Chapter 67

“Ben for the love of your god can you try and watch where you’re going!”

“I can’t help that yours was some sort of sadistic ass when they made this place!”

He wasn’t sure if it was spending the night in the woods or the stress of the previous day catching up to them, but when morning came they were both in terrible moods. Moods which only got worse as the day went on and they continued to face the risk of plummeting to their deaths.

Worse was how little progress they’d made since entering the trial. If they didn’t need to keep themselves from falling to their deaths every five or ten minutes they would have gotten significantly farther, but then again it was part of the trial, he wouldn’t be surprised if that was just meant to wear them down mentally, and if that was the case it was succeeding. With every near-death experience they started to bicker more and more. In the back of his mind Ben couldn’t help but find it a bit out of character, they’d never really fought before, but his worsening mood pushed it away.

Finally, as if to grant them some peace, that branch of the trial seemed to end. A good twenty minutes had passed without them falling over whatever littered the ground, and the earth was content to stay in place instead of giving way to unending pits, but neither of them could enjoy it. They were both too annoyed with each other, Thera for his inability to keep himself safe, and Ben for her attitude, that neither of them were in the mood to speak.

Why’s she got to be like this? I’m in the stupid life and death scenario to help her! And I’m just a freaking craftsman! Well, priest but that’s not the point. Why’s she being so-

“What was that?” He asked all of a sudden, leaving his thoughts and breaking the silence.

“What was what?” She said while looking around.

“Something just ran through the trees.”

She immediately went on guard and raised her staff, but neither of them saw any movement.

“It must have just been the wind.” She told him dismissively. “Come on, I want to enjoy this peaceful area while it lasts.”

“I’m sure I saw something.” He immediately felt defensive. He knew there was something out there.

“Well if you see it again let me know but otherwise let’s just go already.” Her harsh tone didn’t help anyone’s mood, but with nothing coming out at them there was no point in arguing.

They resumed walking for another 10 minutes of peace before Ben saw it again.

“There! In front of us!” He pointed as something ran by, just through the trees ahead, but he was still alone in his sighting.

“Ben, I was looking that way the entire time! If you needed more rest you should have said so before we got started.”

Anger filled his voice when he heard her response. “This isn’t a me being tired thing! This is a me not wanting to get eaten thing! How did you not see that?”

“Cause there was nothing there!” She yelled back before trying to calm down. “Look, do you see anything now?”

“No.” He begrudgingly acknowledged.

“Then come on, let’s get going already.”

He could tell from her tone she wasn’t going to listen until she saw something too, so he gave up for now. “Fine.”

He wasn’t happy that she wasn’t taking him seriously, especially with their lives on the line, but all he could do was keep vigilant.

As they continued on for the next four hours he thought he kept catching more glimpses of a figure or multiple figures passing through the trees in the distance, but each time he was alone in his sightings.

Thera only grew more annoyed as the time went on and eventually stopped. “That’s it. Take a nap and clear your head. I can’t put up with this until nightfall.”

“I’m telling you somethings out there!”

“Well it’s only bothering you. Now just lay down for a bit and I’ll keep watch.”

She pushed him down and despite his annoyance, he gave in. He admittedly hadn’t slept as well as he would have liked to anyway the night before so he closed his eyes and let sleep take him.

He wasn’t sure how long he had been out. With the sky covered by trees he couldn’t use the sun to judge, but he felt significantly more rested, though as he sat up though his heart froze.

Sitting maybe 30 feet away was some sort of humanoid creature, and when he locked eyes with it, it began to get up, as if it had been waiting for him to awaken.

Standing at around nine feet tall, he would have mistaken it for a person at a distance. But its long arms dragged across the ground as it stood upright, with two empty holes where its eyes should have been.

“Holy shit Thera I’m pretty sure you should be shooting that!” He said in a panic.

“Oh you’re up? Wait, what are you talking about?”

“Giant monster walking towards us and my intense desire to not die mostly, now if you would please.”

She looked to where he was pointing and her expression changed from one of annoyance to concern. “Ben there’s nothing there. Is the trial making you see things?”

As she said this the creature’s mouth curled up into a cruel grin, like it was enjoying his fear and her dismissal as it approached them.

