Grass and Fire

"Is that the one?"

"Death almighty! That's a lot of them!"

"Ssh! Keep your voice down, my father said that the Uhndak has a weird nature to somehow able to detect enemies. We can't ruin our surprise advantage."

The whole place is a giant forest, so we decided to not travel by our dragon comrades. Instead, we asked them to borrow themselves and follow us from under the solid earth and only help when needed.

Well to be fair, Althea can just be there forever and heal us without ever needing to show up.

After a long walk through the jungle from the Exhibit 1 gate, we finally encounter a place that seemed to look like a village or an outpost. Either way, it's quite massive.

The place was protected by palisades just like the one we found on Kendang. However, there's a lot of vegetation grown on those walls as if they are either ancient or made by the Sarma.

"How are we going to eradicate 7 of those… villages? If they're as strong as the one we found on the savannah, 1 day wouldn't be enough!"

Hada has some good points. We can already see hundreds of them just by being on the outside of the walls. There are just too many of them.

"Don't worry, I have a plan."

It's maybe still more than an hour left until the perfect noon arrives. Although the Sun is already high up in the sky, sitting comfortably in her throne, ready to witness what I'm about to offer for her eyes to see.

And my plan started… with a spark.

"Oy, apa tuh lek!? (Bro, what's that!?)"

The Uhndaks' attention was pulled away by the flickering orange light from the side of their so-called village, playing cheerfully on a tree bark until it goes…

*Boom!*

A huge explosion occurred, turning the trees into nothing but burning charcoals. As it was a wildfire, it spread violently from one tree to another, until they circle the whole village with walls of flame, blatantly saying, "There's no place to escape."

As fragile as they are, some of the trees began to fall into the village palisades, infecting them with the hotness of a blazing forest fire. It was a sight to behold, I could hear their hysteric scream serenade the air along with the melody of cracking woods.

[Phoenix Arts]

[4th Level]

"(Phoenix Dance: Act I)"

"Ampiieak…"

An Orange shaded dome slowly widens itself and covers the entire place under its aura. The whole area was turned into a giant stage for Anna and her dances. In it, fiery feathers rained upon the earth, healing its allies, burning its foes.

She bestowed the team with a phoenix blanket, giving us warmth and protection against the raging fire. As someone who was born under the mainlines of Genka, both Anna and I are blessed by the bird of fire, allowing us to use phoenix energy to make magic. Though this power is a lot denser in Vasurha.

And as a female who excels in the support role, Anna can use its power to heal and protect her ally with flame immunity. Now the other 6 members of our team can safely walk inside this forest fire with ease.

"Relax Falisha, the fire won't burn you."

Yet the fear of it, might not so easily perish.

Even if we're safe from its burning sensation, the forest fire also devours something essential for us to survive inside it. Oxygen.

Luckily, we have someone with the power of the sap of life with us. Althea spawns a bunch of floral stones which continuously convert carbon dioxide created by the fire into oxygen for us to breathe. I don't know how she did it, but it's simply amazing.

"Let's go! Make sure no one survives!"

I lead the team into storming the village, to kill all the Uhndaks which are now in a state of panic.

Like all plants, Uhndak also has the ability to photosynthesize. Just letting the wildfire do the job might not be a wise thing to do since they have a chance to survive by not dying from out of breath.

I don't know why, but the burning trees here in Kaput island didn't create a thick smoke that'll block the sun from helping with their photosynthesize. We need to manually finish the job.

"Through here!"

We move through the hole on their palisades and quickly run inside to start hunting those Taanji.

I can see them running around senseless, screaming, crying for their lives. It was clearly something they didn't suspect to happen. If they're not such a pest, I might actually feel bad for them.

"Engage!"

We began our attack, initiated by fiery solar waves created by my [Santi] which shred and burn anything on their path. I don't know why, but the Uhndak here wear a lot of vegetation as their clothing, which makes them a highly flammable target.

Falisha summoned tens of her elementals, with each carrying a shield with them. Those armies of her started running around, charging at our enemies, while waves of ice energy kept on coming from their shield.

*Roar!*

As the chaos start rising, Revian burst out of the ground, sending earth flying all over the place, befalling Uhndaks and their building. His mouth started to glow, and like a dragon he is, furious breath hence pumping out, raining those poor Taanji with dragonic earth energy.

His breath slowly petrifies his enemies, and with his giant draconic shield, he shattered them like glasses.

Some of the Uhndak of course, fight back. But with Chiya continuously crippling them with her curse, also with Hazana's lightning flying all over the air to zap and paralyze them, these poor folks are extremely outmatched.

These Uhndaks were a lot weaker than the ones we encounter in the Savannah. Maybe even worst than those we fought in Kendang.

I guess their combat capability degrades along with the size of their number. Without any coordination and unity, they won't stand a chance against even the lowest ranking Guild member like us.

I'm starting to feel pretty confident. This mission might not be as hard as I thought it would be.