Heart of Oak

A low fog hung over the land, creating a warm glow in the morning summer sun. Deciduous trees swayed ever so gently in the breeze, as if stretching after a long slumber. One such tree stretched a little too much. A series of cracks reverberated around him and he snapped to attention. His eyes darted around, looking for the source of the noise. The morning cacophony of birds sang their calls but no bird would make that egregious crackling sound. The treant reached out towards the sky and the cracking sound reoccurred.

His brown eyes stared at the weirdly jointed limb of his tree-like branches. His elbow had cracked. A very confused stare was quickly replaced by shock and surprise as he scanned the rest of his tree-like body. Much to his own dismay, he was, without a shadow of a doubt, a living, sentient treant.

It was very early in the morning, just a few minutes past sunrise and the fog made the land cool and damp, casting a misty haze like a sheet of ground webbing. He stepped out of his resting spot, ripping up the soils as he moved his stiff legs. The fog obscured any sense of direction, thus, he simply continued forward. A few minutes of walking brought the treant to the edge of a lake where the fog was the thickest. He knelt down and leaned in to take a drink from the freshwater.

Dripping into the water was a large leafy beard, made up of an amassed collection of garden variety ivy. He pressed his wooden lips to the water, fully submerging the beard and began to drink, from a thousand spots at once. The sensation spooked the treant and with a few scrambling steps, stared at the water. "What the-" the voice that came out of the tree was masculine, low and rumbly like distant thunder. "Think, what am I? Where am I? Who am I?"

It would be several hours before those questions would be answered. The midday sun finally burned off all the morning fog, even the densest parts that hung low over the lake. A reflection shined back at him, a reflection of a well aged oak tree with a build large enough to count the rings accurately. Staring at his reflection brought back a flash of memories, still images of scenes from years past. He saw faint silhouettes of companions of different sizes and shapes. He saw no faces, like dreamscape people. Their names came to mind however, at least some of them did.

"Khar!" He called out. "I require you, owl-kin, to be my eyes in the skies."

A series of heavy wing flaps echoed above him then came a heavy thump behind him as the snow owl landed on the ground. He spoke with formalities, acknowledging the treant as some figure of authority. "At your service, my liege."

The treant turned about and stood up. He towered over the snow owl, casting a shadow over him. Despite this, he was unwavering with his head bowed in respect. "Rise, Khar. I have some questions for you."

The snow owl raised his head. "Ask away."

There was a moment of hesitation before the treant asked his question. "Who am I? What am I?"

The question threw Khar through a bit of a mental loop. Why was his master asking for details about himself? Surely, the all-powerful deity knew? "You are Oakengrove, father of the forest. You are a tree spirit, often referred to as a treant or dryad for simplicity sake. Do you not remember?"

Oakengrove shook his head. "My memory is hazy, like I'm still trapped in a dreamlike trance. I remembered your name, your general appearance even, but I could not remember your face. Now that I see you before me, I recognize you like an old friend."

The snow owl quietly nodded. "Do you remember the rest of us?"

"I recall a few others, a centaur of notable build, a winged man no larger than a dwarf, a green dwarf, and a shapeless blue blob," the treant responded. "I cannot give a more in depth description for that is all which my mind's eye sees."

Khar pressed his winged hand to the underside of his beak and thought for a moment. "The centaur is Kateda, a staunch warrior of chestnut coloring, a voice of reason and yet, fierce. The green dwarf is actually a goblin. Ciez is his name and he's one stubborn little man. Him and the winged dwarf behave like squabbling brothers. The winged dwarf is Cedrik, a fae with precision unmatched. The blue blob is Saea. She's a slime, the first one of us you rescued. We know not her story of how you and she met, but she's your right hand with electric passion."

Oak then called out their names, "Kateda! Ciez, Cedrik, and Saea! I beckon thee to my side once more!"

Stepping out from behind trees, the group of four made themselves known with wide smiles and a gleeful gaze to see him again. Saea was a slime, shapeless and glowed an awe-inspiring blue-green hue and hastily bounced over to the treant. Her body contorted and congealed into a more humanoid shape, resembling that of a physically fit human or elf, although the facial features were still somewhat absent. "Master!" She called out excitedly, "It's good to see you again."

Oakengrove tilted his head in curiosity, "How long has it been?"

