Chapter 63 – "Roots and Resolve"
> "The deeper the root, the harder the fall. Unless you never fall."
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Scene 1 – "The Grove of Rot"
The Root Avatar walks between rows of Root-Fleshed like a gardener.
He hums. His fingers bleed sap. With each drop, a Root-Fleshed twitches to life.
Root Avatar: "The blade boy trains. Let him. His steps water my soil."
New Root-Fleshed begin to grow—spines along their backs. Some crawl. Some whisper.
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Scene 2 – "Six Hours to Survive"
Maiku draws a training circle in the dust.
Maiku: "No breaks. No water. Just training. Six hours."
Training Structure:
1. Blade Precision (Jakku's arena)
2. Root Prediction Tactics (Reen's illusions)
3. Mental Endurance (Gift's projection training)
4. Survival Under Pressure (Live-simulation assault with time limit)
Dion, Matthew, Reen, Gift—they rotate stations in real-time.
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Scene 3 – "Matthew's Mental Path
Matthew collapses from mental pressure. His heart races unnaturally.
Flashes of the Roar echo in his chest.
He screams—not in fear, but in release. A low, distant rumble is heard. His eyes glow faint amber.
Maiku (quietly): "He's close. Very close."
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Scene 4 – "Nerves and Needles"
Below the Planet lies the Root
It twitches.
Thorns begin to sprout across its back—gnarled and wet. Each thorn pulses like a heart.
Narrator:
> "Sleep no longer means stillness. It means mutation."
The Root Avatar whispers to the sleeping beast:
Root Avatar: "Soon, you will not crawl. You will pierce."
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Scene 5 – "The Halfway Break"
The team stops after 3 hours—sweat-drenched, near-collapse.
Reen: "How is this even possible…"
Dion: "Because we have to be."
They eat quietly. No one speaks much. Gift sketches a crude map in the dirt.
Gift: "We've mapped 22 Root outbreaks. He's growing strategically."
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Scene 6 – "Hollowpoint Planning"
A map sprawled across a bloodstained table.
Jakku: "He's blocking cities with controlled roots. Starving supply lines."
Maiku: "Then we don't go around him. We go through."
Dion (focused): "We burn through his nursery. Cut him off before he sprouts."
The team formulates a four-part raid:
Dion and Reen infiltrate the East Grove
Matthew and Gift disrupt the South Vein
Maiku and Jakku hit the center with distractions.
All converge at the root core in 3 days
After that they destroy the Core Grove.
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Scene 7 – "Matthew Awakens"
Matthew sits. Wind around him distorts.
He whispers the Roar chant.
A blast of invisible pressure bursts from his chest—cracking stone.
He sees a phantom dragon's jaw above his head for a second.
Matthew: "The Roar isn't power. It's memory given teeth."
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Scene 8 – "The Whispering Thorn"
One of the new thorned Root-Fleshed speaks. Barely.
Root-Fleshed: "Hunger… Light… Kill…"
Narrator: "He grows speech. Intelligence. Soon, not just claws—but strategists."
The Root Avatar carves a spiral symbol into the True Root's bark. It responds.
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Scene 9 – "The Bloodmoon Map"
Reen connects veins on the map with glowing red string.
Reen: "He's shaping his growth like a glyph. A pattern."
Gift: "A glyph for what?"
Reen: "To awaken whatever he's becoming."
They stare in silence. The glyph on the map pulses like a heartbeat.
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Scene 10 – "Still Standing"
Just before sunrise, everyone sleeps.
Everyone's asleep but Dion and Matthew.
They both train. Silently. Side by side.
Dion: "You feel it too?"
Matthew (smirks): "Like thunder waiting to break."
The boy and the dragon stand silhouetted. One glowing faintly gold. One breathing with blade precision.
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> "A crew. One storm. And under their feet, the ground prepares to bleed."
To Be Continued…
Narrator :
> "The deeper the root, the harder the fall. Unless you never fall."
In Chapter 63, the tension thickens. Not with explosions or battles—but with the press of preparation. The weight of what's coming crushes down on both sides. And yet—both sides grow.
Above ground: Resolve. Discipline. Will.
Below: Mutation. Hunger. Evolution.
This is the calm before the reckoning—but it hums with friction.
Dion and his allies are no longer just survivors. They're soldiers now. Each sweat-slicked breath in the six-hour crucible isn't about skill—it's about endurance of spirit. Every illusion, every pressure test, every simulation: a sharpening.
And yet, even among them, Matthew begins to stir—not as a follower, but as something ancient reawakening. The Roar, once a whisper in his chest, now rumbles. Power doesn't crackle—it remembers. It warns.
But the Root Avatar doesn't sleep. He tends to his garden of horrors like a poet, nurturing not just warriors, but intellect. He's not building a horde. He's sculpting a strategy. A glyph. A pattern. A transformation.
Roots are no longer vines. They're veins.
In the dust and blood, the team plans. A raid. A convergence. A hope. But the map pulses. The thorns speak. The glyph breathes.
This chapter is not about who is stronger—it's about who adapts.
And both sides are evolving.
But then—just before dawn—two figures remain.
Dion, blade in hand.
Matthew, the dragon in his chest.
No words. Just movement. Just preparation. Just a promise:
> "You feel it too?"
"Like thunder waiting to break."
And break it will.
Because this is no longer just a war of flesh and root.
It's a war of becoming.
To Be Continued…