Chapter 609: Where Arrows Wait

Eirwen stepped silently across the damp loam, holding her unstrung recurve bow with easy, practiced familiarity.

Eirwen lifted her hand to slow the arborists behind her when the nearest relay root shivered against the neglected grove’s floor.

Behind her, three provincial arborists in coarse linen smocks followed her footsteps, their pruning hooks ready at their belts.

The elder arborist carried a wicker basket filled with grafting moss, nutrient pastes, and clean pruning shears.

"These groves served as natural mana conduits centuries before the imperial engineers laid down copper wires," the old man explained in a low voice.

"A healthy willow grove can whisper a message across thirty leagues of mountain forest in less than three heartbeats."

The foundry map led them along a winding game trail, arriving at a sunken grove where colossal willow roots broke the surface.

Slender crystalline conduits crisscrossed the thick root bolls, many drained of sap and choked with pale fungal rot.

"Which of these living beds survived the hostile drainage?" the elven archer asked, crouching down to inspect an exposed root seam.

"Only the southern cluster, my lady," the elder tender answered in a hushed, anxious whisper, pointing toward a mossy knoll.

"The choir envoys pumped spatial poison through the eastern flumes four nights ago, killing every sapling in the outer ring."

"They tried to starve the network before we could reconnect the provincial circuits," she deduced, testing the wood with her thumb.

"However, these three mother roots still carry vibrant, living resonance beneath their bark."

The elder tender opened a shallow notch in the nearest damaged root and showed her the dry fiber beneath its bark.

"That one cannot carry a message," he said. "A fresh graft might keep the tree alive, but not before the coming fight."

"Then mark it outside the circuit," Eirwen answered, handing him a strip of plain cloth.

The younger arborist tied the marker around the dead branch, separating the surviving beds from the roots they could only tend later.

She pressed her palm against the central trunk, closing her eyes as she listened to the slow, steady pulse of subterranean sap.

A sharp whistling hiss sliced through the morning silence, shattering the tranquil peace of the sunken grove without warning.

An obsidian-tipped arrow slammed into the trunk two inches above her ear, splitting the thick bark with explosive force.

"Scatter into the drainage trench!" Eirwen commanded the tenders, rolling across the moss before leaping behind a buttressed root.

The three arborists scrambled into the depression, ducking low beneath the protective ridge of earth and tangled briars.

High upon the eastern limestone ridge, an armored choir bowman notched a second shaft, his mechanical sight humming with dissonance.

"Release your grand forest domain, elven guardian!" the corrupted sniper taunted, his voice echoing across the mist.

"Unfurl the green sea and drain your precious reserve, or watch your tenders bleed beneath my shafts!"

A second arrow whistled through the branches, striking a stone boulder near the trench and spraying sharp gravel across the leaves.

The sniper adjusted his stance, deliberately measuring the wind currents and elevation gaps between the ridge and the sunken trees.

From the trench, the youngest tender raised his pruning hook toward the struck trunk, trying to pull a wounded shoot clear.

"Leave it," Eirwen called without turning. "Keep your head beneath the bank until his next arrow lands."

The tender lowered his hook, and the bowman’s sight settled on the root that shielded their abandoned position.

Eirwen remained perfectly calm, listening to the ambient air currents without allowing the taunt to bait her into premature release.

’He wants me to trigger The Forest Remembers on a single skirmish, exhausting our national answer before the true battle begins!’

She strung her recurve behind the root, then nocked an ordinary goose-feather shaft without channeling any divine green mana.

Instead of hiding behind the thick root as the sniper expected, she kicked off the bark and vaulted upward into the willow canopy.

She shifted her elevation with fluid grace, landing upon a broad overhead bough twenty feet higher than her previous position.

The choir bowman adjusted his mechanical sight downward, anticipating her emergence from behind the ground-level barrier.

He released his stored shot with a concussive twang, sending a barbed projectile tearing directly into the empty root bastion below.

At the exact instant his bow limbs rebounded forward, Eirwen drew her string to her cheekbone from her elevated perch.

