“Here you are.” The two-horse cart creaked to a halt at the edge of the dirt road. The old coachman, his weathered hands steady on the reins, raised one arm to gesture toward the scene ahead as if revealing a prize to his guest.
The road ended abruptly, swallowed by a forest of gnarled, twisting trees. Their massive, bark-covered trunks coiled and contorted like the limbs of some ancient, restless creature. No leaves adorned their skeletal forms; instead, thin, spindly branches erupted in every direction, weaving a dense wall of organic spears that jutted menacingly toward the road. The sight was both beautiful and forbidding, a natural barrier daring anyone to venture further.
The guest was clad head to toe in an imposing suit of plate armour, its polished steel reflecting sparkling glints of light like a mirrored automaton. Not a single sliver of skin was visible beneath the thick overlapping plates, each one perfectly interlocked with immaculate precision. His cube-like helmet obscured his face entirely, concealing any hint of expression behind its angular, featureless design.
Strapped securely across his broad back was a large, intricately crafted spear, its shaft and blade an iridescent blue that nearly glowed in the daylight. A similarly ornate sword rested at his hip, its pommel adorned with sapphire filigree drawing a beautifully detailed blue rose. Seated next to the guest was an oversized backpack bulging at the seams from its overloaded content.
The guest spoke, his voice reverberating with a metallic echo as it struggled to escape the confines of his helmet. “Is this it?”
“Well,” the coachman replied, his tone carrying both caution and finality, “for obvious reasons, I can’t take you any further. But yes, the flower is said to lie somewhere within this forest.”
The guest rose from his seat, the weight of his armour causing the cart to creak in protest. He stretched, rolling his shoulders with a low groan, his words slightly distorted by the movement. “And this flower should be the one I am looking for?”
The coachman nodded, adjusting his grip on the reins. “Well, if your quest was to find a miraculous flower unbound by the laws of our world, then I don’t know which flower that could describe if not the one of our village’s tales.” He gestured toward the impenetrable wall of gnarled trees. “And before you ask—yes, it should be somewhere in there.”
The guest twisted his armoured torso to one side, a sharp pop echoing from his back. He straightened and turned to the coach, his metallic voice carrying a touch of gratitude. “Thank you for your patronage. I’ll be sure to visit the village once I’m done and let you know what I find.” The guest placed a few silver coins in the coach’s open palm and stepped off the cart.
The moment his armoured boots struck the packed dirt of the road, the ground seemed to awaken. A sudden burst of vibrant flora erupted around him—a ring of fresh grass, delicate wildflowers, and small, colourful mushrooms. The unexpected growth formed a vivid, living circle beneath his feet that contrasted harshly against the otherwise lifeless road.
The coach smiled at the miraculous burst of life. “I’ll hold you up on that friend. I wish you luck on your search.” The coach pocketed his money, took hold of his reins, and set his horses to carry him back home. The guest waved goodbye, watching him leave and contentedly listening to the faint clop of hooves fading out into the distance.
The guest was left alone, standing before the gnarled, twisting wall of wooden appendages. The forest loomed, its dense, impenetrable mass seeming almost alive, watching.
He took a step forward, and with it came a quiet miracle. Around his armoured boot, a vibrant circle of life bloomed—fresh grass, delicate flowers, and tiny mushrooms, each unfurling as though called to existence by his presence. Another step, and the phenomenon repeated, each patch of vegetation forming a gentle bed to cushion his footfall. Step by step, he approached the forbidding barrier, the bloom of life trailing in his wake like a living echo,
Surprisingly, he felt a spark of excitement as he stood before the impenetrable barrier of trees and twisting branches. The sheer impossibility of finding a way through this dense overgrowth only fueled his anticipation. To him, the daunting challenge just added credence to the fact that this would be the flower he was looking for.
A worthy quest needed a worthy trial, after all.
The man paced along the forest line, looking for an opening that he could enter. Eventually, he found it, a small split in the wall of spears where all of those sharp protruding branches inexplicably curved away from one another. The twisted wood spiralled outward, forming a narrow, funnel-like opening, dark and foreboding yet strangely inviting.
