chapter 13: Alpha

[Species name: Wood worm

Species grade: E

Attributes: Wood

Height: 1-3cm

Evolutionary history: The wood worm is a worm type monster that is part of the 'timor vermis' genus, they are an evolutionary deviation from zombie worm evolutionary template, while their evolutionary ancestors preferred to stay in dark secluded areas, not venturing out into the open air till food was low, this deviation was formed by zombie worms who were either left outside by their horde or ventured out on their own, while the zombie worm would attach itself to a creature of some sort while it lay dormant in the caves during the day, the worms that ventured to the surface were not so lucky and ran into alert prey due to their instincts telling them to attack hosts during the day due to the nocturnal nature of most upper cave dwellers, due to this, the few that survived desperately tried to latch onto the only thing that would stay dormant during their invasion, plant life, this caused their physiology to change over many thousands of year to better accommodate for the invasion and control of plant trees, as they are what the species has found is the best form of plant life to invade, their initial ability to control animals with functioning neural networks has been lost in return for the ability to control wood.

Defining features: The small wood worm is a disgusting little creature that has a conical shaped body with two little claws, evolutionary remnants of the zombie worms long clawed legs, it has a mouth filled with chisel like teeth that point horizontally, it's mouth spills over to form a semi-circular shaped, it can spin this mouth at up to 10rps, though its teeth are shaped specifically for wood and it's bone structure is not designed to take the impact of drilling through anything other than wood, as such the creature can't burrow into flesh, their skin is bark like in both texture and look, allowing for another layer of camouflage. Host trees look no different from regular trees.

Hunting behaviours: The wood worm will lay in wait of its prey, pretending to be a normal tree, and wait for prey to approach them naturally, and then impale the prey with their roots and absorb the water and nutrients from the victim, though when the prey they will communicate with their brethren in the same way most plant type monsters communicate, due to their nature as social insects, they have very little problems with others of their kind taking prey, unless they do it within another's territory while they have not revealed themselves to their prey yet.

Mating behaviours: The wood worm reproduces its off-spring semi-asexually, the wood worm, much like a virus, will find cells in a plant and inject its DNA directly into the cell, turning it into an egg, that grows at an alarming rate, hatching after only ten days, once the egg hatches, the worm's skin will take the appearance of the tree they are born from. A single worm can lay up to one hundred eggs in a single clutch, though less than three of them survive on average.

Symbolism: In most societies, the existence of the wood worm is not a commonly known fact, and those that do encounter them assume they had somehow angered forest fey, as such they do not have much symbolism, however in ent societies, they are seen as boogiemen, used to scare saplings, as they seem to have the ability to take over ents and pilot, as such the ent view them as a pest, that should be wiped of this earth.]

The group snuck carefully through the forest trying to cause as little noise as possible.

"So why are we sneaking again?" Nicolas asked curiously, "did you not say it was pointless?"

"Yes" Alex replied, "But this way we may get farther without running"

"But will we not have to run faster when they find us?"

"Possibly, but that's future Jack's problem"

"No, I think it is now jack's problem"

"Huh?" Alex gave a small start of surprise, finally noticing the pack of wolves, gathering together behind them.

"Tell me" Alex asked, in a shaky voice, "How far away are we?"

Nicolas gazed at his map in a casual manner, "hmmmm, about a mile"

"Well shit"

"So, you feel ready for a run?"

Alex grabbed Nicolas's by the back of his shirt, a deep purple mana roiling around his legs in a chaotic storm.

[Venomous dash]

Alex rocketed forward, dragging Nicolas roughly behind him, a trail of purple, translucent wisps, slowly spreading out over forest floor.

The wolves directly behind them took a step back, instincts kicking in once the raw, poison mana began to spread out over the forest floor like an infection.

Alex dashed through the forest in a crazed manner, dragging a disgruntled Nicolas behind him.

"How long were they behind us" Alex shouted, swerving to the left to avoid a root erupting from the ground.

"About ten seconds" Nicolas replied, rolling his body to dodge a particularly aggressive root.

"How long do you think it will take" Alex asked, yanking Nicolas sharply, to prevent him being impaled.

"Well," Nicolas pondered, "We, could, go for a longer and safer route, or we could cut the journey in half with a more dangerous route"

"What makes it more dangerous?"

"Well, there is a massive gorge in the way, should not be a problem, right?"

"Y-yeah" Alex replied in a shaky tone, "no problem"

"Good, then we shall arrive in two minutes" Nicolas stated with a dramatic flourish, "onward, to glory"

"WHY ARE YOU SO CALM"

"When you are a veteran like me, this kind of thing becomes normal"

"THE GAME HAS BEEN OUT FOR. LESS. THEN. A. MONTH, HOW CAN YOU BE A VETERAN"

"Tch, my rouse has been uncovered, once this ordeal is passed, I must destroy the evidence"

Alex stopped engaging in conversation, to focused on keeping him and his mentally ill partner within this mortal coil.

[Spatial leap]

It seemed that the trees had somehow adapted to his teleportation, as upon landing, Alex had to jolt to the side as a veritable forest of roots erupted from the ground, catching his right shoulder, spraying his blood all over the ground.

"This has to one of the worst rides I have ever taken" Nicolas chirped up behind him, his voice shaky and forced, "Would not recommend"

Alex turned around to retort back, but stopped, eyes wide upon seeing Nicolas. His left leg had been completely ripped off till just below the knee, the blood stump that remained oozed blood like a macabre fountain, staining the forest floor with its red ooze. The torn and broken remains of Nicolas's lower leg lay pathetically on the dirt, only a short distance from its original residence.

