Bug Fables: The Everlasting Sapling

**Bug Fables: The Everlasting Sapling** is a role-playing video game developed by Panamanian independent studio Moonsprout Games and published by Dangen Entertainment.

## Synopsis

The three friends Vi, Kabbu, and Leif search the mythical land of Bugaria in pursuit of vast treasures and eternal life.

## Plot

In order to form an adventuring team, Kabbu the beetle partners up with Vi the bee to register with the Explorer's Association. After passing their initial trial, they are deployed to Snakemouth Den, a dangerous cavern and suspected home of an artifact.

In the cave, the pair find the ruins of a roach city, guarded by a monstrous spider. They also find a moth trapped in its web. Together, the two free the moth and escape deeper into the ruin. The moth, Leif, reveals himself to be able to use magic, an extraordinarily rare feat; but also admits to memory loss: he is unable to recall what happened to him in the cave to give him this ability.

Eventually, the trio manage to find the artifact and defeat the spider, barely escaping as the cavern floods. They are dubbed "Team Snakemouth" in recognition of the accomplishment, and are rewarded by the queen of the Ant Kingdom, Elizant II. Before long, the team is sent out again to find the other artifacts in different regions of Bugaria.

As they explore, Leif reveals that he served Elizant II's mother and predecessor, Elizant I, and that he had apparently been in the cave for at least a whole generation. Vi reveals her estrangement to the Bee kingdom, who criticized her decision to become an explorer, but is later able to make peace with her sister. After exploring a ruined castle in the desert, Team Snakemouth is able to explore deeper into Snakemouth Den, where in an optional mission set in the abandoned Roach laboratory, Leif discovers the truth about his amnesia, his magic, and his lapse in time: He is in fact a colony of sapient Cordyceps fungus created by the Roaches to channel magic, inhabiting the body of the deceased adventurer Leif, who was killed by the Spider but reanimated by the fungus.

After recovering the fourth and final artifact, the Ant Kingdom is attacked by soldiers of the Wasp Kingdom, led by the mysterious Wasp King. The Wasp King, able to wield fire magic, proves too much for the adventurers, and he absconds with the final artifact.

Team Snakemouth ventures into the northern grasslands to recover the artifact from the Wasp Kingdom, an isolated and militaristic people. They pass through a dangerous swamp, during which Kabbu reveals that a monstrous centipede living in the area killed his travelling companions during his journey to Bugaria from his home to the north. Upon encountering the beast again, Kabbu is able to slay it, finally avenging his comrades.

Infiltrating the Wasp Kingdom, Team Snakemouth discovers the imprisoned and deposed Wasp Queen, Vanessa II, who reveals that the Wasp King mysteriously took control of the wasps as if by magic and usurped her. They also realize the Wasp King is not here; this was a trap set to lure the Ant Kingdom's strongest out of the kingdom so the Wasp King could return and take the other artifacts with little resistance.

The team returns to the Ant Kingdom but is powerless to stop the Wasp King from carrying out his plan and escaping to the Sapling's resting place: the Giant's Lair, the abandoned human domicile looming over Bugaria. Elizant II, broken and humiliated, admits that her true plan with the Sapling was to use it to revive and rejuvenate her mother (who, thought dead, is actually being kept alive in stasis through Roach technology), and to abdicate the throne to her, understanding that her mother was a much more beloved queen and that her own lack of diplomatic tact has led to several broken ties with other kingdoms.

Out of options, Elizant II requests that Team Snakemouth escort her to the Termite Kingdom, a powerful and technologically advanced, but isolationist kingdom located in the foggy and barren Forsaken Lands that had become estranged from the Ant Kingdom following Elizant I's alleged passing. There, they meet with the Termite monarchy, and after Team Snakemouth proves the magnitude of the threat of the Wasps, the Termites agree to provide military support and transportation to the entrance to the Giant's Lair. Team Snakemouth, other adventuring teams, Ant Soldiers, and Elizant II convene at the entrance. Once there, Vanessa II gives Team Snakemouth a personal heirloom that protected her from the Wasp King's magic.

Within the abandoned monolith, the adventurers discover a village of living Roaches, who have sworn to protect the Sapling, but were unable to stop the Wasp King from passing through. When questioned, Elizant II reveals that her new plan is to destroy the Sapling, saying its influence consumed her mother, and (backed up by Leif) had ruined the lives of countless bugs, including the Roaches who doomed themselves to living in the dangerous and dreary Deadlands to protect it.

Moved by this, the Roaches allow them to proceed, and eventually they find the Wasp King just before he unlocks the Sapling. Using his fire magic, he incapacitates everyone except Team Snakemouth, who are protected by Vanessa's relic. Without his strongest weapon, the team defeats the King, but they are unable to stop him from unlocking the Sapling. However, the Sapling is withered, only growing a single shriveled seed. Despite this, the Wasp King consumes the seed, granting him incredible strength and vitality, and destroys the Sapling. Even with this, Team Snakemouth is able to defeat him, and, having exhausted all of his power, the Wasp King is transformed into a harmless, nonmagical tree.

Back in the Ant Kingdom, Team Snakemouth is rewarded with a grand celebration, and are officially knighted by Elizant II, who, thanks to reopening relations with the Wasps and Termites, is now seen as a much better queen. While talking with Leif, she admits that while not fully satisfied that she was unable to bring her mother back, she is glad that she was able to fulfill her greatest wish.