Mutagen

Day 154 - 7:42 PM - Kawasan Falls, Municipality of Badian, Province of Cebu

The attack in the coastal town in Matutinao began more than half an hour ago. And here in the middle of the woods, engulfed by the night sky, four men were patiently waiting. They were atop the steep area of Kawasan Falls, overseeing the path to the south side and below.

Of course, these four were Pefile, Berrak, Geronimo, and Padua. Being the group with only men experienced in battles, they were the best people to infiltrate the home of the Tamawos.

It was unfortunate that they could not just storm into the tribe like this. After all, the goal on this side of the plan was not to destroy but to save a person. 

If they just stormed in, making everyone aware of them, things might face a wrong turn. The Tamawos were a long-lived race. Even after almost two decades without contact with the tribe, many of them would recognize Pefile at one look. Although disguising could work, it was not for long. Tamawos had ways to decern individuals from the same tribe. His disguise would surely get blown after some time.

When Pefile's brother recognized him, it would be a bad thing. It would be clear why Pefile was back, and his brother would use that information against him. In the worst case, Celine's life would be put in danger before they could even save her.

That was why it was better to stealthily infiltrate as they entered. Once the group managed to find Celine and get her out of the dungeon, it would be fine if they started to kill everything on sight as they escaped. Of course, they would rather avoid it if possible.

"How long are we going to wait here?" Padua whispered. "Boss is already having fun there for sure."

"Just be patient, will you?" Geronimo scolded his friend. "This is why you are never dispatched for covert operations. The officers definitely noticed that you're not cut for the task."

Berrak and Pefile were just listening to the banter of the two, but they agreed with Geronimo's words. Padua was quite a hot-blooded individual. Being patient was likely to be the last in his vocabulary.

"Shhh." Berrak suddenly hushed the two. "Some people are coming."

The two immediately shut their mouths. And as Berrak said, a rather large group of people were seen at the woody path on the other side of the waterfall.

Men with wooden spears, pale-skinned bodies with tribal tattoos, white hair, sharp nails and teeth, and handsome-looking faces, there was no doubt that this was a group of Tamawos.

Looking at the leader of the group, however, Pefile could not help but narrow his eyes.

"You know that guy?"

Berrak noticed Pefile's expression and asked.

"An enemy of mine."

Pefile answered with a grim tone.

The Tamawos, in general, were just like how they were usually described. However, like Pefile, some individuals were born different from others. 

Unlike most people in Pefile's family, he had the highest affinity to flora, especially trees. Some Tamawos could also use trees as transportation. They could move from tree to tree as long as trees were intertwined with each other, whether it be branches or roots. However, how long they could do it consecutively was limited.

Pefile, on the other hand, did not need that the trees he would use to be connected. Instead, the trees he could use to travel should be the same kind of tree. If he entered an acacia tree, he must also exit in another acacia tree. The only problem was that the distance he could travel was shorter than others if the trees were not connected.

While Pefile had that kind of special ability, there were also others kinds of special people within their tribe.

That tall Tamawo, Terville, was one of those special people.

Terville was different in the sense that his existence bent the current state of the Tamawos. Terville did not bear the curse that the angry god put unto them. And yes, Terville could charm and mark more than one woman, even if he did not fell in love with them. It was unknown, though, whether he would die if he actually fell in love and did not succeed in taking the woman's heart for himself.

That, however, was the cause why Terville was exiled from the tribe. It was already good that he was only exiled. It would not be surprising if he was executed instead. After all, his existence itself was taboo to the current Tamawos and orders that were given to them by their creator.

There was no need to mention that Terville's personality itself was somewhat rotten.

Among the people he liked to charm, his type were those who were already married and already had children. Furthermore, he would not use the method to slowly weaken the woman and feign her death. Instead, he would make the woman leave her family, breaking it to pieces.

Others would have turned a blind eye to him if he actually fell in love with the woman. There were also others in the same circumstance, falling in love with a married woman.

But Terville... did not. He was doing it for fun, indulging himself in pleasure, finding fun in wrecking families of humans.

And when the previous king learned about his deeds, Terville was exiled and was stripped of his powers to charm human females.

In the coup that Pefile's brother did, this vile Tamawo was the mastermind. And with the current situation, it was likely that it was Terville who charmed the women currently held in the town of Matutinao. After all, it would be impossible for the other Tamawos to do it without falling in love with those women.

"Hurry up! We need to get to the town as fast as we can!"

Terville shouted to his men in Spirit Languange as they ran through the riverside.

On the other side of the waterfall, the four men silently watched the group pass by.

"There's seventy of them, right?" Berrak murmured, counting the Tamawo Warriors. "They seem confident to just send that number of people to face Boss."

"They probably didn't get the correct information," Pefile replied. "The one we saw earlier to relay the news looks like out of breath and about to collapse."

