Chapter 13

We woke up, or down. Can you wake down?

 I mean, the world was tilted and I had this weird weightless and floating sensation. I tried to move my arms and legs but that only made the swaying stronger and the groans of the others more pronounced. We were tied to each other, upside down, in what I could only call a trove inside the tree trunk itself? It was difficult to tell what everything was when you were looking at it from the wrong angle. The walls around us were tight, greenish brown and wooden with those patterns that show the age of a tree. There wasn't much decoration in there apart from a couple of furnishings that looked naturally made by the tree itself. We were inside the residence of ultra tree lovers and I had tried to cut of the roots of one of the greatest trees in the Verdant Shard. We were screwed.

"Guys, are you awake?" I whispered. I wanted to know what our fighting power would be if we suddenly had to fight. Though, the Sprout Warriors could have easily taken us down when we were at our most defenseless. Drugging and taking us here to just kill us seemed like adding extra steps to a pretty easy outcome. So there must be something they wanted out of us, something they needed. We could use that to our advantage if we first found out what it was. 

"Huuuh" A high pitched groan sounded from my right and I tried to turn around forgetting the whole tied together thing so I made us all sway to my right and I heard a thunk that I was pretty sure was someone's head. 

"If you keep moving like that, we won't be for long! Seriously, did you make a deal or something with our enemies to take us down? Because if so, you are doing a perfect job of sabotaging us!" I could recognize the voice and vitriol coming with it on my left anywhere. I flinched at the harsh words, even more so because I had noticed that Adriana was at my right so that meant it was Lance's head that had taken the hit. I expected the others to take my side or at the very least, try to get him to stop with the insults but the silence that ensued was so loud it punched me in the gut. They were considering it. They thought such an absurd thing might be true. And there was nothing I could say to prove that wasn't the case. I still didn't know why they were taking this whole thing so seriously, seeing as their equipment and levels were as low as mine and I thought playing games was a chance to make friends and have fun as you went on adventures, but for some reason they wanted to clear the game as fast as possible and right now I looked like a big obstacle to that goal. So I didn't reply or try to speak them out of their suspicions. What was even the point?

"Just as I thought" The voice was wizened and deep and it had the effect of immediately making us all raise our guard. "Your tumultuous relationship with Mother Nature has even made you have infighting between your group. Disobedient and unruly children don't make for good companions and they can find no peace or accord between themselves" The guy's voice was dripping judgement and I tightened my fists because his condescending words were seriously getting on my nerves. Who did he think he was?

He sat at the green, leafy chair in front of me and locked eyes with me and only me. I mean, I had been the greatest offender of Mother Nature or whatever the shit he was preaching so that made sense. If he wanted, I was going to take full responsibility too. Let the others go. Just keep me and do whatever. We obviously had different goals and priorities and I was done feeling like I was the one in the wrong for being true to my intentions while they hid all of theirs. Happy to separate then and prove my honesty in a last idiotic act. So I glared right back at him. He seemed divided between disappointment and intrigue at my rebellious behaviour. 

"You are our prisoners" No shit, Sherlock. "You will be tried for your crime against Mother Nature" If he said Mother Nature once more I swear to GOD- And had he looked at me specifically when he said your crime? "You wear the Mother's skin...but then you go and betray her" I was confused only for a split second until I saw what he was holding and examining. I drew a blank of shock before I was filled with the blood red of anger. He had my cloak. I had expected that since it was part of my gear and I wasn't dead, he couldn't take it off me. Maybe the rules for NPCs, I kinda still wanted to call them UPs but the others kept correcting me frustratedly, were different. If he kept running his hands through Erlong's intricate work, I was going to make him pay. He threw a searching glance at me. Fine, you are doing it on purpose. You obviously are trying to make a rise of out me. Well, it's working and I will not be ashamed to fight you over a bloody leaf cloak.

"Did you make them the offer yet?" A much more unripe voice said and another person appeared in the tree trunk. A young girl. I was so thrown by how realistically human they all looked. It was much easier when we were up against monsters or plants or whatever. The middle aged man with the green clothes sighed and finally took his eyes off me to look at the girl in an austere expression.

"I told you not to interrupt me when I'm making my intimidation tactic" He gritted between clenched teeth looking more like a reprimanding father than the annoying bozo from before. She shrugged nonchalantly and sat at the wooden stool like she owned the place and didn't have four people hanging by their ankles looking at her.

"To be fair, you never had the chance to use it before so how was I supposed to know how long it would take?" She was a little bratty. I liked her already. Especially when I saw the vein popping on the man's forehead. 

"Get out with the others and don't come back in until I explicitly ask you to" He tried to keep his demeanor but it had crumbled on his feet like badly furnaced clay. See? I did learn some stuff. I wasn't all that useless, thank you very much!

She huffed just to show she could but still obeyed him. I tried to keep up with her to see how she got in and out of the trunk but the sheer bulk of four human bodies was making it too difficult for me. For just a brief moment of disobedience, she looked back at us before getting out of the trunk and our eyes met. Hers were the greenest green I had ever seen. Did that just rhyme? She winked and I decided that maybe I was just a tiny bit useless after all. 

"Ahem" I turned my attention back to the old man. I couldn't see the others so their absolute silence was starting to concern me but there was nothing I could do about that now. "As you probably heard, instead of going through the trial which could have some very bad consequences for you..." I was finding myself less inclined to believe in his ability to harm us but I still nodded for him to continue since he kept looking at me once again. Had he mistakenly thought I was the leader? Had he not seen us during the boss battle? "We have a deal to offer you. And your crimes will be absolved" Crimes? Plural? Was he trying to oversell this or was it my imagination? For some reason, people didn't look like that much of an adversary in a game where you had poisonous tree warriors and ice snakes so I got bold. 

"Is that what's in it for us? And what are we even supposed to do? You didn't specify." He looked pissed. The others gasped almost inaudibly. It was a reassurance to hear them. He fumbled. Good. 

"Maybe, we could arrange for something more as well. " The words seemed to pain him. "What would you have us do?" Oh no, he showed his hand right there. His eyes kept darting around uncomfortably and he had just left it on us to decide our prize. Meaning, he was really counting on our accepting the deal and was willing to do a lot to get us to agree.

"Information about this world" I replied and he looked relieved. There was nothing more valuable than information. It was the difference between life and death in here and I was tired of being left out and feeling like an idiot just because of my ignorance. I don't know wasn't gonna cut it anymore. 

"That can be arranged. But first, you will have to swear your allegiance to the Keepers"