Abandonment of the Red Fungus Army—Chosen by the White Spore

Chapter 9–Part 2His body was broken with repeated slashes from the swords of his family until he could no longer move. Bound with honeysuckle he was deprived of food and water for days in the same room Teres was put in. Melsil had lost count as everything around him faded, nothing in his mind except his father’s disappointment. The torturers that had brutalized Teres had been replaced by Juchil and other Duchil family members repeating the same things in his mind over and over again.Teres… He thought. Your smile it...it poisoned me. I hate you...you tempted me to commit evil...to defy my race and my family. I should have never spared you...He looked down in sorrow.What did my father do to deserve such hatred and lack of gratitude I showed him? Melsil asked. To betray our race the way I did…He looked up as the door opened for his father, mother and three siblings to enter. They all looked at him gravely, sorrow apparent in all their faces. Their hands were nowhere near the sword hilts, something very strange as Duchil family members were taught to always be ready.“Do you know how long you’ve been here?” Juchil asked as he neared him.“How…?” Melsil asked as he was too deprived of nutrients to say anymore. “Nine days,” he said. “Nine days.”He knelt down in front of his son to meet his gaze.“Do you realize the amount of pain you’ve made me suffer?” Juchil asked.“Y-y-y-yes,” he replied. Juchil motioned for Golar to come forward. His wife drew her sword to cut the vines binding Melsil. He fell over, too tired to move any further.“Gather your strength,” Juchil said. “You need to get back into the war effort. We have to counter an alliance between ants and the pines. They don’t like each other but they’re united against us. The ants are using the Venom Drench martial art to deprive the land of the red mushrooms we’ve planted and we need to stop them before they can go any further. Are you up for the challenge?”He looked up at his father to look at him with a pleading expression.“I will do anything…” Melsil said. “To redeem myself. F-f-forgive...my foolish...ness.” Juchil gave him an uneasy smile as he ran his fingers across the dome shaped mushroom head that crowned him.“You have returned, my son.”Melsil held his sword forward at Geseer, the red mushroom swordsman pointing his own blade at the Duchil family member as well. Geseer was the captain of the Red Fungus swordsmen and the personal trainer of the Duchil royal family since Kuseen had been born. The captain had trained every of Juchil’s children in swordsmanship from their first year of birth until present day. The mock battles between them were brutal as not only was Melsil only nineteen while Geseer was thirty-five but Melsil was also wearing weight vines. The vines dangled off his arms and legs with large seeds that greatly slowed his movements. And to make matters worse, Melsil had to attack first since he was the challenger.He ran at the captain, sword swung to his side to strike his opponent. Geseer deftly parried Melsil’s attack but almost as he did the Duchil family member slashed at him again. This attack nearly landed on Geseer’s collar bone, not expecting his opponent to be so nimbly able to block the attack. Geseer then attempted to slash again but Melsil sidestepped the attack before landing his sword against the older swordsman’s neck. Geseer gasped, startled at such speed. Then he laughed.“Getting better all the time I see,” he said. “Even better than your father. Took him twice your age to beat his tutor that quickly. You're a natural kid.”Melsil sheathed his sword before bowing. He looked around to find his family standing around him and looking proud. After taking the weight vines off and throwing them to the floor, Melsil walked up to his family to feel a sense of warm gratitude flood over him. Everyone from his parents to his siblings looked so happy for him as he was the only one of his siblings, along with Kuseen, to defeat Geseer.“Way to go, Melsil,” his sister said. “To think I’ve raised such a fine warrior,” Golar said.“I’ve waited for this day for so long,” Juchil said. “You have truly shown remarkable progress. If anyone else had been better than me at such a young age I’d be jealous but you...you’re truly a fine specimen.”He smiled beneath his face covering, his eyes alone showing every emotion he felt. The event with Teres felt like a distant memory. His father had forgiven him for showing such foolish weakness for allowing her to pollute Melsil’s mind. He could now forgive himself for such a sin.And yet he wanted to kill himself. Melsil had the desire to fall on his own sword in battle, to die in a way his family would think was simply another soldier lost in their war. He wanted to end it all and say goodbye to everything he knew. Every single night that Melsil slept he could see Teres’s face, staring up at him with an expression he still couldn’t figure out.Was she pleading for me to save her? He thought. Or was she just happy that she died with a clear conscience? Or was she happy she got through to me? That I refused to kill her and that was her ultimate victory?“Truly a wretched woman she was,” his father said. “To think they tempted my dear boy.”“You can say that again,” he answered. “I only wish I could see her face again when her family was skewered in front of her eyes. Now that I think about...it’s hilarious to me.”Was that what Teres wanted all along? He thought. To prove something to me? That there’s something beyond just fighting for your kind and immediate family? What am I to fight for instead? Nothing? Everyone? Those are the only two possibilities.“It’s time to rejoin the war effort,” Juchil said. “I’ve gathered the strongest swordsmen to take back the land of Ushujin that the pinecone people have. Only question is do you think you’re strong enough to face up front the place the ants are most heavily concentrated?”