All creations that gain sentience are no longer within our control. No matter how much we think we can control life, it refuses to adhere to our rules.

~Mother Danu, The Primordial Goddess of Nature

Soul Burn erupted and tormented him with a vengeance. Pain like he hadn’t experienced since the early days of his curse nearly destroyed his psyche in the first wave. His nails tried to tear his Shield and Source out, and he screamed with enough anguish that several formations activated inside his room. Reacting to the heat, an icy fog rose from the floor’s surface, and some rationality entered his ravaged mind.

*Lily?*

*Breathe, I’m not sure what is happening, but your Soulscape is…*

*What?* Crow was practically screaming through their connection and vomited blood shortly after. Even without seeing it clearly, he could smell that it was black from getting torched. It was a smell he was very familiar with because he dealt with it every time he cultivated in the past.

*I think it’s evolving. Can you send your consciousness in? It may prevent the torment.*

Crow thought about it and tried to sense the state of his body. Other than feeling the pain physically and mentally, it only appeared to be weakening his body. Given enough time, he’d recover. Sending his consciousness into his Soulscape, he realized there were layers to it he hadn’t noticed before. Currently, he was at the outermost layer and could enter the inner areas. It didn’t prevent him from looking, but what he saw was beyond his imagination. Something like this can happen?

*Why do I sense that old wooden bastard? Lily, what is this?*

A tall woman appeared by his side. Her purple hair was as exotic as it was beautiful. Her thin, transparent wings were filled with swirls that alternated different shades of violet. The patterns seemed random at first, but Crow felt there was something more profound hidden within.

His eyes roamed down to her small, pert breasts with tiny lavender nipples, which hardened under his gaze. Her flat stomach and slim waist flared into womanly hips. The hair of her nether regions was a lighter shade of purple than what was on her head and hid her forbidden zone from his roaming eyes. Long, slender legs looked like they could wrap around him twice.

“Done looking?” Lily asked, her soft voice carrying a sensual undertone that would make even a chaste monk give up his vows.

“No.”

Lily giggled, and her soft hand caressed his cheek before a bolt of gold lightning zapped him.

“Dammit, what was that for?” Crow rubbed his face vigorously.

“Don’t you think you should pay attention?”

“I am. What is this golden light surrounding us, and why is your skin covered in it? Even your eyes are losing their purple color.”

It was all true. Lily’s eyes were filled with golden light, drowning out their original purple color. The stream of golden light flowed around them and wrapped around his Soulscape. It seemed to aid Lily’s power since she was full-sized and speaking. However, her aura was discordant and created a chaotic feeling inside him while sensing it. It still had the sharp, explosive nature of lightning but felt soft, like a ray of golden sunlight. That conflicting nature was the source of uneasiness.

“The stream of golden light is a branch of Yggdrasil. Ignoring the fact that it shouldn’t exist here, it seems attracted to your Fireheart Oak, which is why… you should look closely!” Lily said and pointed toward his Fireheart Oak. “You sense Mugna because he’s finally succeeded, and whatever he’s doing is somehow linked to you.”

“I’m not following. Isn’t Yggdrasil only something treants can achieve?”

“If I’m not wrong, he did something to Litavis’s core, probably placed his seed inside it to create an embryo that would displace him from Father Oak. It is their way of propagating their species. Technically, it’s Mother Oak now, but that sounds weird.”

Crow burst out laughing, and Lily looked at him weirdly because she didn’t think she had said anything funny. Seeing her weirded-out look made him laugh harder.

“What…?”

“Mugna is going to have children!” Crow laughed and kept laughing. “That old bastard has been trying to shirk his duty to chase a woman this whole time. Now he’s loaded down with raising kids.”

Lily giggled along with him and could picture Mugna’s grumpy face.

“I wish you could speak and laugh out loud more often. You have a lovely voice,” Crow said, distracted by her melodious words. Lily didn’t blush when he was ogling her naked body, but now her face burned from his sweet words.

“You really need to look at your Soulscape. I’ll give you a hint. Your Fireheart Oak isn’t anchored to the planet you made.”

Crow’s eyes widened as he focused more heavily on the details of the interior space. The tree that was his creation was rooted in Yggdrasil’s stream of light and had grown immensely. Where he was, it was hard to sense the enormity of the current core of his Soulscape.

“Doesn’t look like Mugna is the daddy,” Lily laughed, and Crow’s face fell.

“You mean…?”

Lily nodded. “Mugna reawakened Yggdrasil by creating that embryo, but along with Wood Mana, I sense Fire.”

“But how?”

“I honestly don’t know, but I have a guess,” Lily told him. “Yggdrasil doesn’t really seed new treants because that’d take too long. Instead, it will seek all the trees of the family that awakened it—oaks. Typically, it selects a candidate from those—”

“Why not use the lineage that sired or triggered this event?”

“It seeks the best chances of seeing the most growth. Since your Fireheart is an oak tree and an impressive one, it doesn’t surprise me Yggdrasil chose it to become the new treant and… the temple of its power. All oaks will see a significant surge of growth, and those who have gained spirituality will transform into Fireheart Oaks.”

“How do you know all this?” Crow asked.

“I’m from Tuatha De Danann… where do you think treants originated?”

“Is Yggdrasil something Mother Danu made?”

“No, not at all. It might predate the primordials.”

“Where is my planet?” Crow asked, staring at the massive tree that dominated all existence within this place.

“There,” Lily pointed at a branch. Hanging from it were two acorns, but he didn’t see his planet. “It’s the acorns. Since the canopy is like the sun, the acorn cap will shield the planet from it while getting daylight from the golden stream below.”

“And the other acorn?”

“I believe it’s Litavis, but don’t ask me why it’s here.”

“It most likely has to do with the connection between the Fireheart Oak and the embryo. The real problem is that I think your Soulscape is now linked to that embryo. Or, more accurately, it linked you to Yggdrasil. Like Mugna, you’ll be able to draw upon this power.”

“What aren’t you telling me?”

“You aren’t a treant. It isn’t a power you can harness, but it is strange. I don’t sense it resisting you.”

“Could it be because of the heavenly flames? They cleanse normal mana, which might be why I’m experiencing the curse again. It is roasting me alive because of Yggdrasil’s power.”

Lily didn’t comment, but Crow took it that she accepted this as a viable theory. In a way, having his Fireheart Oak’s roots buried in the golden stream was both torturing and nurturing his Soul.

Pop! An explosion went off inside the acorn, and it was loud enough that they both heard it. Lily and Crow looked at each other and tried to move toward it. This time, his consciousness could approach the tree as the outer barrier didn’t resist him anymore. While he couldn’t enter the Litavis acorn, it connected him to it through Father Oak’s root system. He could view or sense everything the big oak’s roots touched, which was pretty much the entire planet. Crow was shocked at how much of the world Mugna had under his control.

Entering his personally created planet, he saw that the vibrant plant life he’d meticulously brought over had wilted because of the heat. However, the wood nymphs quickly captured his attention because every one of them was fleeing toward him. Unsure of what to make of the situation, one of those trees suddenly exploded.