The heart-shaped Madness kept soaring downwards towards the deceased carcase of the ancient mammoth. The human-shaped plants noticed Arthur approaching them, before lifting their heads and opening their orifices, revealing dozens of razor sharp mandibles within.
These moss-type human shaped plants all shared a single consciousness, despite being somewhat independent from each other. Arthur didn't fully understand why they didn't attack him at the first sight of him, but threw those thoughts to the back of his mind.
He glanced behind him, ignoring the fact that his hearing was starting to come back. A trail of blood leaked out from his ears, nostrils and left eye, as he sprinted over the sections of the mammoth covered by the moss, heading towards the faint beam of light in the distance.
'Right now it doesn't matter what they hell I need to do, if these plants can put more distance between me and that "thing", I'll do whatever it fucking takes!'.
The heart-shaped Madness was still covered in the bone-eating insects. They had entered some of the larger veins and created large wounds for them to enter its catastrophe filled body. It roared in pain and in agony, as Arthur suppressed the pain that came from its cries.
It collided with one of the ribs of the enormous mammoth, with a force great enough to level an entire mountain. Yet the lightning covered bones and the hair of ice and snow still remained firm, and it rolled on over the half-eaten corpse, moving closer and closer towards Arthur but-.
The human-shaped moss ross up, like the tide against a cliffside. Most of the human-shaped existences were instantly destroyed by the shadowy liquid that dripped from this Madness' body, but those that didn't, swarmed the large creature like ants on an elephant.
The rampage of the heart-shaped Madness had halted, causing Arthur to glance behind him slightly his chest rising and falling, with beads of sweat dripping down his face.
Despite the size of the heart-shaped Madness, it had been completed halted by the waves and waves of rising moss. They embraced him, wrapped around him in the same manner that a spider would a fly, covering it with their green-tinted sea.
Arthur felt the hairs on the back of his neck raise significantly, and he turned around, leafsword in hand, swinging it behind him before coming to a full stop, his blade just centimetres away from the targets neck.
Arthur froze, and noticed that one of the human-shaped moss, stood behind him, looking at him with a somewhat blank expression.
It tilted its head slightly, peering at the leafsword in Arthur's hands, before brushing its finger against it.
Arthur heart a collective wince echo from all of the other human-shaped moss', his heart almost skipping a beat, before the strange existence in front of him moved its free hand underneath the slightly cut finger.
Several drops of green coloured liquid, perhaps blood, dripped down towards its open hand. A total of ten drops fell down, before it floated up slightly, condensing into a small green coloured crystal.
It extended its hand, crystal still floating atop, towards Arthur, dropping it in the young man's hand before gesturing for Arthur to leave.
Arthur didn't say anything, clutching onto his leafsword for dear life as he gave the strange moss a nod before sprinting off into the distance. If he turned back right now, a horrid, sinister, looking smile, the same one present on Randolf's face could be seen on the faces of all these human-shaped moss plants.
It seems that the Madness came in all different shapes and sizes....
The thousand year old reincarnate bit his lip before speaking in his mind.
'Can you analyse this thing? What I mean is, is there any recollection of this substance in your database?'.
"Ding! Extrapolation of substance proceeding.... time until completion.... 4 years, 364 days, 23 hours, 59 minutes and 57 seconds remaining....".
Arthur gritted his teeth and glanced behind him, noticing that the human-shaped moss were all just standing there, watching him. Everything within this place had the capacity to kill him. Just because this unknown Race helped him, didn't change the fact that Arthur knew absolutely nothing about them.
He didn't particularly want to take this green coloured crystal, but unless he could find something to protect himself from it, he didn't want to take any-.
'Wait a second.... That's....'.
Arthur slowed down his pace slightly noticing the faint gleam from one of the eyes of this archaic mammoth. There were hundreds, if not thousands of human-shaped moss that had been frozen, trapped forever in a field of green and ice.
Sections of moss, that weren't frozen by ice had slowly started to shrivel up, wriggling slightly as it tried to move itself towards the rest of the main body.
'It cut off an entire section of itself in order to protect the main body.... which means that even this Madness was scared of this ice....'.
If the substance that came out of this eye could freeze this moss to the point where they had to amputate a part of itself in order to ensure survival, then perhaps Arthur could use some of the ice in order to contain this green crystal....
His breath hitched and Arthur took in a deep breath.... before immediately sprinting towards the eyes closest to the exit hole.
He didn't dare to look back, or to stare into the eye of this dead mammoth, but even though he couldn't see them, he could hear the sounds of squeals and screams. The waves of moss started rising, and immediately released the heart-shaped Madness from its prison.
The two existences screamed, the focus of their attention still on Arthur.
The reincarnated demon gazed down at the enormous, house-sized eye, before extending his hand forward slightly, holding the green crystal in between the tips of two of his fingers. Dipping it just slightly enough, to bathe in the vitreous contained within it.
Arthur winced and felt a single drop come into contact with his index finger before pulling out and placing the crystal in his pocket, not even bothering to look at it once it had become frozen. A bone-numbingly cold sensation crept up his arm, and Arthur activated one of the few Fire Attributed Fae within his origin essence sea, setting his right arm ablaze, trying to fight off the cold.
Arthur wasn't thinking about anything other than trying to survive.
For the first time in so long, his heart was beating wildly, and his desire to survive, and his desire to continue existing had burst forth from the very depths of his heart.
Fighting something he didn't fully comprehend, and finding an entirely new existence, new Attribute, even a completely new World astounded him!
The pain that caused his arm to spasm was announced by the Artificial Intelligence, but was completely ignored by Arthur as he stepped up into the light. The warm, gentle touch of the sun, brushed up against his cheeks, as he jumped up, and leapt through the regenerating hole created by Elder Anatol-.
Arthur's eyes widened as he felt a massive amount of spiritual essence collide with his body. A searing hot pain suddenly bloomed from upper left shoulder, as a massive thorn, crafted out of moss and shadows pierced him.
His gaze grew hateful and he turned around slightly, noticing the heart-shaped Madness and the human-shaped moss glaring at him with sinister expressions on their faces.
.... Even though the heart didn't have a face, it was still wriggling its veins and appendages angrily, as it squealed and writhed at its watched Arthur.
The seventeen year old was pushed through the opening on the outside of Randolf's body. Letting out a loud grunt as he collided with the soft dirt outside.
The last thing Arthur remembered before passing out, was the voices of Elder Vova and Dominic as the faint figure of a Umbral Shadow Wolf collided with the Monster he had just come out of....
His hand moved towards his pocket, and moved the frozen green crystal into one of his Storage Fae.
He smiled....
He had won.