Kumbanaka spent the next twenty minutes regaling Fred about Kumbanaka`s rich heritage and family history. Apparently the history of his family was a subject of immense pride and fascination for Kumbanaka, and he seemed to feel that everyone else should agree with him. Fred listened politely. Even Martin had never pontificated this much. He wondered if Kumbanaka was trying to prove something to him, or if Kumbanaka just liked the sound of his own voice (It was a very nice voice, after all, deep and enchanting).

　　Finally Kumbanaka tapped his pipe out on the ground, picked up his camp chair, and said, "I suppose I can`t keep you. And I need to move in." He walked back to his living room and started unpacking his huge pack. Fred felt it was a good time to focus on other things. He saw Black Mamba peeking at Kumbanaka from across the tree room. Fred felt sure that both Kumbanaka and Martin knew she was there, but neither chose to acknowledge her. "I`m sure she was just curious. I hope she doesn`t go anywhere she shouldn`t."

　　The morning proceeded without incident, but in the afternoon, Fred spotted the group of axe-wielding men, walking into his domain. He recognized the grumpy-looking "foreman" (anyhow, that word popped into his head, and he liked it) leading them, and saw there were three be-robed men following along, too.

　　When the group got to the base of the ramp, looking into the tree room, the three mages started casting. Two of them cast a big dome-like protection spell, just as the fairies started throwing their own spells around. The magic dome did its job; the fairy magic simply bounced off, protecting all the men. The third mage then waved his hands in a big show, and a sudden wind rushed down on the tree. All of the fairies were shoved to the ground by the huge gust, like little dolls thrown from a window onto pavement.

　　They`d obviously prepared, because the axemen all rushed forward and started chopping the fairies to bits. Fred was appalled. Such little things (through admittedly mean and magical) were set upon by big men with axes. The results were swift and gruesome. A few of the men got singed by fairy magic, but the tactic was successful, and the fairies were no longer protecting the tree.

　　As the mages retreated to the base of the ramp, the axemen (including the foreman) got to work, standing around the tree, chopping it down from its base. The silver tree was fairly resistant to the axes, but there were ten axemen, and they swapped out as they got tired.

　　As the men chopped, they couldn`t miss the bodies of the fairies disappearing into sparkles. One of the mages appeared to have put one of the fairy bodies into his pocket. He clearly seemed disappointed when his pocket spouted sparkles too. Fred didn`t know what he wanted with the dead fairy; probably some sort of mage thing.

　　In about ten minutes (of hurried hard work) the tree toppled, and the men shouted in triumph. They all grabbed onto the tree, and started hauling it up the ramp. But it wouldn`t fit. They all shouted and gestured and stamped at each other, but eventually they`d cut off enough branches that the tree could barely fit. Up the ramp it went, slowly, brushing the entrances to the temple, the maze, and the lairs of the Jinpa, the mummy, and the Beetle Bros. Fred wondered if this would attract any of the monsters to come out, and the humans were clearly worried about that too, but it didn`t happen. At the time, another team of humans were inside fighting the Beetle Bros, but the Mummy and the Jinpa apparently couldn`t be bothered by simple tree-nappers.

　　Then the tree group approached the ogre`s lair, and more shouting happened. Fred knew the ogre would throw rocks, and the humans clearly knew that too. The mage looked sour about it, but (after more shouting) he cast his protective dome over the entrance to the ogre`s lair. Then the rest of the group started dragging the tree again, through the dome and past the lair entrance.

　　The ogre wasn`t napping, and he threw big rocks as hard as he possibly could. They bounced off, but that just made the ogre scream and throw harder. Fred noticed that the mage was standing aside, chanting and gesturing furiously, sweating and groaning, with a red face. "That must be a lot of work," Fred mused.

　　The men rushed the tree past the entrance as fast as they could, but the ogre eventually got tired of throwing rocks and came to the entrance to pound on the protective dome personally. This didn`t make the mage any more comfortable, but the tree started moving even faster. Finally the men drug the tree out of sight, and into the main entrance tunnel. This tunnel was even narrower, so they had to stop again and cut more branches off. The men cursed and sweated; many of their axes were now very dull.

　　Fred could see that all his creatures in the front area were dead (pre-resurrection?), so there wasn`t any fighting going on. But there were warriors milling around, waiting their turn, and they didn`t think much of these new guys trying to drag a whole tree through their battle zone. More shouting happened, and a few of the warriors stepped up to help drag the tree outside, probably just so they could clear the corridor.

　　The tree finally made it out onto the black stone entrance platform. Many of the axemen sat down to rest. The two mages disappeared, and Fred noted that they`d left their fellow mage (the one who`d done the shield that protected them from the ogre) on the wrong side of the ogre`s lair, curled up and resting after such an arduous casting.Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

　　The foreman was in heated negotiation with several people (probably merchants?) who`d watched the tree come out and wanted to haggle about it for some reason. There was a lot of negative head shaking. Perhaps the whole tree was already spoken for. Nobody seemed to go away happy from the exchange.

　　Finally, after a short rest, the axemen all picked up the tree (and the various cut-off branches) and walked down to the town with it. Fred pretty much lost interest in them, but since he could see everything all at once (more or less, if he thought about it), he knew they took the rest of the day to chop it up more, load it into multiple wagons, and leave.

