Even though Aloe had watered the plants just a few hours ago, the soil was already dry. Such was the relentless sun of the desert. The plants didn’t seem affected by it, though. They had their water before it evaporated.
“Which is which?” Aloe stood before the farmland where she had planted all the medicinal herb seeds. “I don’t remember.”
She had planted the four types of plants in four different rows, but as expected, she couldn’t recall which was which. And unlike with the grass pots, this time she didn’t make a note about it.
“Oh, well. I can just remove a seed from each row.” Aloe put on her gloves and excavated the dirt until she had four distinctive seeds in her hand. “This is going to take a lot of time to evolve. That’s a lot of vitality needed.”
Her Cure Grass pills still weighed in her satchel, but she was repulsed by the idea of consuming more. In the following days since she took them, Aloe hadn’t had any problems in the latrine, her stomach didn’t seem particularly upset or her evacuations problematic. The possibility of Cure Grass being suitable for human consumption was out there, but she wouldn’t like to bet on it.
Pill consumption was best left at a minimum. And it wasn’t like she was in any haste. She still had three weeks before her until the month was over, so it made no sense intaking needless amounts of grass when she could just wait for her vitality to regenerate normally.
Aloe sat down on the desk with the four seeds in front of her.
“Alright time to begin testing of...” Her words died out. “Yeah, I don’t know which is this one.” She said grabbing a small, light-brown seed. “Meh, if it evolves the Aloe Veritas will tell me the original plant. Evolution test of unidentified medicinal herb begins... now!”
Aloe stopped breathing, reading herself for the drop in her vitality, but as she tried to push her vital energy into the seed she was stopped. The seed, like a cork in a bottle, didn’t budge. It didn’t accept any vitality inside it.
“Fu-uh-uck!” Aloe cursed, almost throwing the seed to the ground. Dreading her realization, she checked the other seeds’ vitality. “All of these are infused! I can’t evolve them!” She groaned.
If she knew how Karaim managed to remove the vitality of plants – a thing she didn’t know for sure he had ever done, just supposed to be likely – then she would be able to evolve infused plants. But as Evolution required to pour her vitality into plants, she couldn’t do so with infused plants as they had their top vitality limit reached.
“What in the heavens can I do now then? I have infused all the seeds!” She didn’t know plants had an upper limit of vitality or that they even collided with Infusion. “There must be some somewhere. I can’t have used them all.”
Aloe shakily stood up and searched for the jars where she had originally stored Umar’s seeds. Whilst she had cleared a sizeable patch of grass to make place for all of the herbalist’s gifts, there were a handful of seeds in each jar. Considering she had to space the seeds to give them space to grow and then divide the land for the four types, there should still be there some in the jars, even if she didn’t remember that.
“Don’t tell me I have thrown them out!” Upon a second thought, which Aloe’s distraught mind didn’t lend, it was obvious that she couldn’t have done so.
Where would she have thrown them to, after all?
Any waste that she had produced over the last week was still in the oasis, just somewhere she didn’t remember. After searching for the jars all over the desk, the kitchenette, and her still not stored luggage, Aloe found them on the shelves of the closet storage.
“Oh, thank the sun, there are still some.” The number of seeds left in the jars was laughable, but she only needed a single one to make her tests, so overall, it was infinitely more than she needed.
Umar had wisely divided the four seeds into two pods. Black seeds which were – obviously – black were put together with brown seeds, which Aloe couldn’t bring herself to remember. The other pot had small traces of light-brown and dark-brown seeds, and once again, she didn’t know which were those. Black seeds were the only ones she was able to recognize, but the simple color classification allowed her to grab all four types easily.
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Aloe picked one at random, it was brown, but after separating it from the other ones it became impossible to discern which type of brown it was. If light, mid, or dark. The difference was very subtle.
“Random seed evolution test begins... now!”
The seed greedily sucked Aloe’s vitality, much to her content. But her elation was quickly subdued as the amount of vitality absorbed was negligible. But she didn’t lend herself to defeat. It was likely that she had just infused it, but she had yet to decipher the pattern for Evolution consumption cost. If there even was one.
