Esoterico: A Hidden Land

Chapter Fifteen: The Dark Side Of Aracounis

"Livin' Nightmare!" Sally gasped.

But the young Scyphers had no time to speak any more as the tree launched his first attack. The fist from one of his gigantic arms crushed a blow upon Newton, sending him flying. 

"Hey! How dare you!" Ryan spat as Newton crashed yards behind. 

"Ha ha! What did you think? I've got the home ground here, so it's my play!" Saying this, the tree grabbed both Sally and Smith and threw them further than Newton. As they moaned, Ryan couldn't keep his temper cool. He lit up with energy refills and shot a couple of blasts at the laughing tree. Each blast ripped away one arm. 

But losing a pair of arms seemed to rather amuse the villain quite much. He smirked and said, "Joined the game then! Come on, we've got lots and lots of rounds for this game!" He didn't use his remaining 13 arms this time. Instead, a long creeper rope shot at Ryan. It grasped him, wrapping him around from head to toe, smashed him against the ground twice and left him there. Ryan felt as though his bones were broken. Several scratches were created around his face and hands. 

"Dude! You alright?" Newton's voice rang out. He, Smith, and Sally were up and joined him by now.

Laughing ludicrously, the tree went on, "New playmates! Nice! Just what I want!" Saying this, he shot some more creeper ropes, but Newton had his defense. He built some spell structures and shot them at the creepers. Just like spinning blades they cut through all the creepers, and still went on, finally creating a couple of rough cuts on the trunk of the tree.

"Nice move!" The tree went on playfully.

Ryan gritted his teeth and stood up. He whispered in Newton's ear, "He's just playin' games with us. No matter what we do, he keeps laughing. Just try to anger him. It may lead him to one false move."

"But he's just a laughing madman; will he get angry?" Newton said, but at the moment the tree whacked a punch on Ryan, making him fall flat against the ground.

With a battle roar, Newton produced a dozen of his blades in the shape of spell structures and shot them violently at the tree. Three of them slashed off the same number of arms, and the rest of them produced a quantity of cuts. 

Ryan was up quickly enough. In a wink of an eye, he signaled Smith and Sally, and they all lit up with energy refills. 

"Come on!" Ryan cried, and the three of them shot six energy blasts, blasting off six of the arms of the tree. Six shots more, and then the tree stood, for the first time, stupefied as he was armless and scarred. He wasn't laughing now.

"You've got me armless, but you ain't won yet." The tree grimly spoke. 

"We don't need to win." Ryan hastily told Newton, "We gotta find Rudy, C'mon now—he won't get us if we aren't fighting him.". They went away, turning back at the tree, but the tree wasn't such an easy one. He said, "Where are you goin' so early, sonny? We haven't finished our game yet!"

"Run!" Ryan ordered his team, as they accelerated the speed. But that wasn't enough. They didn't know the power of the tree's roots. As they went only six yards, the roots thrust out through the ground below  

and grabbed their legs up to their knees. 

Gritting teeth, Ryan shot a couple of blasts, which shattered the roots, but two more of them thrust out. He destroyed those two but this time four of them appeared and grabbed him, wrapping his body tight up to his throat. 

The rest of the group were in the same situation. 

"Still you breathe, huh? The tree had his booming nasty smile back. Take this then!" He just winked, and the ground below Ryan started to soften. Moments later, Ryan found himself and his groupmates drowning in quicksand, which was solid ground moments earlier. Ryan shook and tried to free himself but couldn't move a toe. Everything except his face was wrapped up by the roots. He could only hear the moans and shrieks of his friends as slowly and gradually the quicksand came into level with his chin. Ryan closed his mouth to avoid gulping down sand as he felt it touch his lips. The tree's laughs were now unbearably louder…