Chapter 28: A line to the leyline

Year 75 Month 7

With additional 2,000 normal trees added to the valley per month, I hit 20,000 normal trees this month. Thanks to this, it also triggers Trevor to gain a skill called [Explosive Regeneration], that he can use once a month. It allows for a sudden regrowth of an entire forest area, from damage. The valley’s trees are getting denser, and wider, but really, Trevor providing oversight allows me to focus on big picture stuff. It’s kinda like that moment where you can delegate menial tasks that one don’t like to a robot.

The higher tree count also grants 2 additional artificial souls. But I have yet to think of what to do with it. I do have the biolab assistant idea, and going by the way how Forest Mind helped tremendously in research, I suspect a biolab assistant may end up being an automated testing system, which is cool. It’s like having a science officer reporting back with new stuff every now and then, kind of like those RTS games, where we select something to research, pass a few turns… and ping!

“How about me?” Oh. Meela. I sometimes forget she exists, since she goes to sleep very often. Apparently non-physical souls like herself has the option to put herself into “stasis”, or a “sleep mode”.

“You actively reject every idea I put to you, and you still ask me for opinions…” I could use a secretary, but Trevor might get jealous. Or do they? I frankly have not understood the degree of sentience these “artificial souls” display.

“Because I really, really just like lazing around. I have done a whole lot of thinking and this whole hero thing is bonkers. Maybe Max would be a hero, but me, no.”

“You do have a sense of good and evil, do you not?” The gods selected her, so… she had to. Or maybe the hero power kind of messed with her mind a bit. Not beyond the god’s ability to cause her to feel a strong compulsion to fight evil...

“That's cause of my upbringing. I have great parents But driving myself into doing hero things, all this fighting demons and monsters… no. I rather be a bartender or an artists. Alexis would have been a teacher, or a scientist.”

“Too bad she’s dead. Too bad they are all dead.”

“Ah yea.” Meela makes some kind of noise that sounds like frowning. “I wonder whether the rest of them… where are they.”

“If they had a similar experience like you, maybe their souls are still drifting around.”

Meela pauses. “What.”

“I mean, your soul got shredded and damaged so bad that you can’t even move to the next world. And somehow you followed the familiars here… Your friends are there with you, so it’s not strange if their souls got shredded too, don’t you think so? So, because they have no real attachment to this world, maybe they end up just.. Floating around or something...”

Though, this poses some interesting thoughts about the nature of the fragments that I receive when these heroes die. What exactly am I getting, when I get the fragments? Their soul, or something of an “attachment” or “extension” of their soul?

“Hmmm…” Meela’s spirit bobs around in the soul realm. She does that when she is bothered and has something.

“What are you thinking?”

“Can you make an altar?”

“An altar?”

“Yes, yes. Altar.”

“Uh… okay.” I later had the elves do it, since my ability to manipulate stone and rock is fairly limited.

It is a simple one, created next to the site of the Tree of Prayer. Essentially it’s just a flat rock like a prayer or offering table, and a few rocks stacked on top of each other into a… totem?

“Is there a priest amongst the refugees?”

“Huh. Where are you going with this?”

“I met a priest once, who said that its possible to offer a prayer to the souls of those still wandering, to lighten their load, to send them… away. I’m hoping to pray to my friends’ souls, so they find solace and peace, so they…. They go peacefully.”

“Huh.”

I relay the request to Jura, and Jura then asks Yvon for it. They need some time though, as there are a lot of new refugees and they do not have a register of their respective jobs.

“You want to pray so they can move on, eh?”

“Yeah. That’s the least I can do, to help them along, no? They are my friends, I wouldn’t want to see their souls stuck wandering this stupid war-crazy world anyway.”

“War crazy, eh?”

“You don’t think so?” Meela sighs. Somehow I heard that, even though she’s a floating light. “I didn’t realise it when I’m alive, but… this world is obsessed with fighting.”

“An output of the world they live in. Demons, monsters, if your world had creatures like this, you would invent weapons to kill them too.”

“I wish it isn’t.”

“Bet plenty of people do too.”

Other than that, the refugees are doing surprisingly well. With the first crates of wine sent out for deliveries, it seems they are making good progress on winemaking. I got to give them credit for their entrepreneurial spirit, making such goods.

The stalemate with the dungeon continues, but if the refugees ask for help again, I’m gonna ask them to help raid the damn dungeon. They can keep the loot, for the money, but I want the core. I’ve actually yet to decide what to do if I get it, but I want it.

