--- Y-City---

Cade was shocked when she saw the lobby vanish. Of the members on standby, she had been closest to the entrance, when the whole room suddenly vanished from the building. She didn't have much time to process the information, as the situation rapidly changed.

"Mike, Mina, Fin?" she spoke into the orb, but there was radio silence. "Can somebody hear me? Shit."

From the headquarters of the Scene rows and rows of berserkers and soldiers in Polyarkanate Armors exited. Their numbers flooded the street. She wanted to warn the others, but it seemed that the Scene had managed to even interfere with the communication orbs.

Seth had probably stepped into a teleportation trap. It was a clever way to get rid of him for some time as it was hard to protect oneself against being teleported. However, she did not worry about Seth. Wherever they transported him, she doubted the blacksmith would suffer. It might take a while for him to return, but he would probably be unharmed.

Looking at the horde that had flooded the streets, looking for them, Cade decided to return to the system church post haste. There was no use in facing those guys head-on. The rakshasa could only hope the others had the same thought and they would meet up at the Church.

"You must be Cade Albright."

She wanted to return but was suddenly stopped by a man blocking her path. He was a tall slender man, wearing a scale armor and carrying a spear. His thin mustache and copper skin gave him a dashing style.

"Don't try to run. There is nobody left that can help you. The Tower Master is gone. Our men have already raided your hideouts and the system church is encircled. None of you will escape from Y-City."

"We will see about that," she said, getting ready to fight.

…

--- Tree Station 12---

"Where are those pretty boys?" Glasses heard the commander complain. With the help of the Tuatha De they would not have had a hard time with the demons, but they had not arrived. Had they decided not to come?

"Send in the augmented." the command was given.

Facing a setback against the ever-growing demon army, The Scene sent in their strongest melee units. Formerly adventurers with Knight and tanker classes, they had agreed to be experimental subjects after receiving the immortal serum. After losing the system and its benefits to gain immortality, the researchers of the Scene had not stagnated. Skills and magic abilities stayed the same, even after the transformation, even so, they had to get used to using them without any assistance, but the growth that came with simply absorbing souls could not help in strengthening their bodies.

The augmented were the result of many experiments using modern drugs, magical drugs, and martial drugs from the Voracious Cloud Continent in addition to technological enhancements that would not have been possible to install on an ordinary human being.

With the entrance of the Augmented, they were able to battle the demonic horde to a standstill. While they were unable to get the upper hand, a bank of fog appeared on the battlefield. The Tuatha De finally lend a hand, but what exited the mist were not the eerily beautiful allies from the other side. What crawled from the fog was the complete opposite in appearance, but the same level of threat. A wave of bloody skeletons and obese monsters swept into the mountain valley.

The former looked like fresh skeletons that jumped out of their fleshly envelope or had all their meat gnawed off. The opposite looked like terribly obese people with a thick, swarthy hide, beady sunken eyes, and a mouth filled with needle-like teeth.

Having no intention to join the skirmish, they aimed directly for the defenseless city. Even glasses got goosebumps when he looked at what they called the Hungry Skeletons and Bloated Horrors. They were things the Tuatha De created with corpses of humans, their reinforcements had arrived, although the pretty faces themselves did not show up.

Hungering for human flesh, the flesh they had lost, the Hungry Skeletons were mindless beasts always aiming to consume people or corpses take on their flesh, and create more of their own. The result of the feeding frenzy were Bloated Horrors, embodiments of gluttony that would keep eating and growing and generating more skeletons and horrors.

There was always something unsettling about these beasts, Glasses was just lucky he wasn't their enemy. Even if he was immortal, being eating alive for all eternity was nothing he wanted to risk or to think about.

...

At first glance, things were starting to not look good. The tree was dead, the barriers were destroyed and monsters were encroaching on them. An outside observer would think they were in a tight spot. Evee observed the monsters rushing toward their city with a grim expression.

"I think we have seen enough. Let's stop playing dead."

After all, they had the greatest number of people to protect within TS12. As a result Minas Mar's focus when it came to defending concentrated on this tree station while leaving the others to their appointed guardians and affiliated powers.

Before the unsettling creatures that exited the fog could get any closer to the city, the barrier rose again, stopping their advance. The infiltrators had made some trouble, but none of them had actually managed to reach any of the generators. The members of Minas Mar had done their job well.

The barrier was never in peril, but everyone had been shocked about what happened to the tree. Yet, nobody was worried. It was Karina's reaction that gave them confidence. The dryad had not even twitched, when the tree was hit and withered away. She only gave them a confident smile, easing their worries.

The monsters built up at the edge of the barrier, their fists banging against the magical wall with unbelievable power, shaking the city. Only Karina's smile grew wide, showing an unexpectedly callous look on her otherwise always-so-kind face. She finally decided to reveal the secret of her confidence.

"I will tell you something funny. We may call these trees saplings and off-shoots but in the end, they are like mushrooms. What's important is not what is visible above the ground," with this statement, she clenched her fist tightly.

Like bundles of hair and tentacles of wood, roots shot from the ground all around TS12. Frozen earth and ragged stone broke apart as the Guardian Tree's roots rose to the air and bound everything in their range.

Tortured immortals, insane monsters, and undying soldiers were grasped by the tree and pulled below the surface of the earth, never to be seen again. With roots penetrating their skin and growing a dense net throughout their body, they were subjected to insufferable torment as they turned to root knots, giving energy for the rebirth of the fallen "sapling".

The dryad had learned from what happened in Agra. Ever since then, the trees one could see on the surface, albeit powerful, were just decoys while the true power of the Guardian Tree was hidden underground and spread throughout the whole vicinity of a Tree Station.

Like in a gruesome horror movie, roots started swallowing any trespasser, that dared to get too close to the city or the tree. The dryad was hellbent on striking the fear of a legendary Guardian Tree into their enemies.

This was not unique to TS12. All Tree Stations currently under attack were surrounded by a vast field of man-eating roots. She would show them that they can't be underestimated. She wouldn't betray Seth's trust.

…

Glasses watched in shock, the ultimate sign that their Tree Buster had failed miserably. Even the augmented, which had managed to keep the demons in check, could only resist for moments, before being pulled into the deep.

"Damn, we have to leave right now!" he cried out in a panic.

"Where are you running? We can't just leave the Tree Buster here!" his colleague called out behind him, but Glasses had already started running.

His decision was affirmed when he heard a tragic scream from behind, not long later. He would have gloated to be finally freed from that guy, if his own life was not in peril, too. Without the soldiers and augmented, keeping the demon occupied, there was nothing stopping those guys from turning the rear line to dust, as they did with the serks.

His breath was ragged and his knees weak but he kept running. He couldn't remember having ever felt this frightened. Since he took the serum, he never expected to face the possibility of death ever again.

He was afraid of pain, which was why had not gotten any augmentations, that could have made up for his weak body and the lack of skills or stats in that area. Now, the pain seemed so trivial, when facing the cold reality of death.

Having attained his dream of immortality, it was almost as if it had amplified the meaning of actual death... With jumbled thoughts and close to collapsing, he finally reached the edge of the abandoned slums. He didn't see any of the demons follow him, but he still made sure to hide among the ruins and calm his breath.

Seeing that he was not pursued, he started to move. Cutting through abandoned buildings and broken ruins, he avoided the streets and open spaces. He was not the best in physical or magical battles, but he had ways to hide his presence and void monsters. He just needed to reach one of the dungeons they controlled.

Glasses was sure, as long as he reached one of the dungeons, he could get a car and return to one of their bases. With a few barriers and meters of reinforced concrete between him and the demons, he would feel a lot safer.