Chapter 7: Council

The Great Tree existed many centuries before the elves of the settlement built their city around it. Back then, it didn’t have its hollow in the center. The wood elves would never dare carve into the tree themselves, but from the great oak’s process of growth the space formed naturally.

Some of the civilization considered the hollow a blessing of nature gods or powerful fae, others were not so sure. But, in any case, the wide and sacred space was transformed into into the council’s chamber. A large round table sat at its center, and one wooden chair stood taller than the rest. It, unlike the others, was vacant. It belonged to Council Lead Beimenor, who stood presently side by side with the city guard’s lead.

The male elf stood almost as tall as Qinala. It was rare for an elf to be old enough to show a single wrinkle, yet the silver-haired elf had at least four on his grim countenance. Qinala didn’t seem any cheerier herself. Guards surrounded them with an awful mix of nervousness and horror manifested as slight trembles in their slender legs.

They looked towards Bula as she grinned in the tree’s direction, all while gleefully destroying homes and terrorizing the populace in the process. Old trees longed cares for and loved by the elves fell over in droves. The male elf watched on, forlorn at the losses thus far.

“Are you sure we can handle this?”, said Beimenor. He looked dead ahead, but the only one he could be speaking to was Qinala.

“I’m not about to not try.”, said the elven warrior.

“I worry the ballista was a mistake. Perhaps there was another way.”

“When the emergency vote was cast today, it was unanimous.”

“Right enough, Qinala, but it is a rather somber affair to see all this devastation and death.”

Before the two continued, Bula suddenly paused before rushing right at the tree. Her advance was steady thus far, and the thoom of her footfalls was something the elves had just gotten used to. Now, those bare green feet pounded into the ground as the giant troll sprinted fast in their direction.

“Get back to the hollow!”, said Qinala.

Beimenor retreated there without a word to stand among the others already in that room.

“Archers, ready!”, shouted the guard leader. The bow-wielding men and women around her pulled arrows from their quiver and dipped the tips into wood buckets filled with a strange purple fluid. The wooden arrowheads now sizzled.

“Fire!”, said Qinala and the guards obeyed. A volley of acid-tipped arrows soared through the sky towards Bula. Even with the unsteady footing from the troll’s giant steps, the target was big enough, and the elves skilled enough, to hit their mark.

Bula saw it coming and shielded her body with her arms. The projectiles pierced the outermost layer of her skin, which sizzled like the arrow tips. Many guards, Qinala included, smirked in a mix of pride of hope. That was quickly dashed as the tiny wounds healed fast on the giant’s skin.

There were rumors that acid could kill a troll, but that seemed false now. At the very least, it was with the quantity of the wood-safe concoction they had on hand. It was also the guards’ last plan. The guards looked to Qinala for orders, and one asked directly.

“Orders?”, said the guard.

Qinala thought, stunned in a rare moment for her. The troll was faster than they thought. There wouldn’t be enough time for another volley. She clutched the handle of the glaive and dug her feet into the wood of the hollow-jutting fortification platform.

“Brace yourselves!”, she shouted.

Guards covered not just the platform, but every structure on the Great Tree as a whole. There were a few homes attached to the giant tree, and to live there was a great privilege and honor. The roofs were used as makeshift platforms for some of the archers, who found their footholds getting more unsteady as Bula’s footsteps grew closer.

Of course, the wide sprawling roots of the tree were guarded as well, as it’s there one could reach the walkways leading up. The idea was for guards there to poke or shoot at her toes, but that idea clearly fell through as did the acid arrow assault. So, those elves were simply the first to squish as Bula advanced at a rapid pace.

With her elbow raised, the giant green troll leapt up into the air and *slammed* right into the great tree’s front. The entire plant shook, and elves fell in droves from the pathways. The shaking alone took care of that, but a good deal also collapsed from the vibrations cascading through the tree or, more simply, breaking against Bula’s body. Dozens of defenders practically burst into red juice this way.

The platform where Qinala rested crushed against the very front of Bula’s arm. The giant troll had crouched to line that target up with the hard bend of her elbow. The log-made platform was sturdy though, and wasn’t entirely broken.

Though many of the guards there fell, Qinala had moved back with the tip of her glaive dug into some wood footing beneath her. In this way, she held her position better than the others.

As the tree shook, Bula loomed back to her full height, and the platform in front of the hollow was level to just below her chest. She arced her arm back for a punch aimed square at the hollow.

“Bula!!!”, shouted Qinala at the top of her lungs. “I challenge you to one on one combat.”

Those inside the hollow gasped. It was a fools errand. Did she mean to simply stall the giant? In any case, like many acts of a warrior like Qinala, it seemed brave as it was foolish.

But, it did seem to get Bula’s attention and halt her punch. Her laughter came out as a roaring bellow. After a few seconds of the ear rocking mirth, she shrugged.

