Reincarnated With The Van Helsing System

”Tsk, what the hell is up with that strong physical attack power, aren’t you one of those damn nature loving bastards, why the hell are you not spawning wide area energy attacks!”, exclaimed the pitch-black tree, which made Tessa softly snort.

Knights among alfears are extremely rare and when they do appear, they come from common lineages of their race, also despite being knights their close combat and single target martial arts, lack when compared to their peers.

Only wide area martial arts used by them, are equal in average, that’s why every alfear that wishes to gain recognition, aims to be a mage, and even then, the vast majority have trouble dominating single target spells, the sole exception to the previous being talented members of the noble and royal lineages.

Which is why, Tessa didn’t experience this problem, though she still focused in control and variety rather than extreme combat-oriented spells, until now of course, since these techniques packed quite the punch.

”Jungle Stride”, with a couple of words, the alfear princess’s image blinked a couple of times, a second later she had appeared close to the pitch-black tree, aiming to that big eye on its center.

”Serrated Ironwood Sword”, next, a bright green energy sword with serrated edges appeared for Tessa to wield with her right hand, which she slashed at the enemy.

”Clang!”, surprisingly, or not really, one of the armored branches got in the way of Tessa’s sword, the clash produced the sound of metals colliding and once the serrated edge of the sword started moving at high speed, sparks and small pieces of dark red crystal flew all over the area.

However, unlike before, Tessa’s sword couldn’t slice through the armored branch, the reason is simple, the pitch-black tree had gathered most of the dark red crystal clad in the area of clash, changing the previous sharpened edges, into heavy armor, preventing the branch from being cut.

And that being the case, Tessa immediately let go of the sword which still had a moment left before disappearing, in order to avoid the second armored branch which was being lashed at her.

With a ”swoosh”, the alfear princess flashed away from the vicinity of the tree, allowing Tessa to safely return, though ultimately resulting in she not achieving anything with her previous charge, very much to the pleasure of the pitch-black tree, which celebrated by using his second spell.

”Black Death Corroding Whip”, manifesting a new energy branch by using more of those red vein-like things, the tree injected its nether successfully enlarging said branch to then smack it in Tessa’s direction.

And there was an extra trick here, the tree using his four legs, dashed towards the alfear princess, not with a movement spell, but the thing was quite large so it naturally had a bigger range than Tessa, allowing it to need to travel less distance to try and land a solid hit.

”Forest Guardian, Nimble Balsa Boots”, unfortunately just like the tree, Tessa also had a trick hidden up her sleeves, in the form of a pair of bright green energy boots which covered all the way to her knees, appearing on her legs.

Which combined with jungle stride, allowed Tessa to bypass the continuous lashes of the tree’s energy branch, and get close to it once again.

’Stupid woman, so long as I gather my defense in specific spots, your attacks won’t be able to easily wound me’, thought the tree, at least until three twenty-five-centimeter bright green energy needles appeared in between her left hand’s interdigital spaces.

”Forest Guardian, Breaking Birch Needles”, with a wave of her hand, the alfear princess threw the three needles at the tree who couldn’t react in time, before they landed on the armored branch with which it was shielding itself.

Of course, the tree didn’t believe that such a small-looking attack could harm him when even that dangerous serrated sword couldn’t cut through his defenses.

”Crack!”, but then, those seemingly harmless needles, made huge cracks instantly appear all over the dark red crystal armor the moment.

”What!”, the tree couldn’t exclaim in disbelief, and the unpleasant surprised weren’t over, a large bright green energy Warhammer appeared on Tessa’s right hand, before she smacked it at the branches in question.

”Crushing Acacia Hammer”.

”Booom!”, alongside Tessa calling out the name of her technique, the hammer landed on those branches, and just like its name, crushed the dark red crystal armor on the spot before making the branches below explode.

Broken pieces of dark red crystal and splinters flew in every direction, but the alfear princess hadn’t finished her charge yet.

”Jungle Stride”, with her legs still cladded in those boots, which apparently similar to the gauntlets had a longer duration than her other techniques, Tessa changed to target the reinforced energy branch.

Seeing the large shaft of the weapon which was condensing on Tessa’s right hand, the tree directly sent the tall corrosive puppet with its own war spear her way, unfortunately Tessa wasn’t directing her attack at it this time, nope, her aim was the energy branch itself.

”Forest Guardian, Suppressing Teak Harpoon”, the alfear princess’s arm swung backwards in order to gain momentum, which was then released alongside a bright green energy harpoon.

’Humph, do you think I’ll fall for that again’, thought the pitch-black tree as it was reminded of how the binding chain stalled for time, giving Tessa an opening to attack his armored branches before.

”Disperse!”, with a single word order, the red veins detached from the main body, so that the reinforced corrosive puppet could have more freedom to move, and it worked, without being tied to the tree, the thing jumped to the sides perfectly avoiding the alfear princess’s technique.