“If that will be what restores our people’s honor,” Melsil said.It had taken months to reach the land near the pine tree. While the Melsil and the hundreds of other swordsmen he had traveled with did see many red mushrooms, it was becoming more and more apparent the ants had removed the majority. The time had been a wet one, the downpour slowing their movements. Juchil had hoped to surprise the ants and pinecone people with the hundreds of Red Fungus swordsmen but the element of surprise was ruined by the rain they’d experienced. While it might have been a miserable experience for the entirety of the Red Fungus soldiers heading there, if it was sunshine and clear skies Melsil would have still hated it. Every night they would stop to rest, he would look up at the stars and shiver in a fear he had never before known. The entire time Melsil was thinking of why Teres was so satisfied with her death. Sure, she wanted to live and was destroyed by her family’s death but there was something there in her expression. Something that bothered the mushroom swordsman to no end. And he was beginning to figure out why.The path that her parents set her on was one that Teres truly chose for herself. Melsil realized. If she was able to decide her birthplace and birth parents, it would have been the Ghilroy family. And she was lucky enough to be born in it. She died as she lived, for the sake of others and not herself. This revelation made him wish for death more than anything else.She’s the complete opposite of me. He thought. In circumstances, not in personality or in intellect. If I could decide my birthplace and parentage…He couldn’t say the Ghilroys, Melsil feeling he was not able to achieve such a noble level they had attained.It would never be the Duchils. He thought. I would rather be born to the poorest family of the lowest class of any species than them. I hate killing...it took me so much to just kill soldiers in battle...I wanted to spare them but knew it would risk my own survival too much...killing and oppressing this many innocent people...it’s just too much…He would turn away from the stars, afraid of gaining any further revelation from them.But if I run away and leave...Melsil thought. My people would be oppressed...all I’d be doing is easing my conscience at the risk of letting the fungus people be destroyed by foreign invaders.Melsil would then shake his head.But it’s not as though my might alone would be enough to save the fungus people. He thought. As strong as a master swordsman is, he’s no match against thousands. Nuten and his family found that out the hard way. He thought that was invincible in both morality and power. And so he and his family fell by the sword. The result of confusing physical might with righteousness. If I fight, will anything change?As much as Melsil dreaded the coming battle where more widows and widowers would be made, he almost felt it a relief. As any soldier will tell you, charging headlong into an enemy is easier than dealing with the complicated affairs of the heart and mind. The mushroom swordsmen finally met the wall of Red Mountain ant soldiers that had prepared for them. The ants formed a long line to form a barrier past the grassy terrain that was strewn with fallen pine cones. With fungus soldiers’ movements slowed, word spread fast of the approaching fungus army and the ants were quick to mobilize a defense force. Melsil was at Geseen’s right side at the front of the army of fungus swordsmen drew his sword to signal to charge. The rest of the Red Fungus soldiers did so as well and ran at the ants ahead of them, splashing in the rainwater under the dark clouds as they flung themselves forward.They’re soldiers. He thought. Just like me. If they die...no harm done. No innocent civilians killed...no blood on my hands of women and children. I need this.And that was when the pinecone people leaped from the cones surrounding them. From the dark recesses of the brown pines launched forward several people of the pine at once. Melsil was the closest of the soldiers immediately around him to a pinecone to practically smell the resin that they naturally produced, almost pricked by their pine needles growing from their upper bodies. He looked around to find one was extending its tree limb for an arm at him, the green needles around his wrist threatening to poke his eye out. The swordsman rolled onto the ground to avoid the attack, his body splashing into the rainwater and mud as he did. He quickly picked himself up, covered in mud and thoroughly soaked, to find that a mushroom swordsman next to him had been thoroughly skewered by the pine needles extending from his arm. Geseer was nowhere to be seen, most likely lost in the chaos as their formation had been destroyed by the surprise ambush of the pinecone people. Melsil couldn’t understand why so many swordsmen marching forward were destroyed by a simple surprise attack.However, when he steadied himself to his feet he found out why. Strapped to the front of the pine soldier that had stabbed to death a Red Fungus swordsman was a living fungus person. They were a male, yellow drape fungus who was bound to the pine soldier with honeysuckle vine. Melsil was unsure if he was seeing things or not because he wondered how one could restrain a living person to themselves without being burdened that much. That was before he noticed it was a child. The yellow drape was screaming and shouting for their parents, tears of green running down their face. All of the appendages that cloaked a yellow drape had been cut away, leaving nothing but stumps. While the fungus child was obviously in pain and writhing around on top of the pine soldier’s stomach, the warrior turned to face a Red Fungus swordsman that Melsil recognized as Shegel, the swordsman raising his black venom sword in defense. He was a mighty warrior who was one of his father’s favorite assassins, slaughtering the entirety of three noble families all by himself. However, when Shegel noticed the child he lowered his blade. The fungus swordsman was obviously very reluctant to attack with the child strapped to the pine swordsman. Shegel never hesitated to attack anyone before. Melsil thought. He’s slaughtered children without a second thought before. I’ve heard him brag about it to my