Chapter Three
Sometimes he felt like he was raising his parents. Especially in the last couple of years. They seemed to grow extra childish by the month. Though he supposed he couldn’t blame them. He would probably find creative ways to entertain himself if he reached the multi-century mark.
Wanting to get their little game out of the way, his gaze flipped between his parents. Both stared expectantly at him while shooting almost hostile looks at each other.
“We will follow the typical rules. Three rounds, best two out of three wins. Since mom won last week’s sandcastle battle, she gets to go first.”
His mother did a little celebratory wiggle before flinging her right hand forward to display her first card, chest puffed with pride.
Arden inspected the card. It had a similar shade of green to his Accelerated Growth card, so it had to be a plant attuned card. The picture displayed a figure pointing its hand with a greenish brown noodle shooting out of it. He figured it was a projectile card, but he checked the description to confirm it.
Vine Extension (Common) Level 1
Type: Ability
Affinity: Nature
Attunement: Plant
Effect: Use mana to extend a single vine. Length and strength depend on the amount of mana used. Must use on a vine. Must be in the user’s active hand.
As soon as his father saw the card, he deflated, then showed his own Vine Extension card.
Arden also deflated a little, knowing he lost out on a card, but the Vine Extension card seemed useful. It didn’t have much combat usefulness, though. If he was right about what it did, the card could have excellent utility, so he couldn’t complain. Unfortunately, the card depended on having a vine at hand.
Despite knowing the outcome of the round based on previous competitions, both parents looked at him expectantly.
With a sigh, he swiped the card from his mother’s hand before it could disappear wherever his Accelerated Growth card went. He wouldn’t be surprised if one of them stole it to use in the competition.
He gave each of them a suspicious look. If one of them did, they auto lose on principle.
As if they read his mind, they both stiffened, causing his eyes to narrow. They were guilty of something. Either way, he would find out soon. “According to the rules, duplicates void the round, but since each of you only has three cards, I’ll call it a tie. With a tiebreaker to be determined if needed.”
Both of them nodded their heads with a serious expression, fully invested in the game as if their lives depended on it.
Arden waved his hand toward his father, directing him to go first this round.
A sudden pillar of sand manifested in front of Audun, which he set his card on, then he directed the pillar to move toward his son.
Arden just shook his head at the theatrics as he scooped up the card. The first thing he noticed was the brownish green color denoting its different attunement.
He frowned, worried he couldn’t use it, but he filed that away for when his mother displayed her card. His Ortus bracelets were of a different shade than the plant attunement, so he might have several attunements available to him.
That would be a huge boon. Most only had a single attunement available to them, severely limiting the cards they could use. It was one of the main reasons he went the manual initiation route. Another bonus beyond skipping the initiation phase was a higher chance of receiving multiple attunements.
He inspected the card. Right away, one thing stood out to him. Unlike the previous cards, the picture seemed almost violent. A figure laid on the ground in an awkward position with little dark green dots above it.
Curious, he checked the description.
Dispense Spore (Uncommon) Level 1
Type: Ability
Affinity: Nature
Attunement: Fungi
Effect: Use mana to disperse a cloud of spores. Potency and yield depend on the amount of mana used. Must have fungi with the desired effect nearby to use. Must be in the user’s active hand.
The uncommon rarity made him excited for a moment, but what use did he have for this card? Sure, it had offensive applications, but its limitation made it practically useless.
Unless one of his parents found a card to conjure fungi, he didn’t see himself using it much. He heard mold was a problem in wetter environments. However, in the desert, he doubted he would find fungi nearby when he needed it.
Actually, the Vine Extension card was probably just as useless. He only knew vines existed because he saw them in books, never in person.
Still, it was worth keeping it just in case he found a synergetic card. If he found a card to conjure fungi, it could be a devastating combo, especially since one’s own cards could not hurt the wielder. He could stand in the middle of a cloud of spores while his enemies struggled.
Of course, that was if he could even use it.
He tucked away the card into his left hand alongside the Vine Extension card, then turned toward his mother, waiting for her move.
Not to be outdone by her husband, she also conjured a sphere out of sand. She set her card on top of it, then rolled the sphere toward her son while somehow keeping the card on top.
Without hesitation, he scooped up the card. It had a dark green border. A third attunement? He would rather they found a bunch of cards with the same attunement to give him an excellent base with synergy. He had no idea how he would organize his active hand, not that he had enough cards yet to fill an active hand.