Unfortunately, the wild smile that was about to appear on the pitch-black tree’s ”face” immediately died down, as streams of bright green energy suddenly popped out of the harpoon which had already passed by.

”Crack!”, the energy streams released by the harpoon directly pierced through the back of the corrosive puppet, coming out from the front to then dragging it alongside the harpoon, successfully pinning it down against the ground, the next second.

”Blooming Ascending Spears”, by ”coincidence, the area where the corrosive puppet landed, was one where Tessa had stepped upon before, and so bright green marks appeared all over it, before turning into energy spears that ripped the body of the corrosive puppet apart on the spot.

”Hsssss!”, the corrosive black mana clashed with Tessa’s bright green energy, and both destroyed each other, however it was more of a loss on the tree’s side, because those red veins perished alongside the puppet.

”Damn it!”, the pitch-black tree cursed on the spot, in case you wonder why it didn’t just release the puppet before the spears finished the job, it’s not as if the tree didn’t want to, but it couldn’t, the moment those energy streams coming from the harpoon got a hold of the puppet, the control over that the tree had over it, was interrupted.

’Don’t tell me, that bitch tricked me into cutting the physical connection to the main body, wasn’t her damn focus physically strong techniques, what the hell!’, inwardly exclaimed the tree.

And he was right, unlike the vine binding chain from earlier which’s focus is to physically restrain its target, which made it perfect to be used against the armored branches, that harpoon was used to suppress energy-oriented targets.

Of course, Tessa knew that if she directly pierced the reinforced energy branch with it while it was still connected to the main body, the tree might either cut off a part of it to save the rest, or even fight over the suppression, so she made it so the tree would have the ”chance” to separate it from the main body.

With the ”wireless” connection instead of the direct one in place, then Tessa’s energy was strong enough to overwhelm the control that the tree had over the isolated red veins, the rest is just as you saw, she used one of the traps she had prepared to finish it up, the important part is that she perfectly saw through the tree’s decision making and anticipated to it.

’Mmm, am I perhaps being influenced by Daimon’s way of doing things… well it’s better than rushing head on like a fool like Adam wanted me and Femi to do’, thought the alfear princes as she extended her left hand, making bright green energy gather on it.

”Forest Guardian, Strong Yew Longbow”, the bright green energy on her left hand took the form of a longbow, but that wasn’t all, energy also gathered on her right hand, taking an arm sized straight shape with a spiked point at one extreme.

”Forest Guardian, Explosive Cedar Arrow”, the moment that arrow formed, the tree immediately felt an overwhelming sensation of dread invading him.

’What the hell, after all that now she suddenly decided to act like one of her kind and use a damn bow for a long-ranged spell!’, thought the tree as black ominous mana exploded on its four legs.

”Black Death Step!”, with a loud shout the tree suddenly got its lower body cladded in black mist to then turn into a black flash that moved away from Tessa’s line of sight, or so he thought.

What the pitch-black tree didn’t take into account was the fact that, his senses screamed danger the moment the arrow appeared and that was before Tessa even placed it on the bow in other to shoot it, in other words, the danger didn’t come from the arrow and bow themselves.

”Centenary Guardian Vine!”, for a change, the alfear princess slightly raised her voice when calling out her technique, the ground rumbled and then a thirty something meter long giant green energy vine raised from below, carrying Tessa on its back, to then chase after the tree at an insane speed.

’Humph, do you think I’m going to let myself be trapped by that damn thing, so you can then shoot that arrow at me, dream on!’, the tree amazed by the speed of the vine opened its mouth to then shoot a wide area wall of black mist.

”Black Death Corroding Wave!”, unfortunately for the tree, this vine’s function wasn’t to restrain the target, nope, this technique which was triggered due to a combo of different techniques she had used, was capable of both attack and defense, it was up to the discretion of the caster how to use it.

”Hsss!”, and so, Tessa used a portion of the energy contained in the vine to shield herself from the incoming wave of black mana, successfully piercing through it, just in time to reach her target.

”Aghhh!”, with a gesture of Tessa’s hand, the vine lashed at the tree which was taken by surprise over this development, directly landing on its trunk.

”Booom!”, the tree was sent flying into the distance heavily landing on the ground a moment later, and now Tessa who used jungle stride appeared right above it, her hands had tensed the string of the bow and placed the arrow on it, to then release it in the form of a stream of bright green energy, aimed right at the big eye at the main body of the tree.

”Crack!”, listening to the cracking sound, normally would have made the alfear princess smile, however it was her time to not be able to react as she was supposed to.

”Hsrhsshshs!”, a loud screeching sound, made the alfear princess flash away, a drop of blood actually dripped down her left ear, since she didn’t manage to get away in time, that being said Tessa didn’t allow any sign of the pain she felt, to show on her pretty face, which was instead frowning as she looked at the result of her last attack.