father. The pine soldier took the opportunity to charge at Shegel, the assassin quickly attempting to counter. While the swordsman was no slouch, he was so reluctant to attack the enemy combatant his defensive parry was too late. Just as Shegel raised his blade the pine needle growing from his opponent’s wrist speared his neck, immediately causing him to collapse. With Shegel dead, the pine soldier quickly turned to Melsil, the swordsman not even bothering to lift his sword.So this is their strategy. He thought. Use children as literal meat shields to prevent them from landing the killing blow. They know our warriors are bloodthirsty enough to cut through women, children and the elderly en masse with a smile on their face, laughing the whole way. Unless it's their own kind...that hasn’t allied with another race. Our soldiers will wipe out anyone in their way they think is a threat to their own species...but what happens when it is their species? It was not until the pine soldier lunged at Melsil he realized he was more focused on the child than his opponent. He wasn’t even conscious of the fact that he was lunging backward to avoid the sharp point of his opponent’s weapon growing from the pinecone man’s body. Everything in Melsil’s mind was racing with possibilities of how he could save the yellow drape child. As he was attempting to figure out ways to preserve the fungus infant’s life, his muscle memory was taking over and he was practically stumbling over himself to weave around the pinecone man’s strikes. If I can cut the vines linking the two I can kill the soldier without risking the infant’s life… He thought. He barely side stepped a stab from the pine needle that would have skewered his neck. But such a cut would require me to not only be very precise but shallow. Melsil worriedly thought. I’d have to hold back every bit of force just to halve the vines...not to mention the child would fall and possibly be trampled by the advancing warrior. Could I catch him…?That thought was immediately cut short by the pinecone man nearly stabbing him in the upper chest. He avoided it just in time to avoid a mortal wound but too late for the attack not to land at all. Melsil screamed in pain as the pine needle cut into the side of his chest, green fluid pouring from the area. He jumped back, clasping the wound to find his already green hand becoming greener and greener as blood poured from it. He glared down in pain before turning up to find the warrior still charging at him. While Melsil could not see the pinecone man’s mouth due to it being covered in a beard of green pine needles, his eyes were full of nothing but bloodlust, the screaming infant splitting his ears.“To kill a Duchil family member is a greater honor in my line of work than anything!” he shouted. “Die along with the rest of your devil race!”It was now or never. Either decide to save the child and somehow live or abandon both goals entirely. Melsil, taught to make accurate slices with less than a second’s worth of time to act, slashed forward at the pine soldier’s upper chest. The honeysuckle vines carrying the child were cleanly split in two but left nothing more than a shallow scar across his bark plated chest. The yellow drape child fell to the ground before the pine soldier was fully aware of his hostage being gone. But that didn’t matter as Melsil took the brunt of a pine needle to the chest. When the green foliage speared his body he felt a world of pain followed by a quick numbness that spread across his upper torso. He breathed a sigh of relief that the wound was not deep enough to almost reach the internal organs most vital for mushroom men to survive, the equivalent of their heart before falling to the ground. The slash of his black venom blade had deterred the enemy combatant from thrusting any deeper into Melsil than he did, expecting a parry to counter the needle spear rather than an attempt to save the child’s life. The pine soldier fell with him to the ground, kneeling over him with his spear still stuck in his body. He glared, attempting to drive the weapon growing from his wrist even further in before Melsil’s instincts kicked in. He slashed upward with the black venom blade to slice the pinecone man in half. One of his halves was flung to either side of the mushroom swordsman as he stood up, the arm of the dead soldier still protruding from his body. Melsil felt dizzy standing up, the pain inflicted too much to continue on. The fungus people were nowhere near as durable as the people of either oak or pine and a single good hit crippled them for days on end. Just as he grabbed hold of the arm of the pine soldier and tore it out of his body, Melsil almost collapsed in pain before finding the strength to carry on. While fungus people were weak, he had been taught to continue moving despite immense pain.He staggered forward to lean over the screaming infant. He scooped up the yellow drape child as he wondered how long it would be before his drapes would grow back. The child continued whining in fear, flailing around in Melsil’s arms as he was threatening to throw himself out of his grasp. As he tightened his grasp on the child, he looked around at the remaining battlefield.Everything was wrong. The Red Fungus swordsmen were clearly reluctant to attack anyone with fungus infants attached to them. Now that he had a clearer view of his opponents, both ants and pinecone people were strapped with fungus children. Many soldiers were safe from the more reluctant of the Red Fungus’s warriors while those who didn’t care as much could be seen slicing through their own kind’s children. This middle ground of concern between the forces where the entirety of the army was unsure to spare or sacrifice the children was clearly hurting the war effort and leaving many more mushroom swordsmen than would normally be slain. And the torn children littering the ground was truly sickening. Their green blood began to mix with the mud and rain of the ground beneath them. The battle was clearly lost for the fungus and their futile effort to turn the tide of the battle was only getting innocents