the story of orthenox:

my story begins long ago, at summer's peak days,
I was taking a break from fishing that day so I was watching my daughter play in a field of wildflowers, how happy she was to play in that meadow. All day she played, picking the bright pink wildflowers and examining each one with care, as the day carried on everything was blissful. soon would i realize everything I ever cared about would be gone, i didn't think anything was wrong until i heard a roll of thunder: no, it couldn't be thunder, the sky was clear of clouds. if it wasn't thunder what was it? the answer revealed itself in a matter of seconds, the trees were shaking. "RUN MELISSA, RUN!!!!" i shouted to my daughter from across the field, already breaking into a run."RUN!!!!!" i shouted again. Melissa, my daughter started sprinting, i was only 50 yards from the treeline, if something was after me: I'm dead meat. Melissa saw it before i did, at the end of the field she screamed for me to hurry. She did not explain why i should hurry or from what i should run, but i continued running in her direction: gaining speed with every stride. She could have warned me i could never outrun what was following me: it was none other than a basilisk. it appeared as an enormous black mamba with fangs dripping poison and eyes that paralyze it's prey with fear. in only seconds it had caught me in it's bird-like talons and stared me right in the eye. i saw a gold beam of light and heard Melissa scream "DADDY DON'T GO!" and disappear into the horizon, heading home to tell her mom. I woke up in a dense swamp: was i even alive? was i dreaming? what had happened? i did not know, all i knew was my sudden desire to kill and a feeling of sorrow deep in my heart. i will never see Melissa again, but at least i saved her.in my mind i knew she would tie her favorite toy boat to the dock in our pond. i was saddened by the thought and i knew for sure i could never go back to my family when i looked at my reflection in the water, the basilisk had turned me into orthenox, the vine monster.

story inspired by doublejinxx's arcane serpent

warning: his extra vines do not show in preview because they are a "hat"