Vol. IV Chapter II: A Bloom of Spores

A wet, ragged gurgle cut through the silence of the forest.

Lucius ducked just in time as a decaying arm with gnarled fingers swept over his head.

The body it belonged to, once likely human, was little more than a lifeless shell, its flesh threaded with thick, sticky fungal strands.

From its empty eye sockets bloomed faintly glowing flowers, releasing clouds of spores with every movement.

"Behind you!" shouted Tairaku.

Lucius spun on instinct and cleaved through the creature's torso with a single stroke of his sword.

A thick cloud of spores, reeking of rot, burst out and instantly choked his lungs.

He yanked the sword back, fine, sticky filaments still clinging to the blade, and raised his other hand to shield his mouth.

"How many more of these things are there?!" Lucius panted, falling back.

Tairaku stepped up beside him, launching a fireball at another creature stumbling out of the underbrush.

"No idea. But the air’s full of spores, means the nest can’t be far."

Lucius could already feel his lungs burning.

"Meiruna and Glizzy... damn it. If they breathed this in for too long..."

He didn’t need to finish, Tairaku just nodded.

"Splitting up was a mistake."

They looked around.

The mist between the trees had thickened, not a fog, but a shimmering blanket of spore-dust.

 Every step stirred it, every breath made it harder to think clearly.

"Tairaku, look!"

Between two trees, footprints pressed into the damp earth, dragged along by strange, smeared marks, as if someone unconscious had been pulled through the underbrush.

Lucius’ heart pounded.

"It’s their trail."

Tairaku nodded.

"Let’s follow it. Quickly."

They raced through the dense forest, sleeves over their faces, breathing as shallowly as they could.

Still, their lungs burned, their eyes stung, and it offered little relief.

Finally, they burst into a clearing.

The ground was carpeted in sticky white mycelium and a thick, shimmering layer of spores.

A sharp, panicked scream rang out.

Glizzy.

"There!" Lucius yelled.

In the center stood the goblin, clothes coated in pollen dust, her face smeared with mud and slime.

She flung essences wildly, keeping a circle of monsters at bay.

"Back off, you... you... moldbrains!"

But behind her loomed something far worse than the infected corpses:

A massive plant structure jutted from the ground, shaped like an open flower bud, its slimy, pulsing tendrils spiraling upward, covered in violet thorns that made a sickening squelch with each movement.

A pair of thrashing legs jutted from the maw-like blossom.

Tairaku’s eyes went wide.

"Meiruna!"

But before they could act, dozens more corpses erupted from the mycelium-coated earth, as if their bodies had been feeding the plant for years.

Lucius’ sword struck through the air, striking down the advancing swarm with swift, resolute blows.

One creature lunged with its fleshy maw agape, but Lucius’ blade split its skull like rotten timber and with a side-kick, he downed another.

Tairaku swept the spores away with a Ventha spell, giving Lucius a moment to breathe, then launched firebolts to burn the clouds and some of the monsters with it.

But it wasn’t enough.

For every one they cut down, two more emerged from the ground.

Their breathing grew heavier, sweat ran down their faces.

Meanwhile, Meiruna’s upper body was being slowly pulled deeper into the plant’s blossom, her legs flailing in the air.

The flower was closing, like it was savoring its prey.

Lucius' mind raced.

These drones are just trying to keep us back. If I could just get close enough to that thing...

"I’ll distract them!" Tairaku shouted, as if reading his thoughts.

"You get Meiruna!"

He darted to the side, downed an essence, and summoned a blinding flash of light above his head.

They locked onto him and attacked, drawn by the sudden flash of magic.

Glizzy looked up, startled, as the creatures abandoned her and swarmed Tairaku, who had thrown up a barrier, the undead bodies clashing against it.

"Now, go!" he yelled to Lucius.

Lucius nodded and sprinted forward, sword in one hand, the other reaching for a vial.

The massive plant reared, its meaty blossom snapping open with a bone-rattling screech that filled the air.

Lucius uncorked the essence and poured it over his blade.

"Fulgor gairm torvalen!"

Flames erupted, not ordinary fire, but a cold, luminous green, crackling and hissing with living energy.

A tendril lashed down at him, Lucius ducked, rolled, and came up near the base of the roots.

With an upward arc, he sliced through one of the main roots.

The plant let out a scream and thorned vines shot toward him but Lucius quickly leaped onto the pulsing mass and plunged his flaming blade into the heart of the blossom.

The greenish fire surged, devouring its flesh with a sizzling roar.

With a shriek and a burst of steam, the plant twisted in agony before collapsing into a twitching heap.

The remaining monsters collapsed instantly, just as Tairaku’s barrier faded.