Lausanne follows Jura everywhere these days, and even though Jura is initially reluctant to take her as his apprentice, her persistent and cuteness somehow won through his old man’s heart. He is ageing, after all, and I suppose people mellow down as they age.

“TreeTree…”

“Huh, yes.” Jura jolts me out of my overhead valley vision. “Yes…”

“It’s Lausanne.”

“Oh. What about her.”

“She’s… she’s not talented. But she keeps trying.”

“That's good.” I like hard work.

“No. Its bad.”

“Eh? Why?”

Jura pauses, and walks a few steps around my main tree, takes a deep breath, and then sits. “Combat, or fighting requires talent. It's the way of the world, learn to fight to your strength, not pursue an idol whom you can never match.”

He sits.

“Think about. If you are good in fighting with a sword, you learn to fight with a sword. If you have talent to be a mage, you learn magic.”

“Hmmm…”

“So, what I am trying to say is… Lausanne’s wasting her time, by doing what she isn’t naturally disposed to doing. But, I don’t know what else to teach her.”

“That seems kind of fatalistic.” Meela pops out, she says to me. “Do people of this world believe that they should only hone their talents?”

Jura continues, unaware of Meela’s comment. “Maybe I can test her for other things, and teach her for self defense, but perhaps she is best suited for… more non-combat chores, like her mother...”

“Ewwww.” Meela groans.

“So TreeTree, can you talk her out of her silly dream of becoming a hero? She may lose her life pointless pursuing a dream that is… erm. . futile.”

“...”

“Isn’t she too young? How does one know of talent?” I retort.

“In most societies, by age of 6 it is already possible to identify what one is talented in. And Lausanne’s case, she’s displaying a total lack of talent in fighting.”

I didn’t like this conversation. At all.

“Please TreeTree. I’m trying to look out for her, so I think she needs to find something else to do. Something with a better use of her time. One does not teach a fish to fly, or a bird to swim. Lausanne’s trying, and I too admire that hard work, but it’ll set her on a path she is not meant to walk.”

Really.

“I’ll… I’ll think about it.

I feel terrible even saying it, but I want to speak to Lausanne first, even though she’s just a child. I want to hear her thoughts, and I think it’s not right, just because one isn’t talented, doesn’t mean one cannot pursue their dreams. But I do recognise Jura’s comment, that if she is classed in a way that does not fit her natural abilities, that is a bad thing as well.

“What do you think, Meela?”

“No. The girl has the right to do whatever she wants.”

“Even if she can do better elsewhere?”

“Yes. And can’t you help her along?”

When Lausanne returns home later that evening, I speak to her, as she laze on her bed. She gets her own bed now, now that Brislach and Wahlen has moved to New Freeka, where they found work.

“Lausanne?”

“AH TreeTree!” She rolls, and squeezes a bolster.

“How’s your training with uncle Jura?”

“It’s hard! But I like it!”

“Really? Do you ever wonder you should be doing something else?”

“You’re really asking her?” Meela pokes in.

“I like it. I want to be a hero, that can save everybody! A hero must know how to fight so I can protect everyone!” Did Lausanne’s experience with how the reincarnated heroes create this sort of desire? Is it because she still does not fully comprehend the nature of the heroes divine gift?

“I see…” I chickened out. To tell her to stop, I just don’t have it in me.

Is this my idealism, that will somehow cross with the reality and cruelty of this world?

“Good. Encourage her!”

“Ah…. Is that not making it worse? Maybe she will realise as she grows older.. this is perhaps a phase.”

Meela stops… “You.. you’re kicking this problem down the road.”

“Look, we don’t know what the future holds. Maybe Jura is right, but maybe he is not.” I think it is too early to tell.

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“He’s wrong.”

“Maybe. I hope so. But what if he isn’t?” This world can be… brutal. And mistakes are costly.

“She’s six. I didn’t know what I wanted when I was six.”

Lausanne leans back. “You know, Uncle Jura says I should learn how to do other things. And I think he is also right. Do you think there’s a way I can learn everything? But mommy say I should not be greedy.”

I pause.

Meela pauses, and after a brief moment, laughs.

“She’s right. Do you have any skill?”

“If… hmm.. maybe my [dream tutor] then?”

“Then its settled!”