Unless his parents gifted him some non-affinity cards, but he doubted they would. They always insisted he should rely on his body and senses instead of non-affinity cards. Most just used non-affinity cards instead of trying to improve one’s own baseline capabilities. They never realized if they improved themselves, the cards would have an even greater effect. Or they realized, but didn’t want to put in the effort.
In essence, they were a crutch that, if used correctly, could be devastating.
His thoughts stalled as his eyes widened when he saw the holographic picture. His head jerked up to stare at his mother, but all he received was a blank face. Even he knew what that meant. Excitement bubbling as he inspected the card.
Stolen story; please report.
The picture depicted a figure surrounded by a greenish gas. Both the figure and gas were holographic. Giddy excitement built, though a nagging worry tinged it. He hoped his mother didn’t have to go through too much to get the card. Maybe she didn’t. The card could be worthless if the effect was bad.
At that thought, he directed his attention to the description.
Poison Resistance (Rare) Level 1
Type: Resistance
Affinity: Nature
Attunement: Poison
Effect: When in use, a passive draw on mana will provide poison resistance. Must be in the user’s passive hand to function.
His eyes turned into saucers as he stared at his mother, who for once didn’t look smug but was completely serious. “Please tell me this card wasn’t too expensive.”
“Price doesn’t matter. I will do everything I can to ensure your safety. If someone were to hurt you in direct combat, it would be different, but I won’t allow someone to poison you.” Suddenly, her serious expression vanished, replaced with a smile. “Besides, if we are right about your attunements, you may need the resistance to handle poison of your own.”
Knowing when to give up, Arden turned his attention to his father, who raised his hands in surrender while giving his wife a loving look with a bit more heat than usual.
Well, he might want to make himself scarce once they finished this game. Another attempt at a sibling might be in the works.
“I think we can all agree mom won this round.” His words fell on deaf ears, as their usual competitive nature was nowhere to be found. Instead, they seemed to be in their own world ogling one another.
Wanting to see what the other two cards were, a mischievous smile sprouted on Arden’s face. “Do I take your silence as the end of the competition? If that’s the case, mom would be the winner.”
In an instant, all heat vanished from their eyes, replaced with determination, especially with his father, who sent a wave of sand at his wife.
With a casual flick of her wrist, she dispersed the sand, then turned toward her son with a smug smile, thinking she had the win sealed.
Arden’s eyes narrowed when he spotted the familiar light green border when his mother flipped the card toward him.
His hand flashed up, catching the card between his fingers before inspecting the card, hoping it wasn’t what he thought it was.
Relief filled him when he found it wasn’t, earning a giggle from his mother. “Did you really think I would cheat like that? I wouldn’t hear the end of it from Audy if I did.”
He ignored his mother while he inspected the card, not wanting to give her the satisfaction. The picture showed two seeds, one brown the other black, with an arrow pointing toward the right one.
Convert Seed (Uncommon) Level 1
Type: Ability
Affinity: Nature
Attunement: Plant
Effect: Use mana to convert one seed into another seed. User must have a healthy, unsprouted seed. Must have knowledge of the desired seed. Must be in the user’s active hand.
No wonder she was so confident. This had amazing synergy with Accelerated Growth. All he needed was a bag of random seeds and the knowledge of what he wanted, then use Accelerated Growth to grow the plant. Though it probably didn’t work that smoothly. He doubted he could grow something really fast in the early levels. Still, he could see a ton of uses for it.
Arden returned his focus to his parents to find his mother doing a little celebratory hip wiggle with a smug smile.
However, his father didn’t look like he lost. On the contrary, he looked almost confident. More confident than he was before his wife’s card reveal. With a smirk, he flicked his card toward his son, who caught it the same way as the previous card.
The first thing he noticed was the deep green border, very similar to his Ortus bracelets, though his bracelets were a slightly deeper green. Did that mean there was an attunement he didn’t know of? Everyone knew the bracelet’s default color was the person’s strongest attunement.
There were only five attunements in the nature affinity: plant, poison, fungi, wood, and biological. He knew biological wasn’t deep green. Wood was, but if it was a different shade of green than wood, he wasn’t sure what it could be. Maybe he was overthinking it.
Instead of dwelling on the unknown, he focused down on the card. A holographic image was the first thing he noticed, causing his heart to jump. Another rare? How did his parents afford one rare, let alone two? This was too much. They should focus on themselves more.
Despite almost wanting to give the card back, Arden inspected it. The picture had a branch bent into a circle with a holographic green background. How? They always complained how hard it was to find Sand Manipulation cards, saying it took them years.
