
### Protocol E

You step into the space between two large exposed roots, each big enough to be a small tree in its own right. The roots continue to be exposed beneath the tree as they dig down into the earth, and you climb down, at first sliding down the loose, crumbling earth, and then grabbing onto smaller roots and climbing down them like a rope ladder.

Eventually you reach the bottom of a large earthen bowl. A lone ray of light shines feeble and weak on the floor. The air smells of rich loam. You cross the floor and climb up the other side.

The tree sighs and whispers to you.

> Hello, human child. So nice of you to visit me. There was another child who used to visit me a long long time ago, but I don't see them much any more. I sleep most of the time now though. And not very well. I dream of a dark ocean and a great sea monster. The dream pulls me under, and it becomes harder and harder to wake from it.

> I can tell that the forest likes you. You should visit my friend the river in the wild woods.

You finally have to squeeze yourself through a narrow gap between two roots and claw your way up out of the ground, but you emerge and are standing on the other side of the massive tree.

You brush the caked dirt off your hands and forearms to reveal that your skin has become dark corded wood.

You have the *Barkskin* effect.

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