An invitation that he felt he had to accept. His mind took almost no part in the decision; an inexplicable call forced his heart forward, calling him inwards, calling him deeper.
The opening of the funnel loomed just above his reach, requiring a touch of acrobatics to hoist himself up. He reached out, his armoured hand gripping the rough edge of the entrance. At his touch, the forest responded—a small swarm of vines and sprouting plants erupted beneath his fingers, coiling around his arms and gently, yet firmly, pulling him upward.
He slipped through the gap, the jagged branches brushing against his armour with a faint scrape. The opening was narrow, forcing him to drop to all fours and crawl, his movements slow and deliberate. The spears of wood pressed close on all sides, but the dense thicket seemed to part just enough to allow him through. Finally, he emerged from the crawl space into the heart of the forest. The air was cool and damp, with the dewy scent of recent rains.
The forest was unlike anything he had ever seen before. There was no life to the forest floor, no bushes or grass, other than the strange plants his own presence had summoned. Beyond them, the towering trees were the sole purveyors of this otherworldly realm.
And what a sight he was seeing; a deep ebb and flow of intermingling life, knotting and unwinding, launching up into the sky and crashing into the dirt below. A snaking string of thick trees formed a vertically shifting floor full of pitfalls and hills. It was as if a tangled ball of string in one’s pocket had been sculpted to the grand scale of an entire forest.
The man quickly realized he could not simply walk through this forest; every step required careful calculation. He had to scale over the thick twists and entanglements of the trees. He had to crouch under gnarled caverns and into the organic tunnels of the crowded underbrush.
His heavy armour did him no favours in this dense labyrinth. Every movement was accompanied by the constant clanging and screeching of tree tips and sharp branches scraping against his plate. The barrage played a ceaseless symphony of friction and noise that grated harshly the echoing bell of his helmet. Similarly, his body was always being tugged and pulled in every which direction as small protrusions and nibs would get caught in his plate-mail.
But the real torment was his spear. That unwieldy weapon seemed determined to make the journey as challenging as physically possible. Its sharp point constantly caught on the surrounding trees, lodging itself in thick bark or threading through small gaps in the branches. No matter how carefully he moved, the frustratingly long weapon was always there, pulling him back or getting tangled in the dense, chaotic growth.
None of this deterred the man, though. In fact, it instead caused the opposite effect. He got more and more excited with every jump and twist he made; each obstacle was a motivator. The harder the journey, the more invigorated he became, pushing forward with a fierce determination.
Behind him, with his every step, his every stabilizing hand, his every bumped elbow, the forest bloomed a memory of his convulated journey. Where once there was only drab brown, the path was now alive with colour. The dense, cave-like undergrowth began to transform into a vibrant tapestry of life. A thick blanket of green unfurled behind him, adorned with the dazzling blooms of thousands of newly budding flowers, each one a splash of bright hues in the otherwise shadowed expanse.
He came across a particularly stark vertical wall along his forest jaunt. No gap in the wall would have been large enough for him to squeeze through. As far as his eyes could discern, his only option was to climb up the wall.
The wall was a sprawling mass of intertwining trees, their trunks and branches forming a complex network of footholds and ledges. With so many footholds, the climb itself wasn’t particularly difficult; the forest seemed to invite him upward, offering its natural scaffolding.If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
This ascent brought him to the highest point he had reached in the forest so far. For a brief moment, he wondered if he could somehow make his way to the canopy and catch a sweeping view of the entire forest. But as he gazed around, he quickly dismissed the thought. The trees were packed so densely, their trunks pressing against one another in a tangled web, that reaching the canopy was a laughable proposition.
Reaching the top of this local peak was a good point for him to catch his breath and take in what he could of the surroundings. In the distance, with a careful squint and just the right angle between the trees, he managed to glimpse the opposite edge of the forest. He wasn’t fully sure whether that was a good thing or not. Would the flower he was searching for be past this bizarre monogenetic forest or within it?
