35 Chapter Thirty-Five – The Grimm Tree (1/2)

A dreadwood. Really.

The last of the Hags sent out a flock of blood ravens to see what happened at her sister's little hut. None of them came back, which was an answer all its own.

There were thorn golems out there, some very nervous ogres and trolls, two surviving drak-wolves who were equally nervous, the giant toad that was her familiar, a really big snake swimming in the vicinity (seriously, how did she feed all those things? Eesh!), and the monstrous dead tree under whose hollow-out roots she was living.

That tree was a dreadwood. Its root system was huge, and gave a clear idea of just how big the tree itself must have been when it was alive. It only took a little bit of stimulus from my paranoid self swishing water currents past them to make those dead roots twitch and start moving by themselves. I realized all the other guards were just distractions for the rotted, massive trunk of that tree, and the killer root system waiting to grab and crush down below.

Tremorsense for at least forty yards in all directions. It didn't occupy the island it was on, it WAS the island. There was no way to approach it in the water without being sensed, and of course being above the water meant no cover at all, not that I could walk on water as yet.

That was fine, fine. It just meant I had to be a little creative. After all, there were no instant resurrections at Renewal, unlike my time in Nightmare. I was a terrifying little shit, yes, but I wasn't stupid. It would be years before I reclaimed everything in Nightmare, let alone here.

Killing the shellycoat let me raid her hut. There was a lot of cursed and trapped shit in there, and I was pretty sure she'd moved some out to the Shrine I had yet to revisit, but it was more then enough for me to thoroughly condemn whatever form of filing system for alchemical components she had, and make some interesting surprises.

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Her guards, of course, did not have tremorsense. Her guards were also posted around the tree, not ON the tree. Because, become lunch, you know.

And I could cover sixty yards on a Spirited Charge. It was more then enough to take care of any of them, if I could get moving.

I spent the night inflicting new agony on myself, as I Tattooed my Cloudstepping Sandals onto my feet.

These were aesthetically pleasing curls of white and light blue, winding and flowing over my feet, heels, and shins. Like all my Tats, they had to be exposed, or sharing space with a Chakra item, to work, so no magic boots for Sama anytime soon.

I had to do them at QL 35, and it was a good thing I was really flexible and had full body awareness with a Diamond Vajra while I was working on them.

It was also good that I had a Fort Save exceeding +20, because poking a chakra point open while making a Tat was just like in Nightmare, the mother of all blisters popping as my soul squirted out this tiny little opening in my ki, just so it could fill up this runic art I'd been stabbing in below my skin, allowing me to pump in some Essence and manifest the first couple levels of the Sandals.

Walking on air didn't come until /5, being a Nine. Walking on water, however, kicked in at /2, and two Essence.

It was called being able to make Gear. I might be an undersized little cockroach now, but ah, with the right Gear, complementing my own abilities and Tremble, I was going to be freaking nightmare.

Ignoring how incredibly sensitive my feet were right now, I allocated my Essence, stepped out onto the surface of the water, and unending streams of mist poured out of my soles, supporting me on top of it without problem.

I could end it with a thought if I needed to dive, pinching off the presence of my soul to power down the Tats. They were glowing softly and blowing over my feet and lower legs, felt kinda cool and ticklish, actually.

Tremble couldn't talk yet, but that was changing soon. There was work to be do, and humming along was no problem at all.

It was time to be a direct and very fast terror in the night. Spirited Charge would do everything I needed, and my speed would make up for the rest.

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I just picked them off with hit and runs.

Blooding did for the trolls. They couldn't regenerate from the wounds it inflicted, so punching a hole through their hearts was as lethal as it was to anyone else. I came skating in out of the night and fog, a blur out of the shadows, and with restricted visibility they had very little time to respond to me before I leapt in, clearing the grasping roots that couldn't sense me, and driving Tremble hilt-deep into their chests.

The three Trolls died about a minute apart. No, scratch that, the last one tried to flee for his lair instead of standing guard, and I cut him down out in the darkness.

The six ogres tried to back up and cover one another. That just helped me pounce off the dead ones and on to the next, shredding them both as they screamed.

Tremble couldn't sing quite yet, but that drone was mmm-mmm ominous.

Tree roots scrambled for me, and I chopped through them in passing, fully able to see them in my Tremble and play the sunder game.

She didn't come out as I chopped apart her guards. Thorn golems were violently disassembled as sprays of razor-point poisoned thorns went everywhere. My Penetrate Damage Reduction was at 10 and could totally deal with their Hardness, and I had no good experiences with golems, which I proceeded to share with them.

Even I could feel the gaping evil of what the greenhag was bringing forth in there, an inhuman howl that seemed also filled with subtle mockery and dominance as it belted forth eagerly.

Even the ogres turned around as they heard it. It was truly a skin-crawling kind of thing. The thing that came out of the entrance to the greenhag's cave was worth the look.

It was all black, like it was made out of slick plastic or something. It didn't have eyes, just a kind of bulb head and jaws that went all the way across it, massive and made for chewing. It was probably about eight feet tall, but had limbs more like a gorilla, so it could move on all four oversized feet and claws.

It radiated evil a Fiend would respect. I was a little impressed that she could bring something like this out, and figured she must have had a little something saved up for a long time in order to be able to Summon a Grimm.

Of course, this didn't stop me moving. Dumb ogre distracted #1 got Tremble in the side of the head. I twisted it around as I stepped across his back with misting feet, and as the last one jerked back around, sliced him up and down and sent a fountain of his insides into the outsides, ducking the spray of blood, sliding past as chopchopchopchop I hacked down some big dead roots that wanted to grab me impolitely, and skated back exactly six inches out of the dreadwood's reach.

I could see its trunk quivering in frustration. It had been trying to throw some mind-reaming spells at me, but I ignored it. This wasn't Nightmare, where all the spellcasters were horribly overpowered.

The grimm seemed to find my antics amusing, and the slow fall of the ogre as it grabbed its insides and tried to stop them from falling out laughable.

”Oh, oh, you are going to be a fine one to play with,” it purred, in a sibilant voice that did not match that mouth, or how weirdly expressive the lips of those jaws could be.

”A grimm, huh.” I saw a finger twitch at my total disdain, which the Fey language conveyed with infinite hauteur. ”Couldn't find anything better, aye? I was hoping one of the Tarn, at least. A Bandersnatch might have given me a run for my money, at least. Well, if you have to go dumpster diving, I suppose the bottom of the dumpster is best.”

It hissed, not at all pleased at my scorn. ”Oh?” it asked, sidling forwards onto a run of roots, moving closer to my position. ”You sound like you have met one of my kind before?”

”In Nightmare, I met grimm like you many, many times on my runs. As a matter of fact, your kinfolk managed to kill me thirteen times, over time, mostly because they were opportunistic pissants who gangbanged me when I was fighting giants or vampires.”

”Thirteen times in Nightmare, and you have not come to fear us? You have courage!” it mocked me. ”But this, this is not Nightmare, little one…”

”Oh, that's because of the other side of the equation. I killed three hundred and twenty-nine of you pissants before you got too terrified to come out anymore!” My voice rose, and Tremble's drone had an awful, ominous beat, even as the grimm froze.

Tha-thump, thum-thump!

”From the shadows crawled the grimm,

Full of vigor, full of vim.

Venom, hate, fat on sin,

Mocking claws, a coward's grin.

They struck from the rear,

Seeking pain and fear…

And were gutted, shattered, jaws split wide,

Fed to the Land, and cast aside.

Every day, a grimm to slay,

Until they dared not come to play.

TREMBLE, SHE COMES!”