The cavern the Entelodont tried to hide in made for a good nest. The walls were strangely familiar. Not rock. But I got the same sense of safety from them I would form my own nest. The world essence was almost as strong here as it was in my sister's inner world, and I think that was why I liked it.

Not as strong, but there wasn't that stupid [Dao] pillar that sister was always paying attention too. So, this was better. I spent a few moments preening some of my feathers instead of finding water to take a bath. Sometimes it was best to just do something without telling sister. I didn't like hiding things, but some of her ideas didn't always make sense. Wasting time to find water every time after eating was one of those things.

The earthiness of the cavern I had chosen to sleep in was soothing. The scent of growing things, rich soil, the vibrancy of the world essence, and a hint of death. I knew that smell. The smells had triggered an ancestor memory of mine, memories every Roc gained before they hatched. One of my ancestors knew this smell and shared their memory of what it was with the Rocs of his line.

It was the smell of something long dead that the world had reclaimed. Flesh and bones used to enrich the soil and let the plants grow strong, left alone for the world to reclaim over years and years. My ancestor's memory had me curious. I wondered what had died in here, and decided when I woke up from my nap, to find out.

One nap had become three, but sister said a growing girl needed lots of good food and lots of sleep to grow strong, so I didn't care that sleep was more important than exploring.

Normally, I wouldn't be able to search in here. Rocs did not see well in the dark, but sister's teaching made it possible. If hadn't remembered, I might have gotten lost. But I was able to explore after I expanded my essence like sister had taught until I could see some of the cave. Not as well as outside, but good enough that if I stayed near a wall, I could find my way out.

Sister had explained to me that part of being strong was being smart. She said I needed to learn, and practice skills called 'stratgy' and 'tack tics'. She showed me how easy hunting was when you were smart. So, I knew going too far in the cavern would be dumb. I might get lost and have to ask sister to come and save me.

But if I kept the wall next to me, close enough I could always see it with my essence, then I shouldn't get lost. I might not find the thing that smelled so good, but that was better than getting lost.

I still thought I would find it. The cavern didn't seem really big. I had squawked and whistled a few times, but the walls hadn't sung back with me. It wasn't like the cliffs where my egg had rested. Whenever mama or papa would whistle or trill, the rock walls would respond with those same whistles and trills.

As I began exploring, I decided that sometimes thinking was not only hard but a waste of time. Even if sister said it was good to practice, it made things take longer than it needed to. I had hardly moved along the wall before I found what was creating the smells, proving that if I hadn't spent so much worried and thinking, I would have found the good smell long ago.

I decided I would mention to sister that too much thinking was just as stupid as no thinking.

I didn't understand what I was sensing right away as I approached a man. It looked like a man. He was sitting like sister did when she did her funny thinking. Once I moved to the other side of him, I saw he was holding a shiny stone. It was glowing well enough that there was enough light to let me see without my extended essence.

His body was covered in a lot of strange plants. So many of them, that the only thing I could make out was his shape. And only because the plants had grown so tight to his body. As I examined the plants, I decided they were the reason for the strong world essence that had collected in this cave. It was simple to figure that out after I watched the plants gathering the world essence, collecting it, and directing it into its seed pods.

Being careful not to damage the sitting man, I snatched one of the seed pods with my beak, before hopping towards the cavern entrance. There was something tasty about the scent that was hard to resist. But there was something else besides the good smells that was out of place. Something about the pod seemed to say this wasn't food, this was Roc.

I tried thinking, I even tried using the new ways to think that sister taught me, but I couldn't figure out why I wanted to eat the pod and protect it. I understood saving food to eat later, but this wasn't that. This need to protect was more how I felt about sister.

I decided that breaking the pod open might help, and that thought proved to be a good guess. Once I had cracked the seed pod, a small core fell to the ground. A beast core. The seed pod was food that explained the tasty smells, but the beast core was life. I would need beast cores to gain levels before sister faced her next tribulation, that was why I felt the need to protect.

I wanted to horde the beast core for when I needed them. Sister told me there would be times I would need to beak through, and the cores would help with that. I'm not sure why I couldn't sharpen my beak on rocks like I did my talons, but sister said. And I think she might be right, why else would I feel this way about a shiny?

Now that I knew why I wanted it; I was stumped by something else. This entire day was turning into one big headache as I was forced to think more and more. Why would a beast core grow inside a plant? That made no sense.

Beast cores grew in beasts. Everyone knew that.

