— POV Mathias —

It’s been a couple of days, but I’ve decided that I should wait a bit before I teach her how to use her Natural Energy. I know how I use it, to grow, but how the heck would an animal* use it? (*Animals in the sense of the Kingdom Animalia). As far as I can see, I have two options with regards to this issue. The first option is the patented “wait and see” approach. With this I could just study animals that exude this energy and see how they apply it, and from there generate a set of lesson plans for Taeya. I’m hesitant about this approach though, all I have observed is that they slowly take in natural energy from their environment and slowly release it over time. In fact, it might just purely be a waste product formed from eating plants so much. The only active users of natural energy are plants as far as I can see. Ha, maybe I’m a pioneer in this field!

The second option I am also hesitant to employ, but also excited about! I’m pretty sure this train of thought has no predecessors, so it’d all be guesses and hard work. Okay, this part actually has three different variances. From what I have read from fantasy, there are a couple of different ways that nature energy can be used, especially by elves. For one, there is the donation system. This system uses a donation of GP to a plant, namely me, along with a request for something. There are two ways to even do this: The classic spell chanting, along with symbols of runes (like english haha, or Basic, C++, etc.) that evoke a response from the nearby plants (or me, if I’m available). This way would be difficult, but can be applied en-masse. The downfall of this method is that the user would need a small incarnation of me, or my power. So a wand, or stick made from my branches? That sounds SUPER fantasy like. For instance, when an elf comes of age, they go through a ritual to beseech me for my blessing, in the form of a wand. Mmmm, that sounds nice. I’d have to make the wands genetically linked to the person though, to make sure the sacredness remains intact. The second variance would also be super fantasy-like.

The second variance would not use runes or other means to activate a spell, but it would rely entirely on my spread. First, I would need to thoroughly spread my roots across the whole globe to form a global consciousness. This would have the people saying stuff like “Nature, grow and bind my enemies!” or something like that to have me support them in battle. No wands and it’s inherent to the elf. This could be held religiously as well, where I would not help people until they’ve gone through a ceremony to gain nature’s blessing.

In both of those variances I plan on incorporating singing into the way the elves commune for small tasks, or for crafting with wood. I would give more for better singers, of course, I don’t want to be bored forever listening to the same songs over and over. Maybe I could make the best result for a song if it closely resembles “High ho, high ho, it’s off to work we go!” and other hit songs haha.

My final approach would be imbuing them with something like aspects of nature, or something similar. Like I plant a seed or something in their body or add a network of thin vines that slowly absorb their energy to affect them in battle. So stuff like releasing adrenaline, healing factors, maybe bark skin, vine arms, bursts of other mana types. The diversity in this approach is huge, but I personally don’t want all of the elves to be vine freaks and battle maniacs like that though… I guess there’s another way to modify this, to kind of get even more of a fantasy feel, but I’d be less true to the image of an Elf. Something like imbuing a seed with my bestial mana, or something like that, so that they take on the aspects of the animals, like their spirit animal. It would be call the Awakening Seed or something like that.

But, again, the last few don’t feel right to me. Each of these possibilities would be interesting to watch and develop, however, I’m not just going to cast away these potential time-wasters to avoid me being bored. I’ve never felt so much boredom before I’ve become a plant. Even though I grow quickly, I’ve always been naturally a little lazy, so if something can be automated, I will automate it so that I can do other stuff like watch TV, eat at restaurants, etc. So for growing deeper and wider, I mainly have that self-automated with a small thread of consciousness that’s basically instinct. All plants have it, the instinct to grow and become stronger. And after I built my tree, I’ve been limited in what I can waste time on. Experiments are perfect!

Speaking of experiments, my Slaughter Guards are so fucking big now! They’ve become what I wanted them to be - large enough to keep away large pests and small herbivores, but I can say now that I have a small amount of regret. Even though I always have at least two near my real body, they no longer groom my leaves for aphids because they are too big. Instead their mutated brood take care of that, but they are so much more busy than my Slaughter Guards used to be, and constantly moving about, shooting magic out, and generally being annoying. I miss June - quiet, did her duties, and I could barely detect her. It felt like a real professional. They lack discipline, but there’s too many for me to deal with, so I just need to continue on my plan B.