Kateda spoke up, "It feels like years, unless you got a calendar handy."

Ciez and Cedrik both were quiet as they approached him.

Oakengrove threw his gaze back towards the sky, clear and blue above with no clouds in sight. "Khar, take flight and survey our landscape, I want to know what's around us."

The snow owl snapped to attention, nodded, and took flight.

The treant looked back towards the lake. "I think we'll set up shop here, we have much that needs to be done and so little time to do it."

Ciez walked up to the water and poked his spear into it. "What do you think is out there?"

Oakengrove let out a weighted sigh, "I can only begin to guess but whatever is out there, there is no guarantee it is friendly nor will stay friendly the longer we are present. We need a home where food is abundant and the landscape is defensible. The lake is large enough to house fish and the surrounding forest provides both resources needed for any future projects as well as a hiding ground for us."

Ciez turned to Kateda, "Will those hatchets even cut down a tree?"

Kateda shrugged her shoulders, "That's not what they're built for, but given enough time, yes."

Oakengrove shook his head, "No need to chop down the forest." He turned to face the forest and raised his arms and began to chant in a strange language. The others recognized it as the language of the arcane, that of magic casters. It was a long-winded spell and sprouting from the ground at the edge of the forest burst forth a massive oak tree nearly a hundred feet in diameter and almost a mile tall. It grew into its size as if time simply just passed several millennia in a handful of seconds. The massive tree came with an overarching canopy that spanned across a notable part of the lake and the surrounding forest, casting a thick shade over the area. Hundreds of thick branches hung at different levels creating a series of flat shelves.

A large doorway was grown into the base of the tree and revealed its hollowed out interior. Oakengrove let out a heavy exhaustive sigh and fell to his knees. Casting the spell to grow a tree of that proportion zapped almost all of his energy out of him. He gave a satisfied smirk as he stared at the creation. "Good to know I can cast magic."

Saea positioned herself behind him, catching him in his fall and acting like a gelatin bed. "Master! You shouldn't be casting spells that strong yet."

Oakengrove leaned into the slime's grasp, "Perhaps, but now we have ourselves a home, rather, the foundation for one." He sat up with her assistance. "I do believe I have one more name who might be of considerable use to us." He tossed another glance towards the forest. "Frida, dragoness with the artisan's hammer, come build us a home."

Stepping out into view was a blue humanoid dragon dressed in a ragged and patched up baggy jumper which barely covered her well toned arms. Around her waist was a tool belt of sorts bearing a small collection of carpenter tools. She held a sledge hammer over her shoulder and kicked out her hip to the side, "You called?" She spoke with a more breathy voice.

"Frida," Oakengrove gestured to the gianormous tree. "This tree shall be our home and this forest, our territory. Utilize all that it offers to build all of us a place that we can comfortably call home."

With a loud thud, Frida's sledgehammer hit a rock on the ground, shattering it. "With what?!" Frida looked behind her at the dense forest. "I can't knock down whole old-growth trees with a weighted hammer. For all that is holy, please tell me you have some other means to obtain materials."

Oakengrove shook his head. "As of right now, no. Khar is scouting the area. I will aid you in gathering materials." He then turned to the other three. "Ciez, Cedrik, Kateda, I need you three to go find us some food.

A few miles south of the forest was a wide open plains where bison roamed freely. Cedrik stood beside Ciez, notching an arrow into his bow. "I cannot wait to feast on one of these. It looks so meaty."

Ciez chuckled. "You sound like me when you say that. But I doubt your arrow is enough to fell one of those."

Kateda rolled her eyes. "And how exactly are we carrying that back to the tree?"

"Surely you have the strength for it." Cedrik said.

"Pfft." Kateda snorted. "I'm half the size of that thing. Probably weighs an actual tonne."

"You got axes, we'll just chop it into carryable chunks."

"And bleed the thing all over the place? C'mon Cedrik, you can't be this dumb."

"I'm hungry okay. It sounded like a good idea in my head."

"I say we hunt something smaller and come back for the bison when we have a cart."

Ciez groaned. "But what else is there to hunt around here? I don't exactly see deer or meese."

"Moose." Cedrik corrected him. "The plural of moose is also moose."

"Nope, it's meese."

"Ciez, I will strangle you."