How did they find Wood Manipulation so quick? No way would they have put the effort in to obtain such a valuable card when they didn’t even know his affinity until today.
With tears gathering in his eyes, he looked up at his father. “I can’t keep this card. It’s too valuable.”
Like his mother with the Poison Resistance card, his father drilled his brown eyes into his son with a dead serious expression. “You can and you will. Nothing but the best for my son.”
Slack-jawed, his mother stared at her husband. “How? You know how long it took us to find Sand Manipulation.”
Audun practically glowed with smugness as he stared at his wife. “You remember the wood elf who came through our village a decade ago? Well, apparently, he wanted the Cutting Wind card we found way back and had a spare Wood Manipulation card. Who could pass up an uncommon for a rare card even though at the time I thought our son had a higher chance of receiving wind affinity? I took a gamble, and it paid off.”
With her hands on her hips, she glared at her husband. “You mean our Cutting Wind card? Why did you get to keep the Wood Manipulation card?”
Audun smirked, knowing he won. “Don’t act like you didn’t use some of our collection to obtain cards for our son. I know for a fact we had two Fireball cards.”
His mother glanced away guiltily.
Tension left Arden, now knowing they didn’t have to give up a ton to obtain the card. Now giddy, he read its description, which he avoided doing to spare himself if he gave it back.
Wood Manipulation (Rare) Level 1
Type: Manipulation
Affinity: Nature
Attunement: Wood
Effect: Use mana to manipulate wood shape. Wood must be separated from the tree. Strength and durability depend on the wood used. Must be in the user’s active hand.
Now if only he had wood to manipulate. His eyes gravitated to the stone trees looming over their home before shaking his head. No way it would be that easy. He doubted he was the first, or even the thousandth person who had the idea.
Wood wasn’t impossible to find, though most of it was pretty dried out. Maybe Wood Manipulation would fix the useless wood. He had a feeling he would spend most of the rest of the day before he received his class card quest trying out the card. Who knew what Ortus would throw at him for his class card quest?
Suddenly, cold water washed over him. He couldn’t use his cards unless he found ambient nature mana. Something that was a rarity in the desert. Without breaking into Grade One he couldn’t use his own mana and without abundant ambient mana, that would take him a long time. So much for skipping the initiation phase to gain access to cards during his class card quest.
Maybe Ortus would take his situation into account. He skipped the initialization phase so hopefully that showed he had talent enough to nourish or Ortus may just give him a harder quest. Though a harder quest meant better class card options. He needed to ace his class card quest if he wanted to have a chance.
If he received a bad class card or worse failed the quest, all his preparation would be worthless. Sure, he could still use cards, but without the attributes granted by having a class, he had no chance to achieve anything.
When he turned his attention back to his parents, he found them both staring at him expectantly, almost desperately. He stared back, smiling as his parents gave him their best puppy dog eyes.
He wished they told him what they bet on. They never did until after the fact, though. Usually it had something to do with him, so their excuse was it would create bias if he knew ahead of time. They weren’t wrong.
As always, there was never a clear winner. They had near identical skill levels, after all. If only the first round wasn’t a draw.
An idea sparked, but if things went his way, it wouldn’t solve the tie breaker. He set the small stack of cards in his left hand on the bench, then tapped the Wood Manipulation card on his right bracelet. His bracelets glowed, then the card turned into particles of green light before entering his bracelets. He had wood attunement then. Now for the rest.
Out of the corner of his eye he spotted his father sending his mother a smug look, because Arden choose his card first.
As usual, he ignored them as he tapped the next card on his bracelet, which was the Convert Seed card. Like the Wood Manipulation card, it turned to motes of light, then entered his bracelets. Plant attunement too, sweet.
To get it over with, he tapped the remaining cards in quick succession. Each card entered his bracelets to become a part of his deck confirming he had at least Wood, Plant, Fungi, and Poison attunements in the nature affinity tree. The only known one he was missing was Biological. That one might be harder to come by, as those cards were quite rare.
It wasn’t unheard of to have so many, but definitely not common and almost nonexistent in the villages. Even his parents only had three attunements each, and they were one of the strongest in the nearby villages. Maybe he hit the jackpot, and he had the full nature tree, but he couldn’t be greedy.
Just the attunements he had were more than enough. If anything, having so many would complicate building his deck and choosing hands. No way would he complain, though. He had a ton of versatility with so many. Even if the Nature Affinity wasn’t known for direct damage dealing.
The problem now was, who did he choose to win and what did they bet on?