The Autobots walked slowly through the forest, paying full attention, but still taking in the beauty of the cybernetic fauna of the place.
"It is unbelievable that such a place exists on this planet." Arcee commented in awe of the place.
[[Ratchet, is there any other place on this planet that has similar energy readings to this place?]] Optimus asked, concentrating on finding the Decepticons.
[[No abnormal signals like this one from this forest, Optimus.]] Ratchet replied as he ran an energy scan of the Autobot base's systems, looking for more power around Earth.
"I think we could bring the Energon Harvester here and harvest large amounts of Energon." Bulkhead suggested, supported by Bumblebee's beeps. "This is a gold mine, we must take advantage of this opportunity."
"We don't know anything about this place, it would be reckless to do something like that, especially with the risk of causing an incident with the fauna of this place." Optimus said, feeling his instincts screaming at him not to dare do anything against the forest.
Bulkhead was a little unhappy with Optimus' answer, as it hadn't been long since one of his teammates had died while searching for the "scarce" Energon for the team. He looked at one of the trees, noticing that it was rather short compared to the others, and saw one of the Energon berries within reach.
[Hmmmm... A single fruit shouldn't be a problem.] Bulkhead thought, reaching out to touch the fruit.
Optimus, who was checking up on the team, widened his eyes in surprise when he saw Bulkhead touch the fruit and was immediately alarmed. "Bulkhead! Don't do that!"
The moment Bulkhead touched the Energon Fruit, several insects, birds, and forest animals instantly turned red-eyed and stared at the Autobot as if ready to tear him apart until there was nothing left.
By sheer luck, Bulkhead froze in his tracks as he felt himself being watched from all sides, as if he were being tried for some extremely heinous crime.
"Bulkhead, slowly back away from the fruit." Optimus advised, understanding why he had a bad feeling about the forest. "The forest becomes completely hostile when a being not part of the habitat touches its energon."
"Ooops," Bulkhead whispered, stepping away from the fruit as carefully as possible, causing the animals to return to their neutral state.
"Those things are still animals, they see the fruit as their food and will do anything to keep it safe." Arcee added, feeling relief in her Spark that the animals hadn't decided to attack.
Before Bulkhead could catch his breath from the shock he had suffered, he looked up to see the Decepticon Nemesis ship flying above the clouds, heading for where they were. "DECEPTICONS!" Bulkhead warned, turning both of his arms into cannons.
Optimus, Arcee and Bumblebee followed suit, raising their weapons to fight their greatest enemies, but to their surprise, the Decepticon ship passed over them unnoticed, heading for a patch of forest a few miles from their position.
"They ignored us?" Arcee asked confusedly, used to being the target of dozens of Energon cannons trying to tear her apart.
"The forest is probably jamming our radar signal, giving us a significant advantage." Optimus said, looking at the direction the Decepticons were headed. "Autobots, with the Decepticons in this forest, I fear this place will become a full-fledged war zone."
Bumblebee emitted his beep and said that the Decepticons were likely to make the animals quite angry and attack not only them, but any living thing that comes near the forest, including humans.
"We must do everything in our power to prevent that from happening." Optimus said seriously.
***
Megatron took in the view of the great transformed forest, noticing a few animals that flew away at the approach of his ship, dazzled by their clearly robotic appearance.
"According to legend, in order to defeat Unicron, Primus created the 13 original Primes, each of whom possessed great power and abilities. So it would be natural that Primus' blood would have a similar ability, mirroring the Allspark's ability to create Cyberlives." Megatron declared, as Soundwave looked out at the forest by his side. "How magnificent, as if it were a small paradise imitating the grandeur of Cybertron before the war. Soundwave, send our reconnaissance troops, we must get what we came for before the Autobots find out about this place!"
The elevator descended from the center of the Decepticon ship, carrying over 6 armed robots, each carrying cameras for live video transmission to the Nemesis command post. At the same time, more than two dozen Decepticons transformed into aerial fighters and flew to cover a larger area of the forest.
"Soundwave, can you locate the Energon Singular?" Megatron looked at Soundwave and waited for confirmation.
Soundwave noticed that the specific energy he was looking for was slowly disappearing, mixing with the radiation from the forest itself, making it more difficult to pinpoint the exact location of the target, but with his abilities he was still able to determine that the target was moving in the opposite direction of the ship.
Megatron saw the radar on Soundwave's face and wasted no time in issuing new orders. [[The specific target is 3 kilometers north of the Nemesis position, bring it to me immediately.]]
[[Understood, Lord Megatron]] All Decepticons assigned to the mission responded.
Megatron viewed the forest from the perspective of his subordinates through the hologram in front of him, admiring the beauty of the ecosystem and the capabilities of the Energon Singular.
