• 
• 
“Pü had just finished filing the bevel of the setting, everything was ready. Putting down his tool, he delicately seized the magnificent amber cabochon with the help of tweezers and put it within reach of mask to contemplate it one last time. It was made of a subtle mixture of three different kinds of supreme quality amber: Zun's amber, Soo's one, and Beng's one, all from the depths of the Bark. Satisfied with his work, he was about to seat it in a receptacle he had crafted the day before. This one was made of animal material. Unfit for consumption, these epidermal productions were generally thrown away after the butchering of the game. However, the skilled crafters knew of their incredible sap-conducting properties. For his creation, the Zorai had used a fragment of a gubani nail and a piece of arma thorn. The gubanis were large, gregarious, fearful herbivores with yellow fur, powerful rear end, adherent feet and two "fins" on their upper backs, improving their aerodynamics and speed. As for the armas, these heavy pachyderms with short legs, they were characterized by their greenish carapace covered with moss and equipped with spiny excrescences, their thick skin and the impressive row of horns of defense which decorated their head. But the two herbivores from which the materials in question came were not ordinary specimens. Before they perished under the blows of the hunters, they lived in dark and deep caves located under the jungle, in the Prime Roots, and dominated in strength and speed the other representatives of their species. Their appearance also stood out: gigantic, brightly colored, with lavish growths and a princely gait. When you came across one of these legendary creatures in the company of its fellow creatures, you had the impression of watching a king and his court. The components recovered from their bodies were in fact of an uncommon quality. The rarest ingredient was from the hoof of an equally amazing ancient rendor, which lived in the boreal desert regions, and which explorers from the tribe had brought back from their travels. Rendors were stocky quadrupeds with a massive forehand, a small thick neck, and a large head covered by a leathery carapace that served as a helmet.
Concentrating, Pü made sure that the fossilized resin bead's girdle was at exactly the right height: there was no gap between the surface of the amber and the setting of the future jewel. Measuring each breath, he began to push the receptacle toward the jewel with a small sledgehammer, making lateral and opposite movements. He then changed the angle to bring the edges closer to the precious material, making slight movements from right to left, and finally pushed it up and down, enclosing the amber forever in its protective case. The craftsman contemplated his work, took a small triangle file from his apron and removed the marks left by the previous tool. He was describing arcs of a circle, slowly, but precisely, without ever scratching the precious cabochon. After a final examination, Pü took his chisel, ready to work the rim of the receptacle by massaging the surface backwards and towards the amber. And just as he was about to make the delicate move, his hand trembled slightly. The Zoraï bit his lips. He had almost damged his creation. From a simple amateur, such a scrape wouldn't have made a difference. But Pü was a master jeweler. Usually, he was not very demanding of himself and even less so of others. To many, he was a genius, who brought to the top of the art any activity he chose to practice. Unfortunately, being in the center of attention tended to make him anxious, so he preferred to do the minimum in public. But his relationship to jewelry making was very different. First of all, because his mother had taught him this craft from a very young age, but also, probably, because it required extreme delicacy, a trait rarely put to use during his uncle's martial arts teachings. Jewelry making was a solitary and silent art, which allowed him to forget for a while his warrior status, and thereby to symbolically oppose his father. He practiced it for pleasure and not for obligation. And for him, it changed everything, and motivated him unceasingly to surpass himself.
Pü placed the bead back between his fingers, determined to properly work the rim of the receptacle. Once finished, he would go and finish ornamenting the tiara he had been working on in secret for several weeks, and which he intended for his mother. This jewel was the missing piece. And as he was about to make his move, it was not his hand that trembled, but his arm: the jolt did not come from him. The Zoraï put down the unfinished piece with his tools and hurried out of his workshop. He took a few steps and raised his head, staring at the bark ceiling of the sky-tree from which the astral rays filtered. The ground shook slightly again. Until then, the huge felled stump had always been able to protect the village, both from natural threats and from homins. It was the refuge of many animal species, especially birds that nested in the highest strata, but also their. The tribe had settled at ground level, but had also built a number of dwellings on bark-sides and high roots, preferring however the ancestral building techniques' archaism to the pagan innovation of karavaneer magnetism. Be that as it may, for Pü, it was impossible to imagine that the rain tree would fail in its ancestral mission of protection. As if to prove him wrong, the ground shook more strongly, and the first cries were heard. Worried, he started to run towards the family home located at about ten meters, hoping to find his mother there. He tried to analyze the situation. The first hypothesis that came to mind was that of a homin attack. After all, their enemies were numerous. But the new, more violent tremors overcame this idea. As far as he knew, no homin had the power to shake the bark in this way. The threat seemed to come from below. The Prime Roots, under the Jungle, were made up of huge bioluminescent caves, real ecosystems inhabited by gigantic herbivores. Perhaps a herd of pachyderms was passing under the village? His mind wandered from hypothesis to hypothesis, trying as best it could to rationally deal with the facts. Arriving in front of his home, he hurriedly drew the drapes, calling out to his mother and brother. Not any answer. His mother was probably at Grandmother Bä-Bä's. And as he drew breath to start back up to the top of the village, his lungs burned. An aggressive toxic veil had just poisoned the atmosphere. Never had the young Zoraï smelled so acerbic an odor. This terrible scent announced the worst, he was certain of that. Squinting, he grabbed a sword from his father's rack and slipped out of the hut as quickly as he had entered it.
