Chapter 22: Traveling (Part 2) The vibrant tree
It's still Mary's POV
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Looking down, I smiled at Rose as we walked down the ice path leading through the woods while holding hands. It's been a few hours since we left Symbiote village. Right after we had left the village, we started to head straight for the blue woods. The woods are most known for their reptilian monsters, so I decided that that would be the easiest route to take, since killing reptile monsters such as snakes and lizards was my specialty. In the few hours since we had left, we were able to make it to the tier two ring of the woods.
Just in case you're wondering, each monster territory is divided into rings. These rings are classified by the powerful monsters living in the monster territories. For example, territories with extremely powerful monsters will probably have up to six rings. Obviously, the danger level of these territories are classified by the amount of rings each territory has. If a territory has 2 or fewer rings, then it is classified as a low ringed territory.
If a territory has 3 to 4 rings, then it is classified as an Intermediate ringed territory. And if a territory has 5 to 6 rings, then the territory is classified as a high ringed territory. Now a place can have more than one territory around it just like the Symbiote plant village and as such it's better to be sure that you're heading to the right territory because you might go to a territory that's danger level is too high. Usually, the more rings a territory has, the more mixed up each ring in a territory will be. Like, territories with five rings might have Class C monsters in the Safe Ring instead of Class E monsters. Oh, and just to clarify what I'm talking about, here's how the ranking system would typically go for the rings in a normal territory.
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Ring 1-- safe ring -- Composed of mostly Non Tier monsters ranging mostly Class F with a few Class E's here and there. Every territory has a safe ring. So, pretty much as long as you're an adult, you should be okay if you're at the edge of a territory. The edge of a territory is a ring in itself so every territory has at least one ring.
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Ring 2 -- Outer ring-- Composed of Tier 1-2 monsters. This ring can range from having monsters graded as Class E through D monsters
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Ring 3 -- Intermediate ring -- Composed of tier 2 through 3 monsters, this ring can range from having monsters graded as Class C through B monsters
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Ring 4 -- Jr ring -- Composed of Tier 3-4 monsters, this ring almost always had only Class A monsters with very few Class B monsters. There are almost never any Class S monsters in this ring.
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Ring 5 -- Internal ring -- Composed of a mix of Tier 4 monsters that are about to transcend to Tier 5 or are already Tier 5. This ring usually only has Class S monsters, with very few being the lowest of Class- SS.
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Ring 6 -- Apex center -- Composed the strongest of the monsters reside and usually are Tier 6. These monsters can be ranked as Class S through SS.
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SSS ranked monsters and above are usually lone wolves and and almost never group together . Of course, their are always exceptions but these exceptions rarely happen. Now this is just the classification for High ringed monster territories. Thankfully, the blue woods is not a High ringed territory and only has 3 rings, making it an intermediate ringed territory. We've run into a few monsters, but nothing I couldn't handle. Only a couple of Blue Blizzard Snakes and Hail Lizards. Rose was especially excited about heading home, even though I had just killed a Blue Blizzard Snake she's still smiling as if nothing happened.
I'm truly glad that my daughter has this trait. No matter what the situation, Rose always seems to somehow find a positive light in it all and never lets bad things get to her. I hope this side of her never changes. Using the steel sword strapped to my back, I hacked my way through the large thorn Brier's blocking our path. Cutting through the rest of the thick Brier, I had to momentarily close my eyes as I was assisted with a bright flash of light.
As my eyes adjusted, I couldn't help but gasp as the most beautiful tree entered my vision. Well, it has the shape of a tree, the only problem was that it was only six feet tall. The tree was a deep shade of red going from its stump all the way to its the top of it's trunk where it split off into multiple branches. At the end of what looked to be every single branch stood multiple large green fruits that had yellow dots located on top of the fruit. The shape of the fruits were the same as pairs, but they seemed to be much larger. They were twice the size of normal pairs at the very least.
Looking at the tree, I began to feel uneasy as I started to look around. (Why is it that all the plants surrounding the tree are dead, but the tree is extremely vibrant. In fact, it's easily the most beautiful plant I've ever seen. There are even some wolf corpses surrounding it, but I don't sense any other creature. There's not even a single wood beetle in the bark of the dead trees. Something's not right.)
Grabbing the sword that I had already put in its scabbard, I started to scroll my eyes around the area as I looked for any sign of danger, ready to draw the sword at any time. "Woooooow, so pretty" hearing a squeal of excitement come from beside me, I turned my head as Rose rushed past me heading straight for the small tree. Feeling a bad promotion, my eyes widened as the front of the tree started to scrunch up while the ground started to shake. "Rose, get away from there!!!!" "Huh" Turning around to look at me, Rose showed a confused expression before her whole face turned pale as did mine.
"Noooooooooooo!!!!!!!" Screaming as tears flowed down my eyes, I hurriedly grabbed my sword before rushing at the tree. Looking at Rose, I felt my entire world tremble as insanity threatened to take over, as coming out of Rose's stomach was a long thick root painted in a deep red.
(TO BE CONTINUED) (｡ŏ﹏ŏ)(〒﹏〒) poor rose, will she survive, who knows. I surely do.
Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone