There was a stealthy rustling noise, and a dark figure approached us from the shade of the trees. I heard Cara’s intake of breath, and she reached out and took my hand. I squeezed her hand reassuringly. A tree spirit emerged from the trees and marched slowly toward us.
He was as tall as a man, but much broader. He looked like an ancient, wind-blasted tree that had seen too many winters. Hidden inside his branches, there was the suggestion of a wise face, but no detail could be seen except for bright green eyes glowing steadily at us through the dimness. The tree spirit was a strange presence, but there was nothing of the horror of the demons we had fought earlier. He was very strange, but he was not evil.
“You have cleansed the valley of the Festering,” he said in a rumbling, creaking voice. “Soul Binder, we have not seen your kind for many generations, but now we can offer you something in return for your service to us. The Festering taint is abroad in this land. We wish to see it driven out. I bestow upon you the Persona of the Tree Spirits to aid you in your quest.”
I heard a rustling sound like leaves in a rising wind, and a floral scent washed over me and permeated me. Emerald light shone out all around me, then washed from my fingertips back up my arms and into my body.
There was a sudden flash of light, and as quickly as that, we were back in the glade. The spirit realm was gone, and all was as it had been.
Cara blinked, and her eyes widened. “Oh, Leo! You’re wearing a new Persona!”
I looked down at myself. I was dressed in green and brown armor of light leather. It was similar to the samurai armor I’d seen elsewhere in this land, with interlocking plates woven together and hung over a coat of light mail. In my hand, there was a long wooden staff.
The instinctive knowledge of the Persona was in me, and I knew that this staff was called a bokken. Wood it may be, but in the hands of a skilled practitioner, it could be as deadly as a sword. Looking closer, I saw that it had a string of intricate characters carved into the top.
Cara gazed at me admiringly. “It looks good,” she said. “But what does it do?”
“Let’s find out.”
I lifted the bokken and whirled it experimentally around my head. The wood seemed to have a life of its own. I felt deep knowledge of a form transmitted to me through the staff. The bokken danced around me as I guided it through the martial forms. It made a satisfying whoosh as I swung it around my head.
“There’s something more…” I could feel some promise of greater power from the staff. It tingled in my hands, pushing me to take the potential of this new weapon further.
Again, listening to my instincts, I took one step forward and slammed the base of the staff into the ground. Power surged from my heart, out through my shoulders, down my arms, into my hands, then into the staff. There was a crackling sound, and green light flashed and flickered around my hands, coalescing into leaping forks of emerald lightning, which danced around my fingers.
I concentrated on it and directed its flow down into the earth.
There was a thunderous boom and the green lightning spread across the ground in an expanding circle away from the base of the staff. It ran around Cara’s feet like water around a stone, but when it hit my feet, it ran back up my body, creating a loop of power which blasted between me and the staff. The circle continued to expand away from me, and I could see the tall grass waving and swaying as the emerald lightning danced up and down it.
I pushed further, forcing more power into the spell. The lightning increased in intensity until the whole clearing was full of it. I knew that if I willed it, this raw power would cause incredible damage to any enemies within the circle. With a twist of my will, I manipulated the spell once more. An explosion of green light blasted up within the range of the circle and into the sky, and the spell dispersed.
Cara let out a low whistle. She was standing a little away from me, looking impressed. “That will be good against large swathes of weak enemies!” she said.
I nodded my agreement, feeling well pleased with this new attack. “I wish I’d had this when we were fighting the Gaki. Imagine the slaughter I would have inflicted upon those demonic hosts if I’d been equipped with this. The thought makes my heart burn for battle.”
“Well, you didn't do too badly even without it,” Cara said with an admiring smile. “You might not be able to go back to that battle, but I’m sure you’ll have plenty of future opportunities for battle. I wonder. . . how would the Tree Persona manifest with me?”
I laughed. The excitement in her eyes was very attractive. “There’s only one way to know. Let’s see if we can manage the swap as smoothly as we did earlier.”
“All right.”
Cara reached toward me with her awareness of the Personas. As she did so, I focused my awareness and reached back toward her. There was a snap in the air, like a whip cracking, and I found myself wearing again my version of the Kitsune Persona’s shinobi aspect. I was not wearing the headgear, but the rest of the costume felt pleasantly familiar as it slipped into place around me. As before, there was a sensation of coolness that washed through my body as I took on