I used the bond to see if sister was still doing her funny thinking. Happy that she wasn't I sent a message with a picture of the seed pod to her, hoping she had time to help me figure out what this was. My bird brain needed help to figure this out. Sister said sharing was good, so I would share this problem with her.

Sister had said she couldn't use her real body to come inside this world, that it was a special place for plants and animals, a place to train me to become a mighty hunter, but she could use her Dharmic body to visit. I really didn't see a difference between one body or the other, they were both sister.

I had to wait a few moments for her to find a safe place to sit, some place to protect her real body before she could come to see what I wanted to show her. Sister had explained why she couldn't control both bodies at once. She said that we would both be facing Heaven's fury, a test to see if we were strong, and if we were, we would advance. She could control both bodies at the same time then.

Until then, her special body spent most of the time sitting on the island in her inner world staring at that stupid [Dao] pillar. It didn't take long for her to arrive. She was still preparing to leave the area with the bad people that had attacked her family, so I was not mad that it took her a few moments to get safe.

Once sister arrived, I began hopping toward the cavern. There wasn't any point in showing her the seed pod I had cracked open. There was only the core left, I had eaten the seeds. I'm sure sister wouldn't mind that I ate a few before she arrived. They were seeds; they tasted as good as they smelled, and I was a Roc. It was my job to taste them to make sure they were good.

Sister had followed me into the cavern, only pausing long enough to gather her lightning into a tight ball of energy. I stood in disbelief and awe as sister controlled the lightning, keeping it tightly leashed, using it to light the cavern. Sister was the best, and now that I had seen what she had done, I could do it.

I had never thought that lightning could be used for something helpful like this. It was fun to play with, and hunt with, but as a tool? I directed one ball of lightning after another to form, creating a string of lightning balls to serve as light. I would have continued, but sister reminded me that I wanted to show her something. Now that I could use the lightning balls as light sources, it was even easier to reach the dead body and the growing mound of flowers and seed pods.

"How did he get in here?" Sister asked once we arrived.

"It shouldn't be possible," she mused to herself. "Maybe whoever made these training grounds used the same mechanics for the spatial array, formations, and enchantment Dragon Spire used when hosting the tournament. Those events were technically held in areas using the same principles used to create my spatial ring."

I wasn't sure if what sister was saying was a good thing or not, but I managed to get her attention again by whistling and trilling until she focused on what I wanted her to see. Once she came to the other side, she saw the shiny rock the body was holding. The object was glowing brightly enough that we could still see the glow even with the cave lit up with our lightning balls.

"What is that?" Sister asked.

I felt her tighten her essence and direct it at the object. I had seen sister do this a few times, her way of thinking at something to understand it more. I wasn't good at it. I was better at spreading out my essence in a large area. Sister had said that was a good thing, that if each of had something we were good at, and shared it, we could work better together.

"A world seed?" Sister proclaimed barely a second after sending her thought at the rock to examine it.

I didn't think she was talking to me, sister liked to talk even when no one was listening. It was why I was trying so hard to learn all the words she was teaching me. I sent my confused emotions through our bond. I didn't know what it was either. But I knew sister would figure it out, letting her know she had done good was important. That way she would feel better.

"A world seed is a special spirit stone," she explained to me using words and her mental voice to project pictures at the same time. "They are found at the base of spirit mines and are the reason those mines regenerate stones over time.

"If it weren't for a world seed, the mines would run out of spirit stones. That would be a bad thing, because eventually the world essence would thin without new spirit stones growing to revitalize the world's Qi.

"I wonder who he is and how he got his hands on one of these?" She said talking to herself again looking at the sitting man.

I waited a few moments more while she examined the shiny before whistling to get her attention once more. I still had to show her a really important thing. Once I was sure she was paying attention to me, I collected two seed pods. I gave her one to examine, keeping one to show her what was inside.

"Strange," she admitted, "it's formed like a pinecone, but feels like a mushroom. Maybe it's supposed to be an oyster mushroom?"

Trilling one more time to make sure she was watching; I broke the seed pod apart. Once I had cracked it, I lay the pieces on the ground and used my beak to move the beast core that had been hidden inside to the side so that she could see it.

I was happy at her burst of emotional pleasure. I had done good, showing sister these new things.

She had given me this world. Sister had said when she gave it to me, that gifts were a projection of love, a way to show the person you gave a gift to they were important to you.

Sister had given me a world, it only seemed fair for me to give her a plant that could grow beast cores and a world seed.