Of course there’s a cataclysmic eruption in my own backyard the moment I first glance at a volcano. What are the odds, really? I know a thing or two about volcanism, having spent my teenage years living on Jupiter’s moon Io. Public schools there tended to put more emphasis on geology than many of the other nations in the solar system. Rightfully so, if you live on the most geologically active body known to man, it pays to understand what that means. Assuming the geologic profile of this planet is similar to that of Earth, (a bold assumption, I know) then this is the sort of event that only happens every few centuries. The odds of this occurring to me right now are so slim that I refuse to believe there isn’t magic shenanigans involved.

That said, I can say with reasonable certainty that this forest is royally screwed. What isn’t destroyed by the rain of heavy debris due any minute now, will likely be smothered to death by the oncoming ash-fall.

This is life-threatening, in the sense that most of the living things in my sight will perish in the near future. It is not, however, a threat to my own “life.” Thanks to the familiar flora of the forest providing a handy frame of reference for me to use as a scale, I estimate that my core is nice and safe approximately 12 m underground.

While I’m on the topic of dimensions, I may as well add that my core is about 10 cm wide and my cavity has a diameter of roughly 3 m, though it’s not even close to being spherical.

It bears mentioning that as soon as I breached the surface, I felt instantly rejuvenated. Logically, there’s more ambient mana up here for me to passively absorb.

Now I was no gardener or botanist in life, however, that’s largely a product of personal gardens being difficult to acquire on space stations. But I won’t lie, I have a pretty solid understanding of biology. The flora in this forest fascinates me to no end, in the past I never really had the opportunity to visit a real forest. Only now can I see how much I’d been missing out on.

As these thoughts flash through my mind I begin to form a plan. If I was to quickly collect some nearby plants and toss them into my hole, not only could I do experiments on them while I wait out the volcanic ash storm, but I’d also have something fascinating to look at for a while.

To be honest, the latter reason is my real motivation for going ahead with this plan, but we won’t dwell on that.

Having substantially more mana to work with, I effortlessly rip up patches of clover, moss, and grass. I then toss them all down my tunnel entrance. I then collect some vines, berry bushes, weeds, and even saplings.

At this point I’m eyeing the once-burning flowers with lust, though the petals had burned out and turned grey the moment the caldera exploded, I still desire these clearly magical organisms. They’re just out of the reach of my domain but that problem is easily rectified when I promptly claim more territory in their direction. I gingerly uproot several choice specimens and gently lower them down to my core room. Truly a fine addition to my collection.

What do plants need? Nutrients, sunlight, air, and water. The nutritional issue is quickly taken care of when I scoop plenty of soil into my cavity and spread it across the floor. I then plant all the flora in the soil somewhat haphazardly. Sunlight is an obvious no-go; I fully expect these plants to die in a day or two and I’m not about to expose my core by removing the ceiling. To say nothing of how difficult that would be. There should be plenty of air down here for the plants to last a while along with water present in the damp soil. (As a minor side-note, my actions were also driven by the hopes that a specific common dungeon trope held true in this world.)

Of course, as I was gathering plants, I could hear the impacts of volcanic debris pummeling the forest. I wasn’t too concerned. It shouldn’t be long before the ash lands and begins transforming the world into a grey wasteland. This was all to be expected.

What I didn’t expect, however, was to witness massive vortexes of fire spontaneously bursting forth from thin air. If that wasn’t bad enough, they seemed to move with a will of their own and actively seek out anything living. Needless to say, this didn’t bode well for the local wildlife.

I’ll refer to them as fire elementals, I’m so good at names.

All joking aside though, I think it’s time to seal up my tunnel because I see several heading my way and I doubt they’re coming over for a cup of tea.

As I’m positioning my emergency plug, I hear a primal roar and witness a giant green Komodo dragon come crashing into the clearing. And by giant, I mean at least 6 m long, not including the tail which is probably another 3 m on its own. As I watch the fire elementals lash out at the massive monitor, I make my cowardly retreat.

The instant I merge the plug with the tunnel walls, my sight of the surface is cut off and I can feel a sudden decrease in my mana regeneration. I guess I can’t have my cake and eat it too.

As I settle down in my cozy core room, I take a look at all the different plants I’ve found. I’ve positioned the fire flowers, as I’ll call them, together at one corner though they haven’t changed from their previous grey state. The rest of the floor space is filled with a hodgepodge of plants looking untamed and regal in my personal opinion. I love it.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

At this point I’d like to point out that the moment I began scooping large amounts of dirt into my tunnel I’d been receiving many notifications from Mr. Normal claiming that various miniscule animals such as mites had been added to memory, I can only theorize that they’d been dying constantly within my domain which makes sense, if even a small amount of soil is packed with animals, then it stands to reason that there are many animals dying naturally in the soil at any given time. This proves that I don’t need a direct hand in an animal’s death for it to be added, it just needs to pass away in my domain.

