Author’s Corner: Another shout out, this time to miguelmp for the positive review. And don’t worry, guys, he’s getting closer to leaving the nearly-pure fantasy part of the game!

------------------------------------------

Analyzing the wolf’s nose was surprisingly difficult, as a sense organ is far more complicated than something like a paw or wings. Still, about an hour and a half later, I had managed to memorize the pattern. With a bit of hesitation, I gradually applied to spell to unlock the next Aspect for my magic.

New Spell Unlocked!Aspect of the Tracker - Nature Magic - ☆

By studying the sensory organs of various creatures, you are capable of assuming those traits to enhance yourself.

Mana Cost: 30

I wasn’t really sure what I had been expecting, but a massive overflow of vivid smells still managed to catch me off guard, to the point where it was almost nauseating. In order to save my aching gut, I hurriedly dismissed the spell, letting my nose return to normal. After taking a moment to recover, I saw the window that had appeared, and was honestly disappointed. Maybe senses are considered a pure utility effect, and thus aren’t ranked very high, but still… only being worth half a star frustrated me.

Either way, I had my collection complete for the wolf. Next thing I did was to fully memorize the creature’s aura so that I could add it to my collection of shapeshifting forms. That part took a bit longer, nearly three full hours. However, once I had it, and memorized it, I didn’t bother trying to shift into a wolf. I figured it probably cost at least 500 mana, so it’d be best to wait until I hit that.

Looking over towards Sharon, a thought occurred to me. “Celeste… you can still measure my affinities, right?”

The holographic girl appeared above my wrist, nodding obediently. “That’s right, Falenel. Want me to take a look at them again?”

Her constant change in attitude confused me, but maybe that was just her personality settling in, or she was doing it on purpose to be playful. “Yeah, is there one listed as an Animal Affinity?” I asked curiously. Since there was a Plant Affinity, maybe there was also one for animals. And if that was the case, the manipulation skill would likely have a similar effect as the one I have for plants.

“Hmm… yup! There is one listed as a Beast Affinity. Currently, your rating with that is only a single percent. Why, you don’t feel like training it, do you?” She asked, seemingly surprised. She likely knew my thoughts regarding the birds, so cultivating this affinity would be weird for me.

“Not just yet. Was only curious.” It’ll probably be something that Sharon gets fairly early on. I’d wager it was likely one of her top three starting affinities.

Hearing my reply, Celeste let out a sigh of relief, before her hologram vanished back into the bracelet where she dwelled. Now, it was time to start cultivating the remaining elements I needed in order to establish my inner grove. Out of the three remaining affinities I needed, water was currently the highest at 2%, so I started with that.

Standing up, I walked over closer to the pond and sat down, setting my hand just at the edge of the pond to let my fingers be submerged. Even though I had Aura Sight now, and it allowed me to see the mana of the different elements, I wasn’t sure it would let me make a connection over a distance. So instead, I made the link the same way I had before, through a physical connection.

After that, time passed much in the same way as when I trained my other affinities… slowly. It took nearly three full days to get the Water Manipulation ability, and then another three days each for Light Manipulation and Fire Manipulation. On the bright side, I managed to figure out a recipe for alchemy to cure burns… Though, that was only because I foolishly stuck my hand inside a fire to establish the connection to that type of mana, before I realized that living creatures(like myself) naturally emit a small amount of fire mana.

In the end, I managed to raise all three to 5% after nearly ten full days of training. During that time, Sharon has been practicing even harder than I was. Not only did she get the Beast Manipulation, but she also got the abilities for water, earth, and wind in that same amount of time. If I didn’t already have a head start of two affinities, she would have easily beaten me to it.

Also, I should mention that I finally got around to testing the Earth Manipulation skill. It reminded me of an old anime, where a person had to use sharp movements to move the earth. While I didn’t really need to make any movements, it took quite a bit more mana than the other affinities. However, the effects made by manipulating the earth were permanent, so it could make up for it.

If you’re wondering how I managed to feed myself for these nine days, it’s really simple. Every day or two one of my meals would be taking care of in the real world, but other than that we(Jarl) roasted the wolf, and the rest of my meals came from Yin and Yang. No, I didn’t eat them, too. I was tempted, after I had gone several days without any meat, but they kept bringing me fruits instead.

But anyways, I had finally cultivated all five affinities needed for my inner grove, so after I received the last one I smiled towards Jarl. “Think you could teach me how to get started on my ‘inner world’ now?”

He looked me over, and smirked. “Alright, just don’t think I’ll be going easy on you. This is a big step for druids, so try to take your time. Once you have it established, it is much easier to expand it in the future.”

I nodded and sat down on the ground, crossing my legs to wait for his instruction. Seeing that, he chuckled lightly, before nodding his head. “Okay, first of all, you need to make magic seeds of each of the five base elements. Don’t worry about darkness for now, you can add it in later. In order to create the seeds, you need to cultivate each element and condense the energy into a small shape. Then, using your Nature Magic to give it form, you turn it into a seed. Be careful of how much mana you put in each one. The quality of your inner world will depend on the balance between the different mana types, and can only be slowly shifted over time if a mistake is made at the start.”