Not wanting either of them to die, Ben grabbed her hand and forced her to run with him like their lives depended on it. As far as he was concerned they did.

“What the hell are you doing?” She yelled.

“Look I don’t know if I’m seeing things but I don’t want to take the risk! Now please come on!” As they ran he spotted more creatures coming out of the woods, all with the same hollowed eyes and taunting smiles, and all of them simply walked towards them, though with their height he wasn’t getting as much distance as he would have liked.

6 of them. He didn’t like their odds but he had an idea at least.

“Thera I’ll cover the burden on your staff if you can open a pit in the earth about 20 feet back?”

“You said we should only do this in an emergency!”

“I’d call this an emergency!”

“Ben there’s nothing there!” She yelled and stopped in her tracks. “If the stress is too much for you let’s just leave, I don’t want you getting me killed.”

She wrenched his hand from her grip and turned around and started walking back the way they came, in the direction of the creatures.

Their grins widened as they quickly closed the gap between them, the closest raising its massive clawed hand, trying to tear into Thera’s face.

Skin tore and blood flew, but Thera was spared injury. Ben had rushed in front of her, throwing his arm and by extension his gauntlet between them, only for the creature’s claws to slice cleanly through the barrier it produced, the gauntlet itself, and the jacket he’d made for Myriad.

DamnfuckdamnitshitOWOWOW this hurts!

There was no time to focus on the pain though, he grabbed Thera’s hand and with a renewed effort ran for their lives.

“What happened?” Thera yelled at him. From her perspective it seemed as though he had rushed in front of her, only for his arm to erupt into a bloody mess.

“There’s a fucking monster there! That’s what happened!”

He turned to look back at the creatures tailing them. They were gaining some distance, but not as much as he would have liked, and he knew he at least wouldn’t be able to keep the pace up for much longer. With the almost lazy attitude they seemed to have while chasing them he didn’t think there was much chance of tiring them out, so that meant they needed to act.

“There’s nowhere to hide and we aren’t escaping these things. I need you to fight.”

“How am I supposed to fight something I can’t even see!”

“Well I can, so just trust me here!” He came to a dead stop and spun them around. Thera grasped her staff and looked about blindly. He grabbed onto her and her staff and connected to her suddenly being filled with her emotions. There was guilt over what happened, but there was also still so much anger. Normally if he felt someone’s mood like this he would try to make sure he was as calm as possible to try and relax them, but that just wasn’t an option for him at the moment, his own mind was in turmoil. He briefly wondered why that was but he didn’t have the time to focus on it, their feelings were building on each other as Ben aimed her staff and Thera tried to pull together enough matter for an earth bullet, but having even less control than usual the forest itself began to rip itself apart as her magic ran wild. The creatures were thrown to the ground by the chaos and Ben did everything he could to try and hold the staff together, strengthening every inch of it as the raw mana wanted to tear it apart and trying to keep rebuilding the sacrificial enchants as fast as they would break.

The creatures were on the ground in front of them and that’s where Ben directed her aim, even knowing it wouldn’t go well for them either, and Thera fired her shot.

The spell was massive, at least four times greater than when she worked to manage it, and when it hit the ground where the creatures fell it felt like the entire world shook, and the impact threw both of them back.

Ben did his best to fight past a body full of pain and a raging headache from using too much mana as he got up and looked around. He wouldn’t need to worry about anything sneaking up on them for a while at least. Thera’s magic had pulled down all of the more regularly sized trees around them, leaving only the true giants standing in place. He got up and searched the area, not seeing any sign of the creatures they encountered, not so much as a corpse.

He was sure they had been hit. Perhaps they had been buried, or maybe they disappeared when their part of the trial was done. Either way he looked to Thera as she was pulling herself up and tried to not let his anger get to him. If she had just listened to him from the beginning things would have gone so much smoother.

Seeing her appear fine he didn’t say a word, instead opting to lay against the trunks of one of the giant trees and dig through his bag.

Stupid. He thought to himself. He’d been so focused on his tools that he’d neglected one of the most important supplies he should have brought. Bandages and healing potions. What sort of narrow-mindedness kept a person from realizing they could be hurt, he thought as he chastised himself.

