Year 143
We’ve made contact with a few secretly dissatisfied kingdoms, and of them, a few more agreed to establish covert trade relations. Rather than fly any national flags, the trade would go via ships that looked like, behaved like, and manned by pirates. Privateers, essentially.
We would also need to arrange with some independent islands to act as trading intermediaries, to cover up the paperwork and trail, disguising the origin of goods. We’re some pariah state, at least, in the eyes of the 4 temples, but clearly not all kingdoms think so, even if they can’t disagree publicly, given how far we are. I suppose we’re like a certain nuclear state in that sense.
It was also a good way to formally ‘engage’ many out of work merchants that have already turned to piracy anyway. So, the FFA organised a project to convert a few of the smaller port cities into ‘pirate-dens’, where all these out of work merchants can start their new careers as state sanctioned privateers and merchants.
This was where the [Trade Lord], that young noble from before, volunteered to take up the task of changing the port cities for this purpose. One of the allied kingdoms was rather miffed, but we offered to compensate him for letting us run one of the port cities, in the form of tax revenues. Someone else was going to accept the terms anyway.
I spawned a few more artificial minds to track the ships that call on the ports. There was always a risk that real pirates would then come to these ‘fake-pirate-dens’, and the only way we could spot it is if we tracked the ships that were on our side, and those who were not. The crews could change too, so the artificial minds were there.
One of these ‘fake-pirate-dens’ was in a swampy area, and I’d imagine it looked like some pirate movie, complete with the mist and faint glowing lights that lurked in the swamp trees.
Swamps.
I do have the magic poop resistant plants from a few decades ago, so those also can be considered a type of ‘swamp’ plants, but those are more of a ‘freshwater-swamp’ type of plant.
The issue really, is really saltwater. These swamps are next to the sea and ocean, and saltwater tends to make the regular plants feel dry and quickly they would die. I also had to quickly barriers for my roots, so as not to ‘draw’ too much salt into my root networks. My main body is adapted to all kinds of environments, and that also includes saltwater, so I could control my roots behavior to a certain extent. But maintaining a connection to the saltwater and swamp plants meant placing some filters in place.
If I want to ever cross the ocean, the first barrier I’d have to pass is to develop saltwater-adapted plants. That’s ignoring all the other issues such as high underwater pressures, monsters, possibly underwater druids, underwater civilisations and possibly, even eldritch monsters.
I’d probably start by finding a small island somewhere across the sea and attempt a small crossing. Conceptually that should not be so different from growing a root under the riverbed. Especially if the roots are deep enough not to be affected by the saltwater.
Anyway, I digressed.
The demon king has not been spotted leaving the Eastern Continent. After the collapse of the blockade, and also from Lausanne’s experience on that continent, it turned out that a lot of small cities have managed to survive, as they went underground.
By Lausanne’s own measure though, about 70-80% of all kingdoms have been destroyed, the actual casualty rate is probably around 40-50% as most of the citizens have fled once the demons started to expand. This even included nobles and royalty, who fled to allied kingdoms, or those with blood relations on other continents. The few kingdoms that are left are usually maritime-focused nations, that had cities based on the islands, or those who built their cities into mountains or other easily fortified locations.
Yet, no demon king spotted. The demon drakes have been flying and attacking the maritime nations, and so far, only the ‘demon-champion’ class giant drakes have been spotted. I used my magical sensors to try and understand what’s happening, and couldn’t detect anything either.
Also, that batch of heroes did arrive and attack the demon king, and they were slightly above level 100, all of them.
So, I’m predicting that the demon king is either injured rather badly that it needs to recover, or there’s some residual energy left by the heroes that kept the demon king immobile, or, the demon king itself cannot move by nature.
If it’s the last one, that would be a great relief to the world, but that certainly didn’t align to the drakes.
“No one has seen the demon king itself, actually. Only the heroes have dared venture close.” Lausanne said. Now that she’s back in Freshka, she’s taken on the role as one of the Valthorn’s military trainers, together with Ardi. They’ve decided to put down their adventurer’s hat and settle down as educators. For now.
-
Lausanne when she was younger did not have much talent, I recall that I had to feed her so many memories and dreams before she developed combat sense. Or maybe she was just a late bloomer.
But somehow I think Arlisa started with a natural aptitude. Even as a 2 to 3 year old little girl, she seemed like she easily mimicked the movement of her mother. I wonder whether it was because it was her mother that’s teaching her, rather than anything genetics or inherited, but somehow, something told me she’s gifted.
I wonder if I concentrated my resources on her, would I make someone way stronger? Still, that family has been through so much, so I decided to look elsewhere.
Now that there’s almost an entire continent under my observation, it was possible for me to spend more effort to spy and locate talent.
To most of the civilians, they thought I derived this ability to locate talent by some kind of soothsaying or predictive ability, but in reality, it’s just a massive network of observation trees, artificial minds to crunch the data, and then a layer of reviews. So, for very young children, I actually don’t know anything, since the data needs to be gathered over a long period of time. This meant the earliest we drafted someone to join the Valtrian Order’s early-stage academies and training camps was around 7 or 8 years old.
