Ch 7 : Tree Giant Vs Pskov’s Heroes (Part - 3)

Scene 5 : Nature's Steadiness

Avi struggled the moment the Tree Giant swallowed him whole, twisting against the crushing cage of roots that coiled around his body. The inner vines had their own sinister intent. They exhaled a faint, sweet-smelling mist—a sleeping gas meant to drag him under.

He froze every tendril that touched his skin, shards of frost crackling up the vines like silver veins.
But it wasn’t enough.

The mist thickened, clouding his thoughts.
His Zhivava was being siphoned away with every breath he took.
Bit by bit, strength leaked from his limbs, and the world dimmed around him.

Avi fought to stay awake—
but the giant’s grip tightened, and the icy light behind his eyes began to fade.

The moment Avi slipped beneath consciousness, the world outside—the roar of the Tree Giant, the shouts of his friends, the divine blaze of Simargl—fell away like a distant storm.
What replaced it was silence… a silence so deep it felt carved out of eternity itself.

He found himself seated at the heart of a vast circular platform.

The floor beneath him was smooth white stone, carved with a massive Brahma-Kamala lotus whose petals spiraled outward in sacred geometry. At the center of that lotus was the meditation dais, glowing faintly as if trying to pulse calmness into whoever sat upon it. From the petals extended intricate-based circuits, etched like ancient yantras but wired like futuristic circuitry. They ran across the floor, up the walls, and into the ceiling—an entire ecosystem of geometry and energy that powered the lights, the air, even the gentle hum that vibrated through the chamber like a hidden mantra.

The ceiling above him shifted between worlds:
in its dormant form it bore red hibiscus inscriptions woven into a mandala…
but with a single breath it shimmered into a holographic dome, revealing stars, constellations, and drifting astral maps as if the entire cosmos had been folded into a single room. Celestial diagrams rotated gently overhead, bathing the room in silver-blue light.

The walls, made of polished obsidian-white stone, were engraved with the outlines of mythical beasts—
a four-tusked elephant crackling with lightning,
a saber-toothed tiger traced in icy white,
a ram burning in crimson fire—
and on the door’s wall, a three-headed dragon whose sutra-like lines pulsed with living luminescent veins.
Every creature was carved not as decoration, but as guardians or reminders of some forgotten lore.

And at the core of all of this—

Avi sat bound in living vines.

They wrapped around his limbs, chest, and neck like a cocoon, holding him in a perfect meditative posture. Their green luminescence throbbed with a heartbeat not his own. His expression was not the calm serenity the world knew.
His face twisted with suppressed wrath,
breath ragged,
eyes clenched shut as if battling a storm inside.

The meditation lotus could not quiet him.
Even the circuits flickered under the weight of his rage.

Here, in his own mind, Avi wasn’t the calmest of the trio—
he was a sealed wildfire.
A forgotten wrath locked behind vines that had been wound around him long ago, for reasons buried in another world.

But slowly—painfully—the vines pulsed.
A warmth spread through their coils.
Each breath they coaxed from him softened the storm within.
The rage ebbed, bit by bit, like a tide receding.

Until—

Avi’s tension cracked.
The fire dimmed.
And the calm returned, not as nature, but as discipline rediscovered.

With a final exhale, he opened his eyes.

Serene.
Quiet.
Unshakeable.

Avi—the calmest among them—reborn in the echoing chamber of his own mind.

He rose slowly as the vines loosened their grip and slipped away from his body, falling lifeless against the floor. For a brief moment, he felt weightless—unanchored. His breath steadied, but something felt wrong.

As Avi looked around, a chill crept into his awareness.

He wasn’t there.

Before him, seated upon the circular platform, was himself—a perfect projection. The same posture. The same bindings. The same coiled fury barely restrained beneath the skin. This place was not a room in the physical sense—it was an echo. A memory preserved, looping quietly in the depths of his mind.

A reflection of who he once was.

He studied his past self, the wrath radiating from that image like heat from smoldering embers. His fists clenched instinctively. He remembered that feeling—the burning impatience, the urge to break free, to lash out at the world that refused to make sense.

Yet the vines wrapped around that projection told a different story.

They did not crush the anger. They guided it. Slow. Persistent. Gentle in a way only nature could afford to be. The wrath still existed—undeniable—but it was held, soothed, taught to breathe.

Avi felt it then.

Warmth.

Not the heat of fire or battle, but something older. Softer. A warmth he hadn’t realized he had been searching for ever since he awoke in this unfamiliar world. His chest tightened, and with it came a dull, aching absence.

