In bindings made of vines, our three heroes—Xi Guo Lee, Budou, and Kiwi—were marched through the warrior village, in a jungle that honestly resembled Ghebville in more ways than one, with one important distinction: it was on ground level, rather than up in the trees.

This was probably some ham-fisted metaphor for class struggle or something, but I didn’t have time to check with the author—they just handed me the script and begged me to narrate as fast as possible because their budget was so tight—and I just sort of accepted it. I can only assume what the intention was. Death of the Author, or I guess Lack of Consultation With the Author.

As the three young men were paraded through the streets, the onlookers, all of them female, green-skinned, and sporting thick curly green hair (all except for Harold), chanted in jeers and jests at their new captives. It was shameful, humiliating, and sadly a turn-on for Budou, who was really into this kind of stuff.

They were led into the Matriarch’s hut, where an older green lady sat cross-legged on the floor in front of a burning incense pile.

“So you have arrived at last,” the old woman said. “I have been expecting you for such a long time.”

“You have?” asked Xi Guo Lee.

“Yes, of course. I just said that.”

“I bet you’re lying,” said Budou. “I can tell when people are lying.”

Xi Guo Lee rolled his eyes. “No, you can’t.”

“Oh yeah? What’s your favorite color?”

“Pink,” he replied.

“Ha! You tried to trick me by telling you the truth, but I knew that ahead of time! You’re not lying!”

“...No, I was.”

“Liar.”

“You three have been known in the prophecy of our village for twenty generations,” the old woman said. “I should welcome you with celebration. But instead I can only welcome you with the scorn you deserve. Our entire way of life will soon come to an end because of your arrival. We have predicted it since before the Goblins knew how to walk on two legs. Before humans knew what zero was. Before Prince died.”

“And you’re gonna send us on an ADVENTURE?!” Kiwi exclaimed.

“Of a sort,” the old woman said. “But first, let me introduce myself. I am Shu Dai Xiong,” said Xu Dai Xiong, “Elder of the Vinists.”

“The Vinists?” Xi Guo Lee asked.

“Yes, the Vinists. I am their Elder.”

“What are the Vinists?”

“You don’t know what the Vinists are?”

“No, I don’t know what the Vinists are. Could you explain?”

“I could explain what the Vinists are.”

“...Will you explain what the Vinists are?”

“That depends.”

“Depends on what?”

“Depends on a lot of things.”

“Such as what?”

“Such as whether you will accept my adventurous quest,” said Xu Dai Xiong.

“We’ll do it!” shouted Kiwi.

“Anything not to die,” added Budou.

“Then I will explain what Vinists are.” Xu Dai Xiong stood up from her criss-cross-applesauce position and then extended both her hands. From her palms extended a great variety of vines that formed into a circle and then began to move at such a rapid pace... that it was actually animating the inside of the circle like a frame. Vine-based television technology. Impressive. Most impressive.

“Vinists are the People of the Vine,” Xu Dai Xiong began. “We are a secluded jungle race that has been mostly lost to time, but now conveniently we have decided to expose ourselves in order to obtain the Great Red Giant Carp Monster or whatever it was called a couple chapters ago. We have heard about a great evil approaching by the name of Yue Ji and we wanted to cut his power off by killing the mythical beasts before he himself could reach them. It will destroy the ecosystem of Soul Power, but it will stop one man from amassing all the power himself and then redistributing it in an equal way. Equality in Soul will only lead to war and devastation because of how human nature so easily leads to chaos; Yue Ji is an Accelerationist and sadly this is part of his overall plan.

“The Power of the Vine, though, is something that Yue Ji lacks completely. We Vinists have kept its secrets hidden for centuries just as we have kept ourselves secret. And we have taught our sons and daughters, or daughters only I guess (besides Harold), to wield that power however they can. We can defend our village for up to seven years in siege, by our defense minister’s latest estimates, unless the bunker bomb is invented by the time we are attacked.

“We are half-vine, half-mortal, and we are extremely powerful. The Vinists will do anything they can, and what they can do is very, very nice in the colloquial sense of ‘destroy lots of enemies with vine-related magic.’

“However, even if we hold up in a very long siege, inevitably we will lose. Because Yue Ji himself is gaining so much power that he will be unstoppable if he learns the Vinist’s secrets, and so he will stop at nothing, even grinding by killing each of our low-level Vinist warriors periodically for a hundred years. We can’t let that happen.

“The prophecy spoke of three low-intelligence young men who would stumble into our village, very specifically after we defeated a giant fish. I am surprised at the absolute accuracy of such a prophecy, not that that matters particularly at the moment.

“My point is, my dear boys, that you must help us find the Root Vine and defeat Yue Ji before it’s too late. Otherwise, our world is as good as gone.”

Xi Guo Lee gulped. He had already lost one world in his past life, as you may recall from the second chapter backstory. But another... that would ruin him far too much.

“What can we do to help?” he asked.

“I literally just told you,” said Xu Dai Xiong. “Help us find the Root Vine, the source of the Vinist’s power. If we can locate it and destroy it before Yue Ji reaches it, then we have a fighting chance at stopping him for good. Yes, it will destroy our own vine powers, but we Vinists have no other alternatives.”

“Awesome. Where’s the Root Vine.”

“Far away from the land of Alabaster,” she said, “on the continent of Chicken Coop.”

“Chicken Coop?”

“Yes, Chicken Coop.”

“Like the place where people keep chickens when they are farming chickens?”

“I don’t understand what you mean?”

“He’s just being a dumbass,” Budou said. “He thinks chicken coops are things, not continents. He isn’t as clever as you or I, Ms. Xu.”

Xu Dai Xiong took absolutely no heed to Budou’s brown nosing and continued as if he had never spoken. “I will send one woman with you... My great-great-granddaughter, Nan Gua.

“I used to be a Gua,” Xi Guo Lee said. “I welcome any Guas.”

Into the hut came Nan Gua, the same woman who they met earlier at the mouth of the river and who basically kicked their asses (although it was a very unfair fight, to be honest). She wore her mask again, covering her face which Xi Guo Lee thought to be extremely attractive, but her skimpy vine armor was removed in favor of a more casual robe, which was far more revealing than the vines, actually. Despite covering more of her body, it accentuated her curves even more, and made her attractive to the point that Xi Guo Lee was absolutely creeping on her in exactly the way that these sorts of main characters loved to operate. Luckily, he had a robust and interesting personality to make up for the uncomfortable way he acted around women.

Nan Gua bowed in front of the three men and then clasped her gloved hands together. The mask, which bore a smiley face ripped off from the cast of AUU-16, revealed nothing about her emotions, to the point that it was impossible to know if she was immediately romantically interested in any of them.

“My great-great-granddaughter Nan Gua will come in handy,” said Xu Dai Xiong. “She will guide you to Chicken Coop and most likely fall in love with one of you, or at least two of you if you are the kind to create triad relationships.

Kiwi and Budou looked at each other with suspicion, and possibly something more... but their overwhelming straightness overruled anything beyond that mere glance (although Budou’s glasses did flare up at the remark).

“Well, are we going to go now?” asked Nan Gua, the half-vine beauty whose vine-based breasts were prominently sticking out. “I’ve been waiting all day.”

They went.