In a way, my observations of Arlisa constituted special treatment, from me. Which was partly why. just last year I started screenings for the children of nobles and those of retired Valthorns and Valtrian Orders, and so far, I spotted some hereditary skills. Indeed, most hereditary skills are transient, in the sense that they would transform into another skill at a certain maturity period.
That age differed by race, by skill, and by many other factors which I have yet to understand, and I needed a larger, larger dataset to form anything conclusive. I wanted to institute mandatory screenings of young children in a [biolab] at ages 3, and age 5, and then age 10, but from Patreeck and the other artificial mind’s assessment, such screenings would be resisted.
If anything, I needed to mask it as something else, and preferably, tap into faith and religion.
Already, the priests perform some kind of ritual on young children, similar to blessings. So, we decided to expand the ‘blessing’ ceremony on young children, so as to include a ‘ceremonial’ dip in a biolab.
Of course, the biolab would have to be shaped and formed to be compatible with the priest’s blessing ceremony. A baptreesm at ages 3, 5 and 10, if I may borrow from the religions of my world. The one aged 3 and 5 would be ‘blessing’ with some additional nutrients and healing. The one aged 10 could be the coming-of-age ceremony.
I gathered my Patreearchs and Matreearchs to roll out the new baptreesm process. Again, ceremonies, processes and rituals were things priests loved. It gave them power, and purpose. For the people, it gave them peace of mind.
All for the purpose of gathering a massive dataset and assessment of the continent’s talent pool. This was a massive undertaking only Patreeck could handle, and even then I had to set up more artificial minds to take on the recording process, which led to me unlocking a new tree type.
[Unlocked new special tree type - The Registree.]
[The Registree is a library of data, and can store all kinds of information.]
Jura, sat one day and said something random. “It’s easy to believe that people are destined to do what they are meant to do, after all we are not heroes. But sometimes when I look at Lausanne, and remember how her parents were just ordinary elves, I think to myself, maybe it’s really possible for people to exceed what they were originally destined to do. Even me, I thought I’d cap out at level 60 so many years ago, but since then, so much has happened, and now I’m a level 99 Warlord.”
“You need one more level to hit 100.” But I think his comment on destiny, perhaps this register I am building is very much like a caste system, isn’t it? That I classify people by their innate talent and forgo the part on people working hard and striving against the impossible.
“I know.”
“Do you want to cheat?” I offered him one experience seed, wrapped up in the shape of a fruit. I have a few hundred experience seeds anyway, and I’ve been hoarding it forever. I’ve always wanted to use it, but I reckon there must be a restriction of some kind.
He smiled, and he bit it. “We need every edge we can get, at this point.”
Once he finished eating, he felt his body ache, and then his entire body started cracking. Those cracks appeared, and then disappeared, it lasted for 10 minutes. Then once it was done, he smiled.
“Wow.”
“Wow?”
“I’m a Level 100 Warlord of Aeon. I suppose I should’ve seen that coming with Kraveik’s Aeonic Lord.” Jura laughed. “Good skill too.”
“Good?”
“[Steelwood Barriers of Aeon].” Jura laughed. “I can make your shields, with the same strength.” Essentially, with this ability, he could stop demon walker attacks!
Still, for a level 100 skill that’s quite a letdown, now. But since I was on the topic of children and hereditary skills, I just casually asked. “Jura, do you ever plan on having kids?”
Jura laughed again. He laughed for a good 10 minutes, then he stopped. “You know, 60 years ago, Casshern actually gave us a simple briefing on what to expect from Spirit Trees. For other spirit trees, it was common to receive questions about family, our intentions to breed and they would bless our children. I was quite relieved that you didn’t do any of that, so now, 60 years later, I wasn’t expecting that question!”
Well, a part of me wanted to know whether his kids would have the kind of hereditary skills like Arlisa!
“If I meet the right person, maybe.” Jura smiled. “But as of now, I’m fine being a lone twig.”
-
Trees now covered large swaths of the continent, and the Rottedlands itself have been cut into multiple slices by rows and rows of trees, kind of like a pizza.
In a way, the entire continent has never been so green and had so much forest cover. It even altered the weather, some places that were once really hot started to become bearable, and some colder places warmed up. Rain also started appearing more frequently in the once dry zones.
Forests generated their own microclimate, and amplified the creation of rain clouds.
[Milestone achieved : 300 billion normal trees linked on the Central Continent]
The milestone triggered a level gain.
[You gained a level. Level 170.]
[New Domain Ability obtained : Gift of Accelerated Growth]
[Once a year, you can cause any one person to hit Level 60. Activating this ability gives you a full read of a person’s classes. You may assign the additional levels. Does not work for those above Level 60. Does not work for [hero] class.]
[New Domain Ability obtained : Gift of Accelerated Skill Evolution]
[Once a year, you can upgrade any one individual’s skill of your choice by one tier. Does not work on [hero] or [divine] skills.]
