The forest attacked.
Not from one direction. Not from two. From everywhere.
Trees twisted, their trunks bending like reeds in a storm, their branches sharpening into spears that shot toward Damien from every angle. Roots erupted from the earth like grasping hands, coiling through the air with impossible speed. The canopy above him descended, leaves transforming into blades that rained down like a storm of green steel.
Damien moved.
His shadow wings carried him upward, but the forest followed. He weaved between the strikes, his body a blur of motion, his daggers carving through branches and roots that came too close. But for every limb he severed, two more took its place.
The air grew thick with poison.
A mist rose from the moss-covered ground, green and sickly, burning his lungs even through his Shadow Armor. Milkweed burst from the undergrowth, millions of seeds filling the air like snow, blinding him, choking him, covering every inch of his vision.
He could not see. He could not breathe. He could only move.
But the forest was everywhere.
A branch caught his shoulder, sending him spinning. Another slammed into his back. A root wrapped around his ankle, yanking him downward. He cut himself free, but the poison was already in his lungs, his muscles weakening, his movements slowing.
He activated Shadow Slash.
His daggers became a blur, five hundred strikes compressed into a single moment. The shadows carved through the forest, severing trees, cutting roots, shredding the milkweed into nothing. For a moment, he had space.
Then the severed pieces moved.
The branches he had cut continued to attack, independent of their trunks. The roots he had severed grew new tips, new thorns, new weapons. The milkweed he had shredded reformed, the seeds multiplying, spreading.
The forest was not dying. It was adapting.
Damien gritted his teeth. He was fighting an entire forest. Not a creature that controlled trees...the forest itself. Every leaf, every branch, every root was an extension of the same will.
And that will wanted him dead.
'this is not possible for mere adventurers'
The thought surfaced unbidden as he wove between two crashing trunks, shadow flaring to deflect a spray of thorned vines. 'Beyond Floor Seventy, none of this is survivable for a normal expedition. Not even close' He thought of Ouranos, sitting calm and ancient in his chamber beneath the Guild. 'Did he know? Does he know what's actually down here? How could he send anyone.... how could anyone even conceive of sending parties of adventurers against something like this?'
He was a god now. And he was struggling.
He flew higher, trying to escape the canopy. But the trees grew with him, their branches extending endlessly, reaching for him with tireless patience. He cut and cut and cut, but it did not matter. There was no end to it.
"This is impossible," he muttered.
The forest's voice echoed through the leaves, a chorus of a thousand whispers.
"A virus. An infection. You mortals never appreciate the land. You never respect the earth you walk upon. You trample. You take. You destroy."
A massive branch swung toward him. He dodged, but another came from behind. He spun, cutting it in half, but the two halves curled back around, still attacking.
"The forest gives and gives. It offers beauty. Sustenance. Life. And what do you give in return? Fire. Steel. Death."
Damien dove into the earth, his shadows wrapping around him, forming a drill that carved through soil and stone. He descended, deeper and deeper, searching for something...anything...that he could call a heart or a weakness.
There was nothing.
Just roots. Endless roots, connecting to everything, connecting to nothing. They twisted and convoluted, wrapping around each other in impossible patterns, and when he tried to follow them, they led nowhere. They were not a network. They were a labyrinth.
The forest's voice followed him underground.
"Do you think you can escape? The earth is mine. The roots are mine. You are nothing but a foreign body. A parasite. And I will expel you."
Damien erupted from the earth, landing on a high branch. He looked around, his eyes scanning the endless sea of green.
"How do I even fight this?" he whispered.
He considered, for a moment, just leaving. Drilling through the floor, descending to Floor Eighty-Two. He could skip this floor. He did not have to fight. He was the God King of Orario. He had nothing to prove.
But something stopped him.
Pride? No. Not pride.
Rage.
This creature...this forest...had called him a monster. It had called all mortals monsters. It had judged them without understanding, without compassion, without a single moment of consideration.
And Damien was tired of being judged.
He flew upward, ascending through the canopy, past the reaching branches, past the clouds of poison and milkweed. He rose until he reached the ceiling of Floor Eighty-One...the barrier that separated it from Floor Eighty.
And there, he stopped.
He gathered his power.
Not his shadows. Something deeper. Something he had felt only once before, when he had ascended. The Arcanum. The divine essence that flowed through all things. He had never tried to manipulate it before. He had never even considered it.
But now, he reached for it.
It was like grabbing a river. Like trying to hold a storm in his hands. It fought him, resisted him, tried to slip through his fingers. But he was persistent. He was stubborn. And he had godly power of his own.
He changed it.
He twisted the Arcanum, bending it to his will. He shaped it, transformed it, forced it to become something new. Something he could use.
Something destructive.
"You want to see a monster?" he said, his voice calm and cold.
He raised his hand.
"Let there be fire."
A single spark appeared in his palm. Tiny. Insignificant.
Then it exploded.
Dark purple flames erupted from his hand, spreading outward like a wave, then a flood, then a tsunami. The fire was not natural. It was not even magical. It was something else...shadow and flame intertwined, destruction and darkness merged into a single, terrible force.
The flames descended.
They hit the canopy first, incinerating leaves, branches, trunks. The trees screamed—not metaphorically, but truly screamed, a sound of pure agony that echoed through the floor. The fire spread, consuming everything it touched, devouring the forest with insatiable hunger.
Damien watched.
He watched as the forest burned. He watched as the grass, the flowers, the moss, the earth itself turned black and dead. He watched as the creatures within...the insects, the birds, the small beasts...were consumed, their cries cut short by the flames.
He watched as Floor Eighty-One died....a floor the size of a continent...Burned...
The forest's voice rose in a chorus of wails, a thousand whispers becoming a single scream.
"You... you cannot..."
The flames consumed the creature at its heart—the face of wood, the eyes of embers, the body of ancient bark. It burned like everything else, turning to ash and smoke.
"This is... this is genocide..."
Damien's voice was flat. "You wanted to see a monster. Here I am."
The last of the forest fell, and silence descended over the ashes.
Damien landed on the charred ground, his feet sinking into the blackened soil. Smoke rose around him, thick and dark, gathering at the ceiling of the floor like a storm cloud.
He looked at what he had done.
Floor Eighty-One was gone. Where there had been endless forest, there was now endless desolation. No trees. No grass. No life. Just ash and char and the faint, lingering smell of burning wood.
He had not just killed a Monster Rex.
He had eradicated it.
"I did not know I could do that," he said quietly.
He looked up at the smoke. It was massive, a cloud of dark vapor that filled the top of the floor. He had no idea where it would go, or what it would become. He did not have time to find out.
He turned and descended to Floor Eighty-Two.
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