Chapter 76: Explore-a-tree

Year 84 Month 3

 

With the demonic supercannon down, the royals and nobles quickly made their way home. Truth be told, I think that’s a bit premature. The supercannon is but one of many demon walkers that are on the continent, and the demon king seems to be summoning more and more of them.

 

There are now supercannons on all continents.

 

The heroes too, after defeating the supercannon and gaining levels, expanded the network of [telecommunication trees]. Indeed, all of them acquired level 90 [towers]. At this point, I honestly don’t see anything other that the demon king himself making a dent at the heroes progress, so I feel the demon king’s stay in the world would last no longer than 1 year. 

 

The restoration of the [messaging] network also brought a return of intercontinental news and trade, something we really sorely, sorely needed. The first thing I did, of course, is order all my upgrade materials I needed. Lausanne’s Living Weapon, Thorny, reached level 20 and is level capped until I get the materials needed to upgrade him.

 

Then, there’s also the issue of Lausanne’s new bright idea. 

 

She wanted to visit other tree spirits and well, things like it. Perhaps, it’s similar to the old elven pilgrims that used to visit the great elf tree-guardians, even if just to acknowledge their role in the protection of the elven capital. 

 

“Travelling in this environment is quite difficult, and... we would need you here for defense.” Jura explained his views. He was fine with it, but he preferred if Lausanne waited till after the demon king was slain. Elves live for many many years, and Lausanne could always compare herself to future heroes.

 

Lausanne, of course, agreed. She’s smart, and she’s patient. There’s also much about the outside world she didn’t know about, so she agreed, on the condition that Jura, and everyone else included her on trips to nearby kingdoms, if they ever go on those visits. She had to learn how to conduct herself in foreign lands, after all.

 

In principle, I agree with Lausanne’s idea, and I would even like to tag along such that I can also communicate with the other spirits. In short, Lausanne’s going to be my envoy to the spirits. I too, have much to learn about the spirits of this world, my experience has solely been through my own lenses, and what little I learnt from the dead. 

 

-

 

The destruction of the demon supercannon also brought about a period of rejuvenation. Throughout the areas where my [subsidiary trees] and [giant attendant trees] are, trees are starting to regrow, and that makes me happy. It’s nice to see little trees starting to pop up next to my bigger trees, or a little field of flowers or grass. 

 

I get significant enjoyment from having new grasses or trees join my network of trees. Increasingly, it’s the tree part of me that finds joy in this. Or perhaps it’s just Trevor and gang’s enjoyment? 

 

The refugee situation temporarily subsided now that [message] and the demon supercannon’s death spreads. There’s something about uncertainty that adds to that fear, so with open communications restored, those living in different places no longer live in darkness. It’s just a thing about knowledge, that allows people to make better decisions.

 

All in all, with the royals and nobles making their way out.

Year 84 Month 4

The heroes are out hunting for the other demon bases. There are many throughout the continent, but at least, they know where to look for them. Benefits of real time communication. 

 

For me, I turn my focus to further studies of the telco tower. I’m not getting much insights into how it stays ‘synchronised’ with the other towers, but with the help of more lab equipment around the tower and ‘attempting’ to intercept magical [messages], over time I’m starting to figure out what’s happening. 

 

The [Telco Tower] has multiple components to it. The other parts is a form of ‘demonic barrier’ which creates a ‘safe zone’ for messages going to the sender, and from the sender. These repels the effects of the Demon King’s global ability. Secondly, is a kind of ‘repeater’, where the Telco Tower receives a message, and sends it to someone else but within the same ‘tower-range’. For longer range and continental messages, that goes through the somewhat quantum-entangled communications that exist between the towers. 

 

Of all of those, I decided to focus on the ‘aura’ repelling the demon king. It’s the easiest for me to study, and in many ways, similar to my [lesser demonic suppression aura]. I reckon the similarities would help me in understanding what exactly is happening.

 

And my suspicions were rewarded, because after some poking and thinking... I had a notification.

 

[Demonic Ability Reduction Aura - lesser obtained]

 

Yay! 

 

Feeling a bit accomplished, I went back to the hex wasteland. Apparently, the heroes have been sending a whole load of messages, to all the kings and leaders they could contact, to stop using the [hexbomb]. Because it made their work a lot harder, since it would disrupt their travel paths. 

 

I thought heroes would have some resistance, but maybe it’s just caution on their part. 