And the ground cracked. The shockwave, of an unheard-of violence, threw Pü to the ground. Mask against bark, he got up as best he could. What he saw then horrified him: the tremor had cracked the stump, tearing off in the process the tall root near the one where Grandmother Bä-Bä's hut stood. The huge mass of wood swept away several dwellings in its fall and crashed with a deafening crash into another part of the village. Screams came to him and a cloud of sawdust filled the whole space. Pü knew the Zoraï who lived in these houses, as did every member of his tribe. Praying to the Great Genitor, he hoped that none of them were home at the time of the tragedy. But the worst was yet to come. For he heard it. The dreadful hum of decline, the one that would chase hominity forever. Winged shadows several meters sprang from the lower levels of the village and the screams intensified. In the dust-darkened atmosphere, he could not clearly distinguish them, but as far as he knew, no bird of this size had ever been recorded. The Zoraï tried to stay focused on his goal and charged toward Grandmother Bä-Bä's hut. As if to prevent him from doing so, one of the flying apparitions swooped down on him and a huge spray of flames shot out. Pü narrowly dodged the burning spray, shocked by the vision that had just reached him. The flash of light had indeed allowed him to see the monster up close. This one was a disgusting reflection of the vile beasts that had haunted his childhood nights. A tapered and sharp body covered with iridescent scales and carried by six long translucent wings, four tubular and hollow excrescences connected to an ovoid skull, a foul hole lined with tiny hooks as a mouth, two pseudo-members welded together by a swollen gland, and finished with a proboscis from which oozed a smoky and odorous yellowish liquid. This creature was the abominable caricature of a dragonfly, that a crazy artist could have dreamed of during a feverish night.
Pü's heart rose and his neck sank between his shoulders. He felt every muscle in his body contract, his jaw tighten and a cold sweat run down his spine. It had been many years since he had felt fear. Every inch of his body was screming to him to be careful. To face this threat, three different reactions were programmed deep in his cells, selected by life long before he and his ancestors were born. Atavistic, prehistoric reflexes, anchored in his flesh until death: immobility, flight and attack. Pü was a born warrior, conditioned since his earliest childhood. So it was by pure automatism that his arm drew his father's sword and struck the horrible apparition. The amber blade struck the scaly armor of the kipesta without succeeding in piercing it, but ricocheted towards one of its stringy wings, which it sliced through. The creature gave a repulsive squeak and fled into the sawdust mist from which it had emerged. At that moment at least, fear had changed sides.
Pü wasted no time and resumed his run. The kipestas tried several times to attack him and the villagers he passed, but, more skilful than them, he easily routed them. The further he ascended the village, the more the dust cloud dissipated. What had been at first only distant glimmers in the darkness became fires. Some of the huts were already charred by the flames. Bodies too. He knew them, all of them. In the face of these visions, the young Zoraï managed to keep his composure. The urgency of the situation demanded to protect the living and exterminate the threat. The time for weeping and recollection would come later. As he stepped onto the floor before the one where he hoped so to find his mother safe and sound, the situation changed. Suddenly, the winged monsters gained altitude and flew beyond the top of the stump. The humming disappeared into the heavens and left place to the silence of desolation. Pü's hearing, which had become accustomed to the oppressive sizzling of the wings, became particularly sensitive to the other sounds around him: the plaintive creaking of the bark, the crackling of the flames, the heart-rending lamentations and the distant cries. For a brief moment, he was taken by the hope of seeing the nightmare end there. But his sense of smell sent him an opposite signal, a signal of death. The pungent odor that had poisoned the atmosphere since the invasion suddenly escalated. The Zoraï gagged and repressed a nauseous reflex with his hand. And as he was about to take the last walkway, the one that would lead him to Grandmother Bä-Bä's hut, where his mother probably was, someone shouted his name from a lower floor. It was the voice of Ke'val, his uncle.
