The Forest
SkyHaven is large and very crowded, there were no cars or carriages so the roads were thick and people bustled about. I was walking with Amaris while she asked me a series of questions like, how I transfered, where I transferred from, my entire life story. It was kinda annoying but when I didn't want to answer she dropped it. We stopped at a Burger Queen and sat down to eat, and I was able to ask her questions. Nothing out of the ordinary happened. She gave believable answers so I let her be. It was nearing 5:00 so I decided to leave to get to work.
"Alright, I need to go. Nice talking to you." I grabbed my bag and stood. "What," Amaris said. "Why, I was having so much fun though." I threw away my trash. "I have to get to work, and I can't be late." She stood and grabbed my arm, "No follow me, I need to be sure of something." I tried to pull free, but she melted my arm and legs and carried me. We walked for 10 minutes and were allowed through the walls by the Protectors there. She walked deep into the woods and dropped me on the floor and restored my bones.
I shot up, "What the fuck was thaat for!" I activated my own power and looked around warily. Normally, you'd just run to the wall, but traveling in this forest alone was a death wish and I would need time before I was able to fight a strong monster. "Stop being a little baby," she teased, "I'll take care of your job, just follow me." I had no choice, I couldn't order her to do anything in this situation, and if I wasn't quick enough, she'd just melt me and I'd be useless. I followed her through the woods. We weren't on the path, so I had to push branches and leaves out of my face. "Mind explaining?" I asked. "Well you see, you have the highest PL I've seen, so I wanted to ask you to do something for me." "Don't you mean force." "Yeah, force." An ear piercing screech filled the air and we stopped. It felt like we were being watched. Like the monsters were hiding in the thick canopy high in the air. I tethered to a few trees and began to steal their durability. These were Trifate trees, they looked like oak, but were taller, were sentient and could grow spikes to kill things that messed with them, and needed a ton of magic to cut. I also decided to copy Amaris's power just for some offence. There was rustling and an entire flock of large metal birds swarmed us.
I couldn't melt any of them since they were completely metal, so while I used tree spikes to impale them, Amaris used a bone sword. (I don't know where she got them from.) They were strixes and I could already feel the curses piling up. The strix would paralyze you if it cut you, luckily I was near indestructible after tethering to so many of them and trees. Amaris wasn't so lucky and was already falling over. I scooped her up just as I lost my vision and began to run.
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I ran for a few minutes before my vision returned and I saw we were back on the path. I walked down it with Amaris in my arms, trying to say something. Yup, that paralysis works wonders. I don't know what she wanted me to see, but this is why random people can't just leave the city and go into the forest. We may have just gotten unlucky with the hundreds of carnivorous metal birds that were immune to our bone melt, but I wasn't going to take any chances. As we were nearing the wall, Amaris rolled out of my arms as she began to get some feeling back. "Kenneth, please we can't leave yet." There were tears in her eyes as she pleaded for us to go back. I picked her up again and carried her to the wall and back in the city all the way to the dorm. She could only squirm and wiggle but didn't have the power to actually force me to put her down. I ended up just giving the girl to Melli. It was already 9:00 so I was stuck inside and just crashed on their couch.
There was something in that forest that Amaris felt strongly about, and it must be too difficult for her to get. I slept wondering what it could be.
It was saturday so there were no classes. I woke up and rubbed my eyes. I was in an unfamiliar room and I tensed up before remembering I was in Melli and Amaris's dorm. It was like a house, it had a living room, bedrooms, and kitchen which is where Melli currently was. Melli was the purple haired elf that came to my Inn a while ago. I stood up and prepared to leave but she stopped me. "Just stay for breakfast, I want to ask you a few things." I was hungry and wasn't ready to face Drake's wrath on an empty stomach. I sat down and she presented eggs and white bread with something that looked and tasted like bacon. "Kenneth, tell me what happened to Amaris yesterday. I've known her for years and I've never seen her cry once. Not only that, she was completely paralyzed!" I drank a cup of water. "I don't know what she wanted. She dragged me into the forest and tried to lead me to some location off the path and we were attacked by strixes. The birds were metal, so bone melt wouldn't work and they paralyzed her. I was able to escape and find the trail and come back. Whatever was in there, she was desperate to find it but I wasn't dumb enough to go back in." Melli nodded and sipped her tea. "Kenneth, you're king now and the strongest in the school, I need you to keep an eye on Amaris so she doesn't do anything stupid."
"I don't have time to watch her every movement, and you should know, I don't really care." I was lying and I knew it. So did Melli and she repeated herself and allowed me to go. I'm not some kind of hero or anything, but the thought of someone I know, even if it was only a day, and if I don't particularly like them, I'd never wish for someone to be taken by one of those beasts. I'd keep an eye on Amaris when I could but not all the time of course. I left and was going to head to Eileen's room but it would be weird if I was caught in the girl's dorms this early in the morning, and the gates were still locked. I walked out of the girl's dorm and waited for the gate to open. It was still only 7 am and the gates didn't open until 9 on the weekends. When I finally left I decided to talk to Drake about my current situation, hopefully he forgets about me skipping work...