killed. And there wasn’t a thing that Melsil could do about it. Not only was holding a child in his arms that wouldn’t stop screaming and flailing in his arms while also attempting to hold his sword but his strength was half gone. The pine soldier managed to strike a vital place in Melsil’s body and he was now quickly becoming numb and limp from the attack. He looked down at the child in his arms, the constant cries for mother instilling indescribable dread in him. With his sword arm he sheathed his black blade before fully wrapping his arms around the child. “This is madness,” he said. He turned and ran toward the forest of mushrooms that surrounded them, never wishing to see this carnage again.Melsil released the squirming child not long after they entered the mushroom forest. He would have liked to have gotten him to a safer location but there the mushroom swordsman was beyond drained. The yellow drape fungus person immediately began digging into the moisture softened ground and buried himself. It was common for young and immature fungus people to bury themselves often as adult fungus people only had to bury themselves in the ground around once every one or two months. This was due to young fungi not knowing how to properly absorb nutrients through the soil while matured fungus were more adept at gathering nutrients in shorter amounts of time. Honestly, he wasn’t concerned about the child anymore. He had deserted the Red Fungus military in plain view of everyone around him. While Melsil had hidden himself from battles before, he usually was more discreet about it than he was this time. He didn’t hide or try to avoid fighting this time, he merely fled as soon as the battle had begun. If he returned to the Red Fungus forces he would be severely chastised at the very least. Being the son of Juchil, Melsil might get off easy as far as not being executed for this crime but his father would personally punish him.But that assumed he even wanted to come back. Why would he at this point? His family were murderers, their enemies outnumbered them and he’d just watch more than half his fellow comrades choose to murder infants if it meant getting a clean strike in against their enemy. What was the point anymore?Melsil tried to move on, wishing to find safe ground but every step he took forced him to stagger. Melsil knew he had to burrow in the ground to heal his wounds but didn’t want to. For some reason, he just wanted to walk. His feet were restless, as if having a mind of their own and refused to tire despite his lack of energy. He hoped there was no animal near him considering he’d be perfect weakened prey.He thought that maybe the local inhabitants of his fungus species would take him in if he could find them. But by the amount of pine straw surrounding him and the fact looking up could reveal more pine than oak branches, he was still well within the territory of the pine. That Juchil said belonged to the fungus country of Ushujin…That’s so confusing. Melsil thought. Our territory overlaps with the people of the pine and oak so much we were forced to make an alliance with the oak or else risk endless war. Why...why can’t we just share it? Is there not enough land to go around? Are we such animals we can’t just…?His mind began to grow weary as his body did. He repeatedly thought of burrowing in the ground just as the yellow drape child did but would not do so. Melsil wondered why he continued to walk, completely aware he would make himself vulnerable to prey if any happened to spot him. Why…? He thought. Why do I continue to go on? Why not rest? I’d risk dying if I did regain nourishment…And then he realized.And then what? Melsil asked himself. I can’t go back to my family...I don’t even want to...I think I’d rather die…He stopped to himself. Melsil then laughed to himself. He began laughing so hard almost fell over, trying to stand up straight before keeling over from exhaustion. He collapsed on his back, chuckling to himself as he stared up at the canopy of mushrooms beyond. Melsil couldn’t stop, finding the absurdity of his situation maddening.I’d rather die! He thought. I’d rather die! Die before becoming another murderer! Die before killing children! Die before killing prisoners of war! Die! Die! Die! It seems to be the solution everyone else in the mad, mad world has! Why not try it sometime if it’s so popular?!He continued laughing the whole way until he grew tired, his eyes closing as a result.He was awoken by the sensation of being carried. Melsil opened his eyes to find he was lifted in the arms of a blue mushroom woman. Upon seeing her cheerful face she looked down at him, clearly afraid of whom she had picked up. She immediately dropped Melsil upon him waking up, the mushroom swordsman groaning in pain as his back was once again plastered in mud.“A Duchil!” she shouted.“Yes…” he said. “Who did you think I was?”“I only collect wounded fungus when I see them after the fighting is over!” she said. “My sister was helping what infants the pinecone people kidnapped from our tribes to find them homes after they recovered and...and I wanted to help the men...but I didn’t know you were a Duchil.”Melsil almost shed a tear the way she said his last name.“Why…” he said. “Why would that matter?”“Because!” she said, tears staining her eyes. “Your family is responsible for this whole thing!”The blue mushroom woman then began stomping into the ground with a mad fury, almost as if she wanted to do so to him. Her fury didn’t make Melsil flee for his life but only caused him to grow concerned for the woman. She had obviously suffered.“The Red Fungus…!” she said. “They started this whole war with the ants when they couldn’t stand the idea of ending the bloodshed with the massacre at Yellow Spore! So full of bloodlust your people are...they decided to kill the Ghilroys! All of them…! The best family of any nation...dead!”He groaned in mutual sorrow, not pain, as she sobbed into her palms.