Slimy chunks and sticky sap sprayed in all directions, and Meiruna’s limp body was flung from the plant’s core.

"Lucius, now!" Tairaku shouted.

Lucius didn’t hesitate, dropped his sword and sprinted forward, arms outstretched as if to catch a falling child

She landed, wet and slick, right on top of him, and together they hit the sticky ground with a thud.

“Oof... She’s heavier than she looks,” Lucius muttered.

Tairaku rushed over and dropped to his knees beside them.

“You’d better keep that to yourself once she wakes up…”

She was breathing. 

Her body, bare and glistening with slime, shimmered under the dappled light. 

The viscous fluid clung to her like oil, tracing the lines of her flushed skin as her chest rose and fell in slow, shallow breaths.

"H-Huh...?"

Her eyelids fluttered and slowly, awareness returned, pupils wide with confusion, until realization hit.

"A-ah!"

Her eyes went wide as a chill swept over her skin, and in an instant, her face lit up crimson, the blush racing down her neck.

She yanked her arms over her chest and curled up, thighs snapping together.

“D-Don’t you pervs dare look!”

A chunk of plant matter hit Lucius square in the face and he immediately stared in the opposite direction, neck twisted, scratching his cheek awkwardly.

Only Glizzy walked over, completely unfazed, inspecting the slime.

"This... this is incredible!"

Her eyes sparkled as she examined Meiruna's slick skin with greedy eyes.

"WHAT?!" Meiruna shrieked.

"Not you, the slime! It’s pure digestive fluid from a hyper-mutated mycoflora! One of these popped up near our tribe once. We can make premium-grade Essences from this!"

"You’ve got to be kidding me."

"Hold still! I need to scrape it off while it’s fresh!"

Before Meiruna could protest, the goblin had already whipped out a sharp-edged tool and began efficiently scraping the goo from her skin.

Meiruna gasped, her whole body trembling with shock and embarrassment.

"W-What?! N-No, wait- Aaah!"

She flinched as Glizzy slid the tool across her belly and breasts, gliding over her sensitive skin, scraping thick strands of slime.

"N- Not there... w-wait, not my- Hmph! Th- That tickles! A- ah!"

Lucius and Tairaku, still dutifully facing away, couldn’t block out a single moan, whimper, or squelch of slime and Lucius’ face burned nearly as red as Meiruna’s.

Glizzy finally lifted two full vials triumphantly.

"Woohoo! We could sell this for a TON of gold, just so you know!"

Meiruna, trembling, naked, and now treated like a collection target, slipped into Tairaku’s cloak and shivered.

"I swear, we are NEVER splitting up for ingredient gathering again!"

"I promise," her brother said with a smile as they made their way back to camp.

Later that evening, the campfire crackled softly as the group huddled around its warm glow.

Glizzy sat on a tree stump, furiously grinding away with mortar and pestle, gleefully processing the harvested slime.

"Ha! Totally worth the effort. With the rest of this haul, our essence reserves will be overflowing again!"

Tairaku nodded, drying a cloth near the coals.

"We’ll need it. If the rest of the forest is this dangerous, we can’t take any more chances."

Meiruna sat with arms crossed, now finally dressed in a second set of clothes she’d grudgingly dug out from the bottom of her pack.

"How far to the next town, anyway? Caelorth was it’s name wasn’t it?" she muttered.

Tairaku closed his eyes briefly, nodding.

"Two days. Maybe one and a half, if we leave early."

Lucius stared into the fire, its flickering glow dancing across his face.

"And this goddess,.." Meiruna turned to him, her voice calm but tinged with doubt. 

"Are you sure she’s waiting for you there?"

Lucius took his time answering, then shrugged lightly.

"She said she would be there. If she wants the book, she’d better be."

Glizzy perked up, ears twitching.

"What is that dusty old tome anyway? I mean, sure, it’s spooky and mysterious, but what’s in it?"

Lucius looked at the leather-bound tome he always carried, no title, no writing, just the dark seal keeping it shut.

"I don’t know," he admitted quietly.

"She never explained it. And I haven’t been able to open it. It’s sealed. Probably with magic."

A short silence fell over the group.

Only the crackling fire and the soft clink of Glizzy’s vials filled the air.

A cold wind rustled through the underbrush, in the distance, some animal shrieked.

Meiruna closed her eyes, arms still folded.

"Then let’s hope your goddess keeps her word."

Lucius said nothing.

But in his heart, a quiet thought stirred:

I hope so too.

                                                                    Note by the Author:

Rest assured, dear readers, scraping plant goo off Meiruna’s nude body is 100% plot-relevant. Promise! :D