Thirty acorns, five wolves, three bears and two more elks later I found the Dungeon.

  The entrance was a dark cave in a grassy hill. Nothing that would make it stand out from the other caves I’d walked past, except for the shimmering green portal that filled the cave entrance. I walked forward and entered the Dungeon.

  This portal was instant, just like the ones on Earth.

  I appeared in another forest but at night. I could see pinpricks of stars, thousands of them, not in any constellations I knew. Like the Biome, I was up on a slope, mountains surrounding the forest. The entire forest was a kind of oak tree but much taller and thicker. The trees were spread out, leaving a couple of feet of space between the wide boughs of each tree. Roots covered the ground, making lots of trip hazards.

  Notifications filled my vision.

  WELCOME TO THE GROWLING OAK DUNGEON

  THE OBJECTIVE OF THE GROWLING OAK DUNGEON IS TO FIND THE GROWLING OAK TREANT AND DESTROY IT’S HEART. THE TREANT IS FOUND IN WHAT WAS ONCE KNOWN AS THE OAKEN GROVE BUT IS NOW THE GROWLING OAK DUNGEON AS THE CORRUPTION OF THE TREANT HAS SPREAD TO THE REST OF THE FOREST. YOU MUST FIND AND DESTROY THE GROWLING OAK TREANT BEFORE THE OAKEN GROVE IS PERMANENTLY CORRUPTED.

  OBJECTIVES:

  DESTROY THE GROWLING OAK TREANT 0/1

  DESTROY CORRUPTED WILD TREANTS 0/30

  TIME LIMIT:

  16 HOURS

  15:58:24

  Of course it would be a timed Dungeon with the timer already going. I sighed, pushing away the Notification. Seemed simple enough. Find the big boss and kill it. There would of course be other monsters to deal with. From where I was, the Dungeon looked pretty large, so would take time to search out the Growling Oak Treant.

  This was a solo Dungeon, so that meant it wouldn’t be impossible to find the boss. Difficult, yes. Challenging, absolutely. But impossible? No. That was the nice thing about the Celestial Challenge System, in an equal Level challenge, there was always a chance to succeed. Larger chance to fail, but that success chance was still there.

  Nothing stood out for a specific way to go. The Dungeon was leaving it all up to me and my Abilities. Dungeons weren’t just a physical challenge, a way to fight and Level up. They were also mental challenges, designed to make us learn all about our Abilities and different ways to use them.

  I was at the end of the Dungeon, what I considered south. It had a round shape, so I could pick east or west, and would completely walk the perimeter. Didn’t matter which way I went to start. I figured doing a circling loop around the Dungeon would be the best idea. I picked right and started that way.

  Didn’t get far before I ran across my first monster.

  A tree ahead of me shifted. It was thinner than the other trees, creaking as it stepped out into the space between the larger trees. It was about twelve feet tall, only a foot thick in the trunk, with branches that looked like arms, leafless branches spread out, looking like claws. Each of the two arm-branches were about six feet long, the finger branches another two or so feet. The monster moved on dozens of thicker branches that moved like spider’s legs.

  Creepy

  CORRUPTED WILD TREANT

  It felt like the thing was equal to me in Level. Two eyes and a large mouth were carved into the trunk, only about halfway up, below where the arm-branches stuck out.

  We had Treants on Earth, so I wasn’t that surprised by the look.

  The ground shook as the Treant charged at me, reaching out with arms. The end of the branches looked pretty sharp. Didn’t want those things grabbing me. They were only a half inch thick or so, not looking that strong, but I knew from experience how strong Treants were.

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  I didn’t let the thing grab me, ducking under the grasping branches and charging at the trunk. I punched the wood, breaking splinters off as I pounded at it. The treant tried to turn, twisting to step back and get at me but I kept within its reach, turning with it, never stopping the punching.

  Wood splintered and cracked as I kept up the attacks.

  My Essence Abilities were pretty simple but powerful. Essences themselves were very broad and more concepts. The Abilities came out of how the person wanted to use that Essence Concept. It ended up working in conjunction with the other Essences we got. So people with the same Essences could have vastly different powers.

