Navigating through the dimly lit main cavern we came to a similar tunnel to the one I went through. "On the other side of this tunnel." S'ffa said pointing through the tunnel.
"How do you even seen in the darkness?.." I said walking carefully and slowly.
"We have evolved to see in darkness.." S'ffa replied.
"Yup Me and Grace has night vision as well…." Helen replied.
"That's pretty neat…." I replied.
Walking through the dark tunnel the echos of chopping wood reverberated through the tunnel. "Wow how is it possible to grow tree underground?.." Helen said her voice raised with curiosity and confusion.
Nearing the end of the tunnel the silhouette of a dense forest consisting of large thick trunk trees. Along with glow of several Sporeans resembling fireflies of different tones of green. Entering the immense dimly lit cavern, we truly entered a miraculously dense underground forest, the leaves shimmering in the darkness like schools of fish.
"Woah....." Helen utterly frozen taking in the miracle. "How is this possible???..." she asked her voice stuttering in complete disbelief. "Tree's need sunlight to grow..." She said stunned.
"We don't know ourselves... but there's something about this area that allows for them to grow..... Trees don't seem to grow anywhere else..." S'ffa informed her.
The very faint sound of footsteps slowly became more and more apparent as what seemed to be lights emerging from inside the forest walking towards us. Like builders holding beams of wood there emerged several Sporean carrying a relatively long wooden beam.
"Excuse me... have you seen a girl called Daisy?.." I asked them as they walked past us. One nodded and pointed into the dense forest quickly.
"Looks like we found her." Jay said.
Walking towards the sound of chopping, Helen was still absolutely stunned by miracle of tree's growing without sunlight. Touching each and every tree she walked past within reach, a smile growing on her face with each passing tree.
"What are the tree's saying?..." Grace asked noticing her reaction.
"They said they are happy here!" Helen replied Still communicating with every tree.
"Don't you feel it's a little weird?... that everyone kills trees for wood?..." Jay asked her.
"Ohhh.... yeah..... It's very sad.... but that's the cycle of life... even Elves use wood for houses and weapons" She answered him.
"Ohhhh.... that's one way to look at it..." Jay replied turning around. "Psshhh Emilia.... they know you're from Consecratus" Jay whispered.
"Is it that bad that they know?.." I whispered back still completely unsure what the big fuss is about.
"Of course..... Every know sorcerer from your plane has been at the very least a S Ranked and above.... you know how highly sought after your kind are?.." Jay said.
"I'm sure its fine... they seem like honest people.... I'll tell everyone once we all get back." I smiled to him.
"Up to you..." He replied with a look of disagreement is face his head turning from left to right.
The sound of a feminine grunt could now be heard before each axe chop, "Daisy?..." I shouted out to her.
"Emilia?..!" her familiar voice shouted back and axe chops and grunts now stopped.
"Where are you?..." I asked trying to see her through the dense forest.
"Hold on!..." She shouted back, within a few seconds an intense burst if light radiated out and a feeling of warmth love and comfort filling my body. "You must be able to see me now!" Daisy yelled out to me.
"Yeah we got you!" Jay shouted back shielding his eyes, the light started to fade away and weirdly enough the feelings as well.
"What was that?...." I asked Jay as we made our way to Daisy.
"Not quite sure... I'm still new to Holy and Divine magic...." He replied to me.
"You did get a strange sensation as well?.. " I asked.
"Yup.... I did..." He answered.
"Hey guys!" An extremely sweaty Daisy greeted us her vest absolute soaked, wielding a very large heavy looking axe, with a couple Sporeans behind her.
"Hey!!..." we all greeted her.
"What brings you guys here?.." She asked resuming her task swinging the large heavy axe with both hands with surprising accuracy, each strike cutting into the trunk with deadly precision send chunks of wood and splinters chipping off with each heavy impact.
A Sporean tugged on her skirt causing her to stop as three more Sporean came with wedges placing them into the notch she cut and stood back. "It's gonna get loud guys..." Daisy warned us and with one fell swoop slammed the wedges deep into the trunk. Slowly the tree leaned away from us slightly, followed with a cascade of popping and snapping bark as it accelerated to the ground with a ground shaking crash. "Wooooo" Daisy screams in excitement wiping the seat from her forehead as she began walking to the fallen tree.