- "Pü, is that you? Your father and brother are looking for you everywhere! We need everyone, something even more terrible is happening. The start of the breach is by the Ceremonial Square, hurry!"
The Zoraï grabbed a vine and prepared to jump.
- "And don't worry about your mother, she's much more dangerous than those creatures!"
Then he disappeared from his field of vision, leaving Pü in a daze. But what was he thinking? Of course his mother was far more dangerous than those flying monsters. She was the most gifted magician in the village, and that was why she was assigned to protect Grandmother Bä-Bä. Obsessed with his intense love for her, he had run to join her, when his place should have been with his brothers and sisters in arms at the front. How many of his friends could he have protected if he had been there? Pü cursed his stupidity, grabbed a vine in turn, and jumped into the void.
He soon reached the deepest levels of the village, reaching the floor just above the pit that housed the Ceremonial Square. His heart leapt when he saw the totem pole that usually stood in the center of the square split in half and lying on the ground. Zoraïs were moving the fragments. On one of the walls of the pit, a huge smoking cavity disfigured the place. There was the origin the deep crack that had bruised the stump and caused one of the upper roots to fall out of the tree. It was from there that the creatures had emerged from his nightmares and invaded reality. Some of the masks of his forefathers, which had once covered the totem pole, still lay in the dust and wood chips. Pü crossed their empty gaze. That image was more terrifying than any of the horrors he had seen today. It was a horrible omen. Fortunately, someone snapped him out of his stupor before his mind could wander any further. Pü recognized him easily. A prominent musculature, much more imposing than his own, a mask covered with many esoteric symbols, much blacker than his own... It was his brother Niï, who appeared in front of him loaded with a set of pieces of armor of reinforced wood and braided straw, and started to dress him with it. Pü spread his arms and let himself do it not saying a word, like the child that he was still in front of his big brother. With a familiar gesture, he also unhooked the long sword from his belt. On the other side of the pit, he saw his father, busy talking with some soldiers.
- "Here is a short sword and a dagger, the weapons you handle best. You'll also take the rifle."
- "Are we sure there are others on the way?" said Pü mechanically, still disturbed by what he had just seen.
- "Can't you smell the odor? It has got stronger. An even more powerful wave is coming. Once you are ready, we will go down to the square. The strategy is simple: our group will form an arc opposite the tear where the monsters entered earlier. For we will have to contain the influx, our goal will be to make sure that each of the assaults is aimed at us. I will command this front. From the top floor, we will have the support of father who will command the second group, composed of heavy shooters and spell casters. Their objective will be both to eliminate the threat and to lavish the necessary care on us. From there, they will also have a better vantage point to oversee the battle. Finally, we have coated the inside of the tear with various flamable oils. As soon as the monsters arrive, the gunners will relentlessly pound the duct. It might be enough and we might not need to draw our weapons. But let's not count on that too much. That's all you need to know. The rest you already know."
The elder hung a long, reinforced wooden shield on the younger's back and tapped him on the shoulder.
- "I'm counting on you Pü, you'll assist me, as usual."
Certainly, their relationship had extremely deteriorated in recent years. Often, the two brothers did not speak to each other throughout the day, and met only in the dojo for the daily training. Often, Pü let Niï win: it was not necessary to frustrate the future Black Mask. However, Niï remained his big brother, and, whatever happened, Pü felt reassured in his presence. The young Zorai checked the straps on his armor and followed his older brother into the pit. His companions nodded to him, probably reassured to see the young prodigy among them. He positioned himself not far from Niï and felt the piercing gaze of the Black Mask on him. The minutes were passing and the smell emphasizing. Then silence fell. He was going to speak.
- "Soldiers! Form up!"
In perfect choreography, the line of warriors subdivided into a sequence of pairs placed side by side. For each pair, the soldier on the right kneeled on the ground and firmly planted his shield in the bark, then the one on the left positioned himself behind his comrade and anchored his own shield to the one already embedded in the ground. Once the twin wooden plates were arranged in this way, the rifle barrels filled the gaps between them. This formation had proven itself during a multitude of battles. The tribe being sparsely populated compared to the other groups of homins living in the region, it had become master of defensive strategies.