Plan B involves transferring my body into my tree somehow, like slowly growing new roots and walking towards my trunk and going inside of it. Once inside, I’ll start to surround myself with the strongest stuff I can, forming an indestructible sphere from which I can be safe. I still haven’t decided to enact the plan though, there’s still too many variables that I haven’t considered, and the ones I have, are not enough. So far I’ve managed to see that if I had moved over to my tree body, I might’ve been fried and died. So until I see that at least my tree is impervious to damage from others, or at least the defense reaches a certain level, there’s no way I’m going to move over.

There’s one more reason why I won’t move just yet either. When Taeya one time laid on my body, I instantly started to feel suffocated, and my whole mind was almost taken over with a need to grow up and out, to pierce whatever was above me so that I could live. I almost shot out all of my available energy to grow a spire of leaves, roots, and thorns to pierce through Taeya. That instinct had no rhyme or reason, I know, as a rational being, that there was no way for me to be injured by just her laying on top of me, that I had a ton of energy still coming in, and that my main body wasn’t injured, but that’s how instincts work I gues, stupid grass body. But until I test out stuff, like whether my body is fine if I’m still getting sunlight, does the source matter, if I need fresh air, etc. I can’t move into my tree body.

I’m just disappointed all round by my current situation. Sure, I’ve got plenty to work on now, I created a new species, my Slaughter Guards are becoming more useful, and I’m slowly taking over the mountain I’m on, but I feel like I’m still lacking something, something that will make me passionate to do my job of living. I know I lack strength when it comes to this world, or at least I feel like I do. If that original beast, Torgue and Jard’s father, walked up to my body today and blew some flames out, I’m pretty sure I’d just die. Reality is a bitch. And I’m lacking motivation. It seems too peaceful right now.

…

I really hope that me saying that doesn’t jinx me again.

Hmmmm, there we go. Something interesting has appeared. Well, I found it. I found the pseudo-elf village that Taeya came from. It’s pretty far from here, but since I directed my growth over to this location on purpose, I found them fairly quickly. And now I can grow up a tree and visualize how this village works using my .

Sigh, their living situation is really primitive. They are wearing animal furs and something that looks like a linen or wool based fabric. Just how poor are these people, or maybe, how ancient is the technology in this era? Damnit, again, fantasy ruined. Even if there’s magic, there should at least be a minimum of technology present! I’m glad I can’t smell, they must stink to high heaven without modern conveniences of soap and showers. Good thing I nipped that bad habit in the bud with all of my bugs, my two pets, and Taeya. At first they all resisted, but no way in hell was I gonna live in a valley stinking of BO. The bugs still don’t always follow my rule of bathing, due to their short attention span and since they are bugs, they don’t really need to bathe, but at least my Slaughter Guards have always learned that baths = love, attention, and some sweet nectar. Torgue and Jard though, man, they had a hissy fit. Like, literally, a hissy fit. They yowled and tried to escape, but my roots are strong, and they weren’t fully fighting anyways. After I started combing their fur afterwards, and petting them, they eventually got used to it, but it wasn’t until Taeya had to suffer with them that they started to play in the water and truly get used to it. I also started to heat the water a bit before they got in. Really, due to my mana floating off really fast, the water was already a constant temperature throughout the day and night, but I made it more of a hot springs type place for them.

Back to these elves, it doesn’t look like they are in any hurry. Most of them are lounging around, living in their primitive wooden houses. At least there are farms, and a well, and outhouses. But it doesn’t look like anyone is in a hurry to look for Taeya. It’s been a week ya know! Ah, and there it is, a small source of magic. Their hut is nicer, and it looks like it’s magically fortified slightly. I mean, it’s really pitiful. It also looks like there is a very small magic barrier that covers the village that comes through the roof of this guys adobe. It didn’t affect me when I passed through it, so it could either be that I was way too powerful for it, it’s only targeted at certain types of monsters, or it’s because I’m a plant and not a beast. Most people wouldn’t think about blocking plants with a protection magic for a village. Especially this poor village.

I don’t know if I’m more shocked by the way they live, or by the lack of apparent care I see that one of their children have run away. But, people are still people I guess. I should take this time to try to learn their language and culture, though it seems like they are lacking on the second one. Hearing from range is still difficult for me, I’ve learned how to listen to things that are close by due to vibrations in the ground and if I’m touching them, but I should try to develop an ear-like apparatus if I can. Or a directional dome.