“Sure.”, said Bula. “Do your worst~”

Qinala’s lips stretched back, teeth bared, and glaive gripped. Her naked feet pattered against the rickety platform below. At the very edge, she leapt into the sky towards the monolithic foe.

From within the hollow of the Great Tree, many of the council members crept forward. They unhuddled from beneath their chairs, and stood closer to the chamber’s entrance. Among those few was a curious Beimenor with a silver-haired elf woman by his side. There, they watched, and they weren’t the only ones.

Bula herself seemed to just take the attack: observe it. Qinala moved quick, but the giant troll didn’t even attempt to bat the elven guard out of the way. She didn’t even move to dodge. The giant green woman had a soft smile on her face as the elf’s glaive pointed at her skin. That smile only slightly twitched as the glaive sliced into the green flesh.

Qinala’s battle-cry continued. The guard woman had nothing but disgust and anger towards Bula, and she poured it all into the attack. She had spun the glaive so as to pierce the troll’s flesh from above: something like a diving attack.

The blade of the glaive stuck into flesh a bit below Bula’s chest. Beneath the overhang of one of the troll’s tits, she gripped her toes into the green skin and dug the weapon deeper. She twisted it side to side to widen the wound. Curiously, not much blood came out, and what did was a reddish-brown liquid with an odd feeling to it.

Nonetheless, the deepness of the wound pleased the elf. A bit of the troll’s skin sort of flapped forward, making a pocket of sorts. Qinala hadn’t thought to do damage like that so easily. A bit of jubilation leaked into the tone of her battle cry, which still trailed on.

Then, without so much as a word, Bula reached down with her finger. Qinala’s expression shifted to shock as that digit pressed at her back and pushed her right into the wound.

The guard-elf had ceased her battle-cry.

--==--==--==--

I waited a bit for the elf warrior to say something. Maybe “What?” or “Stop!” or “Why?”, but that never came. She seemed a tad too confused by what I was doing. It wasn’t until her legs slid into that fresh wound that she even started to fuss.

So, I spoke first.

“That was your attack huh? I hardly even felt it. My body would have no issue healing a wound three-times as deep.”

I pushed her in a tad more. With her weapon, she had cut a sort of half-oval-line into my abdomen just below my left breast. The very left and right edges of the wound were already pulling themselves back together, healing.

“That’s the thing about us trolls, we’re great at recovering from injuries. I bet you thought those acid arrows of yours might’ve worked, but even fire’s something I can handle with enough time. You could’ve hit my heart with that glaive of yours and I’d probably be all better within a couple minutes tops.”

I chuckled, then continued.

“My body’s way of healing will have no problem finishing you off on its own.”

I moved my fingers towards the handle of that weapon and pulled it out. I flicked it away over my shoulder among the debris left in my wake. Then, I brought my finger back down and stuffed the elf’s head into the wound.

The woman tried to fidget out, but I could already feel my flesh starting to come back together. All of the onlooking elves seemed horrified by the sounds and sight of my wound closing on the guard elf.

I simply laughed again.

The guard elf kept quiet for awhile, out of pride no doubt. But her body betrayed her fear--or at least her panic. I could feel her squirming around in there, flailing with all her limbs. As my body healed, there was less and less room for her to move around.

An outline of her writhing body pressed from within at the sight of the wound. By then, my flesh had healed the superficial cut and the middle bits of the wound were coming back together. I could feel it: not painful, but certainly odd. It was worth it, though, as the elf woman at last started screaming.

A few cracks echoed from my flesh: her bones, certainly not any of mine. I turned towards the onlookers, including a few of those seemingly important elves cowering in the tree’s hollow. That outline of the guard woman started shrinking as the sounds of crunching and muffled screams increased. I still directed my chat towards my current ‘victim’ though.

“My body should have no issues dissolving you there either. I’m sure you’re thinking about why my ring...”

I moved my finger to my navel-near prison-hoop ring and flicked it up. It bopped gently against back my skin.

“...Doesn’t get dissolved or crushed like you are, elf-woman. That’s partially cause it’s poking out a bit. Once something’s fully in a wound of mine, my body is a lot more aggressive at seeing it as an intruding bit of dust or the like. Makes sense you’d get crushed by my body healing, right, since neither you or any of the rest of your kind pose more threat to me than a speck of dirt.”

I looked down at the shrinking outline now.

“Try not to scream too much in there, elf. You wouldn’t want to waste too much air.”

--==--==--==--

Qinala felt a lot of things. Her anger and disgust only increased as she the troll’s flesh squeezed at her kicking feet and healed around her body. She felt a tad humiliated, too, at being ‘tricked’ like this. Knowing a blow meant nothing, Bula just stood there and took it, only to use the wound against Qinala herself! A wound she was so proud to have inflicted served only to harm the guard captain now.