Again, I nodded, and decided to start with water mana. I chose this one, because out of all five mana types it was the easiest to shape, with light being the hardest. So I used my Water Manipulation to pull some of the water over from the pond to me, and used it to cultivate. I’m not really sure how long it took, but in order to not have to pause to refresh my mana, I only skimmed from the top of the water mana that I took in. It was just enough that it didn’t cause my mana to drop faster than it was restored.

I had started in the evening, and when I opened my eyes next, the sky was already dark. However, I could feel that I was coming closer and closer to completing this seed. I was packing the water mana into a single spot as much as I could, until I felt it couldn’t hold any more. Then, once I felt it was at the breaking point, I used my Nature Magic as instructed, to convert it into a physical object.

The object created was a pure blue orb, about a third the size of my fist. Jarl, having seen that I was finally done, smiled lightly. “That is the first one, a Seed of Water. It’s actually a fairly valuable object by itself, since they can be used in the process of creating an item to give them an elemental ability. They are condensed essences of magic, and produced almost exclusively by druids, or mages capable of creating an enchantment that causes the same effect. The only other way to obtain them is by killing a magical beast or monster with a high affinity towards an element.”

I smiled, looking down at the orb in my hand. If I could mass produce this thing, then wouldn’t I be able to make money even without alchemy? I decided that I’d check the prices of these seeds once I journeyed to the big city.

Next, I slept until morning. What, you didn’t think I’d been cultivating and training for nine days without bothering to sleep, did you? I am not some kind of training monster that could pull that off! When I woke up, I ate, and then started on the next element. This one would be earth, since like water was fairly easy to get a desired shape.

The process was very similar to what I had gone through with water, so there’s not much point in going in detail. Same with wind and fire. Only light had a bit of a difference, because I had to wait until the following morning or else I might get interrupted and lose all my work. Also, each pellet took nearly five hours to create, and by the time I was done, Sharon had gotten the Light Manipulation ability, leaving only one more before she was ready to do what I had just done. I really felt like she was training too fast. Or was I just going slower than normal?

After I was done with all five seeds, Jared told me to use my Nature Magic to fuse them together, by siphoning all of their mana into a single pellet. This was apparently the most complicated part of the process, and failure meant I would have to refine all five seeds again from scratch. So naturally, I wasn’t allowed to fail!

….Yeah, I wish. About halfway through the process, my focus slipped, and the pellet I was working on shattered. So… naturally, I had to go through the entire seed refinement again. By the time I was done with making the seeds this time, Sharon was starting on her first one. It really felt bad being outdone by someone that started later, so I tried to rush through the process of creating the pellet the second time… which made it fail again.

Of course, by the time I was ready to try again, Sharon had refined all five seeds and already succeeded in combining them her first try. I even asked her how she had done so as quickly as she did, and she just said it was easy. That annoyed me more than anything else, since it seemed she was really telling the truth, and not trying to brag.

So, for the third time, I put all of my focus on creating this pellet. Sharon, being the kindhearted soul that she is, even decided to wait for me to finish before moving to the next step. Thankfully, I managed to create the pellet on my third try, the energies all falling into place and fusing into a single sphere. Although the orb was about the same size as the seeds had been, it was no longer a single color. There were patches of brown, blue, swirling red and white, it even emitted a soft glow.

Seeing that I had finally finished, after a total of four days of trying to make this pellet, Jarl let out a relieved sigh. “Okay, now that you’re both ready to move on, the next step is the easiest. What you have in your hands right now is called an Essence of Nature. Simply place it in your mouth, and dissolve it with Nature Magic, and it will be taken care of.”

I smiled slightly, glad to know that this stage was so easy. Looking over to Sharon, we met each other’s gaze and nodded, before we both put the pellets in our mouths and began the final process. Thankfully, the pellet just barely fit in our mouths, or this would be a very awkward training attempt.

Once in our mouths, each of us began draining it with Nature Magic, much in the same way that we had created the pellet in the first place. Except, this time, instead of five different types of mana, there was just one strong combined type flowing into our bodies. After about ten minutes of this, the pellet had already completely dissolved.

Opening my eyes, I saw that Sharon was just finishing up as well, and we both looked at Jarl, confused. I certainly couldn’t detect anything different about myself right away, and my mana signature appeared the same as I remembered it. Noticing our gazes, Jarl only smiled at us for a moment before speaking. “Congratulations, it seems both of you have already successfully created your inner world. To explore it, simply meditate like you would when cultivating mana, but direct your senses inside yourself. You should be able to find it.”

I had already basically done that, hadn’t I? Well, without the meditation. Shrugging my shoulders, I closed my eyes and tried meditating like I would when cultivating mana. However, like he said I focused on myself rather than an element. Soon, I understood what he meant, and it was like I was floating above a small patch of soil, about ten meters wide and long. If this was my inner grove, I was really disappointed in myself.

Congratulations on establishing your Druid Grove!This is a crucial step for nearly all druids, as it gives them more options for training and convenience than ever before.

Current size of grove: 6 meter radius.

Elemental Balance: Decent

I felt very disappointed in myself.

--------------------------------------------------------------

Author’s Basement: Sorry if the chapter seemed lacking today, feeling under the weather but wanted to get something out before people had the chance to arm themselves. Enjoy!