Their plan went off without a hitch.
First, Helim headed for the southeastern side to pick up an escort. And just as planned, she was attacked by shady figures, who moved on just as fast as they had appeared. Innocently, it looked like they took nothing during their assault.
The only difference is that Helim knew what to look for. They had indeed taken the enveloped letter. A few days later, she converged with Mavi and the prince. The prince looked so normal, Helim would have never thought it if she had not known of the plan.
This was the fifth prince, just a few decades old, but still an adolescent. Eruguim, the paragon of the fifth power.
"Is this little one the prince?"
"Yes. The boy is still shy, so try not to scare him. He is the inheritor of the fifth power of the royals; he will grow into it once he trains hard enough."
"Hello, my name is Helim. You don't remember but I was there on your birth sermon, and you're still as cute as then. You'll grow to be a brave guard of Elleria. For now, I will be your escort."
"Nice to meet you madam."
With pleasantries exchanged they continued to the edge of the woods. Their journey was quieter for security reasons, but it was not any less lively. In a day, they met the person who had issued for an escort. It was a mysterious guy? Who wore a hood. He was just as silent as the Knight, only ever speaking when necessary.
They soon found out it was just that he was shy. He is a lemur beast folk. His feminine side ended with his looks and posture. His voice, his behaviour, and even his thinking was strange, but it was not feminine. He just looked female when silent and stood covered in his hood.
Luckily enough, their journey was not eventful. They did not know about the state of the decoy, but soon the palace was in view, and this meant their mission had been complete. But no-one, not a single one of them had been prepared for the sight before them.
It was pure and utter chaos; the pace was fixing itself. All who lived in Elleria knew just how resilient, the woods are. For them to have suffered even a fraction of damage, as this, meant this place had been war torn site.
'Is this the darkness, no it couldn't be, otherwise the whole place would have been evacuated, but the devastation here meant it was a powerful person or a monster. I can still see people, meaning was it definitely not the darkness.'
They were all having similar thoughts. The place was not in ruin, but this meagre damage, to a place that is almost indestructible, was pure destruction. All came to their same conclusion that it was not the darkness. But within that lay an even more critical question, if not the darkness, then what else could have happened here.
Their homes would soon be repaired, but the lives lost were gone, an even bigger loss for a manifestation that has low birth rates. By the trail of destruction, it seemed the battle had not ended, just led away from the living area. First the darkness, then the princess goes missing, then there is some party trying to topple the kingdom, and now on top of all of this, is a new problem.
Mavi grabbed the prince. "I will be heading to the palace. I need to secure the prince. If you look carefully, the place itself is still intact. Meaning the perpetrator was unable, or incapable of breaching it."
She then ran with the prince towards the castle. The lemur used the terrain of the woods of Ellaria to follow the trail of destruction. He had already paid the charges for the escort. Helim was not sure why he was going towards the danger, but she herself had to help those who were injured, she did not have time to waste on thinking of such things.
She was lifting some of the bent branches, checking for people covered by it. She found no-one to her relief. This just prompted her to keep searching. She looked back towards the castle, to set a mental reminder.
'I should head to the castle to report to João, before that old man worries about me."
***
When one, such as the one who was escorted here by Helim, followed the marred scars on the branches, leading from the welcoming grounds to the castle, they would be able to follow the carnage that had ensued.
It was easy to follow, and one did not have to worry about being in a hurry. They were deep, meaning that the path would take time to recover. Along this path one could imagine the battle, a ferocious one. The further one followed, the larger these scars became, and the more recent they looked. They kept getting more violent, until one came upon the battle that had caused it.
Floating above the hill sized roots was a figure of immense power. She was surrounded by multiple of these green glows. This was the first case of green souls you would encounter. For the swarm that surrounded this figure was made of ancient and powerful spirits, the most dangerous ferries, and the most vicious pixies.
The roots extended, as if they were trying to reach her. It felt like unsatisfied person reaching for a better life. Even from here our beast folk friend could sense the pull of the queen on all souls. He felt that his soul was drawn towards the immense radiation, that promises eternal comfort to the soul – one he was barely staving off from this distance.
The light from the souls she had summoned was so bright they almost illuminated the base of the trunk the lemur beast folk was on. It almost felt like the foliage above had vanished and the sunlight reached here. In this moment, all of nature had been subjugated.
Then the proud figure was faced by an even prouder figure. This one was certainly a monster, the source of all this havoc. This being was…
"Queen Xarion, why do you hold back, even now, do you take me for a weakling?"
The queen could not be bothered to reply to a monster. But for the unseen observer, he was dumbfounded. 'An intelligent monster is unheard of.'
"We seem to have a guest."
Then the lemur beast folk hid into the gap between the bark, wondering what was happening.
"You're wrong by the way." It grinned and finished. "Monsters are all mad, so am I. But I am not the first to speak, just the first to ever have a madness that needs me to speak. The source of a monster's madness is varied."