Kneeling in the dust, Pü took a long look at the tear through the sight of his rifle. Near it, Pia, the tribe's best sentry, was half lying on the ground, her ear pressed to the bark. Her heightened senses made her an outstanding tracker, able to spot a herd of mektoubs from several miles away. Suddenly, she raised her hand. A chill spread through the line of warriors, which tightened a little more. Pü felt the muscles of his comrades tense and the supports correct. They were ready, no matter what. And things, indeed, were not going to go as planned.
- "I think something is wrong!" shouted Pia. "I hear what sounds like galloping, but no buzzing of wings. The approaching creatures are moving along the ground at full speed!"
Pü swallowed and saw his comrades do the same. So the flying abominations that had wreaked such havoc were not the only monsters haunting the depths? Sang Fu-Tao, the Black Mask, reacted without delay.
- "Stay focused soldiers! Nothing changes! If these monsters are related to the first ones, they too will look like gigantic insects. In this, their leg joints will probably be sensitive points!"
Pü instantly pulled himself together. His father was right, there was no reason to panic. As always, his experience was speaking. He had been able to analyze the situation in a split second while reassuring his troops. Despite his resentment, the young Zorai had to acknowledge his unparalleled leadership skills. But the Black Mask was not satisfied with a simple reassuring speech.
- "My brothers, my sisters, who could imagine that such monstrosities could be the fruit of our beautiful Bark? Nor you, nor anyone! For I know you, just as I, have felt it: these creatures are not natural and have been conceived for a single reason. And that is? To put our Faith to the test, of course! And who is offering us this test? Ma-Duk himself! Yes, my brothers, my sisters, you have that understood! The time of the Sacred War is fast approaching and the Great Genitor wants to make sure that we are ready to march on the world to take it back in his Name! So don't disappoint me soldiers, don't disappoint our ancestors, who are watching us right now! There are some among them who would dream of living through the glorious events that await us!"
The Zorais reacted with fanatical exclamations, while at the same time the ground began to shake, signaling the approach of the enemy troop. A final shudder spread through the line of soldiers, which tightened a little more. Individualities disappeared and, body against body, sweat and breath mixed, they became one. An impenetrable wall, black and immense, ready to absorb all the horror of the world. Bricks, in this moment and forever united by the past history and the grandiose future that presented itself to them. Pü, however insensitive he was to the religious harangue, could not himself resist the force of attraction that the group exuded.
- "Soldiers! Who are we?" shouted the warlord.
- "We are the Black Warriors of Ma-Duk! We are his armed and purifying arm! We are the guardians of the True Faith! We are the scourge that falls upon the heretics!" the warriors chanted in chorus, as Pü murmured it with his lips.
- "Yes, we fear no scourge, we are the scourge," said the Black Mask.
The force of the shaking intensified and the unhealthy smell reached the limit of what was bearable. But at that moment, nothing could have made the homins and hominas of the tribe give in.
- "Soldiers, here we are! The day of glory has arrived! Awaken the cruelty that sleeps in you! Today our blades will be sullied, our shields will be shattered! A great day, a red day, before the night falls! Gunners, fire!"
Pü barely had time to see the vile shadow crawling out of the tear when shots rang out above him and a shower of grenades fell on the enemy. The shock was terrible. Fueled by the oils, a gigantic spray of flames shot towards the top of the stump, shaking the ground and throwing a cloud of pieces of bark and charred carapaces with it. Protected by his shield and anchored to the walls of soldiers, Pü easily withstood the blow of the blast, of which only a few sparks came to lick his armor. Despite the power of the blast, he was able to make out the horrible, shrill sounds of the creatures caught in the bombardment. Many seconds passed and the cataclysm was unending. Ceremonial Square would be disfigured forever, a small price to pay for their victory. Moments later, as several gunners reloaded their weapons, one of the monsters managed to extract itself from the chaos. At five feet tall, it looked like a monstrous version of a spider. A bronze-colored body, cramped, arched. Chitinous segment, curved, connecting a stinger and a faceless skull, like a curved blade, sharpened, designed to slice flesh. Hanging in its center, not eight legs, but six, articulated, and sharper than swords. On the upper part, a pair of serrated hooks, which probably served as weapons as well as manipulative appendages. This thing was no match for the flying monsters that Pü had confronted shortly before in terms of horror. It was a fantasized predator, carved out of Sap by a maniacal sculptor who would have gone to great lengths to remove any frills. With extreme agility, the creature shot at the line of warriors, snapping its hooks. But the soldiers were prepared, and from their cover, they strafed the hexapod. As expected, only the shots hitting the soft parts had any real effect. Dripping with milky blood, the monster shed pieces as it ran, eventually collapsing in a smoking heap before it had even traveled half the distance to its preys. The event happened several times and Pü was horribly surprised to discover that there were versions of the monster approaching three metres. But strangely enough, at a distance, they posed less of a threat. Their size made them slower and provided a better window of opportunity to shoot at their weak points. On a few occasions, monsters managed to reach the soldiers and were summarily executed. The strategy was always the same: absorb the impact of the attack with the shield wall, follow the creature's movement, use the energy of the rebound to push it back, take advantage of the imbalance created to open a gap and cut it to pieces. The apparent simplicity of this defensive technique was in fact the result of years of intensive training, and showed incredible cooperative work.
