I grow the bushes all around the base of the cavity and manage to harden their thorns by pouring more mana in those particular parts. The sharpening part is not yet done, but the thorns will be able to withstand more strength than normal. I also grow more cherry trees in the cavity, to a total of five. Since I can’t make fruits yet, I technically only have one cherry tree, the others are sprouted directly for the roots of the first one, for the blueberry and raspberry bushes I had a few seeds so I could grow more than one bush of each.

I also manage to divert a water stream in the bottom of the cavity, I don’t want those plants to dry out. And that made me consider something. The water always flows from the top to the bottom. If water flows from to top, it’s because there is something making it do it.

So where does the water in this mountain comes from? I’m curious about this, it can’t possibly appear out of nowhere, can it? Now that I come to this realization, I want to know, I need to know. There is a mystery there and I think that if I manage to clear it I will be able to found out something important about the mountain I was reborn in. It is not big enough to make so much water out of simple condensation.

I send half of my fishes swimming up in the streams to find out where does it comes and start to claim more part of the mountain. I’m making my own way to the top while waiting for my fishes to come back. And when they do, I’m puzzled by their memories. They went higher than usual and at a point near the top, something stopped them. Something is blocking my fishes to swim higher but they saw that there is still water. It’s like there is an invisible barrier in the water.

I don’t like that. Not being able for me to control or strongly connect to my creatures outside my domain is a thing, but having them blocked by something is against my policies. Do I have policies? Yes, I can do everything I want as long as I have the mana and my creatures can venture wherever they want.

I continue claiming more and more of the mountain, following the shorter waterway my fishes find. I want to feel by myself what’s blocking my fishes. At the same time, I order my bats to search for this barrier in the airways. Unfortunately, none of the bats find anything like the barrier. I could also send up the earthworms to see if they find the barrier directly in the earth, but they are traveling slower than I’m claiming my way up.

I’m almost where the fishes have found the barrier now, just a few centimeters up. I stop there, I want to have all my mana before going on the last bit of the way. My mana reserves are higher now, but not by much, it seems the more land I claim the less each bit of it is increasing my mana pool size. I also gather my biggest fish near the limit.

My mana pool is full, I feel ready now.

I claim the last centimeters separating my domain from the barrier and fell it for myself.

It’s like nothing I ever felt before - not that I live a long life yet. I send my mana higher but I don’t feel connecting with the barrier or what’s on the other side. I claim the surrounding area, englobing the barrier itself. Its forming an ellipsoidal bubble almost touching the top of the mountain. I take advantage of the situation to claim the mountain’s top. There is water coming out of the bubble from three different paths. The one I use to track it back, a second one my fish found out and a third one going down in a spiraling waterway, the third is unknown to me. I connect the three waterways near the bubble and send fishes down the spiraling one to scout it.

In the meantime, I’m still inspecting the barrier, trying to feel all I can. There is some mana slowly escaping out of it, a strange kind of mana. This mana is very thin, I only feel it because I’m englobing the barrier on all the sides, it’s also rather pure. It’s a purer mana than the one escaping from my own core. I’m tasting more and more of this mana and I start to find it has the taste of water, I can’t explain why, but the more mana I’m absorbing from the barrier, the more I think there is something in there that is magically creating the water that flows inside the mountain.

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The fishes come back later bringing some strange news that distracts me from my inspection of the barrier. The spiral waterway is going lower than me, passing very near but never through some water or airways I’ve mapped or even claimed, and near the outside forest level, then it goes through another barrier.

Another barrier. There is another barrier beneath me… And the two barriers are connected by a perfectly spiraling waterway that I’ve never crossed before. The spiral is so perfectly made, it can’t be natural.

Ok, this time I’m going to claim the whole mountain, I want to know if there are another ones of those strange barriers in the area. This operation is going to put my other projects in wait, but it’s no big deal, understanding the barriers is the most important thing to do right now. It’s still going to be long and slow. So I may not completely stop my other plans, at least not the gathering one.

I’ve past two days claiming the top of the mountain and examining the barrier, the big bats had brought back some interesting things in the meantime.

New fruits, and two small creatures.

Destroying part of the fruit to learn about them and then making them sprout a little - just enough for them to live and start to grow on themselves - isn’t costly in mana, so I can do it. I’m now the proud owner of some strawberries and redcurrant bushes, an apple seedling. I also have some mistletoe, but it seems they are feeding on other trees, so I don’t think I’m gonna let it flourish a lot.

On the creatures' side, I had a scally one that tries to run away as soon as possible, I had to order my bats to kill it immediately or it would have climb down the cliff. Turns out it’s called a ‘lizard’. The thing could become a fine monster, it has claws that could serve as weapons and scales for armor, it can also walk on the roof.

The other creature try to make a run too, but this time I was smarter, I manage to capture it myself by raising some stone walls around it. It’s still trying to climb them to regain its freedom. It’s the same furry little thing the bats already bring me back the last time and like the lizard, it has scratches left by the bats’ claws when they grabbed it. Since I’m currently running on low mana for this experiment - I’m still in the process of claiming the whole mountain - I think I’m going to kill it instead of trying to keep it alive long enough to claim it, I’ll do it with the next ones.

I order my bats to keep bringing me fruits, but not animals for now.

There is also a good surprise, during the day, a little feathery thing came and land on one of my cherry tree branches, but it left soon after. It is a good sign, maybe it will come back and bring some others flying creatures with it.

8 days later I have finally finish claiming the entire mountain, from top to ten meters underneath the surface of the forest. I have not discovered any other barrier. I’m waiting for my bats to come back from there night hunt before trying to break through the top barrier. I want to have all my creatures with me before attempting something so dangerous.

On my other projects, the feathery creature came back 5 times, and another one came once. I killed the second one, learning the feathery creatures are ‘birds’ and the one I killed was a ‘sparrow’. Thanks to me claiming the whole mountain I also found out that some lizards are living on the surface and in some cracks right under the surface.

My bats also encountered the hiker near the clearing. It seems like they were interrogating themselves as to why the local vegetation had a better growth than the rest of the forest. They sampled the water and went away.

The bats brought back some other fruits, and even some ‘vegetables’ they stole from the hikers. I now have pine trees, plane trees, sweet pepper plant - I don’t know why it’s called ‘sweet’ pepper, I suppose there must be some kind of ‘normal’ pepper - and cucumbers.