Their surroundings changed rapidly as the night swallowed their footprints in a shroud of darkness.
"Ahh," Aiden let out a breath as he made a heavy jump, lightly landing on the ground to continue his run.
The forest was unending and the smell of animal waste mixed with a dry and leafy touch wafting through his nostrils.
"Faster, damn it!" Felix's voice cut through the chaos, his urgency pushing Aiden to increase his pace.
Aiden led the way, his senses on high alert, navigating the dense woods with a mix of caution and urgency.
"Shit, avoid those bushes!" Aiden suddenly yelled as he decelerated, quickly steering the group onto an alternate path.
The other participants didn't hesitate to follow him as well.
"Jajajaja," another demon leaped from the bushes they had just avoided, its laughter echoing in the night.
Fortunately, the group was already long gone, if they had sprinted straight ahead they would have encountered the demon.
"How terrifying," Serena thought with hurried breaths, her heart threatening to burst out of her chest.
The group sprinted through the forest until Aiden, with a gesture, slowed down, preparing for an imminent halt.
"We've lost them," he gasped, his words punctuated by urgency and fatigue.
The eerie calm signaled no immediate danger, yet Aiden, mindful of the imperfections in his perception, didn't lower his guard.
The encounter with the demonic tree, which had devoured Evelyn without a trace, exposed a flaw in his perception: stronger demons could elude his senses.
Aiden's perception operated on dual fronts.
When he consciously tapped into his heightened senses, he could discern the presence of every living organism around him.
The other way his perception could be triggered was by impending threats.
His perception would warn him of these threats by a tingling sensation at the nape of his neck.
"We have to find shelter," Mai's voice suddenly sounded out, her tone was urgent.
Aiden looked around, even though they had run quite the distance their surroundings hadn't changed by much.
Around them was an endless expanse of towering trees casting a looming shadow over them.
"We have no choice, we have to climb another tree," Aiden said grimly.
"No no what if it's another demonic tree?" David quickly asked, his eyes darting around, his fear visible.
Turning towards David, Aiden noticed that his face had gone pale, and although he was carried by Kevin and didn't run, his breath seemed heavy.
"I hate to admit it Aiden but your idea is feasible," Felix said before adding.
"We have to take the risk, besides what are the chances that we'll encounter the demonic tree twice?" He asked.
"Evelyn's dead," Serena's voice suddenly sounded out weakly from the side.
Her shoulders were slumped and by the sound of her voice, one could tell that she was saddened by the loss of another teammate.
"No no no," she muttered to herself almost like she couldn't believe what she had just witnessed.
"Calm down Serena," Felix consoled her before adding, "Now's not the time to grieve."
Everyone grieved for the death of a teammate, but the person who felt the most pain was Serena, after all, she had lived with Evelyn for a month.
As the group mourned, Aiden felt a small tingling sensation at the nape of his neck, and with each passing moment, this sensation increased.
Making full use of his perception Aiden tried to find the source of this danger until he caught something from the corner of his eyes.
"Duck!" Aiden abrutly yelled and the group instinctively lowered their bodies.
"Whoosh!"
The sound of the air tearing sounded out as a few long vines shot over their head hitting the trees around them.
Luckily the candidates had managed to evade. Aiden, now now fully alert furrowed his brows as a rotten smell permeated the air.
Tracing the vines to their origins Aiden widened his eyes, he wasn't the only one though.
David who was the weakest of the group shuddered as he stared above him in disbelief. "T-This can't be," he thought in shock.
As the group traced the vines to their bases they found out that it was connected to wide open mouths, the insides blood red.
These things weren't vines, they were tongues, and the beings that possessed these chameleon-like tongues were the trees around them.
Aiden felt his sense of danger flash like crazy as his perception warned him to no end.
Looking around Aiden came to a terrifying conclusion.
"Everything's alive, t-the trees, they're all alive," he yelled in fright, his voice betraying his fear.
With this revelation the group didn't hesitate rolling under the trap above their heads they broke into another race for life.
Rushing through the endless expanse of trees the group was on high alert, this wasn't just normal demons anymore, these were trees.
This forest was basically made of trees, as without trees it couldn't even be called a forest.
"Fuck! Fuck! Aiden why didn't you warn us?" Felix yelled in annoyance, his heart threatening to burst out of his chest as his eyes darted around.
"Hu, hu, hu," Aiden took light breaths, he pushed his perception to the limit completely ignoring Felix.
Aiden led the charge, flanked closely by Felix and Mai. Following behind were Serena, Adrian, and Kevin, while David and Ethan brought up the rear.
"Whoosh!"
A menacing whoosh cut through the air as a tongue shot toward Aiden at terrifying speeds
But Aiden was nimble as his perception had already warned him of the danger beforehand.
Swiftly he moved to the side narrowly avoiding the danger as the tongue shot past him leaving a rotten stench in the air.
Although Aiden dodged he didn't have time to warn the rest of his teammates leaving them to fend for themselves.
Mai and Felix dodged easily as they were much faster than Aiden and if not for his ability to sense danger beforehand they would have run past him already.
At the same time Kevin, Adrain, and Serena just happened to be out of the tongues range leaving David who was too slow to react.
"Bam," a soft thud sounded out as the tongue latched onto David's chest like some sort of glue.