I’m missing someone.

The realization struck him harder than any blow. Whoever these vines belonged to—whoever had shaped this memory—was not just powerful.

They were important.

The door creaked open.

A presence entered, and instinctively, Avi turned.

The figure was indistinct—blurred, as though painted with fading strokes. No face. No features. Only a silhouette washed in a deep, living green, like leaves seen through sunlight. A faint floral scent drifted through the room, tugging at something buried deep within him. He couldn’t name the flower… but he knew it.

From my world.

The certainty settled quietly in his heart. This place—this memory—belonged to his past.

The green figure moved with gentle familiarity, unaware of Avi’s presence. He had expected that. He was only an observer here, a ghost watching his own history unfold.

She sat beside his projected self and lifted her hand.

Her palm rested against his cheek.

The touch was tender—soothing in a way words could never capture. Even without seeing her face, Avi felt her gaze upon him. Longing. Love. Hope. All of it pressed into that single, fragile moment.

His chest burned.

He wanted to scream. To reach out. To see her face—just once.

But fate was cruelly unmoved.

He felt tears that were not his own fall, turning into crystalline snowflakes before they touched the floor. Nature itself seemed to mourn alongside her, silent witness to a bond stretched across time and worlds.

She spoke.

But her words reached him only as fractured murmurs, distorted and incomplete—like a lullaby heard through water.

The green silhouette stood at last, wiping away her tears. She lingered, casting one final look toward his past self before turning away and leaving the room.

Avi stood frozen.

The memory shifted.

The room remained unchanged, but the door opened once more.

This time, the presence was different.

The silhouette that entered carried a deep violet hue, steadier and heavier with years. Her movements held quiet authority—measured, assured. An older woman. A different warmth.

She approached his past self and ruffled his hair.

The gesture was simple.

And it shattered him.

In that instant, Avi felt small again. Safe. Held. The kind of closeness that made the world feel survivable. She brought food—though he couldn’t see it, couldn’t taste it, couldn’t touch it. Yet he felt the care behind the act, the unspoken insistence that he must eat, must live, must endure.

His breath trembled.

Mother.

The word formed without hesitation.

When he had awakened in this world, his memories had been fractured—faces lost, voices gone, only fragments of his homeworld clinging to him like fading dreams. He had carried the question of his parents silently, locking it deep within himself. He had learned to be calm. To be dependable. To bear others’ pain without letting his own show.

But now—

Now he knew.

Relief washed over him, deep and overwhelming. Even the calmest heart carried fear. Even he had wondered if he had been forgotten.

Garjhimagni was his adopted father. Of that, he was certain. But somewhere, beyond worlds and time, his parents lived,… his mother lived.

Tears fell freely.

He wanted to see her face. To taste her cooking. To tell her how lonely he had been when he first arrived here. To tell her he had found friends. That he was no longer alone.

He ran toward her.

The room distorted.

Distance stretched impossibly between them. Her silhouette blurred further, retreating as he reached out. She tried to speak, but her words dissolved into meaningless noise.

“Mom—!”
His voice cracked as he ran. “Wait… please don’t go. I have so many things to tell you.”

At last, one sentence cut through the distortion.

Clear. Steady. Unyielding.

“Dhairyaṁ sarvatra sādhanam.”
Be steady as ice, my son—because steadiness is the means to all things.

The words echoed.

The room collapsed into darkness.

And Avi slipped into unconsciousness, holding onto the last thing she had given him—

—not anger,
—not power,
—but steadiness.

Scene 6 : Ember's Ash in a Windy day

Perched atop the remains of a shattered building, Bezlik watched the battlefield below with the stillness of a shadow that did not belong. Broken stone and twisted iron lay scattered beneath his boots, yet none of it seemed to acknowledge his presence. From this height, he observed not as a participant—but as a silent witness, a spy whose role was to see, not to fight.

His gaze lingered on the Tree Giant.

Even he would not dare confront such a monstrosity alone. Bezlik knew his limits well. He was no warrior, no champion of brute force—his strength lay in secrets, in patience, in survival. And yet, as his eyes followed the movements of the young fighters below, a question surfaced unbidden in his mind.

How do they stand against it?

These were not seasoned generals or ancient guardians. They were young—still rough around the edges, still learning the weight of the world. And yet, there they were, throwing themselves against a titan that dwarfed the city itself. Their struggle, their refusal to yield, stirred something deep within Bezlik—something unfamiliar, something he had long buried beneath pragmatism and fear.