"Oh no, tiny fairy boy in tights is gonna top this oh so weak goblin~" Ciez said, pretending to be a damsel in distress.

Cedrik dropped his bow and turned around, walking away silently. Cedrik was only a little shorter than Ciez, roughly three and a half feet tall. Ciez was four feet and two inches.

"Ciez!" Kateda reprimanded him. "Play nice will you, we're supposed to be hunting, not humiliating each other."

"I'm just fooling around, Kat. Harmless fun is all."

Then from above, a flying foot dunked on the green goblin. In an instant, his head was in the dirt, dazed.

"Damn right I'm gonna wreck you." The fae said, hovering over the stunned goblin.

The commotion however attracted the attention of the bison they were eyeing earlier. It stared them down, seemingly in debate with itself if it should charge.

"Shit. Ciez, grab your spear, now!" Kateda shouted.

The bison put one hoof forward, then another and it was off, careening down the field, head down and horns forward.

Ciez pushed himself up and grabbed his spear. "Alright big boy, impale yourself onto my pointy stick!"

Cedrik swooped in, grabbed his bow and notched an arrow, drawing it tight. The arrow sailed and struck the nose of the beast, causing it to wave its head around in pain.

Ciez charged forward and lunged. The spear punctured through the bison's face and skull, striking it dead instantly. However its momentum was enough to break the spear and launch Ciez backwards.

The body of the furry beast tumbled and rolled right over the goblin, flattening him into the dirt. It came to a stop some dozen feet behind them, lifeless. Ciez held his head and groaned in agony. "Owww."

Kateda walked up to the dead bison and lodged an ax into its neck, breaking its spine, just in case. "I guess this is dinner then. Cedrik, head back to the tree and tell Oakengrove to give us a hand with this.

Back at the home tree, as it was called by Oakengrove himself, Frida and Saea went to work on gathering supplies necessary to create small apartments on the upper branches. Access topside was made easy through the central spiral, albeit a lengthy and time consuming journey as it was something of one giant ramp. Frida was making do with her wood hammer and a chisel she'd fashioned herself out of a piece of rock. The tools she'd arrived with were damaged or ruined within a very short amount of time, largely trying to do things that they were not meant to do.

Oakengrove and Saea were outside, finding new and creative ways to chop down trees and convert them into usable materials. Oakengrove had begun to relearn his magic, specifically his attack spells. From his hands, each cast unleashed a volley of razor sharp leaves which chipped away at the trees, or lashed the tree in thorny vines, allowing him to saw through it after a few recasts. Saea had been tasked with digesting the bark and unusable branches so that the log itself could be used for structural walls. In a span of a few hours, two whole trees had been cut down and made usable. The process was long and tiring, leaving Saea an overly fattened blob of half-digested sludge.

When Ciez came running, the treant stopped what he was doing. "Ciez? What's got you running back here?"

Ciez slowed to a walk to catch his breath, "Need help... carrying... bison."

"Bison? You lot killed a whole bison?" Oakengrove sounded surprised and impressed by the feat.

Ciez took several long and deep breaths. "We were trying to track down deer but we found a herd of bison instead not too far south of here. There's an open field with like a hundred of them. Kateda said you might be able to carry it."

Oakengrove bobbed his head back and forth as he tried to math it out in his head. "Worth a try. Lead the way."

Saea was left behind to digest what she'd consumed off the trees but instead regurgitated the remains onto the forest floor, reducing her volume back to normal. She decided she'd pay a visit to Frida and see how it was going.

Frida however wasn't even topside in the upper canopy. She was on the main floor of the tree attempting to set up a workshop. It looked crude as it was made with rocks and poorly cut sections of wood and she was growing more frustrated at trying to use it. "Make a home but don't give me the tools I need to do it." She grumbled aloud.

Saea popped into her more humanoid form and approached her from behind. "Frida," she garbled out the name, which spooked Frida.

Friad clambered up onto the working table and pointed a chipped chisel at the slime girl. "Ah for fucks sake Saea, don't sneak up on me like that!"

The slime girl tensed up at the apparently disgruntled dragon. "Apologies, I just came to check in on you."

"You aint getting much of an update from me. I'm trying to do the impossible with no long-term tooling. I don't have a proper workshop to even make furniture, much less build a whole ass tree house, or multiple in this case." Frida made herself comfortable on the distorted wood block. "Where's Oak?"