He broke his gaze from the forest’s end and continued searching. Above, at the very top of the forest canopy, something moved—a strange, warbling fabric-like flow, twisting and curling as it was drawn upward toward the tips of the trees.
The forest was absorbing magic from the air!
The realization sent a surge of excitement through him. This excursion kept getting even more promising. Each sign, each discovery, was further confirmation that this was the place he had been searching for—the hidden cradle of the flower. But he wouldn’t find it up here. With a steady resolve, he turned toward the opposite side of the wooden wall, preparing to scale down into the depths of the forest where his true quest awaited.
As he slowly worked his way through the labyrinthian forest, the suffocating nether began to lift. Faint rays of light, eager and persistent, threaded their way through the cracks and gaps in the twisted trees, illuminating the path ahead. It was as though the forest itself was slowly relinquishing its hold on him.
He had made it to the other end.
Following the light, he pressed forward, heart quickening with the promise of escape. After a few more moments, he reached a gap just large enough for him to squeeze through, a welcoming breach in the wall of trees that had held him captive for so long.
The other side of the forest relented to give way to a small mound of lifeless stone that rose sharply, revealing a stunning valley beyond.
The man walked to the edge of the overhang, where he was met with the sight of a gargantuan cliff. From this vantage point, he had an omniscient view of the valley below—an expansive panorama of lush, diverse life. Unlike the monotonous, twisting trees of the forest he had just crossed, the valley was a vibrant mosaic of blossoming trees, rich, full bushes, and a variety of thriving plant life. Animals flitted through the foliage, hunting, playing, living—an active, energetic rhythm pulsing with colour.
It was a little jarring to witness. He hadn’t realized how the endless repetition of the forest’s dark, entangled growth of the same trees had affected him. The vibrancy of the valley, so full of life, almost felt like a shock to his senses, its beauty and vitality a stark contrast to the oppressive stillness of the prior forest he had just traversed.
It was a grandiose sight, one that revealed the full beauty of nature at the bottom of this titanic chasm. And indeed, it was a chasm—a pit so vast that calling it merely a valley seemed an understatement. The cliff from which he stood offered a view so high it felt almost astronomical. This wasn’t just a gentle dip in the landscape; it was a straight, vertical drop, taller than a city was wide.
The cliff was yet another sign that his expedition was far from over. He hadn’t found a single flower—or even a plant—in the suffocating tangle of tentacle-like trees that had surrounded him. Perhaps, though, the elusive flower was somewhere in this far more inviting valley. He just had to make his way down.
The man was prepared for this; he removed his backpack and began rummaging through it, pulling out a sturdy set of broad nails and an excessively long rope. With practiced efficiency, he drove the first nail into the solid stone near the edge of the cliff, securing it tightly. He tied the rope to the nail, then looped the other end around his waist and gave it an extra strong pull to ensure it was secure.
The man leaned one final time over the edge of the cliff, studying the sheer rock face before him. His mind worked through the logistics of how he planned to tackle the wall. As he pondered, he removed his gauntlets and boots, knowing they would only hinder his progress from here on out.
He stepped back from the cliff and carefully placed the gauntlets in his backpack. Then, he pulled out a roll of thin cloth and, with methodical precision, wrapped it around each of his bare feet, layering the fabric multiple times. Once his feet were ready, he returned the remaining cloth to the pack, then took out a small white chalky block. He rubbed it between his hands, crumbling it until it turned into a fine powder and coated his palms.
He turned his head away, then clapped his hands a few times. A cloud of fine dust billowed from the chalk, the powder swirling around him in the air. He rubbed his hands together once more, shaking off any excess powder, until his palms felt dry and ready. Now, he was prepared.
He began his descent feet first, carefully backing himself down the cliff face. The journey started off simply enough. He kept an expedient pace, only slowing down so he could anchor another nail to act as a safety hold for his rope.
