Luhnan was ignoring the system. The sun was setting, the roots of the pines were stirring, unrest spread throughout the forest, and he was still ignoring the system. It was talking, insistently so, at the back of his mind. He tuned it out, just like how he’d tuned it out when it had first started to spew instructions when he woke up within the dried husks of those two rodents.

He was still angry about what it’d done, what he’d done, and how it had tried to congratulate him for brutally killing and consuming those two rodents.

He could still feel the tingling sensation it had given him when his roots had spread beneath their skin. The involuntary pleasure of draining them dry and adding their strength to his own. He’d taken something from them, something more than just their life. The knowledge rested at the back of his mind. A image, a idea. A… blueprint? He couldn’t put into words how it felt, but somehow consuming those two animals had unlocked some kind of knowledge. He felt confident- no he knew, that if he sat down and tried, it wouldn’t be that hard to recreate parts of what he’d absorbed. He could make his body sleeker, stronger, more agile. He could grow eyes and teeth. He could evolve into something more.

He’d decided not to as soon as he realised it. Taking on a form closer to what he’d killed just felt wrong somehow. It felt like acceptance. Like the first step down a very dangerous slope. Sure it was just a pair of animal. From the look of it they were intending to kill him too. But would it really stop there? If he absorbed and evolved like he knew he could, if he let himself be overcome with that ecstasy of doing what his instincts demanded, who was to say that he would be able to resist doing it again? What if he came upon a human. Would he be able to resist doing terrible things to them if he indulged in the killing of other creatures?

He already knew the answer. The temptation of gaining humanoid features would be too big. It would be too easy. One or two dead humans and he could almost look like them. Turn into something oh so similar. Mimic his food.

Food. That’s what he was afraid of. He hadn’t realised it until now, but his body, his subconscious, and even the system guiding him until now all thought along the same lines. Other things are food. Kill, absorb, evolve, thrive. A simple, but intense list of actions to take throughout life in any way possible.

He couldn’t do it. There was something beautiful about the simplicity of the command, but he couldn’t do it. He knew what the system, and his own body for that matter, wanted of him. But the mere thought of it made him want to scream. Hells, he’d been a softy when alive. Sure, he’d spent lots of time playing violent games and reading the occasional gory comic. He didn’t have a problem with that. It was just fiction. He could easily detach part of his mind to enjoy the nastier bits of life as long as it was through paper or screen. He wasn’t actually there when it happened. There was no guilt, no actual fear. Getting the hibijibis when reading a horror novel didn’t count.

But in person? He’d cried when he’d tried to kill a mouse once. His family kept a cat, and as most cats with a way in and out do, it often brought in live mice for its human companions to enjoy. Luhnan’s family had been away on a trip when the cat had brought in a particularly talented mouse. It had hid away in the old walls of the house for days and constantly escaped both cat and traps. He’d been so mad at the noisy little creature, constantly waking him up by sending the cat into a fit whenever it decided to run across the house. Many sleepless nights were spent trying to catch the little bastard, until finally it had taken a wrong turn and the cat had caught up. In its final moment, the mouse had decided to make one last mad dash towards a old basket of firewood. It had gotten half way in under it, chubby as it was.

The cat didn’t kill it, and Luhnan knew full well that if he let the cat just sit there and poke at it the mouse would eventually escape and the hellish circle of waking up to crashes and skidding claws would start over again as usual.

So he’d grabbed the handle of the basket and pressed. The mouse had started flailing and twitching as he did, and the crack he felt through the old wood had made him burst into guilty tears. He didn’t have it in him to kill it slowly, and the basket was far too soft to make it a quick crushing.

Funny thing. He couldn’t remember the name of his cat. Nor the names or even the faces of his family. But he could remember perfectly how the crunch of the mouse’s skull giving way to the basket pressing down had made him choke and let go at once. He hated that mouse, but he hated hurting animals more. The mouse hadn’t died. It had laid there twitching while the cat tumbled around, waiting for it to start running again. When it didn’t, the feline paused, then bit down on it and ran off to eat it somewhere where it would leave a stain that wouldn’t be found at once.

Cats had the kill switch. They could be nice and loving and cuddly just like small slightly dumber people with fur. But as soon as funtime was over they wouldn’t mind ending a life. They didn’t care for mice. They weren’t friends or family. It didn’t matter to them. A cat wouldn’t have had any problem becoming a mandragora. Luhnan was sure.

Him on the other hand? Hard time. Humans and their habit of befriending anything and anyone got in the way. Maybe if he’d been a hunter in his past life. Or gotten a bit older. Maybe then he would have learned how to detach himself in real life like he could in games and books. Would that be a good thing? He didn’t know. Probably not. There wasn’t much reason for humans to harm and kill in his old world. That old instinct that could numb the guilt and empathy enough that killing prey wouldn’t be so taxing. He had a feeling that wasn’t something he should want. It felt wrong to be able to calmly do harm to something.