What he did have was a magic tool that would gather water from the air to drink. He didn’t have mana to activate it at the moment, but it was thankfully full. He poured it over his arm while looking over his injury. It wasn’t very deep luckily, the gauntlet and coat both managed to at least reduce the damage the creature’s claws could do, but it still hurt.

If he’d bothered to learn more alchemy beyond what he would need to incorporate monster parts into his tools and weapons then maybe he could have thrown something together in the forest, but he’d been neglecting that area of study, only making some potions here and there to help keep the store’s stocks up.

Once the wound was clean he tore up a spare shirt and wrapped it around his cuts before laying against the trunk of the tree, connecting with it to try and distract himself from the pain.

Touching the tree’s mind had an instant calming effect on him. With the giant in a perpetual state of relaxation itself, it was easier to push aside some of the negativity he’d been filled with since he woke up. He spent time with it, sending thoughts and feelings back and forth to get acquainted when he felt an emotion he had to take as a question.

Why?

He wasn’t sure what it meant at first, but he wasn’t using hidden mind at all. His thoughts and feelings were laid bare to it, and it wanted to know where all of the anger was coming from.

Of course I’m angry! We almost died! Plus Thera’s been moody all day long. I’m just feeding off of her bad attitude.

In the back of his mind though something felt wrong. He hadn’t really been himself since he woke up either, had he? At least he didn’t think he usually would act like this.

Why?

The tree probed further, wanting to understand more, and making Ben think deeper. He couldn’t remember the last time he felt like this. He hadn’t been mad at Thera when she was being so cold to him when they first met, and when he was attacked by a screll on their first hunt together at most he was probably annoyed that she didn’t help him back. They had even put their lives on the line and trust in each other to face Roans monsters. The tree was right, why was he being like this?

He felt his eyes widen as a thought occurred to him and he renewed his effort of focusing on the tree, trying to force its calmness into himself while calling out to Thera.

“Hey, I need you over here now!”

The urgency in his voice brought her rushing over as she still struggled with her own feelings. Guilt at Ben getting hurt but with anger still lingering in her mind. Now just as much of it was directed at herself as it had been to him though. Why had she been so unwilling to believe him? This was the trial of her god, invisible monsters shouldn’t have been outside the realm of possibilities, why couldn’t she give him the faith she had before? As she tried to deal with that he grabbed her hand and connected to her, making her feel his more calmed state, as well as that of the tree he was still linked with.

“What’s going on?” She didn’t understand what he was aiming for, but he just told her to wait for a bit and try to let the sense of ease and relaxation envelop her.

She wanted to argue, but it felt so peaceful. Stress and anger had been with her throughout the day, the thought of taking some time to calm down was a temptation she couldn’t resist when presented to her, and she quietly sat down beside Ben, trying to let her emotions melt away.

When Ben felt her relax to a more reasonable level he spoke up. “I’m sorry. I’ve been in a pissy mood all day and let myself take it out on you and that’s not cool.”

The sudden apology caught her off guard but helped calm her even more, but at the same time raised her guilt to all-new levels. “No I’m sorry, I’ve been rude all morning and I didn’t believe you and now you’re hurt because of me. I don’t know why I’ve been like this.”

She didn’t look at him but rested her head on his shoulder. Ben could feel her complicated emotions through their connection and put an arm around her before saying his theory on the matter.

“I think we’ve been under some sort of mental effect.”

The idea surprised Thera enough that she turned to look up at him through her cloak. “But that would be dark magic, at your resistance of 80 and mine of 40 you would feel it significantly less than me, if at all.”

“Sure if this was from a mortal that would make sense, but can you be sure a god’s magic would work like that? Or whose to say this isn’t some non attribute spell? The entire day today has felt unnatural and out of character, and yesterday with the constant tripping it feels like I was being distracted by the world around me.”

She thought what he said over and couldn’t find any flaw with his reasoning, it just left a problem. “So what do we do then? If there is some magic messing with our minds I don’t know how to deal with it.”

“We do what we’re doing now.” He told her. “Every ten or fifteen minutes let’s just stop and use one of the trees to relax ourselves, it seems to work well enough.”

“Seems like that will slow us down a lot, our pace already isn’t great.” She said a bit dubiously, but Ben only shrugged.

“Better than being dead though, right?”

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