Suddenly, the loot-window appeared before the Main Character, allowing them to see what they had earned;

Listed upon the blue screen’s interface were the following: “Corrupted Vines (Unorthodox Weapon), Fifty bullets, and one Damned Sapling.”

“Fifty bullets! Yes!” Ricky cried.

Soon enough after that interface disappeared, another one took its place. This time, it was red in interface, with a slightly larger font on its upper corner reading: “Level up: x5. Earned Five Equipment Points. Gained x1 Favor.”

“Favor?” Malideus gawked at the peculiar text.

“I’m supposing that these points are for exchanging services with True Celestia.” The Summoner grimaced somewhat.

“Then I suggest to call them ‘Bitch Points’ for now.” Malideus grimaced as he glanced at the interface.

“I am more suspicious about the ‘Fifty Bullets’ rather than that last item…” the Summoner noted. “Why would a tree have bullets- oh right. This is following the ludicrous law of ‘Video Game Logic’.”

“Indeed.” Ral Zarek noted, as the path forward opened up to the Main Character. Just beyond the flowerbed that ingrained itself over the grave of the Behemoth Tree, was a pathway--trees have apparently disappeared into nothingness, leaving a trail of green grass towards the inner glades of the forest.

As the atmosphere began to normalize, the trees shaped themselves, twisting and morphing. Their branches no longer spined and pronged, they flushed out leaves from them rapidly. The bases of the trees receded their black hues, opting for a more lively brown.

Vining and upheaving themselves from the ground, lush foliage of vibrant green began to encircle the whole forest, making it ubiquesent with life. Still, however, there were no animals around.

The rays of sun pierced through the canopies of leaves as the smog fully vanished, bathing the greenery in its warming embrace.

“Talk about rapid change in the climate…” The Summoner hummed to himself as he inspected the change of scenery. “At least now we’re not in risk of getting lung-related complications.

“Bleh.” Vaati scoffed out a grimace. “Too lively for my tastes.”

“Well… nowhere else but forward.” The Fat Friar stated, and the Party walked forward, brushing past the flowerbed that was more or less acted as the sepulcher of the tree beast.

As the Party stepped upon the glowing flowerbed of various colors, the flowers suddenly flared into life, brilliantly dispersing off magical embers.

“Oh?” Ral uttered out, inspecting the plants around him. Leaning towards a particularly exotic sample, he inspected it. “These plants… contain magic around them? Of course.

“No crap, brainiac.” The Summoner chuckled a bit. “They rooted on a gigantic tree monster’s grave--the instant said tree monster died. So it wouldn’t be much a surprise that these flora are magical.”

Ral shrugged off that sarcastic remark, craning towards the large, blooming plant. He arched an eyebrow as it held many colors of the spectrum; its upper petals were azure, its left petals were yellow, and its right petals were of a crimson red hue.

As Ral picked it, it seemingly disappeared as he plucked it out of its stem. Promptly, a pop-up window lit up in front of his eyes, awaiting its text to be read.

It simply read in simple font: “Obtained: Elemental Flower.”

Ral blinked in surprise.

“Huh.” The Summoner muttered a bit audibly. “Strange. They gave us another reward for clearing out the boss.”

“What are you complaining for?” Malideus replied. “Free stuff is always good.”

"Maybe it was a secret item?" Vaati suggested.

"A poorly hidden secret item," Ricky stated.

The Summoner nodded. “I suppose… but just to be certain that it isn’t too suspicious.” Clearing his throat, the Summoner spoke out to nothing in particular, “Check item description: Elemental Flower.”

Promptly, another window materialized in front of the MC, displaying the following text: “A blooming plant with three different colors within its petals. Fire, lightning, and ice magic all reside within each petal--respective to their colors. Don’t blow yourself up with this, monkeys.”

“What?” the Summoner uttered out as he finished reading the text. “Did True Celestia write that?”

“Well either way, I’m grabbing a few more.” Ral said, plucking a few more choice flowers till he had a bouquet. “And done.” He smiled, pressing one of the flowers into his book while the rest went into the inventory. “These’ll make for some very interesting experiments later on.”

