There, beneath the gnarled roots, was Halo, lower body buried in moss-laden vines that moved independently, possessed. Their constriction increased second by second.

Several feet away, another tree held a second copy of him, slowly taking shape in the woods. The exact predicament he'd been fleeing.

"Too tight!"

Fighting made it worse. His hands were completely immobilized, and he could feel what was happening to his bones, the small cracks, the joints pulling apart, slow but deliberate.

He didn't understand the mechanism, but the trees had demonstrated their nature clearly enough. Hostile didn't begin to cover it.

His thoughts scrambled for solutions while he strained against the crushing vines. Force alone wouldn't free him, and intelligence was useless when it only showed up after the fact.

However, his mind grasped something, an experience even.

This reminded him of the Perverted Sinner's tentacles. That time, pressure had only made things worse, the harder he fought, the tighter it squeezed. But its oobleck consistency had been the key to escape.

'Of all people… that pervert did more than just save my life.'

He hadn't imagined he'd ever need to remember that nasty situation or that it would apply elsewhere. Turned out, it didn't.

He went slack, muscles releasing, hoping the lack of resistance would let him slip free. What he heard instead was a sickening break.

The crack echoed louder than his own screaming. He clamped his teeth into his lip, trying desperately to muffle the pain.

The vines responded to his relaxation with something like joy, almost playful in their eagerness. Result: his hand, wrenched from its socket.

Curses! Followed by gibberish even he couldn't make sense of.

Pure desperation. He yanked his dislocated hand through the vine mass by sheer force, pulling it to his midsection. The aggressive motion destroyed his clothes, tearing them faster than they could be repaired, and stripped skin from his body, leaving raw, bleeding wounds.

Yet, he barely showed any signs of weakness.

The moment his hand touched his midsection, he drew a deep breath and wedged his fingers into the tiny opening between his stomach and the constricting vines.

He exhaled deeply.

"What a relief."

The agony was overwhelming, he'd have screamed if not for his training. But he pushed through it, summoning Magnus and cutting desperately at the binding vines.

The awkward angle made cutting difficult, and the vines retaliated, coiling around his sword hand, trying to wrench the blade free. But Magnus was secured to his palm. They couldn't take it.

Before long, he'd cut through most of the vines, and oddly, the rest retreated into the water below. Why? Were they afraid of being cut? But that made no sense. They were just plant matter, they'd regenerate.

Soon, he rose to his feet, clutching his twisted joint.

But then, he immediately understood why the vines had retreated.

"Goddamnit."

A figure loomed ahead, constructed purely of intertwined vines. Leaves crowned its head like hair, white flowers bloomed where eyes belonged. Grotesque, botanical, yet undeniably shaped like Halo himself.

He sighed, exhausted and annoyed, then wrenched his arm back into its socket. Tears came unbidden. The pain was brutal, but he'd remember this moment.

This thing came from the tree, born from it. When he'd cut the tree, he'd felt it, the connection worked both ways. Which meant after all the agony those vines caused, he could return the favor. He just needed to figure out how.

"Go hide, Magnus. Looks like this bastard's due for an ass-kicking."

His sneer was half-annoyed, half-determined as he approached. He launched quick jabs with fluid precision, but the creature evaded them with casual ease.

Then another. Dodged.

Frustration peaked simultaneously. They attacked with full force, and when their strikes collided, the resulting shockwave rippled outward, activating something in the trees around them.

However, Halo immediately dropped to his knees, clutching his gut and chin. Pain radiated endlessly through his body, he'd somehow received both attacks instead of trading blows.

That's what he'd been afraid of, why he'd kept to light jabs at first. Too late now to take it back. He couldn't damage this plant version of himself, not without destroying his own body in the process.

He retreated, knees scraping across roots. The creature tracked his movement but didn't follow. Perhaps it understood there was no escape. It waited, patient, as Halo staggered upright and bolted, running for his life. Literally.

"What kind of place is this? Did it trap my soul or something?"

Whether he actually had a soul was debatable, but trapped in this place, stranger things had happened.

He didn't stop until he reached a tree whose roots rose high enough to be untouched by the vine infestation below.

Without wasting a moment, he climbed up and collapsed onto the roots. More water lay to his right, while the nightmare forest stretched endlessly to his left.

Seeing the water brought his crew to mind. The ship kept traveling, every moment here meant more distance to cover. But what could he do? He understood nothing about this place and had no defense against the trees.

After witnessing the vines in action, one thing was clear: he wasn't close to where he'd fallen anymore. The vines must have pulled him far from the ship's location, complicating any escape attempt.

One desperate thought followed another as he planned his escape. The waterway to his right could lead to safety, assuming this was the fourth sea, which he couldn't confirm.

Besides, swimming held its own dangers. vines could be waiting in the water. And blindly entering the fifth sea? That could kill him outright. The next sea might be lava, or something equally lethal to the third.

A plant-infested sea, though, made no sense. Who would create such a thing? And how were vessels meant to traverse it?

Soon enough, darkness approached. After everything his body had endured, sleep dragged at him relentlessly, regardless of his desire to stay awake.

Was it a good thing, though…

'Ah! Who cares? Tsk.'

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