　　About thirty minutes after the tree was chopped down, leaving a sorry-looking shattered stump, Fred`s magic happened. Instantly the tree was whole again, and all the fairies were fluttering around it, as though nothing at all had happened. Fred wondered about this. "Hey, uh, guys, I could use your& opinion", he said, thinking to talk to both Martin and Kumbanaka.

　　"At your service, Spirit Fred", Kumbanaka replied immediately. Martin then said, "What is it?"

　　"Well, is this tree a creature of my domain? Only, it`s a tree."

　　"Why would you say that?", Martin asked.

　　"Well, like a creature, men killed it, and then it reappeared, completely fine, just like a creature would. And those fairies came back too."

　　"I told you it was functionally un-killable", Martin said. "Still, I wouldn`t have expected it to grow back so fast."

　　"I`ve seen several Fwen Rounbous rings, with trees", Kumbanaka added. "I`ve never seen one attacked, much less chopped down. The cities value them so much, it would be instant death for anyone who tried. So I have nothing to relate this to, sorry."

　　"Okay, mebbe I`ll ask Jim about it"

　　"Who`s Jim?", Kumbanaka asked, innocently. Fred expected Martin to jump in and say Jim was a figment of his imagination. When he didn`t, Fred replied himself.

　　"Jim is& He`s the guy who created me. He talks to me, like you guys do. He helped me get started. We talk every day."

　　"He created you?", asked Kumbanaka.

　　"Yeah, he and Aeru. You know Aeru, right?"

　　"Of course I know this world. I`m living on it."

　　"You live upon it, but Fred insists that Aeru is alive, and sentient, and directing 209 new Earth Spirits to protect everything from the coming Demon invasion," Martin interjected.

　　"My great-aunt told us all that she regularly conversed with Aeru. We had no reason to disbelieve her. And we learned never to speak ill of this world, when we were near her", Kumbanaka grinned at the memory. "I`ve never talked to Aeru, but I have no evidence that it`s not alive. Fred, do you talk to Aeru?"

　　"No, only Jim."

　　"And you said that Jim and Aeru created you?"

　　"Yeah, uh, he was there when I woke up here. I mean, when I started as an Earth Spirit. He told me about the five hundred new Earth Spirits that he and Aeru created, and how most of them couldn`t handle it and died." Fred felt like he was kind of oversharing, but it was very easy to talk to Kumbanaka.

　　"Ah! You told me the 209 number, leaving me to wonder about such an odd amount. If you had told me that 209 had SURVIVED, not just been created, I`d have been more inclined to believe you", Martin perked up.

　　"I haven`t been lying to you, Martin. Ever. If you find it so hard to believe, well, sorry." Fred replied peevishly.

　　"How long have you been here, Fred?" Kumbanaka gently asked.

　　"Five weeks, maybe?"

　　"That makes sense. The far-seers in my entire extended family have been in a froth, for exactly that long. Everyone was in agreement; something monumental was going on. I myself felt your call four weeks ago."

　　"Wow, I hadn`t even made a lair for you back then. Jim told me my magic would reach out into the world and find creatures for my domain. I didn`t understand how much that would mean."

　　"It means still more than you know, Fred." It was Martin`s turn to be peevish. "How many more sentients will be subjugated to your control magic, before you`re satisfied?"

　　"I told you. It`s not& me. I`m just trying to do the best I can here. Do you think I wanted to leave& wherever I came from?"

　　"Where did you come from, Fred?", again Kumbanaka asked in a guiding, gentle way.

　　"I don`t remember. Exactly. I mean,... it`s all jumbled. And there`s not much. Memories, I mean."

　　Kumbanaka asked, "But you have a few?"

　　"Yeah. I remember being a man. A human. Male. I get flashes of memories of other men. Other humans. I think I remember things from my last life, like TVs, and cars. I think. Actually those are fuzzy too."

　　Kumbanaka asked, "Do you remember loved ones? A family?"

　　"No, not at all. Is it supposed to happen like this?"

　　There was a pause. Neither Kumbanaka or Martin seemed to want to answer the question. Finally, Kumbanaka said, "Fred, I have little knowledge of the soul magic that must have been used to summon you. What I was told was that it was tricky and dangerous work, and that was enough to satisfy my curiosity."

　　"Tricky, yes, normally," Martin replied. "But with the high number of failures, I suspect Fred`s& creator& just went fishing at the Well of Souls. Leaving everything to the Fates."

　　"Well of Souls?", Fred asked.

　　"Yes. There`s a place where souls run together into a huge swirl of `wirn-giowah`, or raw soul soup. It`s a pit of darkness. A sewer, one could say. Filled with unwanted souls hopelessly awaiting their chance for reincarnation."

　　"I have never been told of such a place," Kumbanaka stated firmly. "Our gods protect our souls, and have a special place set for them by their side."

　　"Yes, yes, all gods try to intercept and corral the souls of their worshipers after death. Most are successful; it`s considered bad form NOT to take such care, among the gods. But still, unwanted souls eventually trickle down into the Well of Souls. Where anyone with the right spell can scoop up a random blob of souls, like bait-fish in a bucket. Heh heh." Martin was clearly proud of his analogy.

　　"I don`t remember believing in any god. I mean, before. Is that what happened? No god wanted me, so I wound up in the sewer?"

　　"Martin is just speculating, Fred." Kumbanaka said. "It`s possible, but I don`t know. And he doesn`t either. You can ask Jim, right?"

　　"Yeah. Yeah, I will."