”Now I’m starting to wonder, what kind of abomination are you, if you were what I thought, the dying scream of the Devil Blood Crystal Mandragora graft I got from the ruler, should have at least made your eyes and eardrums turn into a bloody mess, it was specifically prepared to deal with you after all”.

”And yet, without deploying any defensive means, only one of your ears bled a bit”, said the tree which had used its own branches, which were eyeless since all the eyes on them had gathered to form the main one in the trunk, to hold onto the armored branches, using them to receive both the lash from the vine and the arrow shot by Tessa.

Viscous red liquid flowed out from the eyes on the now tattered armored branches, it was as if they were crying blood tears, while they screamed as the eyes closed, since the branches were dying.

”Crunch!”, however that didn’t mean the tree was losing, in fact it seemed really happy with the outcome as it used its spike toothed mouth to munch on the now dead armored branches.

Apparently, the ability to obtain improvements, by devouring other branches was the one from the devil parasite, it shared it with the physical and energy branches, but it was its own ability, and so the result was also different when he was the one using it.

”Crack!”, cracking sounds came from all over the tree as dark red scales grew all over it, this included the legs, trunk, eyeless branches and even the energy branches which were acting submissive after seeing the end of the armored ones which had failed to protect the devil parasite too many times.

”I see, you can grow by consuming those two, but Marcus prohibited you from doing so by yourself, right?”, said the alfear princess.

This parasite, was created by a ritual using up a whole bunch of different materials, which ended up creating different ”personalities” in it, though the dominating one was the one from the parasite, naturally such a being would try to consume the others to grow, and that is probably how things are meant to be.

But since steps are important in a ritual, there should be a proper order for the previous, so the parasite was restricted to not eat the others, unless some conditions were met.

All the previous was theorized by the alfear princess based on what Daimon told her to be wary about it, ”A devil has the ability to go from one base ”form” to an advanced one, but they’ll only do so after being cornered in their current one, they do so not because of carelessness, but because they find joy in crushing the hope for victory of their opponents”, it’s what Daimon said to everyone.

Naturally, this wasn’t a confirmed fact, but something Daimon’s instincts told him, however given how they were right when it came to not chase after Adam, who was a damn hard to kill cockroach, because it was pointless unless it was supposed to be one of his ”epic battles” out of which he could only escape by using one of his opportunities.

So, by trusting his instincts and also relying in his knowledge about tales from back at earth, Daimon had made a guess about Marcus’s system trait, being the capacity to change ”forms”, something that might even affect his subordinates, which is why he warned Arianna and the others about it.

Anyway, having its ”secret” exposed by the alfear princess, made the tree click his tongue, but then he was reminded of something that his master had told him and ultimately snorted in response.

”You got valuable information about us after selling yourself to the enemy of the master, so what, it’s not like you can do anything about”, he mockingly said, which was a mistake.

The alfear princess has been looking for a way to vent the anger that invaded her heart, after realizing what Adam’s intentions for her were, not to mention the newest discovery that someone from her family probably worked to ”present” her in a silver tray to that piece of trash, and the tree just reminded her of it.

Even for such a calm and aloof girl as Tessa, it was impossible to overlook such words, and so with a smile that wasn’t a smile, the alfear princess gathered bright green energy on her right hand to then place her palm in the middle of her face.

”Forest Guardian, Wild Willow Mask”, the bright green energy covered the alfear princess’s face, to then turn into something akin a tribal mask, made out of energy, it was different than Daimon’s since this one allowed her eyes to be visible.

In fact, since it was semi-transparent due to being ethereal it didn’t hide Tessa’s pretty face at all, but that’s fine, this mask isn’t meant to hide its user’s identity after all.

”Solid Hickory Gauntlets”, with a few words, Tessa’s arms all the way from her hands to her elbows were cladded in bright green energy armor, before she flashed away from her previous position by using jungle stride.

The pupil on the big eye of the tree contracted like a needle, Tessa’s speed was the same, the problem is that unlike before he couldn’t detect even the slightest trace of the alfear princess with his senses, which means that he couldn’t predict where would the attack come.

”Booom!”, a heavy punch landed on the right side of the tree, instantly destroying his newly gained confidence due to the layer of dark red scales that had grown all over it, because while the impact wasn’t anywhere near close to the vine from earlier, which sent it flying into the distance, the pain coming from the area that received the attack, surpassed the previous.

”Crack!”, now imagine the tree’s expression when a second punch landed, this time on one of its four legs.

”Enough you bitch!”, with a loud shout, the tree radiated a huge amount of black mana, blasting away everything in its vicinity, while amusingly raising the leg which took the hit, because it was hurting.

Unfortunately, by the time the tree reacted, Tessa was already back to where she was, though the mask crumbled apart the next second as well.

”Why are you so angry, I’m helping you here, you’ll be allowed to change to your ”ultimate” form if I kill the energy branches as well, right”, casually said the alfear princess whose gauntlet cladded arms were burning with fierce bright green energy, which started fading away when the mask disappeared.