  Tracy and I both had Motion Essence. Mine was in my Primary Slot and hers was as a Support Slot. For her, this gave her the Ability to move through tree branches, climb up walls and that kind of thing. She was like a parkour goddess. For me, the Motion Essence is what gave me my kinetic field and the ability to absorb the energy that struck the field.

  My Secondary Slot was the Manipulation Essence. This gave me the ability to redirect that stored energy into offensive attacks. It also allowed me to rob things of inertia and its kinetic energy. That allowed me to lock myself in place, as I stole the potential kinetic energy that would have let my feet move from where they were.

  This was all because of System physics, which were not old-earth physics. I didn’t really understand how it all worked, but it worked.

  Those two Essence gave me my main powerset. I’d added three more Essences to make me a little more rounded. The kinetic field gave me some defense, but with more powerful attacks I couldn’t absorb the full energy so some of the blows still got through. I added Regeneration to give me self-healing during combat so I could survive those blows and not need a healer. Force Essence added some more power to my attacks and gave me some limited defensive capabilities. My last Essence was Resistance which gave me protection from energy, elemental and mental attacks.

  I moved faster than someone with my Stats would, but that was because of my Motion Essence. I could use the stored kinetic energy to augment parts of my body, like my legs, making me faster and jump higher. Lots of stuff like that.

  My abilities were simple compared to many, but I was pretty versatile and damn powerful. They did make me suck at ranged combat, but that was okay, I was very good at melee. And I liked punching things.

  Which I was doing to the Treant. I kept hitting it in the trunk, breaking through the thick layer of bark. Which was tough. My hands would have been cut up by how rough the bark was, but I had the leather gloves with metal knuckles, which protected my hands. I had to keep moving around the Treant as it kept twisting to try to get away from me. I also had to make sure I stayed away from the mouth. The thing would bite and even though it probably wouldn’t penetrate the field, it would still be strong enough to grab on and probably snap my arm.

  My shoulder was still sore from the elk’s antler. I didn’t want to add a broken arm to my list of ailments.

  I reached up, grabbing one of the arm-branches with my left arm, still punching with my right. I pulled the branch down, hearing a cracking noise. The Treant let out a moan. Bracing my leg against its body, I pushed with the leg and pulled with both arms. The cracking got louder, the arm-branch bending.

  With a final crack, the arm came off. I tossed it aside, keeping my balance even after the resistance was gone. I was running out of stored energy. It didn’t work on a 1:1 ratio. What I used was less than what I’d gotten. Something was lost in the conversion process.

  Drawing some Force energy from my Arcanum Core, I pushed it down to my foot and stomped down on one of the legs, snapping it off. I kicked at another, breaking that one too. Another broken and the Treant started shifting to the side.

  I jumped back, avoiding the grasping other arm-branch. The Treant tried to turn to chase after me as I ran around it, but the loss of the few legs made it slower and harder to move. I managed to kick two more, snapping them off.

  Reaching the back of the Treant, I pushed against it. The thing started to topple to the side, letting out a moan. There were still enough legs to keep it up, but it was off balance now. I lunged forward and started punching it again, splinters exploding off.

  I broke through the bark, hitting the wood beneath. The Treant kept moaning, the noise sounding pained, but I didn’t stop. More splinters exploded, along with the pulp of the inner tree. I finally hit something vital and the moaning stopped, the branches all crackling as they fell to the ground, unmoving.

  YOU HAVE SLAIN CORRUPTED WILD TREANT

  YOU HAVE GAINED +20 TOWER POINTS AND +20 MULTIVERSAL POINTS

  Before I could touch the Treat to convert it to loot, I heard more moaning behind me. Cursing and turning I saw two Corrupted Wild Treants approaching.

  They were spread out, coming from the same direction but not the same path. Each looked a little different from the first. One was very thin, like a walking birch tree. The other was shorter and thicker, with two thick trunks for legs and really short thin arms.

  Both rambled toward me.

  Now I understood why there was so much space between all the trees, why the leafy canopy was so much higher. It created space for the Treants to move and fight. If the trees had been closer, the monsters wouldn’t be able to move or swing those arm-branches.

  I wondered who designed the Tower Floor Biomes and Dungeons. This Dungeon had some good design compared to many I’d been in. At least good design for the monsters. Looking at the way the two Treants moved to flank me, maybe not a good design for me.