Minutes passed without any change in the situation. If the soldiers had hoped that the fight would end quickly, the onslaught of creatures did not end. Their numbers were simply unbelievable. The gunners continued to bombard the tear and the atmosphere had become almost unbreathable, between the acrid smell of the monsters, the fallout of dust and that of particles of melted flesh. The armor of each soldier was now covered with an oozing and smelly ashes film. But while the source of evil never seemed to run dry, the ammunition supply was beginning to reach its limit. Despite the tumult of the blasts, Pü heard his father screaming. He was as if possessed.
- "Gunners, we're coming to the end of the last grenades, so get ready to put on your magic amplifiers! I want you to tap into the deepest of your being! This fury that lives in you, it is nothing but pure energy! Visualize it, tame it! Seize it, in the hollow of your hands, and forge it into a weapon! The most deadly weapon there is! The sharpened reflection of the soul of the Black Warriors of Ma-Duk! Show these horrors that even unarmed, we can crush them with our mere will! Tonight we will feast on the ashes of our enemies! So smile, shout your joy! For the Great Genitor is proud! Soldiers, be worthy of the look he has for you! To death!"
- "To Death!" the galvanized pack roared in chorus, echoing the warlord's exhortation.
The bombardment gradually ceased, and soon the creatures flooded the pit. The tidal wave of stings and fangs crashed through the shields with staggering violence. The atmosphere, stained and darkened by the battle, shifted again as the first spells flew over the warriors: jets of flame, shockwaves, beams of electricity, tongues of acid, spurts of poison, and icy breaths. The air became charged with inflows of energy, and compressed behind his shield, muscles sheathed and feet sunken in sawdust, Pü felt the spiritual particles that made up his being resonate with those of his comrades. The sensation was increased tenfold as the line of warriors received healing salvos from the healers. The healing process of the soldiers, accelerated thousands of times, had erased the last traces of fear remaining in them. Every open wound closed immediately, every broken bone was instantly resoldered. As a result, even if every opening in the black wall allowed the monsters to reach the homins in their flesh, they never hesitated to fight back, carried as they were by a feeling of invincibility. Their souls remained out of reach. It took only a few minutes for Ceremonial Square to overflow with insects. Those who did make it to the floor above were instantly wiped out by the war mages. The carcasses gradually accumulated to the point where a mass grave several meters high covered the entire ground. Minutes passed and the monstrous wave seemed to subside. Yes, the creatures were fewer and fewer in number. Yet their behavior did not change. They charged at the homins, inexorably, as if there was still a chance, or as if that was all they knew how to do. Paws torn off, carapaces broken and flesh burned. Nothing could stop their crazy race, except the extinction of their motor functions. It was there, their weak point. As numerous and armed as they were, they were missing something. A spirit, a soul. Pü had observed the subtlety of animal behavior many times. And these monsters were not, they were less than that. They were like tools. Objects without consciousness. Therein lay the cause of their defeat.
Pü stopped at this conclusion. Yet he, the master jeweler, must have known that the responsibility for a failure does not fall to the tool, but to the person who uses it. It is by forging that one becomes a blacksmith and learning always involves making mistakes. His mother had nevertheless taught him that. A few hundred meters below his feet, the kinkoo knew nothing of the extent of his failure. But it was only a matter of time. For a kipesta that had been watching the battle was already scurrying toward the kitin general's headquarters via another network of galleries. If the emissary could not feel fear, he knew that the inevitable angry reaction his master would have to the news of defeat could cost him his life. But more than anything, he knew that the kitin general would then condemn these arrogant primates to a fate far more terrible than death itself: extinction.
Belenor Nebius, narrator