The scene almost made Alex wretch, but he had no time mull over the macabre scene, as every moment they stood still was distance that their opponents gained on them.

Alex resumed his mad rush through the woodland, leaving a trail of Nicolas's blood like some gory paintbrush.

Nicolas's breathing was becoming laboured, and his eyes were slowly becoming bleary and cloudy. With much effort, Nicolas reached into his inventory and produced a vial of emerald, green liquid and a small stick.

He popped the cork of the vial, he hurriedly adjusted his mask, so his mouth was exposed, revealing pale white skin underneath, and gulped it down in one go, and then hurriedly inserted the stick horizontally into his mouth and bit down hard.

Alex could hear Nicola's muffled yells of pain as he adjusted Nicolas, so he more comfortably carried him on his back, trying to make sure Nicolas he bounced up and down less with each stride.

"You Good?" Alex asked, with concern in his voice.

"My bone is rearranging and regrowing" Nicolas spat out through gritted teeth, "My muscles are forming around this knew appendage, my blood is clotting at a rapid rate, and I am conscious through the entire process, I am doing fine, how are you?"

While Nicolas was still joking around, his breathing was ragged and he was sweating profusely, Alex could tell he would not have lasted long without the potion.

"Just hold on, it won't take long" Alex comforted, turning around desperately to be met with the sight of rapidly approaching wolves, "how many potions you got left?"

"No" Nicolas replied firmly, "they figured out your teleporting bullshit, they will be ready for that boost, and we will both be dead once it runs out"

Alex gritted his teeth and pushed on, unlike last time, they had no convenient out, so they had to just make it through without any tricks.

Alex began the death-defying dance through the forest, narrowly avoiding, or in some cases, just tanking roots, that flew through the air at deadly speed, aiming for his life.

after two minutes of running, Alex emerged from the forest a bloody mess. The massive gorge stretched over the forest floor, like a massive mouth, split into a creeping smile, slowly gorging on the entire forest.

Alex froze slightly as he reached the edge, all it took was a 10-foot jump, but he hesitated.

"Hurry the fuck up" Nicolas yelled in his ear, "every second you stand here like a statue, they get closer"

Alex made a split-second decision, maybe it was due to stress, maybe the imminent threat of character deletion, maybe it was the fact that he also had to worry about Nicolas, but Alex ran right up to the edge, and threw himself off in an anything but graceful arc.

Unfortunately, he was a few seconds too late, a root shot from the cliffs edge, and caught him in his side, throwing his balance off.

In a last desperate moment, he grabbed Nicolas off of his back, and performed an almost flip, using the momentum of the roll to fling Nicolas to the other side of the gorge, and to safety.

As he fell, all forward momentum lost, Alex turned around and dug his fingers into the cliff-side, his gauntlets allowing him to pull off such a feat, though he still felt a few of his fingers shatter in the process.

"Yep" he muttered to himself, "Definitely broken"

As he clung to the wall, lamenting the loss of his digits, he felt a sick feeling in his guts, and his instincts kicked in, and he pushed himself of the cliff-face, to tired and beaten to argue with his insane instincts.

Just as he leaped of the wall, a root sprang from the cliff-face, shooting upwards at an angle, hitting where his heart had been seconds before, skimming the chin of his skull.

Alex could feel a manic smile splitting across his face, he wasn't going to die here after all.

As light purple mana swirled around his boots he took a look upwards, to the tip of the root, and then...

[Spatial leap]

He appeared at the tip of the root and used it as a springboard to reach the other side of the gorge.

Alex landed in a messy heap.

"Hah-hah" Alex gulped in air desperately, before throwing his hands up into the sky and shouting out, "Wooooooooh"

Alex struggled to his feet and made his way over to were Nicolas lay.

"Took you long enough"

"Shut up, just pass me a potion"

"A please would go a long way" Nicolas retorted, tossing a potion toward Alex.

Alex caught it between his palms but did nothing more.

"Well," Nicolas asked expectantly, "are you going to drink it or what?"

"Very sorry" Alex replied, voice dripping with sarcasm, "unless you haven't noticed, all my fingers are at odd angles, don't think I'm opening this any time soon"

Nicolas let out a long sigh and motioned for Alex to come closer, "Bring it here then, you big wimp"

Nicolas uncorked the bottle and unceremoniously rammed the bottle down his throat.

"Happy now?"

Alex spluttered as the healing liquid flowed down his throat.

"Let's get going" Nicolas said, unbothered by Alex's struggles.

As Alex picked Nicolas up once again, something started to nag at the back of his mind, a singular question, why did the trees not attack them?

Ah well... probably nothing.

Alex had other things to worry about.

They pressed on through the forest with no further interruptions, this probably meant that this place was similar to the first secret, and the real wolf den was at the edge of the forest, but Alex still pressed on, he had to see for himself, he couldn't let all their effort go to waste.

after ten minutes of slow trekking, they came to a quarry like indent in the forest, and sitting inside, a pack of crimson clad wolves, laying around lazily in the mid-morning sun.

And in the centre, a massive wolf that towered over its peers, a disgusting, woody growth sprouting from its back, plant like tendrils slapping the ground. This was it, their target, the boss.