“I saw their heads…!” she said. “We all did once their decapitated faces were hung from honeysuckle vines! Your family is nothing but a bunch of gutless murderers!” “I agree…” he said. “I was there when Teres, their daughter, was slain by my brother. I refused to lift a finger to kill them...I would have helped them escape if...if I knew it wasn’t impossible.” He expected the woman to give him a compliment for that. He expected the mushroom woman to show some amount of gratitude. However, all she did was kick him in the side. Melsil shouted in pain as she spat in his face. “And you expect me to forgive you for such a pitiful showing you did for them?!” she said. “The blood you and the rest of the Duchils shed is on your own household! From son to son, daughter to daughter, you pass more destruction to the next generation until nothing remains! Your actions are like your swords...the blackest of venom! I don’t care if you never killed a single person in your entire life! You are still a vile demon who needs to die!” She glared at him before gesturing to attack him before stumbling back. “I…” she said. “I’ve seen too much death...I don’t want anymore...I can’t kill...just die…” It was only after she walked away that Melsil decided to burrow into the ground below to collect nutrients. He almost wished he hadn’t been dragged out, the mushroom woman only reopening his wounds. He didn’t even want to heal, just an excuse to isolate from the world. As he was engulfed in wet dirt, cocooned in the soil, Melsil contemplated what she said. She made it sound as though if I did nothing wrong my family’s murders would still be my responsibility. He thought. Does that even make sense? How can I be responsible for them even though I hated what they did? He paused, attempting to go to sleep as he regained nourishment. Is it because she sees us as the same being? Melsil thought. As a monolith...not separate individuals but...merely one organism that poisons this world? Could that be true…? If that’s true then everyone’s responsible for what their ancestors did. The fungus species are responsible for all the red mushrooms planted everywhere. Ant and crawfish civilians alike are guilty for the crimes their soldiers committed by slaying my kinds’ unarmed inhabitants. The oak and pine have waged wars against one another for years and we were caught in the middle of it. It was this last thought that haunted him. When I see a plant that’s poisonous, like the black locust...I regard them all as poisonous. Even if one in a thousand black locust does not produce thorns...it’s kind have been used as weapons to kill the two remaining trees in Wassergras. The fact that that thornless tree did no wrong does not replace the evil the other trees’ poison did to kill us all. In the same way...my family is a poison to this world...even our own kind. Melsil did not know where he was going anymore. He thought he would head closer to the center between the two trees in Wassergras to find a tribe of fungus people he could blend into. Only after his encounter with the blue mushroom woman did Melsil realize his eyes gave him away as the spawn of Duchil, the devils of the Red Fungus. He merely walked further and further into the territory of the pine, no oak leaves in sight. He wondered if a pinecone person might find him and kill, thus avenging the people of the pine’s hatred of the Red Fungus. But to his horror, no one dared near him. Most people of the pine he encountered were civilians, afraid of his Duchil eyes and fled in fear. And as he continued further, only found more chaos. Apparently, the war had gone beyond standing armies battling for territory. Now terrorist attacks had sprung up. The old trick of stabbing black locust thorns into the near the tree by the opposing tree people was alive and well. As Melsil ventured closer to the base of the pine tree the more black locust thorns shoved into the ground became a common sight. The thorns darkened the ground pitch black with their poison in an attempt to poison the pine tree. The pine would absorb the corrupted nutrients and its growth would be slowed and would produce sickly pinecone children. There was little doubt this was the acorn people doing this to the people of the pine rather than the ants or fungi doing so, the acorn and pine using this conflict as an excuse to slow the other’s growth for their own tree’s health.But that was nothing compared to what they did to the pinecone children. Melsil routinely found fresh, green pinecones that had not been opened or browned torn open, sliced by either sword or spear for the children inside to be dragged out. Scattered around these ripped open arboreal wombs were the remains of the fetuses of pinecone children. Melsil was reminded that people of the tree was born in acorns or pinecones dropped from above branches before climbing out, weird compared to how most every other creature was born.The pinecone people inside, still light green from lack of maturity were torn to shreds. However, as immature as they were he could still make out distinct features. He could tell which children were male or female, he could make out their eyes, the limbs and even faces. Melsil looked to find that those who tore the unborn children must have really gone out of their way to tear every limb from the still developing creatures, almost precise and careful about their destruction. It should have revolted him upon seeing it but in honesty, it fascinated Melsil. Not the gore itself, no, but the amount of hatred these murderers must have had for these people that had not even been born before they brought down their rage on them. It was awe-inspiring, the level of anger one could have for not a person but a species to such an extent they would take unnecessary time to tear off the undeveloped infants’ limbs.I’ve heard of this. He thought. The people of the oak will find new pinecones and tear them open to kill the children inside. Weeds out future competition between the two species.And that fascination ended when he saw one particular male pinecone fetus skewered by black locust thorns. Melsil walked over to find that one pinecone child that was almost near developed into a full grown baby stabbed so thoroughly with black thorns they stabbed through its flesh