In the next instant, David felt a terrifying force reeling him in and his body shot forward.
"Shhhh," the sounds of leaves crunching sounded out as David's body was pulled across the forest floor quickly overtaking the group.
Because of the speed at which everything played out David was too shocked to react, but as the reality of the situation dawned on him he uttered a heartwrenching scream.
"Fuck I'm gonna die I'm gonna die!" He screamed in agony his arms clenching a fistful of dirt in an attempt to save himself but it was all for naught, the force was just too much.
"David, go long!" A voice suddenly broke through the chaos, it was Mai.
David's brain went on overdrive as he rapidly comprehended the meaning behind Mai's words.
Suddenly he twisted his body forcefully taking off the weapons case on his back.
"Whoosh!"
Somehow he managed to throw the case over to Mai who quickly caught it, and in one smooth motion retrieved her weapon from the case.
With that, her feet hit the ground, "whoosh," throwing the case at Aiden she moved quickly, rapidly catching up to David.
Aiden caught the case as he watched what Mai was about to do.
As soon as she overtook David. Mai, her expression grim, swung her blade at the tree's tongue, "slash," the blade severed it freeing David from the trap.
David who was now free rolled a bit due to the lingering force, but he quickly stabilized himself and got on his feet, if the distance between David and the tree had been shorter the story would have been much different.
"Shirkkkkkk!"
An abysmal shriek sounded out from the tree in the distance, it was so loud that Aiden felt his ears ring.
That shriek signaled the beginning of chaos, and in an instant, "whoosh, whoosh, whoosh."
Different trees shot their tongues at the group hoping to drag one of them into their abyss of a mouth.
At the same time "hehehe," a sinister laugh sounded out echoing throughout the forest.
Turning his head Aiden could see something that made him narrow his eyes.
A being with round eyes and a disfigured mouth, it was skinny and had a humanoid figure immediately triggering alarms in one's mind.
Its skin color was somewhere between ash and white and on its hunched back were two insect wings that didn't look functional.
"Aiden pass me the case," Kevin urged Aiden who swiftly threw his weapon's case toward Kevin.
Before long the candidates had distributed their weapons while simultaneously dodging the tree's attacks.
At that moment Aiden felt his ears twitch, tilting his head he muttered to himself, "Is that what I think it is?"
As Aiden pondered with a hesitant expression something unexpected happened.
The hunched-back demon that had been following them slowly suddenly picked up in speed.
In an instant the demon had appeared beside David, its movements almost instantaneous. Time seemed to crawl as the following set of events took a few seconds to occur.
David, unaware of the danger that lurked behind him struggled to keep up with the group of candidates, his breath heavy and haggard.
Meanwhile, Ethan who glanced behind himself couldn't help but take in a sudden breath, his expression a mixture of fear and shock.
The other candidates noticed the demon as well but they were powerless, the demon had already closed in on David.
Suddenly Ethan seemed to think of something as a resolute look flashed past his eyes.
"Whoosh," he leaped into the air dodging a stary tongue and in one smooth moment removed an arrow from his quiver.
"Swoosh!"
The arrow tore through the air surprising David who didn't know why he was being shot at.
"Pirce!"
Passing David's side the arrow pierced the demon behind him and in the next moment.
"Ahhhhhh!"
A human-like yell sounded out stunning David who grunted in shock.
Glancing behind his face paled and a rush of adrenaline forced him to pick up speed, quickly overtaking Ethan who had slowed down.
Before long David was once again overtaken by Ethan leaving him at the back of the group to fend for himself.
Even Kevin who had helped David in the past couldn't help him this time as he struggled to save his own skin from the onslaught of demonic attacks by the trees around them.
Fortunately, even though the vines that shot out of the demonic trees were fast, if one truly paid attention to their surroundings they would be able to avoid it.
The lethality of the demonic trees lay in their ability to catch their target unaware.
Similar to ordinary trees they were stationary with their mouths being the only thing on them that could move slowly.
Before it could shoot out its tongues the demonic tree had to open its mouth, and if one could catch the demonic tree during this process one would be able to accurately determine the trajectory of its attacks and avoid it beforehand.
The problem was the group was surrounded by demonic trees as the forest was basically made up of them.
Fortunately, even David as weak as he was could keep up.
"Aiden we can't keep running forever man, can't you get us out of here with your voodoo?" Ethan yelled out from beside him.
The rest of the group also paid attention as well, hoping Aiden would have something up his sleeve.
Even though Ethan was conversing with Aiden his eyes constantly darted around as if searching for something.
He wasn't the only one, as the rest of the group did so as well, searching for any tree that showed signs of opening its mouth.
Aiden was the only one who stared straight ahead as his heightened perception allowed him to.
In response to Ethan's question Aiden sighed, "There's a water body not too far from us, but at the same time there's a demon around there too," he yelled.
Hearing this Felix narrowed his blue eyes as he thought of something.
The rest of the group all looked disappointed as well, but Serena had a different reaction, as she quickly looked towards Aiden.
"Aiden can you tell if it's a rushing water source?" Serena asked, a light of hope shining in her eyes.
In response to Serena's question Aiden said hesitantly, "I can't sense the water body, I can only sense the demon."