Such thoughts and questions kept Luhnan’s mind busy for a long time as he wandered aimlessly throughout the Pines. It was a peaceful night to begin with, but sometimes life just decides to fling flurry of murderous intent at you when you least expect it.

The creature came faster than the rodents had, and twice as hard. It came from above, leaping from some branch without a sound, wicked dark talons stretched out like a bird of prey.

It wasn’t a bird of prey. It didn’t take off when it’s talons sunk into the mandragora’s midriff, nor did it let out any sort of eagle ish cry of victory. Instead it screamed.

All he saw when it came for him was a piece of darkness moving on its own, the gleam of talons, and the furious red of two eyes. It hit him like a truck, tackling his same sized body to the ground in one fell swoop. After that it let out a shriek that made Luhnan’s already stunned head spin.

Caught by pure, primal fear, Luhnan sought to scream back at it, as you do when scared shitless. He got all the way to opening his mouth, but there his luck ended. The bird of doom jerked its head back to stare him down fast enough that it could have snapped the spine of a lesser avian, then it opened a second pair of eyelids, these ones thinner and vertical, and suddenly Luhnan couldn’t move a muscle anymore.

His scream caught in his throat and became a muffled wheeze rather than the lethal shriek it had been a few hours earlier. Unable to scream, move, or even avert his gaze from it, Luhnan lay stuck, pinned beneath the monstrosity blowing up its chest above him in some sort of intimidating gesture.

It was a rooster.

The rooster stared at him with those glowing red eyes, robbing his body of any ability to move away from that gaze. He couldn’t even tremble. His body was stone beneath the rooster’s glare. For the first few seconds it had him terrified, but as the rooster opened its gleaming black beak and screamed again, fear became annoyance, then anger.

It didn’t even move to finish him. It just stared, talons dug into his chest and shoulders painfully and gaze unwavering. Why? Here was the kind of creature Luhnan refused to become. Something mean and scary that did harm just for the hell of it. It hurt. He could feel the needle thin tips of those talons shift within him whenever the bird breathed or adjusted its position. Anger burned hot in his chest where those talons reached, and despite the rooster’s paralyzing ability, Luhnan felt his body shift the tiniest bit.

He felt his limbs aching, struggling to grow longer and denser. He felt skin prickling and itching. He wanted to open his mouth and bite, tear and rend, not just scream. He wanted to fight. If he was gonna fear for his life, at least let him defend himself.

While Luhnan fumed beneath the rooster, someone else pushed their way through the vegetation and into sight. A old lady with milky grey eyes stepped closer to the pair, salt and pepper hair pulled back tightly to leave her eyes unobstructed. She carried a number of pouches attached to a sturdy old belt, and a larger bag hung at her side along with two daggers.

“What did you find Herman dear?”

The rooster, Herman, let out another scream, a bit quieter this time.

“Oooh, well done. Step away from it.”

Herman didn’t move.

“Off. Go. Shoo you stubborn old lizard.”

Luhnan’s chest burned with anger still, and he fully intended to give voice to it as soon as he could move. That proved to be soon. As the old woman stepped closer and waved at the bird to move, the rooster’s gaze left the mandragora’s body. And away with the eye contact went the paralysis. Luhnan felt his body tense up as talons pulled free and left him alone on the ground. He gasped in a quick breath of air even before Herman hit the ground, then opened his mouth wide and got punted.

Margret took a few fast, skipping steps, then shoot out a leg and caught Luhnan right in the gut as he sat up to wail death upon them all. The mandragora went flying with a surprised wheeze. A tree caught him and promptly knocked the air out of him, and when the world stopped spinning he saw the old woman nock and arrow to a small bow. He didn’t even manage to open his mouth again before the projectile went flying, a oddly shaped thing with a large set of feathers and a lump of cloth tied around the tip instead of a arrow head.

The cloth headed arrow hit the tree just a head or so higher than Luhnan, and the impact made it explode into a cloud of dust as if it was a flour covered towel being slapped against a counter.

The white dust that flew around Luhnan got in his mouth as he tried to breath in to scream. His throat objected and closed up, and he had a feeling that if he had actual eyes, they would water. He vaguely caught sight of Margret approaching him along with the rooster as the world grew darker in sync with his the powder clogging his airway. He thought the bird somehow looked smug.