I immediately wanted to test out my evolutionary powers, and my target was once again, Jura. He was my guinea pig since so long ago, and once again, he will be again.
The new ability was activated by a simple touch of a vine. Instantly, I could detect all the skills that he had, and they were separated into pools, which seemed to correspond to their types. He had his old villager skills, then those skills that were from his original diplomat and fighter skills, and now, warlord skills.
This was a special time-restricted power. Once a year isn’t so bad, really. That meant 10 skill upgrades every demon king. Not bad, in my opinion.
I instantly chose the steelwood barrier. After all, it was his level 100 skill. Naturally I should use it on his strongest skill. Of course, it’s entirely possible some skills, when upgraded, become far more powerful than even the level 100 skill.
Still, I have time, and now I just wanted to use it.
It evolved into [Triple Steelwood Barriers of Aeon].
Woh. Cool. Now I need to figure out who to use it on, next! Can I use it on Lausanne or Arlisa’s [Blessed by a Soul Tree]?
-
A lone ship sailed across the Southern Oceans. It was a fast, well-equipped and heavily armed ship. It came to one of the ports on our Southern coast, and instantly the military was at high alert. It flew the flag of the temples.
It wasn’t aggressive, and it did not display any weapons, so the ship was escorted to the port’s most distant dock. Just in case it carried explosive gems or weapons. This was, by and large, a trading port. It had just a few navy vessels in the dock.
A Valthorn was thankfully in the city at the time, Iasenos, a Level 53 Centaur [Spearmaster], so he ran to the port, fully armed and ready for a fight.
The ship docked, and out came adventurers.
“The cursed continent.” They said.
The soldiers and Iasenos tensed up. That was a horrible way to start. The adventurers didn’t look that interested.
“Don’t worry, we’re sailing off soon.” A young girl hopped off the ship. The adventurers quickly climbed back up their ship, and then the ship started sailing.
“Uh. You guys aren’t even going to come with me?” The girl sighed, and then she turned to the soldiers. “Alright, uh... hi.” The soldiers looked uncomfortable, their weapons were ready and armed.
Iasenos put up a stern face.
They stared at each other for a few seconds.
Iasenos then started talking. “All visitors from abroad are required to fill up the necessary forms. Have you completed your documentation? Do you have your papers?”
The girl froze, and shook her head. “I... uh...”
“Do you have a merchant’s trade letter, or an endorsement letter of your identity from your local authority?’
“I... no.”
“Are you travelling on a diplomatic license or a messenger’s assignment?”
“No.”
“Then I’m afraid you must come with us to our detention center and answer a bit more questions.”
She nodded. “Okay.” She was dressed also in typical adventurer armor and weaponry. At this point, I had not sensed her, only my artificial minds were monitoring the situation. In the detention center, she was interrogated by the Valtrian Order.
It was when she finally explained who she was, that the artificial minds sought my attention.
“My name is Kei, I’m uh... one of the three new heroes.”
Iasenos paused as he processed the information. He quickly chased everyone else out of the room. “New... heroes? The one from the second summoning.”
“...yes.” Kei stared at the centaur. The centaur merely stared back. He was quickly using his familiar to reach out to other Valthorns in the region. He took a few deep breathes and formulated a mental response.
“Why are you here, then?”
“I’m here to claim the hero weapons. The one left to us by my predecessors.”
“There’s no such thing.” Iasenos lied intentionally.
Kei frowned. “I refuse to believe that. Take me to Aeon.”
“What gives you the right to demand an audience with our divine tree?” The centaur played hardball.
“I’m a hero.”
“Prove it. A hero should be able to use star mana.”
She paused and sighed. “I... uh.. My [hero] class is still low. I can’t use star mana yet.”
“Then what do you have as evidence of your [hero] status?”
She thought about it for a moment. “Well, star mana isn’t the only hero thing, right? May I demonstrate? I do need to be outside, though.”
Iasenos nodded. “Come.”
In the port city, the Valthorn’s building is a small one, an additional building built next to the existing local ruling governor’s building. Outside, there was a small field for the local recruits to practice.
She sat, and then floated. “[Ship-mode].” Instantly, a magical frame appeared around her body, and it was shaped like a.... Shipgirl with a magical frame of cannons and guns at her side. “I can transform into magical adaptations of my world, and it’ll get stronger when I level. Does that count as sufficient evidence?”
She honestly sounded embarrassed explaining it. A shipgirl. Seriously. Who came up with that idea?
Iasenos paused. “That could be just some sophisticated illusion magic, but very well. I will raise a case with the regional Valthorn leadership for further advice. Until then, take this.” Iasenos gave her a wooden belt. “Tie this around your leg. That way, we know you’ve not fled.”
“If I am a hero, I could just break it.”
“If you break it for any reason, then we know you’re not a good person anyway, even if you are a hero. So, it’s in your interest not to break it.”
Kei smirked. “I see.”
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