(Later, on the path to Canterlot)

“This sucks…” Vaati said, panting as the MC trekked along the long, hot path out of the forest, the MC sweating profusely beneath their robes..

“There are many ways this could be worse. Imagine if we’d been given a body with no experience points or weapons and then thrown at that thing.” The Fat Friar spat bitterly.

“Yeah, but that’s a quick death. This fucking heat is a long, excruciating one.” Malideus whined, pulling out the Staff of Vodahmin, and switching it to wind element, pointing it at the MC and using it like a fan.

“The ozone layer here must’ve been chipped away considerably here.” The Summoner sighed out a dull exhale.

“I have to agree with Malideus here, for once.” Ral Zarek panted. “The forest was preferable to this. Has the pollution really done all this to the world?..” Ral looked up, along with the others, at the sunny, harsh sky. The heat of the sun rippled the sky somewhat.

“Not even a bird or a cloud up there… Man, no wonder this world needs this Celestia gone.” Ricky noted, as the others continued to walk, still using the Staff of Vodahmin as an improvised air-conditioner. Suddenly, though, upon the road, a monstrous, mandibled wurm appeared, startling the group.

“...Please tell me we’re not on fucking Arrakis. I do not want to deal with a Muad-Dib Celestia right now.” The Fat Friar muttered, slowly trying to back the body away.

“Nope.” Vaati sprinted past the unaware, worm-like creature. “Not dealing with that right now. Too tired for this crap.”

“I agree.” The Summoner sighed out, sweat profusely dropping like a squall from the Main Character’s face. As the brushed past the dirt road of the forest, he leaned the Staff a bit closer to his face, ravenously hogging the air it was expulsing. “I’d rather not waste more time as it is. We already managed to beat a boss, for crying out loud.”

As they progressed through the seemingly boundless acres of trees and foliage, something thudded against the ground beside the Main Character, making a flat, fleshy thumping noise.

“Ha?” The Summoner craned his neck to the side, spotting yet another worm-like creature. “Is it raining larvae, or something?”

“Don’t jinx us you-” Malideus cut himself off as yet another worm fell from the branches of the trees, kicking up dust and dirt as it landed before the Main Character. “God dammit! You jinxed us!” he exclaimed with a mildly frustrated face as he strafed swiftly to the side, avoiding on stepping on the stray larva.

Without no more than a warning, a large cluster of worms fell from the trees. Wriggling and idly strewing ivy and bushes as they flailed aimlessly, they layered the surroundings like a spreading plague--countless of them began to pop us as more and more fell.

“There’s a bit too much ahead of us!” the Summoner warned, glaring ahead of them as he extended his arm forwards unsteadily, his rapid inhales throwing off his speech somewhat.

True enough, as gestured by his extended index finger, there was a figurative wall of larvae obstructing their path. This barricade of worms were tall--seemingly several feet higher than the Main Character.

Approaching steadily, steps faintly resounding off the earthen road, Ral grimaced as he rose the Staff directly at the barrier of larvae, switching the Staff’s configuration to fire, embers emblazoning the tip of the staff, brilliant trails of fire running across the Staff’s end as he continue darting at the wall.

“Oh. I just know the smell is going to be absolutely awful…” Shrugging, he gnashed his teeth as he unleashed a piercing stream of flames from the Staff.

The stream of searing infernos embedding themselves into the living wall, the larvae disintegrated and melted into mere puddles of a sickly green, ashen black.

Closing on the distance between them and the now-melted larvae, the Summoner remarked as he jumped over the puddle of viscous green liquid, “Good work-” suddenly, he stayed his own tongue as he brought his own hand to his nostrils, “Okay. Dammit. You weren’t kidding when you said that the scent would be awful.”

“Ugh!” Vaati gagged slightly, coughing. “Let’s just get out of here!”

“I can agree with that imperative.” The Summoner darted off into the abysmal glades and bushes, dissipating into nothing more than a shadowy silhouette.