Interest flickered behind his unseen eyes.

Below, the battlefield had reached a fevered pitch.

Every piece on the board was in motion now, each player forced to adapt with every heartbeat. At the center of it all, commanding the sky itself, was Yudhir. He moved with relentless precision, his presence dominating the airspace above the ruined streets. Each incoming attack hurled by the Tree Giant—chunks of stone, snapping roots, twisted debris—was intercepted, shattered, or redirected before it could reach the others. The sky bent to his will, and for a fleeting moment, it seemed as though the heavens themselves had chosen a side.

Simargl stood as the anchor.

His divine presence burned steadily, not in reckless fury, but in measured resolve. Waves of enhanced Zhivava rolled outward from him, threading through his companions, reinforcing their bodies and sharpening their focus. It was not a show of dominance, but of guidance—power lent, not imposed.

At Yudhir’s direction, Varun and Andry moved as one.

Ash and water intertwined mid-air, no longer separate forces but a single, adaptive flow. Where the Tree Giant’s roots surged forward like a living tide, their combined attack seeped into the advancing mass—water carrying ash deep into the corrupted veins, corroding them from within. The roots shuddered, slowed, and collapsed inward, their advance momentarily halted.

On the flanks, Rusalka moved with lethal grace.

She cut through the mutated offshoots and warped minions spawned by the Giant, her strikes precise and merciless. Each enemy that strayed too close was dismantled before it could threaten the formation. She did not overextend. She did not hesitate. She simply removed threats.

For a brief, dangerous moment—

It felt as though victory was within reach.

The Tree Giant staggered. Its advance faltered. The pressure eased, just enough for hope to creep in.

Bezlik noticed it instantly.

So did the Giant.

Its massive form stilled.

No roar.
No blind retaliation.

Something changed.

The battlefield held its breath as the Tree Giant began to move again—not in rage, but with an eerie, deliberate intent that sent a chill through even the most hardened observers.

And Bezlik, watching from above, felt it too.

The tide was about to turn.

The Tree Giant went unnervingly still.

For a heartbeat, the battlefield fell into a fragile silence—one that felt wrong, as though the world itself had paused in fear. Then its eyes ignited, glowing with an ominous, corrupted light, and a howl tore from its hollow chest. It was not a cry of pain, but of unrestrained madness—a sound that clawed at the nerves of everyone who heard it.

The giant slammed both hands into the ground.

The impact shattered what little stability the city had left.

A titanic shockwave erupted outward in a perfect, merciless circle, ripping debris from the ruins of Pskov—broken walls, shattered towers, torn rooftops—all of it lifted and hurled through the air as though the city itself were being flung away from the monster at its center.

“My heroes—fall back! Now!”
Simargl’s roar cut through the chaos, sharp with urgency.

Varun, Andry, and Rusalka reacted instantly. Years of instinct and trust pulled them toward Simargl without hesitation. They took shelter behind the Guardian as he stepped forward, white flames erupting from his form in violent waves. His divine fire met the oncoming shockwave head-on, incinerating debris mid-air, turning stone and timber into ash before it could crush them.

Even so, the force was overwhelming.

High above, Yudhir was ripped from the sky, his control over the winds shattered as the blast hurled him backward like a leaf in a storm. He fought to stabilize himself, teeth clenched, struggling to reclaim the airspace that had been his domain moments ago.

But the shockwave carried more than rubble.

Hidden within the swirling debris—masked by destruction itself—were the Tree Giant’s vines.

They slithered forward silently, riding the chaos like predators beneath crashing waves.

The first to be seized was Simargl.

Thick, corrupted roots coiled around the Guardian’s blazing form, tightening with brutal intent. His flames flared brighter as he resisted, but even divine fire faltered when smothered by sheer mass and regeneration.

Before Varun or Rusalka could react, the vines surged again.

They wrapped around them both—snaring limbs, crushing movement, draining Zhivava with ruthless efficiency. Varun gritted his teeth as his energy was siphoned away, water slipping uselessly from his grasp. Rusalka struggled fiercely, her strength unwavering, but the roots only tightened further, feeding on her resistance.

Andry saw it happen.

There was no time to think—only to act.

Varun twisted against the vines, pain flaring through his body, and in a moment of pure instinct, he lashed out with what little strength he had left. His foot struck Andry squarely, sending him flying upward, away from the encroaching roots.

“Go—!” the intent was clear, even without words.

Andry was airborne—

—and caught mid-fall by Yudhir, who seized him with one arm while fighting to stay aloft with the other.