to imaple into the ground. Its body, if he had removed the thorns, was so full of holes Melsil could fit his arm into the cavities. The child’s still developing eye sockets had been run through with the black locust thorns, its chest impaled with a dozen in the same area and its limbs so full of thorns its arms and legs were now segmented into pieces. One would have been enough to end its life but its body was so thoroughly darkened by poison that what could be called its body was almost pitch black, as if shriveled by fire and left out to dry.For a reason beyond any explanation he could give, the mushroom swordsman began taking the thorns from the fetus’s body and throwing them aside. After removing them all, Melsil did his best to pick up the remains of the child, trying to keep it as whole as possible, only for it to crumble in his hands. Limbs, head, chest and all fell to pieces like a broken wood. The child’s body looked more like a collection of charred rocks than a once living being. Melsil began screaming at the top of his lungs. He brought his sword out without thinking, slamming the blade into the wet earth below. He couldn’t seem to stop himself, carving a trench in the ground until the soles of his feet began to shake. This world...He thought. Its evil is like poison. Even when it’s gone, it’s not gone. It just continues. The person who did this...the death of them wouldn’t satisfy the penalty for all they killed. And neither would their family’s family. They all...they’re all so selfish to do something like this...but I’m the same way. I should never have been born. Just another branch in this poisonous tree...either choosing to continue what my ancestors started or ignore it for my own moral superiority. I’m nothing if not a devil...I don’t care if I never slew a single innocent...I’m a devil...just like the son of the person who did this...his child’s death...bloodshed...bloodshed can only be repaid with bloodshed…at least that’s what the world has shown me.After tiring himself out with slashing his sword so much he collapsed again, unable to lift himself up after enough slashes.And I am no unique case. He thought. I wish to die for my ancestors’ sins...I need to experience death...for Teres’s sake...I wish for the western tribe of the fungus people to slay me…A smile spread across his face.Yes. Melsil thought. I can die there...in the territory of the western clans of Ushujin...they can slay me...and they’ll be a hero...for killing me...that’s...that’s wonderful…It was the plains near the heart of Ushujin that caused Melsil to reevaluate his goal of dying by the hand of enemy tribes. He passed by black locust trees, the thin, wiry trunks rising above him as it was decorated with slender leaves. The sharp, black thorns protruding from the bark that ran along the plant. Technically, they were not called trees by the inhabitants of Wassergras as they not only produced no people from their annual blossoms, were shorter than the pine and oak but their thorns disqualified them from such a qualification.The people of Wassergras, no matter the race, refused to give them the official label of tree even though, locally, they were known as such. The thorns and pollen were so poisonous that when they fell from the plants they contaminated everything around them. Their usage as weapons was taken advantage of by the true tree people but still hated, despite their usefulness. Many called for the complete eradication but the black locusts were an invasive species that spread quickly and could not be truly destroyed. It was said that the black locust was the closest living relative to the Black Poison tree, their thorns and venom proof of such. While most regarded the legend of the Black Poison a fable meant for children, its legacy was upheld by the horrid plant. When Melsil gazed up at it, a question rose from his mind.If I die… He thought. Will I not be doing so to escape the responsibility my own kind have wrought against this world? Like the attempt to cut down a black locust...will not one just as readily replace it to plague the world with its venom?He looked down at the black venom sword at his side, also said to be a close relative to the Black Poison.We Red Fungus… He thought. We even use the power of poison to oppress our enemies unjustly. Despicable, my family is.As Melsil traveled through the Ushujin he began realizing what a stupid goal that was. If he died it would make no difference to anyone. It would neither resurrect nor kill anyone. It was as though he gave up on his own goal after thinking just a little bit through it. Melsil traveled for days before deciding it was stupid.What am I going on for then? He thought. Whether I live or die...nothing happens…He went days without eating or drinking, possibly even a month until he realized he was on the outskirts of Ushujin. No longer in the pine or really the oak’s territory he had drifted far, far away from all that. In fact, Melsil was nearing the land of giants before he realized it.The flat, gray stone wall that lay in front of him was the handy work of the Giants. The species said to once be the size of all the inhabitants of Wassergras before eating the Black Poison to grow tall and mighty now lay before him. He stood at the edge of the grass forest, pressing his hand on the wall of stone constructed by the Giants. They were so mysterious and powerful that they were no longer a part of the world of Wassergras, having transcended the plane the species of crawfish, ants, fungi and tree people lived in.Amazing. He thought as he looked at the wall of stone that rose ten times his body length into the air. Everyone is taught to stay away from the Giants’ territory...their constructions form the very borders of Wassergras...Wassergras is a square...hedged in by these slabs they’ve built atop the natural ground. To the north is the Primeval World...but to the east, south and west is theirs...amazing...not even the industrious ants could make something so advanced.Melsil felt the ground rumble, his body being lifted into the air. He looked to see towering above him a beast as