"Wrong angle, sniper," she whispered, releasing her arrow with surgical precision.

Her shaft flashed through the mist like a streak of lightning, punching through the exposed draw mechanism of his mechanical weapon.

The shattered pulleys snapped with violent recoil, driving broken bronze springs directly into the bowman’s shoulder and neck.

The corrupted sniper shrieked in agony, losing his footing on the slick moss and tumbling down the rocky slope into the brambles.

He struck the base of the ridge with a heavy thud, gasping for breath as his corrupted core sputtered and went dark.

Eirwen dropped lightly from the canopy, landing beside the defeated archer with her bow lowered and her expression composed.

The arborists emerged from the drainage trench, staring at the fallen sniper in wide-eyed amazement before hurrying over.

"You took him down without expending your domain reserve!" the young tender gasped, trembling with profound relief.

"A master archer uses elevation and timing before resorting to massive magical expenditure," she replied with a gentle smile.

"Save your awe for the trees, lads... we have three living conduits to inspect and stabilize before midday."

Together with the tenders, she spent the next three hours examining the living root filaments that wove through the grove.

They cleared the choking fungal moss, watered the dormant taproots with fresh spring water, and secured the southern conduit beds.

The young tender applied soothing green sap paste over the scarred bark, binding the exposed fractures with strips of damp burlap.

The living network responded to their care, pulsing with a faint, steady heartbeat that promised future strength for the coming trials.

The elder pressed a small listening cup against the first mother root while the youngest tender tapped the southern connection farther downslope.

A faint answering pulse reached the cup, but the northern graft returned only a dull scrape when they tried it again.

"One road speaks as far as the next living stand," the elder said, offering Eirwen the cup. "The damaged branch is still silent."

Eirwen listened herself, then marked the working route on the foundry map without drawing a line across the silent section.

"Carry that mark to the other tenders," she told the youngest arborist. "No one sends a command through the dead branch."

"The full release waits until every living connection can bear its part."

"These three beds will hold," the elder arborist declared, wiping dirt from his hands with a satisfied grin.

"When you need to channel your domain, Commander, this grove will carry your voice without snapping under the strain."

As they finished binding the final root graft, an outrider scout arrived on a lathered horse, dismounting in a hurry.

"Urgent word from the western river crossing!" the rider reported breathlessly, saluting with clenched fist.

"The regular bridge keeper at the Sixth supply bridge vanished overnight, and an unauthorized replacement crew seized the crossing!"

"Did they alter the planking?" the elven ranger asked, her eyes narrowing with sharp tactical suspicion.

"Commander Hans suspects sabotage... he is marching toward the bridge with a vanguard detachment right now!"

"That crossing carries every grain wagon and medical crate between the capital and the front lines," she murmured, considering the implications.

"If the bridge collapses, our entire eastern campaign will grind to a halt before we reach the viaduct." ℯℯ𝑙.

"Then we must ensure the supply line holds," she stated with cold resolve, slinging her bow across her shoulder.

"Tell Commander Hans that the southern grove is secure, and that our scouts are monitoring the river bluffs. The northern graft still needs work."

The outrider mounted his horse and wheeled around, galloping back down the dirt path to relay her message to the command column.

Eirwen checked the tension on her bowstring, ensuring the horn nocks were firmly seated before strapping her quiver to her saddle.

Earth viewers pointed out the unspent forest domain while Eirwen’s horse carried her toward the endangered supply bridge.

[ Seoul_Tactician: "Eirwen outsmarting a sniper with pure elevation and zero mana waste, that is peak elven archery!" ]

[ StarlightScholar: "She kept her forest domain ready while the front was still shifting. Good call!" ]

[ IronVanguard: "Hans is taking the bridge next! Commander Hans with one arm is about to show everyone how a true veteran fights!" ]

"Keep the southern roots watered until the sap rises again," she told the arborists before leading her horse away from the grove.

The elder hung the failed-root marker beside his tools, making sure the next shift would not mistake it for a repaired channel.