 

The hex has been a significant stumbling block in my research, mainly because the [hex] is the ‘byproduct’ of some kind of ‘magical ritual’, and it’s like I am trying to guesstimate what exactly happened in the ritual to know what ‘created’ a nasty side effect like hex. It’s as if someone gave me a piece of plastic, asked me how was that plastic made, and which process gave the plastic the qualities it possessed. 

 

So, I do want to observe a [blood ritual] for myself.

 

If the ‘nuclear fusion’ theory has any relevance, the blood ritual should be some kind of incomplete process that ‘created’ this... monstrosity. 

 

In my mind, I have a clear, obvious reason for researching the hex. In my mind, I cannot help but suspect that one day, some country is going to think I am no better than the demon king and use this same hexbomb against me. This horrid poison that corrupts the land just offends the trees and vegetation in every way possible, even more that the magically tainted poop. So much so that I get ‘feelings of anger’ through the [rootnet]. 

 

If a forest could react in anger to a factory spewing poison into it’s lands, I guess that’s how it feels. 

 

Even though it repulses me, I steeled myself and placed one [subsidiary tree] right into a pool of hex. 

 

It was a risk, but somehow... I felt like I had to reach into it. 

 

And then I felt my mind assaulted and overwhelmed by strange, twisted emotions and memories. Death. Pain. Suffering. Love. Hope. It lasted for a good two hours, a short flicker of a moment for me, my various [root brain complexes] and [The Grand Mind Tree] all instantly kicked in and ‘worked’ hard to allay those invading memories and emotions. It’s not all bad, but it’s all kinds of emotions, both positive and negative, warped in some way or form, or joined together. 

 

At the same time, I witnessed by [subsidiary tree] rot from the root upwards, it’s bark and trunk turning brittle before breaking up by bits and pieces. It took a while, and after that 2 hours, and I’ve regained emotional control, I soon used the root brains and mind tree to ‘invade’ into the subsidiary tree. 

 

It was too late. 

 

The [subsidiary tree] was dead, it crumbled and turned into dust. 

 

Yet, it was not all wasted.

 

The hex, as we seen it, shrunk a little bit.

 

Ah. Typical of blood rituals. It’s essentially an emotion-memory conversion into power, and so ‘fixing’ the hex meant ‘facing’ those emotions head on and unwinding them. But that still doesn’t answer the ‘underlying’ force. Is it still some kind of soul mechanism? Or does emotions and memories have their own power?

 

I suppose the true way to ‘fix’ the hex is to connect a root to it and run it through the root minds and [the grand mind tree]? 

 

-

 

“So, did you ask your mom?” 

“About what?”

 

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“About teaching me how to fight.”

 

Roma frowned. “You should stick to baking.” 

 

“Easy for you to say.” The black haired boy responded. “I only have my granny to look after me.”

 

“I only have my mom.”

 

“And her army of loyalists and servants.” The black haired boy was sharp, and there is indeed an army of loyalist. Even now, there’s 2 ‘guards’ tasked to watch after Roma.

 

Roma sighed. “Fine, I’ll ask her to teach you something.”

 

“Yay! I can’t wait to hit someone with one of the long hard breads!” Roma facepalmed, and the black-haired boy laughed. Indeed, Roma later did go see Yvon.

 

“Mom... I got a request... It’s got nothing to do with books or magic.” Yvon probably looks puzzled, because it’s quite rare for Roma to have requests outside those topics. 

 

“What?”

 

“I... I have a friend. He... wants to learn how to fight, so uh... could you... um... teaching him?” Roma asked awkwardly, and Yvon looked at her son. He twiddled his fingers even though he’s already in his teens, and Yvon nodded. 

 

“I won’t have much time to teach him, with my duties at the Valthorn kids, but sure. Maybe he can start joining us for a few rounds of basic spars, I have open sessions with the newer Initiates.”

 

-

 

News from the distant continents come in, and the Demon King is on the move. It seems the heroes are quite successful in defeating the demon walkers and the demon supercannons, if they have an ability similar to Meela and Alexis’s Star Mana-form. I reckon that’s probably a standard loadout for a hero. 

 

The heroes are now trying to gather up somewhere, and take down the rest of the demonic walkers. There are many, after all, this demon king was really fond of walkers, and so far, the heroes are successful, so much so that almost every 3-4 days we have news that another walker or supercanno has been destroyed. The heroes by now have moved out of my tree’s observational range, and so any news about their movement is via [message].

 

A part of me thinks, well, this is too easy. There must be something. 

