Cwenburg was flying on Godwyna when she spotted the enemy. It was Hræbeornoth, an Ent, like an old elm tree. His legs were roots, his arms were branches full of leaves. His body was the trunk, and the crown cascaded down his back.
Internal organs were visible among the branches and wood.
— It's a tree, Cwenburg, be very careful. — Godwyna warned with apprehension, ceasing to fly directly toward the enemy, who also assumed a reactive posture.
— Godwyna, you're still Level 3, you can drop me off here and go back. — Cwenburg conjured her water staff and levitated above the Serpentarium. — Stubborn!
Godwyna didn't listen and remained there, until Hræbeornoth's powers were revealed.
From a distance of a few hundred meters, the Ent expelled several seeds into the air.
In a defensive stance, Cwenburg created a shield like a soap bubble around herself and Godwyna.
The seeds exploded and the forest was born, releasing more and more seeds that transformed into even more trees. Hectares falling from between the clouds. A rain of trees that engulfed Cwenburg and Godwyna.
At Hræbeornoth's command, the branches and roots of these trees were enchanted and drastically extended in length.
They were so extensive that they joined sky and earth for miles in gigantic trees.
Trapped within the magic, Cwenburg and her Serpentarium had their arms and legs separated. The roots tightened around their skin, preventing any movement from either of them.
Thus, Hræbeornoth reached the two effortlessly, running through the branches.
The dark climate had few lights, like columns, among the trees piled one atop another.
Hræbeornoth pierced Cwenburg's body with one of his branches, which stretched for dozens of meters. Godwyna opened her mouth in utter despair.
Blood gushed into the air.
And in the forest aroma, delicious and ochre, Cwenburg's body exploded into water. It wasn't her, it was a copy.
Godwyna was attacked by Hræbeornoth's roots, but he too was merely a copy, one of Cwenburg's spells.
Looking around, among roots joined to branches, and trunks like walls. It was like seeing an infinity of trees joined to one another.
Hræbeornoth searched for Cwenburg's aura, but she disguised it well, and Godwyna, far away, exiting the square that was the grove raised by Hræbeornoth's magic, watched from afar, trying to understand the Unicorn-Girl's strategy.
Back at the Demon King's Castle, Æthelflæd perceived the magnitude of the problem as she assessed the approaching auras.
Beyond the one in battle, there were others.
And it was only a matter of time before they reached the Black Castle. Meanwhile, Edas had regressed to the point of not perceiving the danger, and the Alchemist used that to her advantage.
— Edas, take Hærdas and Cynethryth, there are ruins in the surrounding forest, from the time when the Storm Alliance tried to attack the Demon King, go there, as far down as you can descend. — Hærdas, the mermaid, agreed immediately, but Edas noticed something strange:
— And why are you staying?
— Isn't it obvious? — retorted Æthelflæd, knowing that the enemies were probably following the Demon King's power imbued in the Curse Marks on the lolis' bodies. And she lied. — I know a place nearby, but I don't want anyone with me, it'll be easier to hide my Aura alone.
— Are you coming, Cynethryth? — the maid Cynethryth thought for a moment, and followed with Hærdas, both mounted on Edas's back, who trotted out of the Black Castle.
— You have a good heart, Human. — Blith served tea to the alchemist, who drank, savoring the horrible taste. — But, who were you again?
— Æthelflæd, minion of the Demon King. And who are you to him?
— Who am I?
Blith had been losing his memory more easily in recent months. For all these years it was the same, it became increasingly difficult to recall the early years.
And distant memories blended with new ones, in a dance of illusions.
Sometimes Blith awakened as in childhood, with the Immortals in their periods of vigor, when civilization in the Ruined Forest was called Aurea, and Immortal cities were as common as human ones. He would run until he got outside, and see that the world he sought no longer existed for centuries, perhaps millennia, the Butler could no longer differentiate.
Other days, Blith called out the name of someone he had known in the past. Like a ghost without face or voice, only the echo of yesteryear.
— You're the little princess of the Hohan, kin to the Lev?
— I'm afraid not, Blith. I'm still Æthelflæd, alchemist and nothing more. Want to smoke with me?
It seemed quite inappropriate, and the Butler found himself tempted to refuse. Until Æthelflæd prepared two pipes, lit them, and handed one to the old Immortal, who did not refuse the gesture.
The two walked out through the main gate and sat on the staircase before the Black Castle, smoking marijuana, crack, and hashish, all in the same plaster perfumed with benzoin.
In the forest created by Hræbeornoth, Cwenburg began her incantation, her voice coming from many different places.
Hræbeornoth squeezed where the voice should have been, but he could not reach the loli.
Cwenburg had transformed into water.
She had a liquid body leaping and falling among the branches, trapped in recesses and falling like rain, in drops distant from one another across the kilometers of height of the elevated forest.
— Dance, come quickly into my hands. I'm so tired of this time, of this body that was never mine, will never be mine. Every tower is raised from the ground by the mortal's fear of being buried bones. Not me, I came with her, the Mother of Waters. She listens to me and envelops me. It's me and you. When you smile, I feel it too. And from your crying and will to die, I saw myself as a veil among the stars, born of stars. The ocean of our hands and hearts separated by ephemeral consciousnesses! Do you not fear when they scream that you are alone? See, laugh! — her voice gained intensity with each conjured syllable. And the humidity around became palpable, until the water that was Cwenburg multiplied like a torrent connecting the forest to the oceanic depths. — I am the living tide!
The waters in weight and pressure destroyed the stalks and tore apart the branches and roots, and it was a flood that burst through the structures of Hræbeornoth's magic, which descended along with the trees carried by countless rivers.
Everything took its full course, and the forest that had been a huge square in the environment became trees scattered across the entire north of Bight of Horns. With roots upward and branches downward, in the future, that place would be known as the Forest of Cwenburg.