CHAPTER 58: [ WOODCUTTING ]

They took several steps back, in an open area that wasn’t too bothered by the roots.

Fighting with their backs turned to the the tree didn’t seem like such a bad idea if it wasn’t for the tree itself being a potential enemy.

"This isn’t good, if the smoke..."

He narrowed his eyes, a pointless attempt at changing what he could see clearly.

"There is no smoke..."

Fae nodded, her eyes also stuck on the ceiling.

The leaves burned brightly, yet no smoke accumulated at the ceiling.

"The boss should appear soon..."

He looked around, yet nothing besides the fire had changed.

He snapped his tongue, an annoyed look on his face as he pointed his staff toward the tree.

"We might simply have to cut it down."

He scratched his head.

"It’ll take forever..."

Brak promised they wouldn’t dull or break easily, stating they were sharp enough to be C-tier weapons, their size would make this woodcutting task take longer than it needed to be.

Fae stood beside him, waiting for instructions.

"There is no point in standing around and waiting, we’ll have to cut it down. Just start on one side, I’ll try to exert pressure by pulling the tree with tendrils."

She unsheathed her swords, taking a moment to look at their size and then at the tree’s size.

"I know."

She walked up to the tree, then started working at it.

He could sense the tree’s magic at every strike. The way she slashed at it, yet barely made as deep of a cut as she normally would’ve was clear enough.

If it wasn’t for its unnatural strength, it would’ve taken her no more than half an hour to completely cut it in half.

"It’s gonna take hours..." said Alexander, standing back while watching.

Atypical dungeons weren’t uncommon. Ones where enemies behaved strangely, or where certain secrets needed to be known to progress.

Dungeons with secret mechanics required to progress usually had clues spread around, yet they had encountered nothing of that sort.

No paintings on the walls, no statues, no hidden doors.

Alexander leaned on his staff, deep in thought while watching Fae at work.

He almost lost himself in thought as he watched her work. She was cute, and because she never spoke there was something truly elegant about her.

She was mysterious, but not unreadable.

On the surface, she almost looked like a doll.

But those moves, those strikes—she was a force of nature. He himself wouldn’t even be able to dent that tree the way she did.

Granted it was slow, but he knew in her position he’d never get such results.

Alexander suddenly flinched, blinking a few times while his hand quickly went to the side of his neck.

What he felt only lasted a split second, too quick to even tell what kind of pain it was.

He couldn’t look, relying on his hand to feel for cuts or bruises—yet nothing.

He looked at his palm, no blood there either.

"Is this soot?"

He could slightly spread the black powder with his fingers, it was faint but there.

His gaze slowly went up.

The leaves were still burning.

"There shouldn’t be any leaves remaining by now..."

What had once been a ceiling brightly ablaze now looked like a shower head, leaves on fire dripping from the branches and falling through the air slowly.

Some of it extinguished on the way down, leaving barely any trace behind.

Alexander extended his hand forward, catching a leaf that had mostly been consumed with only a small part of it still burning.

The moment it touched his skin his hand recoiled.

"Fae!" he called.

She looked back, then up.

She quickly made her way back to Alexander’s side.

"There’s something going on..."

He looked around, but still no presence of a boss anywhere.

"This is most likely a survival room."

She nodded along while waving her hand occasionally to block the smoldering leaves from touching him.

He scratched his forehead, his eyes tracing imaginary lines on the ground while he tried recalling information he read before.

"This is most likely a survival room..."

Alexander looked up once more, leaves kept falling at an increasing amount.

"There’s no doubt..."

He gently grabbed her shoulder.

"There’s no need to worry. They are very rare, but simple in nature. We just need to survive until the boss finally shows up. This giant tree should’ve been an obvious tell that this wasn’t just as normal boss..."

He took a deep breath, looking at their surroundings once more for any change.

Nothing did, and Fae hadn’t gone through more than 10% of the tree with her strikes.

More and more leaves fell from the branches, the speed at which they fell slowly increasing as well.

Alexander pointed the tip of his staff at the ground next to them.

The surface split open, the abyssal dimension showing through it.

A single large tendril arose from it, arching above the both of them to block the incoming fire that slowly fell onto them.

He then grabbed Fae’s hand, inspecting it from every angle.

"This fire isn’t natural. It’s doing a lot more damage than it should."

Around the initial burn mark some lines extended like a web, as if the magic expanded outward.

The pain itself was cause for concern, he shouldn’t have felt any.

The constant burns he suffered from Sunder’s mark were enough to make those small pieces of burning leaves feel like no more than a bit of warmth.

"It keeps coming..."

He grabbed Fae’s shoulders and brought her into his arms, hugging her tightly.

Right next to the previous one, he conjured another tendril that arched above them.

He could hear the sizzling sound as the fire burned the tendrils above them, the rate at which it did increasing over time.

It slowly started to look a lot more like rain, fire dripping from the ceiling like water through a strainer.

He held onto Fae slightly tighter as he glanced out once more.

"Hold on, it’s just starting."