Sure, he had read some theologies about the origin of monsters, but all this monster spoke of just hit blank walls. The queen was just as unbothered. She then summoned a spirit, that morphed into a blade. This jade blade, swung, and the monster tried to dodge, but its soul, moved towards the strike, wanting to be severed, which it was.
The monster again morphed its soul slightly, allowing it to collapse into a physical goo. Then the savage battle continued, the lemur ran back and disappeared, only having glimpsed at the battle. As he ran, he kept hearing the shockwaves, even the eerie noises from that heavily spiritual battle.
He was still not sure if that thing really was a monster. The fact it had read its mind from that far was even more terrifying. But soon after he climbed high enough, the true terror began. He experienced a massive amount of pain in his chest, followed by agony, sadness, and anger. Basically, his stress levels shot up to a lethal level, until he shorted out and died.
He lost grip of branch and feel to his grave. The immense amount of agony he had felt happened in a fraction of a second. Then suddenly during his decent, his head jerked, and he grabbed onto the cliff made from protruding bark.
Like a rag doll, he moved like a puppet that had strings that had vanished. His eyes glowed red. And like a rabid and savage beast, he climbed with all four legs. His tail had jumped out of the hood and was pushing it up like a spring. His joints moved and twisted at awkward angles. The climbing speed was almost inhumane. The level and movement of the rag doll movement, looked like a child dragging a doll up the stairs.
Then the beast made it to the branch with the town near the palace. The lemur seemed to have lost its mind, as it roared an echoing screech. Its muscle density grew; its bones elongated as the beast became more animal than man. It looked like a lemur swallowing a human cell by cell. The fur spiked as the beast became massive.
Soon the beast became gigantic, as a few hundred metres. This is a true beast, known as Lemurgarine. Its beastly side was undeniable. This is the pinnacle form of every beast. The form that usually needs immense training and focus to assume.
***
The forest folk all looked on in abject terror as they watched the claws climbing up the branch. This was not because they were afraid that something horrible had come, it was just them feeling defeated. Their fair kingdom had been facing crisis after crisis. They were simply fed up.
They were no push overs. This could be seen in the sounds of chatter, followed by bright flashes of light, as sprits started manifesting. These were ancient warriors, powerful ones, so when the beast destroyed one with a single swipe, they realised, this true beast was way more powerful than they had expected – like it was strengthened.
They had seen true beasts, and knew of their deep well spring of power, but something was off with this one. It felt more like a monster. And if that was so, then this was bad. They all touched the trees, and weapons came out from where they stood. Along with their summoned spirits they surged and attacked.
The beast felt a dozen ferries and pixies entre its soul, they were trying to rip it apart. Then the people fought using their skills and adapt use of the weapons gifted by nature.
This was bad because no single beast should be this strong. But one of the guards made it down after seeing the commotion. Then the battle became more one sided.
Then one of the adventures from the guild, who was a beast folk too. An armadillo. He had more control and was at a high enough level to pull it off. With a growl, his armour became large and tougher. Soon it became as deep as clay. Its claws became long and hard as they shone like obsidian. The true beast, Armoural, had formed.
It rolled up and smashed into the Lemurgarine; to off balance it enough for the guard to slash its tail off, it had a strong deterrent for those fighting on the ground. Then when it fell flat, the Armoural un-winded and with its craws it held the monster down. The Armoural was easily thrown off.
Then it jumped and grabbed into its sides, piercing it deep. This was worse because the Armoural claws reeked damage on the soul.
Something was off though, this thing felt like it had been emptied, and then a soul was thrown into the body to move it. And this soul was not even all here. As it was pinned down, the Lemurgarine thrashed about, trying to free itself. Then before the Ellerian guard cleaved it clean with its spirit sword, the beast started shrinking.
Then when the Armoural got up, the few hundred metre true beast was now a tailless, scared lemur beast folk. The red madness that shone in its eyes was gone. It was dead. The people all cheered as the guard cleaved off the head with one final strike.
Armoural was just confused, it recognised this beast. It was Lenor of the Prima party. They were a famous group of daring adventurers. He was suspected that something was wrong, but he had hoped that this was a normal true beast not a beast folk gone mad.
Even more he had not expected that the beast folk he was facing was one of the most renowned. Their party had been disbanded, but no-one knew where either of them was. This also explained why the battle was so hard. They were facing one of the greatest legends. A beast known in folklore as the Ilk Lemurgarine.
He did not know what to make of all of this. But even though the beast was strong, he was not as strong as the man known as Ilk used to be.
'I'll just report this at the guild. I'm sure the investigators will be able to figure it out.'
The battle had not ended because he died, but because his transformation had timed out. Just as the Armoural's one had. He shrunk until he was barely three metres. He took another glance at the decapitated body, and just there he noticed a pouch bag. He took it and decided to help dispose of the body.
Later he wrote his report and handed the report and the pouch bag to the investigators at the guild. He couldn't be bothered, especial with the turmoil in the woods of Elleria. His one condition to the investigator, was to keep him updated.