tall as a tree to him, the mushroom swordsman nowhere near able to see the height of the creature. It was covered in clothing so he could not make out its skin. Its foot was covered in some sort of white shoe many body lengths his size. Melsil looked on as the Giant passed him by, the earth rumbling beneath him as he watched it move. It looked so graceful and lumbering at the same time, what little he could see of it that was.Incredible… He thought. The species that spread the poison of the Black Venom by plucking its thorns...they cursed us all with evil if the legend is to be believed. Do I believe it?He laughed.One way to find out… Melsil thought as the Giant left his sight, the rumbling beginning to reside. I could go find the White Spore said to be on the very edge of Ushujin and the Horrid Cavern...if legend is to be believed anyone who has never killed an innocent life can touch it. Melsil had a crazy idea.Do I fit that description? He wondered.The Horrid Cavern was too long a way to go without resting. Melsil spent days under the earth before gathering the nutrients needed to press forward. After weeks worth of travel he eventually came across it. Between a circular cave of black material from which flowed a wide river and the edge of the slab the Giants walked on was a bare spot of land where something white grew. Pure white. Snow white. It's unnatural color drew Melsil towards it. From the perfectly circular fungus spread wispy spores that filled the air, the fungus person naturally drew to such a scene. As he neared it he found the mushroom had a stem that was coated in many different studs. As Melsil drew closer they almost looked like sword handles. The wispy white spores that almost looked like dandelions floating through the air provided an aura of mystery and strangely comforting. However, as Melsil drew closer to the large mushroom that, unlike most other mushrooms, was not that much taller than he was, found remains of others near it. The charred bodies of fellow mushroom people were slumped against the mushroom, their burnt to black hands clasping the studs. There were more than a dozen bodies surrounding the fungus, deeply disturbing him. However, what disturbed him even more was that it emanated from the mushroom that spoke directly to Melsil’s heart. He never heard the voice audibly but a warm sensation did fill his body, like the light of a clear sunny day after winter’s cold night. Spring filled his heart even though it was early autumn.As he looked at, the sword at his side began quivering. Melsil looked down to find the black venom sword sheathed at his waist was almost alive as it seemed to want to refuse to get closer. The black venom blade was emanating fear in the presence of the white mushroom, something strange as it never exhibited such a sensation before.The black venom cannot stand in the presence of its enemy organism. He was blown away by the voice, the presence of the one who spoke blowing through him as powerfully as a storm of wind yet as gently as a comforting breeze.Come closer. Melsil did not question the voice. He slowly approached the white mushroom, feeling the delicate and beautiful spores that flowed like snow from it immediately giving the mushroom person a sensation of mixed feelings. The white fungus he could feel was an organism that, while not a plant, provided many plants to thrive and survive in quality that surpassed any natural fertilizer. Melsil knew that the mushrooms his kind naturally produced from spores that cyclically fell from their bodies and spread throughout the environment were good for Wassergras’s flora and fauna but this white fungus was the ultimate in such a quality. How such a thing even existed was beyond him but the closer he got to it the warm Melsil felt. If he looked close enough he could almost make out a white flame burning around the mushroom, but that was impossible. If the mushroom didn’t burn, then what did? He was afraid to even touch such a thing. The flame does not burn. He said. Test it.The mushroom swordsman put his hand in the white flame to find that, just as he did that its warmth did not char but instead felt pleasurable. Do you know who I am? The fabled White Spore. Melsil said. The White Magnolia incarnated into the form of the fungi rather than plant. The holiness of the long forgotten paradise belongs with you.You have answered correctly. He said. All life descended from me. I provide the nourishment for all that live. In direct opposition to the black venom that coats this world in filth.Why have you called me here? Melsil asked. Why allow me to approach?Who was it that called you here? The White Spore said. Your own innate curiosity or was it truly me? He paused for a moment, predicting that his answer could determine the White Spore revealing information precious to him.You. Melsil replied. You called me here. All the way even back when I spared Teres.Correct. The White Spore. For I do not give life without implanting a desire for those that exist to live without being driven to find me. Most do not. Instead they turn from the benevolence and peace I have shown them and choose to destroy my creations. The strong oppress the weak and the weak oppress those even weaker. The few in this world that do not bow to their own vices have turned this lush paradise that was created by me into a cruel, formless world that knows no limit of the sin it commits. Filth. Filth. Filth. It is all I see every day. The Black Poison has so thoroughly contaminated this world that I no longer recognize it. I wish to choose a member of the species I choose to exist in to lead the people whose form I have taken. You mean, one of the mushroom people? Melsil asked. Who? Where can I find such a person? You are that selected one. The White Spore answered. You are to go and destroy the Red Fungus. What? He asked. You will take the weapon forged from the original paradise of this world itself and, with it, slay the poison of this world. The White Spore stated. Begin the destruction of Black Poison, rid it of this Earth and so will initiate the creation of a new world, the