When he woke up way later, the world was still dark, but for entirely different reasons. Around him was leather, old, worn, and slick with some kind of wax. He couldn’t feel a opening of any kind, either because the wax and make up of the bag was somehow constructed to confuse him, or because his head was still spinning from that powder he’d inhaled. Either way, the bag was moving. He couldn’t hear anything, but he could clearly feel some kind of rhythm going on with how the bag moved.

He suspected the old woman was walking with him bagged up at her side. He wasn’t that big, and apparently not that heavy either. His thoughts were confirmed when he felt his carrier come to a halt. He still heard nothing past the waxy leather surrounding him. The memory of what the system had told him about being turned into a potion crept up on him like a old fear. Left helpless and trapped, Luhnan did what he’d avoided for a long time.

‘S-system…?’

The answer came immediately, as if the system had been waiting for him to talk to it again.

Yes Luhnan?

‘I’m trapped. What do I do?’

A pause followed his question.

I suggest you flail and scream. You’re in a dangerous situation. Follow your instinct.

‘Flail and scream- wait you just want me to kill again don’t you?! I knew I shouldn’t have trusted you again-’

You are in some kind of soundproof bag. While deadly in the open, a muffled version of your scream should only cause minor harm.

The system cut him off before he could spiral down the slope of paranoia. The plantman thought this over, feeling suspicious still.

‘To who? To large and small creatures? Or will the demon bird drop dead while the old lady only coughs blood or something?’

The system refrained from commenting how ‘coughing blood’ wasn’t exactly a minor injury.

If you lower the pitch of your cry, the effect should be less deadly. It will be hard for you to make this adjustment considering your age and inexperience, but the soundproof enviorment should prove a safe enough space for some practise should you fail.

That made Luhnan feel a little bit better.

But you should hurry. Due to alchemist’s stalks short shelf life, you will most definitely be chopped up and boiled as soon as your captor takes you out of the bag.

That made him feel less good, so he did what any cornered man awaiting sure death would do; he started screaming and flailing for his life. Stubby root covered semi-arms made for poor tools to claw at the leather walls with, but he made up for it with enthusiasm.

That enthusiasm lasted for about ten minutes. After that Luhnan was left wheezing, tired, and no less trapped. And his captor had started walking again. All in all not the best result.

The bumpy walk continued for a good few minutes, carrying with it a sense of dread for when it would end. When it did, it was with a sudden movement and a crash. Luhnan saw stars as the bag was, for a lack of a better word, hurled at what he could only assume was a stone wall. He hit it with a thump that left a nauseating feeling behind.

Stunned, he could do little more than squirm and groan as his head tried to reconfirm what was up and down. His brain didn’t have much luck it seemed, given how all he got was another wave of nausea, quickly followed by a killer headache and a dizzy spell. The world kept spinning, unphased by the fact that Luhnan couldn’t see it, for a good five minutes at the very least.

His head had just stopped throbbing when the top of the sack suddenly opened. A wiry hand grabbed the stalk growing from the top of his head, which gave Luhnan the sudden urge to scream in outrage. The headache was keeping him from doing so at once though, and by the time he’d managed to open his mouth the moment was over. It took him a moment to process what happened in that split second. He had a vague memory of being pulled out of the bag, quickly at that, then dunked down into… something. A warm and content feeling was making his thoughts go painfully slow.

Luhnan blinked, slowly, as if he was in a dream, then looked around. He was underwater, or within some kind of liquid rather. It was thick, comfortably warm, and somehow made him feel safe and sluggish. It had a brownish tint to it, and several murky bits and pieces of indistinguishable things floated all around him. Rough walls that felt like clay just barely touched the tendrils growing from the ends of his limbs. The rough surface was a unwelcome feeling, so he made an effort to pull his limbs closer so that the only thing he felt was the liquid.

He lay like that for awhile, completely at peace save for the nagging feeling that he was forgetting something important. Then he felt a hand on the nearly budded flower at the end of his stalk. Suddenly alert again, Luhnan started thrashing in an attempt to push himself above the surface of the deceptive liquid. He didn’t know what kind of trap this was, but he would have none of it!

Feeling his struggling, the unseen hand went further down to place its fingers around the base of his stalk, effortlessly keeping him beneath the surface to struggle. He only vaguely heard a muffled voice call out outside of the clay thing he was trapped in. A moment later her felt something being dropped onto the surface of the liquid. It was almost as large as him, and heavy enough to sink down a fair bit, which pushed him down further and made escape pretty much impossible while it was in the way.

He only realized what it was when his tendrils started reaching towards it. A paw sunk in front of his face, thin, matted, and lifeless. Horror filled him during the spare second his mind stayed on track, but then instinct and the allure of the liquid became too strong and he let himself fall into the sense of calm and contentment it was trying to lull him into.

Far too late, the system decide to explain what just transpired.

You have been potted.

Luhnan was in no state to notice it.