After living in this village for a week, I have come to know a lot more about it's situation. One of the major Things I've learned is that this village runs on a caste system. Once you're born into it, you can never get out. That explains why a majority of the tribe lays around doing nothing, rather than hunting. The leader of the tribe has the most authority, so obviously that would be Hama. Next is the warrior caste. The warrior caste consists of both hunters, and guards. The hunters are currently higher position than the guards because we are currently dealing with a food problem. Next is the laborers, which is the lowest current caste we have. Because they rarely leave the village, they lack fighting experience and can't do anything for themselves aside from slowly starving to death. After that would be outcasts, prisoners, or outsiders such as myself, however I am a valued hunter so they didn't put me in this caste.

After interacting with the lower castes, I have found out that their intelligence is vastly inferior to the higher castes. Apparently the lower your caste, the less interactions with Hama, the less smart you are. This is because they are all learning from imitating, and they are imitating less than perfect imitations of Hama. That being said, The "laborers" are only capable of simple sentences, while the hunters can hold conversation, and finally Hama himself, is capable of complex words and thought along with fluent conversation.

Everyday we have caught numerous small animals and brought back plenty of edible plants for the laborers. My ideal would be to beef them all up a bit so they can actually start some work. The first thing I've decided to do when I take over, is abolish this caste system. It is so bothersome to have useless people who can't hunt for themselves.

Some other information I've gathered is that about magic beasts. There are very few magic beasts that live in the area, but there is one that is considered particularly dangerous. Bearg explained that behind the village a little ways back is a ghost wood tree which is especially dangerous, which is why we don't usually hunt in that direction. From what I understand, it is a pitch black tree with a core of fire. The tree of course is resistant to fire, so burning it down won't work. The tree itself isn't that dangerous if you don't get too close to it because it can't actually see. What makes it scary is the vast network of vines and roots it has spread on other trees and the surface of the ground. It does this to make up for sight. As soon as stimuli affects it, those vines and roots will latch on and drain their prey of life force.

I am currently standing on the outskirts of the network of roots and vines wearing nothing but a belt with a crudely made stone knife. In my left hand is a torch, and in my right is a bucket of water. I am currently doing the most stupid thing anyone could ever think of. Using the strength of a goblin to put out the fire of a ghost wood tree with nothing but a bucket of water at night.

Over the past week, I have worked on mostly cardio and flexibility in my free time, and although not optimal, I have a time constraint. I don't want to be stuck in this forest forever, so getting this mana stone is imperative to my growth.

Taking a deep breath I step into the minefield. Avoiding any sort of root and ducking between branches and vines, I carefully walk to the center of this large circular "net". The closer I get, the denser the vines, the thicker the roots. This is going to be a problem.

As I get closer, I have to start walking on the front of my feet rather than my whole foot. Step by step, I place my feet carefully between each root, all the while avoiding vines.

That atmosphere is eerie. There is no sound of insects, and the wind does not blow. The leaves up above are black and densely spread making it feel as if I am in a cave. The fact that it's night does not make it any better.

Further in, I have to turn my body sideways in order to fit between the vines. My speed has drastically slowed down compared to when I first started at the front of this pathway.

Finally I reach something that can be considered progress. In front of me, is a wall of vines with extremely small openings in between. There is only one way to enter into the inner sanctuary of this tree. I can see from behind the vines is a dull reddish glow.

I inch towards the small goblin sized opening in the vines and look down, seeing a huge thick root right below it about a foot wide. I grit my teeth and choose a weird angle to enter in at. Tensing the muscles in my leg while keeping my heels up, I leap. landing on the other side of the vines and avoiding the root, I land unsteadily on one foot. My body is tipping, so I do everything possible to keep balance.

After regaining balance I look at my bucket of water in relief at the fact that none has spilled out of the bucket. I change my focus to the location of the flickering red light and see a pitch black tree with what appears to be a mouth-like hollow about a meter from it's base. The fire inside is but a single candle sized flame that dances back and forth from within the tree.

The tree is about ten meters away from my position, and each root that offshoots from the trunk is about a foot thick, and has many smaller roots coming off of them making it impossible to walk further. My hair raises at the sight of it, and only one solution to my dilemma comes to mind.

I quickly calm my breath and hold my bucket in front of me. Lowering my body, I jump off the one leg that is still on the ground. Upon landing on a thick root, I dash, attempting to take as big strides as possible while randomizing my direction. As soon as my foot sets down, the tree trembles, and countless roots erupt from the ground. The only stationary roots are the main ones I am standing on.

Dodging between roots, I continue to make some distance while avoiding being caught. At about five meters away, I notice the mouth of the tree starts to stretch close. My eyes widen in panic and I throw caution into the wind and head straight for the trunk.

Finally reaching the trunk, I splash my entire bucket against the opening. The fire goes out and the whole tree stops moving.

I sigh in relief until

"SCREEEEE" A piercing cry comes from the tree.

All branches, Vines, Leaves, and roots, including the main ones dance wildly, all aiming for me. I dodge and run. There is no way I can fight this as I am right now.

As I retreat to five meters from the tree, a small root wraps my ankle, causing me to trip. I fall face first into another root, which causes my nose to bleed. Like an octopus many vines wrap around my entire body, and I feel small pricks from the vines themselves. At this point I feel my soul start to loosen from my body.

This damn tree is trying to use my soul to restart it's fire!

Quivering in anger, I bite my tongue and smear it on the root in front of my face, creating a small symbol to be a conduit for my soul. Next I open my mouth wide and bite straight into the symbol. My teeth go through rough bark and meat with a woody interior that tasted like charcoal.

As my teeth sunk in, My soul locked itself in place in my body and refused to budge an inch.

"SCREEEEEE" realizing my actions, the tree struggled even harder, desperately trying to use it's vines to pull me from the root, but to no avail. My teeth were firmly wedged into it's own root, and as it sucked at my soul through it's many vines, I pulled it back in through it's roots.

With pained thrashing, Blood starts to drip down my body as the prickles in my skin deepen and the vines tighten. But no matter how tight they became, they were incapable of removing from the vine.

After about five minutes, the vines started to weaken.

After another ten minutes, the tree ceased any movement.

Using the symbol between my teeth, I test for it's life force and realize it's fully dead. Gather my strength, I wedge myself from out of the vines and pull my teeth out of the bark. I look at my body and see countless scratches running across it. My fatigue has piled up, and frankly I am surprised that I'm actually alive from that encounter.

Walking up to the trunk of the tree I reach inside the mouth and knock around until the sound is no longer hollow. Taking my knife, I spend the next thirty minutes carving out the mana stone from the bottom of the tree, right from under where it's flame was. Pulling it out, I stare in awe at the sky blue crystalline stone in my palm. It is about two inches in diameter and emits a soft light.

Using my soul, I feel for the heavenly energy contained within the crystal and sense the amount inside with much delight. There is enough to connect all my meridians and open three of the twelve of them! This would make my talent below average, however the fact that it is strong enough to reconnect them at all is a blessing. As soon as I start the ritual, I can now cultivate!

Burying the mana crystal under the tree's roots, for tomorrow, I whistle a happy tune while walking back to camp.

Tomorrow is going to be quite eventful.

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Hey everyone! last chap for the day. Thanks for reading, I kinda got a bit excited this chapter myself!!!!