likes of which has never been seen. Even the Giants will cower as they realize the error of their ways for desecrating and exploiting this world that was once unblemished. Melsil grew afraid as the white flame around him began to grow and further engulf him. You will atone for the sins of not only the Duchil family but the entirety of wrongs committed by your species. The White Spore said. You shall begin the purging of evil carried down not only by your forefathers but usher in the destruction of the sins of others’ past generations. Through your acknowledgment of the chaos and sorrow wrought by each species you will be rewarded the right of slaying the evil embedded in every form of life. And after using this sword to slay your family, you will take your father’s place as the leader of your race. You mean… Melsil said. I will become the head of the Red Fungus? And with it the ruler of the fungus people. The White Spore said. With the responsibility of using your might for the sake of repairing the countless years of war and blood your family has wrought against the world I created. Melsil shook his head, inciting anger at the White Spore. No. He said. You...you have chosen the wrong man! I am unworthy of such a duty! Choose someone else! Melsil could feel himself begin to lose contact with the ground, as though he had lost weight and was becoming as light as the snow-like spores surrounding him. My family will never listen to me! He uttered. I am the least respected out of all my father’s children! And not only does my own race hate me for being related to them...so does the entirety of this world! The anger of the White Spore had reached its breaking point. Melsil was flung across the bare ground, skidding across the earth. He looked up but found himself to be blinded by the flame arising from around the fungus. It was no longer a soft breeze but an intense feeling that Melsil could not decipher whether it was painful or pleasurable. It was neither, so beyond normal sensation for his experience that it was though the experience went beyond his nerves. His soul itself was standing in the eye of a storm. Before he could apologize to the being, he was lifted off his feet. He felt completely weightless at this moment, only able to look at the snowy spores surrounding him, the fungus emanating an intense white flame as the mushroom swordsman hovered above the mushroom head. The more Melsil looked up to find that, from below, the mushroom stem was growing taller and longer. He saw the mushroom stem expand past the oak tree as the hardwood could be seen out of his peripheral vision before disappearing. He wondered if he would ascend past the clouds themselves, almost hoping it would. As the mushroom grew endlessly to the point he could see the constructions of the Giants larger than even them beneath him become nothing more than specks of dust, Melsil feared he would grow insane from such a sight. However, from beneath the head of the mushroom sprinkled countless spores of white that danced around Melsil. He looked around to find that they formed a circling pattern of snow-like particles that encompassed him. The spores danced around him, seeming to grow limbs and heads of fire that looked like sprites. They danced for what felt like hours, all in very rhythmic and synchronized gestures that only produced more white fire. The sprites sung a hymn into his mind that caused Melsil to sense he was being driven mad if madness could be called wondrous joy. His body began to dance in rhythmic harmony with the sprites' song and gestures, almost against his will but that would imply he would have resisted in the first place. For what felt like the first time in his life, Melsil felt that he had truly understood where Teres gained the power to resist her father’s torturers all those long nights and still continue to hope. Who do you think grew all this? The White Spore asked him, his voice roaring like a wildfire that encompassed all of the wilderness. Who created the Giants before they were mighty and tall? Who grew the plants? Who attached six legs to each ant and gave the crawfish fins to swim with and limbs to crawl on land with? Who taught me the knowledge of the cosmos so that I may know how to construct each creature? Is there a being beyond me that I may learn from him? Then consult him. Tell him to send another in your place. Because I have chosen you and you will do so. A sword hilt grew from the white exterior of the mushroom’s stem. Draw from it. He said. Like the others you saw. But they all died. Melsil said. Only one who has never slain an innocent person before may draw this blade. He said. Those who perished before you came to me seeking a new power to defeat their foes with, wishing to use me as a weapon for their foolish and unrighteous ambitions. They were punished with unquenching fire. Only one not cursed with the iniquity of innocent blood on their hands may draw the sword and live. Now. Melsil reached forward with his right hand, grasping the sword’s hilt. As he reached forward and grasped it, he immediately felt a wreath of fire surround his arm. Before he could even decide it if burned or not the spiral of white flame coursed around every one of his limbs before the blinding light became too much. Melsil was blinded by such a spectacle, the flame reached the sword sheathed at his side and burned it to a crisp. The already black blade was charred beyond recognition. Have nothing to do with weapons formed by the Black Poison. The White Spore commanded. Melsil drew the sword from the stem of the mushroom to find its blade as white as the spores produced from the fungus. He could see his own reflection in it, the man staring back more recognizable than ever. He was shocked at its clarity as he hovered in the air. I grant you the White Spore Sword. He said. Forged from my very own being. Its reflection is so clear it shows the very heart of a person in their innermost being. The flames and sprites disappeared, the mushroom now shrinking back to its normal size as Melsil fell back to Earth. Now go and redeem this world...my chosen.