So, she used an Aloe Veritas leaf, bringing her starting stock to worrying levels. She wouldn’t have enough for the other seeds unless she cut more leaves. It kind of pained her to have already consumed Karaim’s stash so fast.
The ink spots of the parchment shifted as soon as a single drop of sap caressed the seed. And it read:
Species: Matricaria Chamomilla
Sobriquet: Chamomile
Description: Member of the Asteraceae family, a species known for its many helpful properties such as anti-inflammation and digestive aid.
“Oh, so that was the chamomile,” Aloe said after reading the leaf. “And the description is a bit dry, not gonna lie. Chamomile has like tens more properties. Though I doubt that was able to fit on the leaf... Wait, does leaf size affect the description? Mental note, check that... sometime later.”
She repeated the same steps for the other two brown seeds, thyme and sage respectively. None of them proved any success. Their Aloe Veritas descriptions also proved rather useless, possessing insignificant information besides the arcane curses that it gave for species names.
Before taking in her inevitable demise, Aloe waited to pour her vitality into the black seed. Each failed attempt hadn’t been that expensive, but now that her vitality had somewhat diminished, she wanted a break. Cure Grass had needed a lot of vitality to evolve, and the words of Karaim’s near-death still beckoned on her mind. Better be safe than sorry.
Afternoon was dawning on her, but because she already had done her daily tasks, she did a quick stop at the latrine and subsequently took a bath in the oasis. Today’s morning outing with Fikali had incrusted her skin with sand and sweat, but her mind had been so occupied that she hadn’t dwelled on her feeling of discomfort until now.
“Ah~” She let out a non-gormandizing groan of pleasure. “This is life.”
Aloe leisurely floated on the oasis. At first, she had been somewhat intimidated by the body of water, but after a few days, and extensively checking its safety, she finally allowed herself to be at peace in the cold waters.
“Hro?” A wild Fikali cut through the silence of Aloe’s mind.
The dweller stayed on the coast as she observed Aloe in confusion. Her face seemed to genuinely be astonished at the fact that someone or something would wet their body. As a lover of the sands and the ground, Fikali was rather repelled by water. Her expression though, was an exaggeration. She had seen Aloe bath multiple times; she was just expressing her distaste.
“Fikali come on in, the water’s fine!” Aloe joked, fully aware of the dweller’s hate, and splashed around. Thankfully for her, Aloe was too far for the water to reach her.
The monster just ignored her and drank from the oasis. She may have a phobia of water, but Fikali was still a living being.
Just like a cat. Aloe snickered.
As the sun began to mercilessly rape her skin, Aloe made her way out of the water. Her body still felt the aches of the meditation she had endured to sense vitality, even if the wounds had long healed.
“I wish I had a hammock.” Aloe groggily commented as she stretched her body. “Therefore, I could sleep, stay naked, and dry at the same time. Nothing but upsides!”
Then her visage reddened after she noticed the indecent words that came out of her mouth. She quickly donned her open shirt and tight pants even if she was still wet. This place is having a bad influence on me. She thought as she made her way inside her house, her blush intensifying.
To dispel her dirty mind, Aloe focused her effort on the last remaining medicinal herb seed as her vitality had mostly recovered to full.
“Black seed evolution test begins... now!”
Vitality flowed from her hands into the black spot. She quickly filled the seed to infusion levels of vitality and expected the pouring to end.
But it didn’t.
More and more vitality flowed into the seed. Aloe would have been ecstatic if it weren’t because it was draining colossal amounts of vitality out of her body.
First the dizziness, her mind tumbling around.
Second the weakness, the strength leaving her body.
Third... the pain.
This. Is. Too. Much! Aloe couldn’t even bring herself to speak as the pain assaulted her, unable to fight it as the seed continued to drink and drink. And then... a sudden stop.
A cough accompanied her surprise, but the second she relaxed, her back lost all her strength and her face crashed against the desktop with a loud thud.
“No... vitality...” Aloe’s sight faded to black.