(Altura-MC)

The journey back to the village passed in relative silence. The guards seemed to nervous to say anything and Kerrin was unusually quiet. I would be more worried if he didn’t seem as determined as he did. What oh what was going in that little mind of his.

But I had even more important things to worry about. I hadn’t leveled up after the System notification. Usually I would level up the second the System notified me, but it hadn’t happened yet.

Was it because I was so low on Qi? Or was it something worse? A System glitch. Those would completely ruin me. I could just see me being quickly deposed and executed if I suddenly turned out to be a cripple. And I had yet to find any bug reporting feature.

475/660 Qi 460 Qi regained

So my Qi was recovering. At a very fast rate even. But that still begged the question. ‘System, is there a reason that I have yet to level up?’ I asked, hoping that I had enough access that it would respond.

Level ups are initiated from Qi present within the seed. To level up one must have the minimum of Qi present within their core. Qi is regained at speeds 10 times greater than normal until such a level is reached. At the moment, you require 125 more units of Qi to breakthrough.

So it was simply a matter of waiting? Phew. I suppose I had always been super close to breakthroughs before, and gained huge amounts of Qi to level up. And that brought another question to my mind. I must really find and have an off switch installed in you, mind.

How did the System detect my thoughts? Was it constantly observing and monitoring everyone’s thoughts? And if it was, how much data did it store? Was it like that product of a trillion dollar company that was only monitoring and not storing? Or did it…have a compiled file of everything I have ever thought.

I think my privacy may have been invaded without my permission. But where there even privacy laws here? And even if there were, would they even apply to the System? Probably not.

I think I may have to stop this line of thought. It was best not to think about things like ‘Is the System spying on me’. Besides, we had just exited the forest. Now it was time for some answers.

Walking through the village was a surreal experience. Being stared at by every person we passed by made me uncomfortable. But I suppose that was a part of being Archduchess, people will stare at you.

“So, Archduchess, find anything interesting?” Grandpa Beluviar said, standing at the door of one of the huts. Just the man we were looking for. A strange stone in the forest this strange man was near? I bet he knew something about it.

“That is one way to say it. Could we perhaps talk in private?” I asked, I had no intention of letting the villagers in on our little discovery.

“That we can, do come in.”Grandpa Beluviar said as he made way for us. The man seemed sane right now. Far far too sane, his entire persona had changed and I was not liking it one bit.

I rescind my earlier statement, Grandpa Beluviar was not a kind old mentor. No, he was the crazy old mentor.

“So I take it that you knew about the stone?” I asked

“So it is a stone!” Grandpa Beluviar exclaimed. Oops, did I speak too much?- “I must say that I wasn’t sure about it, your grace, but a stone seemed like a likely option. Do tell me, what did you find? What did it look like?” Grandpa Beluviar asked in rapid succession.

“And why should I tell you Grandpa Beluviar? I have only met you today and I would hardly call our previous encounter pleasant.” I asked.

Grandpa Beluviar’s face froze, he sighed and then said, “I suppose I do owe you an explanation. I will admit to hoaxing you last time. I have a persona to maintain in the village and I did not wish to forego it just yet.”

“ But now I have no such worry, I knew that you had found something from the second you walked into the village. A level up in just a few hours? That means you found something, your grace, something very interesting.” Grandpa Beluviar finished.

And level up. It was now confirmed that Grandpa Beluviar knew about numeration. But I wasn’t supposed to. Time to act dumb about that.

“And what exactly do you mean by a level up?” I asked, acting like I was puzzled. I didn’t really have any previous experience acting, but how hard could it be?

“Ah, crossing. I meant crossing. Please just ignore that.” Grandpa Beluviar replied, see, I fooled him!

“Very well, but the discovery had nothing to do with my crossing. And I would like to know how you actually know about my…crossing.” I said. Uh oh, I forgot that I had the habit of saying ‘level up’ too. “But do tell me what makes you think that I would have gained something?”

I wasn’t going to reveal the image the stone had showed me just yet.

Grandpa Beluviar looked at me with an assessing eye before saying, “I suppose I shall have to put something forward before you say what you know. Tell me, your grace, what do you know about the first settlers? And more specifically about how they kept the beasts away from the valley.”

“I confess to knowing very little about that. From what I know they were from a far away land and fought hard against the beasts to keep them at bay. After many years and many sacrifices they succeeded. What about them is related to the stone?” I asked.

“All of the above is true, your grace, but you are missing one crucial piece of information. I have ventured deep into that forest of yours, your grace, and found many beasts that were far more powerful than you would expect. Here let me show you an example: Grandpa Beluviar said as he removed a picture like slate. A magically painted painting perhaps?

“Do you recognize this flower, your grace?” Grandpa Beluviar asked.

I took the slate and looked at a colourful little flower. It was nice to look at but did not spark any memory.

“I must claim ignorance, what is it, Grandpa Beluviar?” I asked.

This caused Grandpa Beluviar to frown disaprovingly and say, “I see that they have truly skimped on your education. No matter, I shall educate you, this is the Flowres Morestorn, a Plant level beast. Named after the massacre it caused at Morestorn, it is one of the deadliest plant beasts for its level.”

“It is also very aggressive and mobile. An anomaly of its kind for sure. It is known to shoot rays of fire that can travel up to a kilometer and shot down even peak Plants. But that is not the greatest threat, your grace, it has another name, Queen of Poison.”

“ It has the ability to command other poisonous plant beasts. The flower will usually hide behind a wave of beasts using its extreme range to shoot down its prey while its army protects it and at times even hunts its own prey. This plant beast, your grace, is in that forest of yours.”

“Now the question comes, why has this highly aggressive and dangerous beast attacked? And what about the rest of the beasts. This one is hardly the only one there, your grace. Perhaps due to the fact that the Clans and the previous overlords did not have the capability to truly cut down on the population of beasts, the forest is now one of the most dangerous and beast filled areas in the Land of Six jewels.” Grandpa Beluviar said.

The Land of what? Ah memories my good friend. Apparently it was the name of the subcontinent I was in. The six jewels referred to the six countries that stood here and more specifically their founders. But the history lesson could wait, there were more important things to worry about.

“So what are you saying? That there is something odd going on? That it is related to that stone?” I asked. This was truly Xianxia land wasn’t it? A threat under every stone? An inheritance in every forest? Or did I just choose a valley full of mystery?

“Quite so, your grace, I believe the first settlers built something that warded off the beasts. Kept them at bay and stopped any beast greater than Early Sapling from getting in.” Grandpa Beluviar stated

“Early Sapling? But the beast I just killed-”I started before I was interrupted me

“Was greater yes. And that is where the problem comes in, your grace, the ward is failing. Already higher ranked beasts are coming in. It is only a matter of time before these beasts find their way into the valley, your grace. And then you and your people die.” Grandpa Beluviar said.