But that easy trek didn’t last long. Things quickly took a dangerous turn. The cliff wall curved back on itself, forming an overhang rather than a straight vertical drop. Before he could press his body to the cliffface and alleviate the weight of carrying his own body. But as he descended and his back turned evermore to the void, the entire burden of his mass was pushed to the grip of his overstrained fingers and toes.
He found himself scaling the cliff horizontally, inching his way along with nothing but his grip and willpower tethering him to the stone. The vast, empty sky stretched beneath him, a constant reminder of the perilous drop. His entire survival rested on his ironclad hold.
A creeping sense of dread gnawed at him. Every muscle in his body was taut with the effort, his limbs trembling from the strain. He wasn’t afraid of heights—not exactly—but hanging upside down over an abyss so deep that even a devadoot wouldn’t survive the fall? That felt like a new kind of terror.
But he did not turn back.
His feet blindly probed the rugged surface—was it the wall or the ceiling now?—searching for any grip they could latch onto. His hands, more flexible and free than his feet, moved with greater ease, their extra hold aided by the chalky powder. Each new connection to the stone triggered a small burst of growth as delicate plants spiralled around his limbs, wrapping tightly to the rock and anchoring him with much-needed stability.
He made sure three of his limbs were firmly anchored at all times, shifting only in small, deliberate increments. The weight of his armour was becoming increasingly apparent, tugging at him with a relentless pull as if desperate to send him plummeting into the forest below—unconcerned with what state it would leave him within it. He had considered removing the armour, but past encounters with flying monsters had taught him a painful lesson. No, he would endure the extra weight and the challenge it brought, unwilling to take any chances.
In spite of it all, he continued to make solid progress.
He drove a nail into the cliff face and secured his rope before continuing his descent down the sloping stone. His feet met a sharp vertical wall, and he shifted his body to the side, straining to see what exactly he had encountered. A small jutting mound of rock protruded from the overhang below.
At first, he was disappointed—he had thought he’d reached the end of the overhang and could finally return to his vertical descent. Unfortunately, it was clear that this jutting stalactite was only a bump in an otherwise much larger overhang. This small protrusion, though unexpected, might still prove useful. If he could climb onto it, it would give him a better vantage point, allowing him to peer around the overhang and assess the next part of his journey.
Thankfully, the protrusion was just large enough to support his full height.
He slowly maneuvered himself onto the mound, keeping the same methodical pace despite how desperately he wanted to be upright again. His head was bursting from the blood ruch.
Once aligned with the stalactite, he twisted his neck, straining as far as it could go to peer across the mound and see what lay ahead.
And then, he saw it.
A colossal green stock grander than any mountain he had ever seen. It stretched down from the cliff’s overhang, seemingly without end, its base culminating in a brilliantly blue bud. The titanic head of a flower whose scale could never be given justice without seeing for oneself.
The flower was unlike anything he had ever witnessed; it was unlike anything he had even thought of witnessing. Its proportions were so large, and beauty so all-encompassing, that he could do naught but gaze in awe.
It was then that the truth struck him. The “forest” atop the cliff was no forest at all. Those towering structures weren’t trees—they were roots. The mystical flower of the village wasn’t hidden within the forest; it was the forest.
He couldn’t stop his tears. He found himself so moved by the natural artistry on display. This trip was not a complete waste, even if it was the wrong flower.
He climbed back up above the cliff.
It was a shame that it was the wrong flower, but it was still a much-enjoyed trip. This was truly an experience he would never forget.
Interrupting his blissful reverie was the chime of a bell. The man turned to face the source of the sound and it was there that he saw what seemed to be a small pink rhombus grow out of thin air, or it was a rhombus, but its body would reject any stable state. It would shift and transform, shrink and grow, continuously morphing into other forms. The pink shape finally locked into a form resembling that of a featureless human with only one limb. The arm was outstretched towards the man holding a glowing parchment: it read.
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<tbody>
<tr>
<td style="width: 100%; text-align: center">You have been invited to</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="width: 100%; text-align: center">The Tournament</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="width: 100%; text-align: center">You are The Garden</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>