Chapter 241: Treant Nest

The nearest Treant lunged. Its tendrils shot forward like spears. Kaito dodged, his sword cutting through two of them. The tendrils regrew instantly. He cut again. They regrew again.

Arthur charged a second Treant, his sword blazing. He cut deep into its chest. The bark split. A pale core glowed inside. He thrust his blade into it. The Treant shuddered and collapsed.

"The core! Aim for the core!"

Elise froze a third Treant’s tendrils. The Frost Golem slammed its fists into its chest, cracking the bark. Nathan fired a Focus Shot into the crack. The core shattered. The Treant fell.

Garrett and Red charged a fourth. Red’s horns caught its tendrils. Garrett’s Volcan erupted against its chest. The bark cracked. Another Focus Shot from Nathan finished it.

Amara’s spirits wrapped around a fifth Treant, holding it still. Long Wei’s fists shattered its chest. Han Seo-jun’s daggers found the core. It collapsed.

The sixth Treant fled into the canopy.

The battle was over.

---

Nathan cut the cocoons open. Kwame, Zara, and Yuki fell free, gasping for air. They were bruised and scratched, but alive.

"Can you walk?" Nathan asked.

Kwame nodded. Zara nodded. Yuki picked up her dagger from the branch and nodded.

The raid party gathered on the thick branch. They were battered. The Southern Republic mage, the Northern Coalition tank, and the Eastern Dominion swordswoman were still missing—taken deeper into the canopy.

"We need to keep moving," Arthur said. "Before they take more."

Nathan looked up. The canopy stretched higher, the silver leaves glowing brighter. Somewhere above, the Treants had their nest.

"Then I guess we gotta go up."

---

The raid party climbed.

The silver branches grew thicker as they ascended, forming natural pathways through the canopy. The leaves glowed brighter here, casting pale light across the bark. The air was thin and cold.

Nathan moved near the front, Moonlight in his grip. His party was spread out behind him—Garrett and Red, Dillon and Cloudy, Elise and the Frost Golem, Smithy. Amara and her remaining teammates followed. Kaito and his team. Arthur. Long Wei. Han Seo-jun.

The fleeing Treant was somewhere ahead. Nathan could see its tracks in the bark—deep gouges where its tendrils had dragged across the wood.

"It’s heading for the nest," Smithy said.

Nathan nodded. "Then that’s where we’re going."

---

The nest was a tree.

But not like the others. It was massive—so wide that its trunk filled the entire canopy. Its branches stretched in every direction, interlocking with the surrounding trees. Its leaves glowed with a brilliant silver light, bright enough to illuminate the whole canopy.

And its branches were covered in cocoons.

Dozens of them. Thorny pods of silver vine, each one the size of a human body. Some were still. Some moved.

Nathan stopped on a branch. He stared at the cocoons. Then at the faces he could see through the translucent vines.

These weren’t the civilians they’d left behind. These weren’t the lesser Climbers. He didn’t recognize any of them.

"Who are they?" Dillon asked.

Smithy moved closer to a cocoon. He studied the person inside—a woman in civilian clothes, her face pale, her eyes closed. "She’s not from our group."

"What?"

"None of them are." Smithy pointed at another cocoon. A man in the uniform of a stadium vendor. Another cocoon. A child. Another. A Climber from a nation that hadn’t even competed in the finals. "They’re strays. People who were absorbed by the Tower when it formed but appeared in different locations."

Arthur’s jaw tightened. "So there are more of us. Scattered across the Tower."

"The entire stadium was pulled in," Smithy said. "Tens of thousands of people. We only found the ones who landed near us. The rest..." He gestured at the cocoons. "The rest are scattered. Some of them are here. Some are deeper. Some might already be dead."

Nathan looked at the nest. Dozens of cocoons. Dozens of captives. People who had been trapped here since the Tower formed, slowly being consumed.

"We need to clear this Tower faster," he said. "Every hour we waste, more people die."

Kaito stepped forward. "Then we don’t waste time. We find the Treant boss. We kill it. We move to the next layer."

---

Nathan analyzed with Hunter’s Insight. The Treants were numerous—at least thirty. Their cores were buried deep in their chests, protected by thick bark. They regenerated quickly. They were coordinated, their tendrils moving in patterns that covered every approach.

"The cores are the key," Arthur said. "But there are too many. We can’t get close enough to strike them all."

"We don’t need to strike them all," Nathan said. "We need to find the boss. The one commanding them."

Smithy pointed at the center of the nest. "There. The largest tree. The Treants are all connected to it."

Nathan looked. The central tree was massive—larger than the others, its bark darker, its leaves brighter. Its trunk pulsed with a slow rhythm. A heartbeat.

"The boss is inside," Nathan said. "Kill it, and the rest fall."

"We need to cut a path," Arthur said.

"I’ll lead the diversion," Kaito said. His sword was already drawn. "The Eastern Dominion will hold the Treants’ attention. The rest of you go for the boss."

"I’ll go with you," Arthur said. "The Northern Coalition will assist."

"The Southern Republic will provide cover fire," Han Seo-jun said.

"The Western Federation will guard the rear," Long Wei said.

"The Free Territories will support with spirits," Amara said.

"The Central Federation will cut through to the boss," Nathan said. "We end this now."

---

Arthur charged first.

His sword blazed with golden light. He cut through the nearest Treant, his blade carving deep into its bark. The creature’s tendrils lashed out. He parried them, dodged, cut again. The other Treants turned toward him.

Kaito joined him, his blade flashing. Together they carved a path through the swarm, drawing the Treants’ attention away from the center.

Nathan’s party moved.

Elise froze the vines. The Frost Golem cleared the branches. Garrett and Red crushed everything in their path. Dillon and Cloudy provided air support. Smithy’s Void Eel disrupted the Treants’ coordination. Ororo’s healing kept everyone standing.

Nathan fired Starfall Barrage into the swarm. The arrows rained down, severing tendrils, cracking bark. Amara’s spirits wrapped around the Treants, slowing them.

The path to the central tree was clear.

---

Nathan reached the trunk. The bark was cold and smooth. The heartbeat was louder here—a deep, pulsing rhythm that shook the branch beneath his feet.

"Everyone ready?" he asked.

Garrett nodded. Dillon nodded. Elise nodded. Smithy nodded. Amara nodded.

Mirko, Kuro, Shiro, and Ororo shifted to humanoid form. Their weapons were drawn.

Nathan raised Moonlight.

"We go in. We kill the boss. We move on."

He stepped through the opening in the trunk.

The others followed.