Below them, the Tree Giant swelled.

With each captured warrior, its presence grew heavier, darker. The air thickened as its vines exploded outward, branching rapidly, rising and spreading like a living forest. Roots tore through the ground and climbed into the sky, reaching for Yudhir and Andry, threatening to drag them down as well.

The battlefield tipped decisively.

Hope dimmed beneath a veil of encroaching darkness.

And then—

A figure stepped forward.

From the edge of the newly formed forest, through drifting ash and broken light, a lone boy emerged. Small against the towering wall of corrupted roots. Unarmed. Unshaken.

Ruslan.

He stood there, facing the impossible, his silhouette steady against the monstrous sprawl before him.

Simargl turned his head, pain etched into his blazing eyes—

—and smiled.

“The young warrior of the lion…” his voice trembled, not with weakness, but with pride,
“…has finally arrived.”

The battlefield held its breath once more.

Not in fear this time.

In anticipation.

Yudhir and Andry descended near Ruslan the moment he spotted them cutting through the air. Their landing cracked the scorched stone beneath their feet, but Andry barely noticed. The instant his boots touched the ground, he pulled Ruslan into a tight embrace.

The ash around Andry trembled.

He held on longer than he meant to.

For years, he had hidden behind jokes and mockery, pretending strength was loud and emotion was weakness. But now—here, with the city burning and their brother trapped inside a monster—there was no room left to pretend.

His shoulders shook.

Andry (voice breaking, low):
“Ruslan… I’m sorry I left you alone.”

Ruslan stiffened for a heartbeat—then smiled, the kind of smile that held tears back instead of letting them fall.

Ruslan:
“I know you had your reasons. Besides… you’re always the one telling me to stop crying. Guess it’s my turn now.”

Andry laughed, breathless and uneven, pressing his forehead briefly against his brother’s.

“I have so much to tell you,” he said. “Novgorod. The battles. And—”

Ruslan’s eyes widened.
“Wait. We have an uncle?”

Andry snorted, finally pulling back, then glanced toward the towering Tree Giant, its corrupted form writhing against the skyline.

“I’ll tell you everything after we bring our eldest brother home.”

Ruslan nodded, no hesitation in him at all.

“Yes,” he said quietly. “Let’s bring him back.”

For a moment, the battlefield seemed to fall away. Ruslan realized he had never seen this side of Andry—raw, unguarded, human. And without thinking, he stepped closer, steadying his brother instead of being steadied.

The roles had reversed.

Yudhir watched the exchange with a faint smile—then his expression hardened as his tactical mind snapped back into motion.

“We don’t have long,” he said. “But I think I understand something now.”

Both brothers turned to him.

“You two,” Yudhir continued, eyes sharp, “have resonated with your Guardians. Not borrowed power—aligned power.”

Ruslan blinked. “Simargl?”

Yudhir nodded. “And Alkonost for Andry.”

Andry’s ash stirred faintly around his feet. “Then… we have a chance?”

“Yes,” Yudhir said. “If we strike together.”

He looked between them, wind beginning to coil around his arms.

“Ruslan’s ember isn’t meant to burn cities. It’s meant to ignite resolve. And Andry’s ash isn’t decay—it’s control. If I bind them with wind…”

Ruslan raised his blade. White flames bloomed along its edge—clean, steady, lion-bright.

“My embers respond now,” he said. “Not just to emotion. To will.”

Andry ruffled Ruslan’s hair, pride unmistakable.

Yudhir exhaled slowly.

“Then we end this.”

The wind screamed as Yudhir lifted his arm.

A spiral of pressure tore through the artificial forest surrounding the Tree Giant—not wild, not chaotic, but perfectly measured. Trees and roots were ripped from the ground and dragged into the vortex.

Andry stepped forward.

His ash Zhivava dissolved into the storm, threading itself through the cyclone, eating away at the corrupted vines from within—rotting their regeneration, suffocating their stolen life.

Then Ruslan struck.

White flame surged from his blade and poured into the spinning maelstrom, igniting it—not into fire, but into a blazing storm of living embers, roaring like a lion’s breath.

Yudhir’s voice cut through the chaos.

“Trinity Ascension — Ashen Ember Tempest.”

The combined Zhivava of two Guardians and the Dragon King’s wind erased the forest in moments.

Mutated plant-hybrid minions were shredded before they could even scream. The storm tore a path straight through the battlefield and slammed into the Tree Giant’s core with titanic force.

The giant reeled.

Its vines snapped.