The little episode I had with dream tutor also led me to wonder whether I could fuse an “artificial soul” and “dream tutor”, creating a “teacher” character. Of course, I only have 2 slots, and if anything, I have to think about them carefully, since I’m unlikely to be able to upgrade the [rootnet] so quickly to support the higher normal tree energy transfer, even though I can still grow the trees without any inhibitions.

So much to think about.

I wonder whether trees losing their leaves is a result of overthinking.

Year 75 Month 8

“A dungeon raid.”

“Yeah.” Yvon explains, the group gathered is about 150 strong, comprising the best fighters, mages and healers the entirety of the valley has to offer, even Jura, who after some convincing, finally agree to participate.

Even adventurers are not spared from the whole non-human eviction notice. Salah is not taking chances, all non-humans, no buts, no exceptions.

In a way, adventurers have it better than the other refugees, since their skills are needed everywhere, and some neighbouring nations are willing to accept non-human adventurers into their lands. They are skilled, mobile, usually self-sufficient, and are already somewhat nomadic, so this eviction hardly stung. If there’s one less country, there’s still many others.

“Are you our employer, mistress Yvon?”

Yvon pauses… “I guess you can say so. Our goal is simple, grab the dungeon core, and if we can’t, destroy it. The dungeon core, whether whole or broken, as you know, is worth a fair bit of money, and will help us with our truce obligations.”

The gathered fighters chatter, prepping themselves for the raid, and then off they went, into the dungeon.

I had no idea what happened the moment they went inside, but I waited, my beetles outside in case anything happened.

To be fair, I could not do anything if shit went down inside, but hey, I could cover them externally. Dungeons, from what I can sense, have similar “space distortion” abilities like I do, so just because I have them “surrounded”, does not actually mean they are surrounded.

So, in a way, all I could do is pray?

A full day and a half later, I get a ping. Through Paws.

“Master, the dungeon core has been obtained, but the dungeon-space is crumbling.” It seems that after the dungeon core has been dislodged from the dungeon itself, the barrier that shields the dungeon from the space beyond disappears, so Paws is able to then telepathically communicate with me.

“How much time do you guys have?”

“No idea. We might be trapped in here.”

“Oh no you’re not.”

The entrance to the dungeon starts to vibrate, shake, like an earthquake is happening.

“Are they going to die inside?” Meela seems worried, starts to butt herself in.

“How far are you guys?”

“It’s a lot deeper than expected. It’ll take us at least 3 hours to get out of the main chamber.”

No. This isn’t going to work. At the rate the dungeon is crumbling, they won’t make it. Hmm.. what can I do, what can I do?

Ah.

[Rootnet attempting to connect to dungeon-space]

“Trevor, help me out here.”

“Yes sire. Synchronising roots into the walls….”

With the dungeon core out of the way, the invisible barrier preventing me from spawning [subsidiary tree] within the dungeon’s area of influence and entrance is also gone, so I spawn a few trees next to the entrance, and on top of it, and guide my roots into the dungeon.

It sort of works.

As the roots mix in with the walls that is crumbling, it seems the roots are taking over the distorted spaces, giving it the stability it needs.

[Energy draining. Passageways reinforced] It seems some of the energy generated by my normal trees and subsidiary trees is used to support this additional dungeon-space. It feels like a magically supported structure, centered around the dungeon core, which draws additional energy from the space and also the leyline beneath it. Now that centerpiece suddenly disappeared, so it’s as if an electrical circuit is without electricity, and oddly enough, I am coming in as the “backup” power source.

“The vibration is stopping.” Paws pings, and as my roots reach deeper and deeper into the dungeon, I soon cross paths with the escaping adventurers.

“The walls…” Yvon says, now I can hear her, as my roots now cover the entirety of the labyrinth.

Dead. There’s dead bodies. Adventurers, not all survived. As they stream pass, I see some carrying some injured, some carrying the dead.

“My roots can now extend into the labyrinth. You guys can calm down now.” I speak to Jura directly, as he comes into range. He’s fine, bleeding in some places, but relatively speaking, unscathed.

He immediately slows down and tells everyone that the Tree spirit’s roots are now stabilising the dungeon and so it’ll not collapse.

And with that, they took the chance to turn back, and retrieve the dead bodies for a proper burial.

Yvon too, has gotten her hand on the dungeon core, which she will let me examine in my [biolab] first, before she arrange for a sale on the magical artifacts market.