Some more Sporeans arrived with wedges and small axes quickly climbing up the fallen tree getting to work in pairs cutting a small notch and placing the wedges inside jumping on top of it to wedge them in.
"I'll make this the last tree..... Okay guys?.." Daisy said to us.
"Ummm how many have you done so far?.." Jay asked.
"Umm I think this is the sixth?..." Daisy replied looking at a Sporean next to her.
"Aren't you tired?..." Grace asked her.
"Ahhh a little…. but its good training!" She said with a giant smile.
"I feel so weak right now...." I said to Jay.
"It's okay.... I do as well...." Jay replied.
"Anything we can help with?" I yelled to her.
"Sure... if you guys want... we just need to hit the wedges in, to split the trunk..." Daisy replied.
"Ummmm..... I'll give it a go!" I said to Daisy.
"Sure come on over." She said waving me to come, the trunk was a lot bigger than I expected the width being the height of my shoulder. "Take my hand." She said crouching down holding her hand out to help me. Quickly walking back to Jay and passing S'ffa to him and returned to Daisy to try and climb the trunk.
"Be careful." S'ffa yelled out to me as I passed her to Jay.
"Thanks." I said taking her hand and climbing up.
"Okay take this axe." she said holding it out to me.
"Sure." I said grabbing the axe, the moment she released it the axe fell on the trunk with a thud. It was a lot heavier than I expected. "Jesus.. how heavy is this?.." I asked surprised at the weight.
"Yeah it's got a little weight to it but it makes it easier... So what you want to do is swing down hitting these wedges into the trunked and work our way down the trunk till the trunk splits." She explained to me pointing at the flat side of the edge indicating where to hit.
Holding the axe up high I was ready to drive it down the wedge, when suddenly an odd feeling made me aim little to the left as I swung the axe with all my might. A loud crack reverberated throughout the cavern as I stuck the wedge deep into the trunk.
"Woah! Emilia you're pretty strong!" Daisy said, as I felt the trunk split a little.
Looking down there was now a large crack along the centre of the trunk running from the edge to more or less the middle of the trunk. "Did?.. I do that?..." I asked unsure if that was all me.
"Yup that was all you!" Daisy said giving me a pat on the back, "I didn't know you was this strong.." she said walking down the crack.
"I didn't either....." I replied to her pleasantly pleased with myself.
Walking down to the next section of the trunk between the other edge and the crack ending. "You should be able to finish it if you can do what you did back there." Daisy said.
Readying to swing the axe down onto the edge the same weird feeling guiding me a little to the side making me strike the wedge perfectly sending it deep into the trunk again. Creating another crack meeting the other at the centre causing the trunk to open a bit more slightly. "Well done!!!" Jay cheered.
"Nice!!!" Grace and Helen screamed in excitement.
"Thanks for helping me Emilia...." Daisy smiled jumping off the trunk.
"I'm sure you or the others had something to do with it..." I said jumping off the trunk landing next to her.
She didn't reply to my comment just a small smile and wink before heading back to the others. "Sorry for the hold up!" she apologized to the others.
"Nothing to be sorry about." They replied with a smile.
"Is that all we need to do?.." I asked looking back at the sundered trunk, seeing a number of Sporeans climbing into the crack.
"Yeah they will handle cutting it into small parts and cutting them into beams and planks." Daisy answered with a smile.
S'ffa stood up on Jays shoulders hands held out like a toddler wanting to be passed over, I went to take her putting her on my shoulder. "You was so awesome!" she said taking a seat on my shoulder.
"Thanks S'ffa...." I replied.
"I didn't know you was so strong!" she said with a smile.
"I know I didn't know either." I replied to her.
"Shall we start heading back?.." Helen asked us.
"Sure... I'm finished now." Daisy replied and turned back to the tree trunk, "I'm gonna head back to school now thanks for letting me help." She shouted to the Sporeans.
Several Sporeans I guess around twenty popped their head out from within the tree trunk with smiles and waving goodbye.