Qinala’s honor was tarnished, and it wasn’t long till the wound started squeezing around her. When Bula pushed her down into the wound, that’s when it really got dangerous.

Light was snuffed out as the flesh healed on the edges. The wound was sealed, with only the middle bits of severed tissue needing to heal. The healing process for the troll was as efficient as it was grotesque--and it was certainly painful for anything living stuck between.

The familiar texture of Bula’s blood was on Qinala’s skin, but there wasn’t that much of it oddly enough. It was hard to pay mind to it when the flesh around the wiry elf’s body was quite literally crushing her. With Bula’s taunts reaching her through the muffling flesh, Qinala felt her limbs and bones twist and crunch. There was more strength in Bula’s mending flesh than in all the guard-elf’s body, and that fact alone made her scream and struggle more.

The flesh was slick and unyielding as it tried to heal right through Qinala. If that wasn’t enough, Bula’s body started to dissolve the “irritation” in the wound that Qinala was. She felt some tingles on her skin from the troll’s blood, which she knew alchemists kept in vials for a reason. Yet, there was another fluid, less viscous and more slippery and slick. Qinala couldn’t see in the dark, but whatever color it was--assuming the fluid had one--it most certainly burned.

Corrosive liquid started sloughing and melting off her flesh. It sunk into the guard-woman's skin, making her entire body softer for the healing flesh to push through. Qinala had flesh pushing against her back and front. Both areas of the troll’s insides wanted to get back together. Bula’s body was gonna push through anything in the way to do so.

Sandwiched between the flesh, Qinala’s pain-ridden body was crushed as the two ‘halves’ of the wound came together. That finally crushed her skull, but her mushy body was further torn and smushed as the flesh pressed right through it. Within seconds after, the elf’s body was broken down and whatever nutrients could be salvaged were carried away by the troll’s blood to nourish Bula’s giant body.

--==--==--==--

I ran my fingers across where the wound used to be. The outline was entirely gone, having shrunken down before a horrified audience. Many of the little guards were so shaken as to stand there, mouth agape and stunned. Others worked up the senses to retreat. Not that they’d get anywhere far with what I planned to do.

“Mmm, an odd sensation that was, but pleasant in its own sense. Tell me ruling elves--as I’m sure it’s you in that tree hollow there--do you regret not giving into my demands? All your scouting and spying and fae cavorting, for what? To see your city end up as a meal and a mess of broken homes. Lot of good you did.”

I locked my fingers together and brought my arms up.

“Say goodbye to your precious tree, elves.”

I brought my arms down in a slam against the tree’s trunk. It was a big plant; its trunk was about as wide as my body while standing nearly twice as tall. Though above me, it was *far* from being above my strength. A few of the homes and guard posts attached to the tree fell from my one smack. I was putting my entire weight into my blows, and looking down I noticed some of the tree roots stir in result.

I hit the tree again, then again and again. I could only imagine the panic running through whatever ruling ‘council’ that elf guard mentioned earlier. It egged me on. Some structures still clung to the tree, and a few elves with them. I moved my hands towards those few standing wooden walkways and hovels. They crushed easily in my grip or were otherwise dashed away with swings of my arms. Elves tumbled hundreds of feet down to the ground, where my own peds would’ve likely taken care of them on the off-chance the fall didn’t.

Only the elves in the tree’s hollow still remained, and with a swipe of my palm knocking off the platform in front of me, they had no where to go. I resumed trying to fell the tree. A few more hits from my fists destabilized it more.

I stamped my feet into the dirt and home-debris by the tree’s roots. Palms to the tree, I pushed with all my might. Even I heard fully and well the roar of displaced dirt from the tilting oak. I grunted, teeth clenched, as I pushed with all my giant strength. I heard screams from the hollow within. That egged me on, too.

Dirt fell from some giant roots feeling sun for the first time in what must’ve been centuries. Still, the tree hold snug, even as it angled away from me. A few stubborn roots held it in place.

With the giant tree angled, I stopped pushing, took a step back, and placed my sole against its sloping bark. I pressed against for a bit of a test in its stability again, then gave it one big kick.

Bark flew out from under my sole. That seemed to do it, as the tree fell all the way back, timbering onto what bits of the elven city settled behind it.

As it fell to a resounding crash, I chuckled again. It was rare to find something that even remotely required my strength to thwart, so I was exhilarated. A grumble from my stomach also reminded me how the exertion piqued my hunger.

I walked towards the tree and straddled it with my feet on either side. I had to step over its jutting roots, from which globs of dirt size of boulders still fell.

Beneath me was the hollow. My ears twitched at the sounds of some pained whimpers, but seems like a bunch were still alive in there. My stomach grumbled again. I bent over and put my hand into the hollow.