"This is not important."
All eyes turned to Pando when she said those words. They had continued asking about the beyond, souls, and all these age-old questions that they always assumed didn't even have answers. It seemed pretty damn important to them !
'These are literally questions of life and death !'
Baoba had another hundred questions about the nature of life, its purpose, the origin of the world, the chicken and the egg, all of it !
Without feeling remorse about all his dreams being minced and sauteed, Pando kept talking : "What really matters is what we will do next. While the Lord cannot find us by our spirits, he probably has countless other methods to locate us normally. We need to move further or else the whole forest will unite against us once again."
Baoba resisted the urge to pout.
'...Party pooper.'
He quickly shook his head and snapped back into leader mode. After all, as always, she was right.
'However, the situation has not changed by that much.'
He sighed. Learning all this was fascinating and all, but eventually he had to come back to reality.
"We still need to retreat. Our power has only marginally increased, we still absolutely do not stand any chance whatsoever. Don't worry about the humans, honestly, if they can win this fight, then Saltus never could resist them anyway. We need to go back and warn the higher ups : this is actually an existential crisis. We sadly cannot do anything else."
So what if his swords stayed sharp now ? Even with those powers, they still would have died in the beast tide without Mother's help. And this was only three days away from Medio and the Tree. The true horrors that occupy these woods could not get this close.
This was only the beginning, and they were already outclassed. What could they do against the endgame ?
"There is a way." The orb spoke once more.
Baoba raised his head, interested.
"While it is true I cannot bless you more right this instant, there exists a way to avoid the Lord's scrutiny. If we move you away from the place I blessed you from, I can cover your traces and the Lord can only fight me in a battle where you are not."
Urtica frowned. "That's it ? We just have to move, and we're good ?"
The orb floated to him, but he pulled away ever so slightly, as if scared of a potential contact.
"Your words express the notion that moving is a simple thing. However, even though in your world it is just a matter of converting energy, your assigned coordinates in the beyond are deeply connected to the very fiber of your being. I cannot manipulate them that easily.
"You will need to bring your physical bodies for me to get a hold of them."
The orb floated silently. She had stopped talking. As if the explanation was over.As if this wasn't completely antithetical to everything she just taught them about the beyond.
Baoba massaged the space between his eyebrows.
'Can't she speak clearly just this one time?'
"Dear Mother, will you please enlighten us as to how we are supposed to physically enter the beyond ?"
She stayed silent for a bit more. The orb lowered itself slightly as she finally spoke : "I do not know of a method that would make this feat possible."
He froze. He knew there was no heaven or hell now, but he still felt like yelling at his patron deity would send him through purgatory. So he tried very hard to control himself.
Sensing the disappointment in her audience, the Mother quickly justified herself : "But I do know of a way to learn ! The Lord is not the only spirit benefitting from my shade, other deities have chosen this forest for their incarnation. One of them, Noti, has the power of knowledge. If we can find them, they will tell us how to proceed."
"So where are they ?"
"I do not know."
"What do they look like ?"
"That remains to be seen."
"How can we find them ?"
"This is a good question."
He took a few deep breaths, calming himself.
"So your plan is to look for a random being, which could be anything, anywhere, in order to formulate an actual plan ?"
The Mother didn't answer right away, as the orb stopped bobbing up and down. The other four were holding their breaths, afraid of the consequences of Baoba's disrespect.
She did say not to speak too reverently, but this was their god ! They often prayed to her ! It already took much of the time Baoba slept for them to get over the simple fact that she was here.
What if she obliterated him right here and now ? Who would give them water and food then ?
However, when she started talking again, she didn't sound angry at all. In fact, the strange, ethereal voice sounded almost... confused ?
"That... is indeed one way to present my idea."
Uncaring of his companions's fright, Baoba sighed as he manifested a block of carapace and sat on it. This decision was going to be important.
This plan was incredibly vague. Not only did they need to search the whole forest blindly, but even if they succeeded, there was a chance that this Noti deity did not have the answers they were looking for. There was a chance that communication was impossible. There was even a chance it was hostile, or cooperated with the Lord.
On the other hand, retreat was still an option. With the elfpower of the whole capital, Noti was as good as found already. The subsequent plans would also be much easier with a decent command center and an army of more than five elite soldiers.
This option was the better choice for the country.
Baoba suddenly grinned.
'But what does that have to do with me ?'
After all, no matter what happened in the end, a loss was a loss. Even if the fools in charge were to go back on their word, and engaged in a war against the humans, the person that gave up on this contest -Baoba- would at least be exiled. More probably, they would present him as a traitor, a spy of the humans, and use him as an excuse for their war.
But what if he was the one to achieve the Mother's plan ?
He would be the one who slayed the Lord, the one who persevered in the face of adversity, the one who single handedly defeated the human nation, a hero !
Plus, by then, he and his team would be too powerful to be taken lightly anyway. His homeless days would be a thing of the past !
A comfortable hotel room ? How about a mansion instead !
'But most importantly...'
His grin intensified into a crazy smile, as a degerous flame ignited inside his eyes.
'In this scenario, I get to kill him. I get to see the life drain out of his eyes, I get to make him suffer ten times what he put me through !'
What was there to fear ?
Death ?
'Been there, done that.'
Still smiling wildly, he got up, turned to his soldiers, and put a foot on the block he was sitting on. After ostensibly clearing his throat, he spoke in a loud voice :
"People of my cohort ! I still vividly remember the day where you all unanimously accepted me as your leader. What an honour it was ! To sit in front of such a noble audience, and to be accepted as the most capable !"
He feigned to wipe a tear in the corner of his eye."It was beautiful."
Confused, Capcsium felt the need to remind him : "You know we didn't really get a say in that desci-"
"But now," he interrupted, "it is time for me to make a decision. This responsibility truly burdens me, but I must choose nonetheless. By the powers your trust has bestowed upon me, I, the leader of the great Saltus's elite task force, have decided !"
Not letting go of his grin, he stepped down from his cube, manifested an especially heavy hammer entirely made out of metallic carapace, and hit his seat away in a devastating swing.
"We're gonna kick his ass ! Thanks to our Mother here, we will not get ambushed like last time, we're gonna go back to only picking the fights we want ! We will move undetected, we will scout this entire region, map all of it, and find every damn deity we need ! Keeping in mind you have no choice, are you with me ?"
The wind could be heard blowing through the leaves as the group was processing what their leader had said.
Capcsium burst into laughter first, quickly followed by Venus.
Pando quietly chuckled before putting her hand on her clavicle with the thumb touching her neck, as the soldiers did to salute. Standing straight, still lightly smiling, she declared : "Sir, yes sir !"
The others followed her lead one by one, half-jokingly. There had never been, in their minds, the option of disregarding their captain's lead.
He smiled even more. "Great ! Now then, let's start searching ! Any ideas where we should start ? Maybe somewhere we could get a lead ?"
Pando and Urtica nodded slowly, they knew what he was referencing. After a second, Venus's eyes lit up, and she blurted out : "The house ! The people in the house ! The place they went !"
Baoba snapped his fingers in approval. "Exactly ! They will know this forest better than we ever could ! What we need to do now is follow their trace, find people like them, and ask them about an entity that would know lots of things ! And where do we start asking about that, I sure do wonder."
He turned to the orb of light. "Esteemed Mother, will you please tell us what you know about the inhabitants of this forest ?"
This was her forest after all ! Who else could have information about its residents ?
The orb floated higher, to meet everyone's eye level.
"What inhabitants ? Apart from you, there is only animals, the Lord's soldiers and deities in this forest. What house are you talking about ?"
...
'Well this is going well.'