This doesn’t do me any good, but it’s nice to know, nonetheless.

While the tiny creature alerts were easy to tune out, several of Mr. Normal’s voice notifications for larger organisms automatically came to the forefront of my consciousness and I couldn’t help but notice them:

<”Andeluvian Orb Weaver” Spider added to memory.>

<”Red Wriggler” Earthworm added to memory.>

<”Periodic” Cicada Pupae added to memory.>

<”Garden” Slug added to memory.>

<”Penicillium” Mold added to memory.>

<”Leafcutter” Ant Larva added to memory.>

<”Leafcutter” Ant added to memory.>

<”Cultivated” Fungus added to memory.>

<”Elephant Hawk” Moth added to memory.>

You know, I’d really like to figure out how Mr. Normal’s naming scheme works. It’s full of inconsistencies but I really shouldn’t worry about it right now.

It’s likely that each of these were either living on the plants I brought inside or in the soil. How they died is anyone’s guess. I look around and, lo and behold, there’s a swarm of angry leafcutter ants near the berry bushes I planted earlier. It looks like they’re angry about their nest getting destroyed. I wager I accidentally scooped their colony in along with the soil. Poor fellas, I’ll leave them to their own devices.

…

I spend a while looking at my plants, carving figurines from rhyolite, and generally just biding my time. In a moment of clarity, I realize that I had totally lost track of time, having no clue how much had elapsed. Perhaps it’s time to check the surface again and see how things are going?

I create an incredibly narrow pinhole through my emergency plug and once more expand my domain outwards.

I see a hellscape.

The smoldering husks of the once-mighty hardwood trees dot the landscape. Everything is covered in a thick layer of ash. All around I see fire elementals ravaging the landscape and dark grey dragons in the distance (because apparently those exist) blasting the land with blindingly white columns of fire for seemingly no reason.

Yeah, I don’t think I should venture out for a while.

Though I also don’t see any reason not to keep my miniscule pinhole unobstructed, though mana doesn’t seem to be flowing in, at least it allows me to see outside and notice the passing of days…

<”Sphagnum” Moss added to memory.>

<”Firebird” Moss added to memory.>

<”Pon Pon” Mushroom added to memory.>

Hello? Did my mosses and grass die already? I thought they were supposed to be hardier than most plants…

Shifting focus back to my “doomed garden,” what I see amazes me. At one corner, dozens of sprigs of hair-like pale green grass have sprouted from the soil, each blade is approximately 40 cm tall! Before I get the chance to ponder this impossibility, my eyes are drawn to the borders of my cavity. Coating the beige rhyolite walls is a lush carpet of the exact same moss I had brought in initially. Furthermore, skinny white mushrooms standing at 10 cm at the tallest are popping up all over the floor! WHEN DID THIS HAPPEN?

The mushrooms make a bit of sense, not being dependent on sunlight and all that, but their rate of growth is simply too fast to be mundane! I have my pinhole; I know how much time has passed since I last checked! 5 hours, AT MOST! The moss and grass though? They should not be growing so prolifically in the absence of any light. Clearly, they’re getting their energy from a new source. Based on what I know about dungeons, I bet it has something to do with mana…

These little pests are leeching mana from me huh? Well I’ll show Hold up. I can tell my regeneration rate has actually increased. I wonder, could it be that the plants (and maybe the mushrooms, can’t be sure about them yet) are more effectively absorbing ambient mana and somehow passing it along to me or making it more accessible?

So it seems that the plants can survive and even thrive by utilizing ambient mana as an energy source… In place of photosynthesis. I dub this new discovery arcanasynthesis. That’s perhaps the first good name I’ve come up with in this life.

I mustn’t forget that I received voice notifications from Mr. Normal when these plants (and singular fungus) sprouted, which must mean that the birth of an organism within my domain also adds it to the decidedly useless “memory.”

All this time I’ve been receiving addition notifications for small organisms in the background. Initially I thought that only meant they’d died. Now I can see it could have also included births!

As I’m having these thoughts, I receive yet more addition notifications:

<”Banta Berry” Bush added to memory.>

<”Fungus” Gnat added to memory.>

<”Bee” Fly added to memory.>

<”Hard Oak” Tree added to memory.>

And the list goes on and on and on.

What I’m sure must be every plant that I collected along with some bonus additions that must have hitched a ride, gets mentioned by Mr. Normal. No, scratch that, I did not see any fire flowers in that list, and I highly doubt they’re an unidentified species. Glancing around, everything minus those burning blossoms has grown substantially, in some cases, entire new plants are sprouting! Vines cling to the moss on the walls, which, at this point, also includes the ceiling. Multicolored mushrooms and other fruiting bodies populate every surface that isn’t occupied by a plant, and moths and flies visit various blooming flowers. Tiny animals sift through the undergrowth, munch on plants, or burrow through the soil. My humble cave is bursting with life that is reproducing and growing at a rapid pace. As it does, my mana regeneration skyrockets.