[New structure obtained : Root Dungeon]
[Root dungeon, leftovers of a dungeon that happens to be stabilised by the roots of a tree spirit. Does not spawn monsters or loot.]

[New skill obtained : Root-tunnels]
[Root tunnels, as what the name says, are tunnels made out of roots. Good for smuggling, transporting, and various tunnel things.]

Sadly, the dungeon core is unscannable by my [biolab]. It’s a bio-lab. Not a everything-lab, so dungeon cores don’t register. So, oh well.

But anyway, that’s not the purpose of me getting the dungeon core. That’s the prize for Yvon’s group, as they get to sell it, of course the agreement is such that some of the proceeds go to the Treefolk, Centaurs and Jura who also contributed to the expedition.

The objective for me, is the leyline.

And so, with a few subsidiary trees now above the leyline, I extend my roots, attempting to reach for that leyline. Well, it’s my first exposure to a leyline, so I don’t really know what to expect, but according to the Wisp, it’s like some kind of 4th dimensional thing, so it pops up in some places, disappears, and then pops up somewhere else, but still all part of the same “line”. Every time it pops up, the things in its way would then be influenced by it, and thus forming things like dungeon cores, and the dungeon cores then “anchor” the aetherline, such that they don’t move elsewhere, though what’s more likely to happen, is that a new dungeon core would often re-appear nearby.

Leyline connection initiated

And I felt dizzy instantly. It’s as if I drank a whole keg of alcohol and the entirety of it’s punch just hit me in one go. Is this magic-intoxication?

“Yes.” The wisp pops in. “At least you didn’t knock yourself out yet, but you are quite high leveled, so this is to be expected.”

Leyline connected. The subsidiary trees above the leyline is merging… The three subsidiary trees has merged into a Special Structure - [ThreeTrees Of Mana]

[ThreeTrees of Mana]
[Created when one subsidiary tree couldn’t handle to energy of a leyline, so three of them merged. An artifact of the leyline, this structure serves as the “conduit” of the leyline, so protect it, as it is your connection to the leyline, in place of the dungeon core. Serves no other function]

ThreeTrees. Did the skill just did what I think? And seriously, why did they make that tree so… visible. It’s like, a big blue tree growing out of nowhere, telling everyone of it’s presence.

Come on, first the ginseng tree, now this. The system is trying to paint me as a target. Or is this some kind of subliminal messaging the system is saying, that trees are always targets, and we should always protect our trees?

“Uh…” I feel the dizziness slowly drain away from me, and my mind starting to regain its senses. Then, even more updates!

Leylines are awesome after all.

Due to the additional energy types supplied, [Soul Forge - Black unlocked].
[Soul Forge - Black allows for the conversion of undead spirits back into regular soul, reversing the effects of necromancy, and the removal of the dark energies of a soul]
[Additional repairs of damaged souls now possible]
[Creation of Soul Harvesters now possible]

[Soul Harvesters] 
[Some call them the grim reaper, some refer to them as valkyries, these are travelling collectors of souls. They extend your soul harvesting reach, and can be directed to specific places, such as battlefields, graveyards to collect souls. Souls collected are of a higher chance to contain “transferable experience”]

Due to the presence of two colors, the following fused abilities are now available.

[Nightmare collectors]
[A special ghost type that steals nightmares]

[Memory collection]
[Using the dark arts, a small % of memories of the dead will be converted into skill essences]

I’m already losing the leaves on my branches thinking about so many things, so now I have more to think about. First of all, the soul forge has different color types, which supply different types of abilities. I have blue and now black, and that’s like pure control deck archetype, isn’t it? But I’m a tree.. So does that make me… a blue-black-green deck?

Anyway, lets ignore that little snippet about trading cards.

How many colors are there, and if I am to hazard a guess, the black comes from the fact that this is specifically an undead dungeon, so there’s probably some linkage. If I go to the volcano, do I get red? And a magical glades or something, do I get green?

Adds to to-do list.

Next, is to further repair Meela’s soul. This second repair didn’t do much, other than allow her to stay awake and active more often. Also, I’m really tempted to fuse her soul and a soul harvester. She’d be a valkyrie! Or a ghost! But she said nope, I’ll think about it.

She should be a nightmare collector then. Kinda of the saw guy, no? Or is that the guy with the spiky nails. Once again, she vehemently rejects the idea.

“I’m a cute little girl. I ain’t becoming your haunted ghost.”

“But cute little girls make the best scary ghosts!”

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