"Out with Ciez and the others, apparently they killed a bison." Saea responded.

"Well, that's dinner for the next few days at least." Frida groaned and leaned against the wall. "With any luck, Khar will find us a village where I can source stuff from."

As if on cue, the snow owl flew into the tree with a loud hearty thunk. Frida jumped to her feet and rushed over to the main door, where the big bird was now resting on the ground in pain. "We don't even have glass and you still manage to hit the wall."

Khar shook his head and looked up at the six-foot dragoness above him. "I misjudged the doorway."

"How?!" Frida's eyes widened as she gestured to the Oakengrove-sized hole in the tree's side. "How do you miss an entryway this frickin' big?"

"Flying too fast." Khar sat upright, his head still rattled from impact. "Where's Oakengrove? I have good news for him."

"Not here, why? What did you find?" Frida was beginning to hope for the best.

"A village just east of here, tucked away in a bowl-like valley between some mountains. Mostly beastmen too." Khar went into some detail about the village. "Looks like a farming town of some sort, maybe a hundred residents at most. Whole thing is built with stone and thatch and littered with goat trails leaving the place."

"How far west?" Frida seemed excited to go visit.

"A few hours by foot"

When Oakengrove returned with the bison, he was greeted by Khar's excitement. Khar gave him a detailed explanation of the land's layout. To the west was the open ocean with a large protected bay. To the north and south were open fields where grazing cattle roamed free. The east rolled with lumpy hills and sparse forests. For now at least, they were all alone.

When night fell, the stars became glitter in the silken black sky. The moon shone brightly white, the centerpiece in a tapestry of celestial beauty. Oakengrove was quietly meditating outside where the noise of the day's feast couldn't reach him. It was only him, the night sky, and the fireflies.

"I look to you," He raised his wooden head and spoke in a low tone. "I know not who you are, what we used to be. I know only that there was once something between us, reciprocal or not, I can only hope. I see you, standing high above me in that dazzling radiance. I respect your majesty but I ask of you, please give me my memories."

He sat there for several minutes in silence, wondering if the moon would actually speak to him like any other living creature. The minutes dragged on, slow and eerily quiet. He mapped out the creases on the moon's surface in his mind, as if trying to remember the features on a person's face. "I seek your comfort, your voice. Something is missing from me and I know you're the only one who could fix it. I don't know what I was, but I know that there was a me before today and the me of today wishes only for the best life for himself and his companions."

Saea had stepped away from the party to get a drink from the lake. Her walk over was interrupted when she heard his voice. Taking cover behind a tree, she leaned out and watched him. He was mumbling to himself. Her gaze lowered and then shifted back towards the night sky. She knew better. He wasn't talking to himself, he was talking to the moon. She lingered behind the tree, listening in on his conversation.

Oakengrove was silent for several more minutes. "Madame Moon, I ask of thee, show me a sign that you're listening, show me a glimpse of my past." For a moment, his whole body tensed up, locking him rigidly upright.

The slime girl watched with concern drawn upon her face. However, before she could rush to him, a second entity sprouted from the ground beside him. A small creature, no larger than a young boar, emerged from the ground beside him. The entity was shaped like a mushroom, pale as the moon with lanky arms. "A Mycel?" Saea whispered the thought aloud.

The small creature was a Mycel, a sort of mushroom creature of the same family as dryads and treants. It meekly walked up to Oakengrove's rigid body and placed a hand delicately on his arms that were resting at his side. As if by magics unknown to her, she watched Oakengrove's body go limber again as he looked down towards this small creature. With an open hand, he let the mushroom climb aboard and held it in front of him.

Oakengrove smiled at the sight of this pasty white Mycel. It was a featureless mushroom with a simple white body and a humble cap. It stared back at him with its gray eyes. "An enoki mushroom. A gift from the moon perhaps?" He mumbled, partially to himself and partially to the mushroom in question to which it did not respond. Oakengrove looked back towards the night sky and smiled widely at the moon. "I knew you'd listen to me. I'll cherish this gift."

Saea continued to watch from her hiding spot as Oakengrove broke off a piece of his bark skin and through his own magic, reshaped it into a cone and placed it upon the mushroom's cap. "A gift from me to you, my Enoki."