[The ability of this power to not only bring me back into action, but to challenge the very concepts of the universe is magnificent. If I master this power and its secrets, I will be able to use it not only to increase my power, but to create a new generation of Decepticons loyal to me. If Primus' power can do this in a forest, I cannot even imagine the possibilities of another cyberformation in a large city.] Megatron smiled, letting his dark thoughts take over.
The Decepticons marching on the ground were suspicious of the creatures they saw, and many were tempted to attack, but the squad leader ordered them to attack only if one of the creatures started the attack against them, which was incredibly successful, as they made a significant advance without interruption.
"This place gives me the creeps." Said a Decepticon, pointing his gun at a sharp-scaled, blue-eyed snake crawling through the branches of a small 40-foot tree.
"Stay on course, we can't get lost in a place like this?" said the leader of the group, who had a much larger weapon than his companions.
[[Attention ground crew, you are approaching peak radiation.]] warned a Decepticon from the Decepticon Commode Post.
[[Understood.]] The leader replied, signaling his team to keep their approach as quiet as possible. [[Air Team, any sign of the Autobots up there?]]
[[Negative, no Autobots on radar or visual, maintain contact]] Said the leader of the air team, temporarily replacing Starscream.
One of the Decepticons responsible for monitoring the Energon radars tapped away at the computer keyboard with some irritation, trying to calibrate the radar with interference. "This damn forest is interfering with the signal, it's like every tree in this place is alive." The Decepticon whispered.
The ground team, consisting of 6 heavily armed Decepticons, approached a tree that was about 100 meters tall, with considerably dense branches with blade-shaped leaves, it had over 400 Energon Fruits on its branches, highlighting even more of the other trees around it.
[[Lord Megatron, it seems we are at the epicenter of the forest.]] The leader of the group said, not quite sure of his words.
Megatron looked at the tree with clear surprise in his eyes, noting that it was visibly different from the others in many ways, but it might be worth his time to investigate. [[Investigate the place, any suspicious activity take the necessary action.]] Megatron ordered.
The group leader cautiously approached the tree. He examined the area and noticed that not even the animals he had seen before were nearby, for it was a sacred area that should never be touched, which made him suspicious. His audio receptors heard a small, imperceptible sound, very subtle, but because of his attention he realized that he and his companions were not alone in this place.
He looked down, behind the tree, and noticed a human hiding behind the tree, seeing him clearly, recognizing him as the one responsible for causing a big mess on the Decepticon ship.
"Ah shit, here we go again." I said, watching the robot stare at me like I was the last cookie in the box.
Before the Decepticon group leader could grab Lux, a web grabbed his head and suddenly pulled him to the top of the tree as if he weighed no more than 5 tons. His screams were heard by all, until an uncomfortable silence fell for a few seconds, when suddenly his parts fell to the ground, completely destroyed and sliced as if he were a vegetable.
The remaining 5 Decepticons began shooting at the top of the tree, but the metal sheets reflected the shots as they hit them, causing a single shot to ricochet in multiple directions, even hitting their own shooter.
The Decepticons saw something fall from the top of the tree toward them, but one of them, more distracted, ended up becoming Airachnid's own mattress, which cushioned her fall but also caused him to take the full force of the impact, resulting in serious damage to his body and leaving him unable to move due to fractures in his spine and legs.
"Hi guys." Airachnid smiled and raised her spider-like paws, which easily pierced the chests of two Decepticons, ripping out their energy cores as she removed her paws from inside them.
"You damn thing!" Another Decepticon shouted as he began shooting at Airachnid, but she managed to dodge the shots with gymnastic acrobatics, taking advantage of her new flexible autonomy that allowed her to move smoothly.
"Don't be angry, I'm just testing my body's upgrades, so feel honored to die at my hands." Airachnid threw her spider webs at the Decepticons' armed arms, using her strength to throw them both against each other, then finishing her move by throwing them into the tree branches that acted as stakes, piercing their bodies violently.
"Don't you think you overdid it?" I asked, approaching her, avoiding touching the robot carcasses on the ground.
"I'm just experiencing the updates on my body, I don't have a manual to read." Airachnid put her hands on her waist.
She looked to the side and saw the Decepticon she had crushed with her body staring at her, which irritated her, so without warning, she extended one of her sharp paws and decapitated him, causing his eyes to slowly lose color until he finally died in silence.
Megatron, watching the events, remained silent, analyzing the situation, not needing much to understand that Airachnid was a traitor and that she was involved with the human he was seeking, further strengthening his conviction that the human was more than they appeared.
"Very well, there is an extermination I must perform personally." Megatron turned and walked toward the exit of his ship, accompanied by a fleet of Decepticons willing to die in his name.