 

Is this it? Really? Is this the slow end of the demon king? The demon king that peaked early and then ended, because it tried to attack all the continents at once?

 

I don’t think so. There must a trick. The demon king has been wandering continents to continents doing something. There must be a trap waiting for the heroes, there’s no reason for demon king to just hang around and idle when the heroes are still gaining strength.

 

The heroes must be expecting it too, things have been going a bit too easy for them now that they’ve unlocked star mana.

 

Oh well, let’s just watch the show. 

 

“Where has the demon king gone? Would anyone have any idea now that the message network is restored? Can we find out about all historical sightings of the demon king?”

 

Jura’s getting better at guessing what I’m trying to do, and he vaguely sounded like he sensed my concern. “I’ll send out a request to the merchant’s and mage’s guilds.”

 

Still, once I acquired the [demon ability reduction aura], that had an instant benefit, because that aura pushes back against the demon’s interference, doing so expands the field of the beetle’s range. After all, the beetles, being a form of ‘summoned’ creature, have little ‘resistance’ against demonic interference. 

 

In fact, I wonder whether there’s an [insect tamer] or [insect master] that will someday come up to me and ‘mind control’ one of my mindless beetles. 

Year 84 Month 5

Treeiner leveled up quickly, and gained some rather cool abilities. Like his level 10 ability literally distorts his training room into a larger one. I wonder what his higher tier abilities will be, a ‘practice dungeon’ would be quite cool.

 

That’d make him his own little dungeon core, isn’t it? 

 

A dungeon of our own for practice would be fantastic, since the Valthorn kids have expanded, and we’re short of ‘nannies’ to look after them, and it didn’t feel quite right to let their older, earlier students to look after them, with their limited life experience. 

 

Even if the first generation of Valthorns, the first 9, are now all above level 20, Lausanne being the exceptional one crossing level 60, but her leveling is stagnating. She complains about it sometimes, and it’s also partly why she wants to find other ways of growing. Her living weapon is also level capped at level 20, and the cool thing about Thorny is that well, it literally gives her a barb armor. Still, it's nothing compared to the kind of star-mana weapons the hero wields.

 

Lausanne was super proud of Thorny before this, but after the supercannon battle she’s been working really hard. Apparently their star-mana weapons literally slice through high tier demons like a hot knife through butter. Things that she needed a full powered strike to kill can be easily cut through.

 

I think it’s the level difference, they are after all in the level 80s to 90s, Lausanne’s just 60, and the gap of 10 levels is extremely big. Like how 30 levels meant I could tank a demon walker a lot more comfortably than before.

 

Maybe if Thorny had the anti-demon abilities like I did, he’d cut through the demons like water too!

 

Anyway, Lausanne’s daily affairs consist of training, helping and guiding all the younger initiates who look up to her. We’ve had to build a dedicated compound for the Valthorns, on top of the existing orphanage. With my new [Giant Attendant Trees], it really opened up the possibility of ‘subsidiary cities’ or ‘suburbs’. 

 

Maybe that’s something I should do. With that in mind, I made an announcement to the Valthorns, to find places suitable for an extra town. Perhaps somewhere close to a mine where I can do some mining using my deep roots.

 

Or somewhere with mana. 

 

Or should I just ask them to settle down in the southwest forests, with my ThreeTrees of mana. 

 

With the valley itself restricted, the forest now littered with the giant trees, New Freeka’s expansion is forced towards the open plains, where all the enemy armies like to march. New segments of town, new walls are built, as the city expands to accommodate more and more refugees and new citizens.

According to Ivy’s census data, she counted about 72,000 people living in New Freeka’s borders. Clearly a bit too cramped for some of them. 

 

Yet, the demons’ continued presence meant the lack of space in New Freeka is a small bother. Out in other cities, there are constant issues of food shortages, so much so New Freeka have been sending food aid to the nearby kingdoms. It’s a move by the Council, of course, since the Council’s past efforts of building wineries, underground heated farms, underground silos, and our most recent underground self-sufficient hideouts meant a surplus of food even for the large number. 

 

The council like allies, and well, I don’t blame them. I want my own allies too.

 

I need to visit the giant lilypod. So, I undid all the trees that I no longer needed, and continued my long chain of trees towards it. I stopped previously when the heroes started their attack on the wounded demon walker. 

 

It would take me a month or two to get there. But if Lausanne wants to talk to another Tree Spirit, maybe I should do the introductions.

 

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