Simargl, Varun, and Rusalka were ripped free as the bindings disintegrated mid-air.

A deep crack split across the giant’s chest—ice spreading outward from where Avi was sealed inside.

The heroes regrouped near Simargl just as the giant retaliated.

From its shattered body, it forged a replica of Simargl—a twisted mockery pulsing with stolen Zhivava, radiating corrupted flame, wind, ash, and ember alike.

Simargl staggered.

His form flickered.

He had already burned through the last of his strength saving them.

Now, he could only watch.

Hope rested entirely on the young warriors before him.

But Yudhir’s expression darkened.

“This is worse,” he muttered. “Exactly what I feared.”

Ruslan and Andry still stood—but their reserves were thinning fast.
Varun and Rusalka were barely upright, their Zhivava still being siphoned.
The longer the battle dragged on, the more the giant grew.

They needed an end.

Not a victory.

A breakthrough.

As the team braced themselves for the worst, something far more subtle—and far more dangerous—was unfolding inside the Tree Giant.

Within the hollowed chest cavity, where corrupted roots and frozen bark formed a living prison, Avi stirred.

Pain was the first thing that greeted him.

Then cold.

Then awareness.

A fracture had formed in the giant’s chest—thin at first, like a hairline crack in ice. Through it, Avi could see flashes of the battlefield beyond. The sky split by wind. White flame tearing through vines. Ash and water grinding corruption into nothing.

His friends were still fighting.

For him.

The realization steadied his breath even as the vines tightened around his body, greedily siphoning his Zhivava to fuel the giant’s rampage. He understood it now—the giant wasn’t merely restraining him. It was using him.

He struggled instinctively, frost crawling along his arms and shoulders, but the bindings held. Every forceful movement only fed the monster more.

Then—

A memory surfaced.

Not sharp. Not loud.

Soft.

His mother’s voice, steady and unwavering, echoing from that dreamlike chamber within his mind.

Be steady as ice.

Avi’s movements slowed.

His breathing evened.

Instead of fighting the vines, he yielded—letting his body go still, just as she had shown him. Not surrender. Control.

Avi (whispering through clenched teeth):
“Okay, Mom… I believe you.”

He closed his eyes.

“I’ll break through.”

The Tree Giant, wounded and desperate, drew harder on every stolen trace of Zhivava—Avi’s, Simargl’s, the others’. It never noticed the change.

Because Avi wasn’t resisting anymore.

He was channeling.

Ice crept outward—not explosively, not violently—but with patient inevitability. It wrapped each vine individually, sealing their inner flow, numbing the corruption from within. The bindings stiffened, brittle and blind.

The giant sensed power rising—but too late, and too unfocused to understand its source.

Through the widening crack in the chest, Avi saw it then.

The false Simargl forming.

A mockery sculpted from stolen divinity, roaring with a twisted echo of something sacred.

That was the moment.

The false Simargl leapt.

And the world shattered.

A beam of pure, concentrated ice erupted outward from the giant’s chest—surgical in its precision, catastrophic in its force. It tore clean through frozen bark and corrupted sinew, carving straight through the false Simargl and erasing half its form in a single, blinding strike.

The Tree Giant howled.

Its chest ruptured completely.

And from the gaping wound emerged Avi—carried on a storm of frost and shards, eyes clear, posture unshaken, his presence cutting through the battlefield like winter itself.

Avi:
“Did you guys miss me?”

For a heartbeat, disbelief froze everyone in place.

Then—

Varun smirked, relief flashing across his face.
“Your break from the party was a bit longer than usual.”

Yudhir laughed openly, voice carrying over the chaos.
“You’re late… Captain.”

Ruslan’s eyes shone.
“Big bro Avi—!”

Andry glanced at Avi, then at Ruslan, lips curling into a knowing grin.
“So this is your Big Bro, huh.”

Rusalka folded her arms, scoffing even as her shoulders eased.
“He really chose the dramatic entrance while we were fighting for our lives.”

Avi didn’t answer. He was already moving.

Midair, he twisted, drawing in a breath so deep it felt like the world paused with him.

Then he roared.

Not in rage.

In resolve.

A dragon’s cry forged from ice and discipline.

A second beam erupted—thicker, denser, impossibly focused. It thundered back through the same wound Avi had created, blasting straight through the Tree Giant’s left arm and shoulder. Bark, vine, and corrupted flesh exploded into frozen debris that rained across the battlefield.

The giant staggered.

Mutilated.

Screaming.

But still standing.

Still alive.

The storm wasn’t over yet.