Remembering the young Tamawo earlier that ran from the town, the other three could only nod. The Tamawos in the town let a young Tamawo run and deliver the news. It was very likely that he was of no help in the battle. That, however, left a warrior with low stamina to ran about two and a half kilometers of uneven terrain as fast as he could.

"They are gone," Pefile said as they saw the backs of the group disappear from their sight. "Let's get moving."

"Are we fine going like this?" Berrak asked. "I don't think that those seventy is the major force of your tribe."

"Likely." Pefile nodded. "The last time I knew, that number should be a third. But now, there are probably more warriors in the tribe. The experienced ones I mean."

"The experienced ones?" Padua interjected. "Then how about the rookies or something like that?"

Pefile turned to Padua with half-closed eyes.

"Don't ask something that would make you nervous. Just keep your mouth shut and follow behind me."

That, however, made the two young soldiers more nervous. Just how many warriors were still present in their tribe? It was hard to say whether knowing or not knowing was more frightening.

"Don't worry, we will take a back door. There might be guards, but we should be able to bypass them."

Pefile assured the two.

The four crossed the forested riverbank. They moved as stealthily as possible, avoiding anything that could alert the enemies. Being a Tamawo himself, Pefile was able to detect the magical wards placed to detect intruders. On the other hand, Berrak used his magical prowess to disable the wards that they could not avoid.

After another half hour, they reached the valley in the middle of the forest. It looked nothing spectacular. In fact, it looked eerie to their eyes. 

It was when Pefile stood in front of a pair of oddly shaped trees. He touched one of the trees, creating some ripple in the air, which was surprisingly visible to their eyes.

Pefile them moved, becoming the other three to follow him, and entered the ripple.

As they entered, the scene in the valley changed entirely. The dark eerie scene turned into a scene in a fairytale. The forest was lush, and fireflies illuminated the place. Huts and bridges made entirely of trunks of giant trees were everywhere. There were even flowers and plants that emitted light here and there.

The three remembered the Diwata Iraya's Sanctuary in Catanduanes. It felt very similar.

"Don't just stand gawking there," Berrak warned the two young soldiers. "We will leave you two."

With those words, Padua and Geronimo held their amazement back and hurried to follow behind the Pefile and Berrak.

Pefile guided the group in the most difficult areas of the village to traverse. They had to pass under a large treehouse with the cliff below, jump over a bridge and cross it as fast as possible, and they even climbed tree branches like monkeys to avoid the patrols.

The worst part was for them to climb down the roots of another large tree on the side of the cliff above the river. One wrong move and they would fall into the water.

It was something that could not be helped. Pefile was aiming for the hidden entrance to the dungeon of the tribe. It was a hole on the wall of the cliff, far above the river.

After a few minutes, they reached the hole.

Suddenly...

"URK!" Padua's nose was filled with an unpleasant smell. "Don't tell me... This hole..."

As they all dangled on the roots of the tree, none of them could cover their noses. The smell entered their noses even when they tried their best not to breathe.

"It's the hole where cleaners dump the feces of prisoners," Pefile explained, seemingly ignoring the smell. "Look below."

As Pefile said that, the other three looked down. Their eyes grew wide, not because of the height, but the pit below them. 

It was the area where the river bent away from the face of the cliff. Below them was a pit dug to catch the secretions of prisoners dumped through this hole. Inside the pit, however, was not only the secretions but dozens of arm-sized worms squirming about.

"Make sure not to fall," Pefile remarked. "If you did, the feces would be the least of your problems."

The face of the two soldiers paled. They were also carrying guns and bullets in their bags so it was quite heavy. They immediately feared that they may fall.

Luckily, none of what they feared happened. They managed to reach and enter the whole Pefile was talking about. The hole was also different from what they initially thought. They thought that it was like sewage, but it was just a large window where cleaners use to manually dump buckets of feces. Aside from the smell coming from below, the window itself was quite clean.

Pefile and the group entered. They silently searched the place.

The inside was a series of caves and caverns turned into prison cells. The whole place was quite empty, though. This place used to serve as a prison to humans caught desecrating the sacred waters. Nowadays, it was barely used.

Each room was barred with thick tree roots as the surface above the prison was actually the ancestral castle of the tribe. These roots came from the very same trees that made up the walls of the castle.

Soon, Pefile stood in front of a certain prison cell. Grasping the root of the tree that served as the prison cell bar, Pefile stared at the woman lying on the bed. She was not asleep, but by what it looked like, she was too ill to notice that there was someone standing in front of her prison cell.

"Celine."

Pefile whispered.

But with the whole prison being silent, Pefile's voice echoed into the prison cell and into the woman's ear.

The woman froze a bit, hearing Pefile's voice. Her droopy eyes opened wide, and she slowly turned her towards the direction where the voice came from.

Seeing the man standing before her prison cell, the woman, no, Celine, could not help but let her eyes drop some tears on her bed. Nonetheless, she smiled.

"You idiot... Why did you take so long..."

Celine whispered back with her dry sickly lips.