Albert decided to walk his way back to the Lair instead of teleporting. A lot happened and he needed some alone time to unwind, to come to grips with all the new changes and, honestly, to regain a sense of connection with reality itself.
There was also another reason, actually. The forest. It was already a beautiful, peaceful sight before. A place where he could find peace and rest his senses, enveloped by nice scents and the call of birds. Now? Now it was completely transformed. It wasn’t the forest that had changed, it was very much the same, but it was him who had. His perception of the forest, his connection with nature. The peace. The sense of belonging.
It was so nice and yet so scary. Because he had never felt like this in his life. He had never felt a sense of longing and belonging towards a grove of trees, nor had he ever stopped to contemplate the beauty of a flower.
It was quite pleasant, but again, such changes were sudden in the way they revealed themselves to him. They felt like the most natural thing ever, the way things should feel, but when he thought about it the abruptness of it all was almost jarring.
Yet. In the end, he chose to embrace it. To go with the flow. He wasn’t worried about ‘losing his humanity’ or things like that. He knew that his nature was more than just his race. He was Albert Grassman, son of Samantha Cromwell and… someone he barely even remembered in photo. He was much more a product of nurture than he was of nature, and no changes to his physical appearance could ever change who he was.
The fact that he had a sudden liking for nature was nothing to worry about. He already liked nature before, he only liked it more now as it was right for him to do. Speaking of which, he was glad he now lived at the Lair, because the thought of living in a noisy city, polluted and riddled with cars and smog made him recoil in disgust. How he had even managed to live there two full decades was almost beyond him, until he realized that he had never known better, having been born and raised in the city.
Besides, as far as human dwellings are concerned, the city still holds distinct advantages to the countryside that only a portal to another place allowing him to go back and forth between the two environments can bridge.
Albert walked with a new appreciation for his current situation and living accommodations. He was also trying to figure out a new magic skill to add to his arsenal – this way also managing to complete a quest he had had for a long time (create a lightning fingers skill). He wanted to clear out his quest list by completing whatever he could get done quickly. He had noticed, scrolling the list with more than a little sadness, that there were a lot of interesting quests gathering dust there.
After more or less two hours of failed attempts, Albert realized that perhaps developing a new skill wasn’t as easy as he thought it would be. Without a skill video, or some sort of insight, his knowledge of magic was not yet enough to make him come up with spells and skills on the fly.
He shrugged. In the past he would have been upset about it, but not today. First of all, today was a good day and he didn’t want to ruin it. And secondly, his mental state was much better than it used to be, with all the meditations and his daily encounters with death giving him a new perspective on life.
He could have hyperfocused on the task as he usually did but honestly, his hyperfocus battery was currently quite empty after dedicating a full day to the seed and then fighting the dryads.
It was along the trail back to the Lair, and it was while Albert was whistling happily and looking around at all the nature surrounding him that he saw something he had never seen before. He stopped, staring at what looked like a magical manifestation a couple dozen meters away from him. It was a green glow, faint in the bright sunlight but definitely visible, hanging around the crown of the trees.
It felt mystical and mysterious.
He approached slowly, trying not to spook it. Assuming it could be spooked, of course. Meanwhile, Albert also looked at it with his magic vision, then searched the surroundings to see if there were others. One step after the other, he got closer.
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He could almost touch it.
In fact, he wanted to see what would happen if he touched it. He could sense no danger coming from it, and by all means it looked like just a random manifestation of magic that could not hurt him in any way. Plus his shield was back online. He was safe.
With that in mind, he extended a finger.
Before he could touch the thing, however, it just zipped away and flew into the thick of the forest. Albert hummed as a smile crawled on his face. The thing wanted to play chase? Then he was going to chase it.
He took off, diving into the thick of the bushes. He slipped through the branches, ducking below the foliage or diving straight through it, feeling the greenery caress his skin and never prickle it, feeling the trees and the bushes making way for him to pass and the ground welcome his feet.
He ran after the little wisp of magic, catching sight of its tail end at times, always far away but never unreachable.
Albert ran and ran.
Until eventually, he reached the wisp. It was floating at the center of a small glade lit by golden rays of sun visible through rising mist from a nearby creek. At the center of the glade was a hollow tree stump, covered in moss and ivy. And as he approached it, something coalesced from inside the hollow stump, taking the form of an ethereal being made of light, mana and what could only be described as a liveness of the forest itself.
It had the form of a great stag, standing proud and tall. Too bad it was just a couple of feet tall, when not standing on the stump of the tree.
“My power has dwindled, young one.” The stag said, feeling what Albert was thinking. “I used to be… taller.”
“Yeah… sorry.” Albert said, averting the gaze of the stag. Even though it had no visible eyes, its gaze was very palpable.
“You are a strange one.” The stag said. It had a deep, powerful voice. “I have been watching you for quite some time, child.”
“Not that young.” Albert said quickly.
“You are. Now that you possess Elven blood, you are but a child.”
“But Eurus told me—”
“Eurus and his people sacrificed most of their power, their essence, to be granted a second chance. More than you think, and more than they told you. Do you remember, child, when you were called upon this valley by the Great Magic?”
The stag must have meant the system quest. Albert nodded.
“Eurus never told you the price he had to pay to make it possible, and you may not ask him. It had been, after all, a price he chose to pay, and now it is his burden to bear. But you, child. You do not suffer the same curse. You have true elven essence in you. That is why you can see me, and why I can talk to you.”
“I see. That’s why I am a child to you, because my life span is that of an elf.”
“Half of that of an elf. You are not a full elf, after all, perhaps for the better.” The stag roared. Was it laughter? Do stags even roar? “You are now the last real elf of this valley. And I don’t mean it sarcastically, although I can see why you are smiling.”
“The others. Can they see you?”
“Not anymore.”
There was a moment of pause. Silence, only the sounds of nature.
“Where are all the animals?” Albert asked the question that had been hovering on his mind for a while now. “There are only plants and insects and birds in the valley. No animals. Why?”
There were, of course, some animals close to the village. The elves kept them. But there were no wild ones.
“They are gone. The last of them wandered outside the dome a long time ago. The forest was dying, child. I was dying with it, before you planted the seed and brought back hope to the valley. To the whole planet. And as the Tree will grow strong, nature will reclaim that which was lost.”
Albert wanted to gulp. No pressure. “You are welcome.”
The stag seemed to grow bigger. It stood a full head taller than Albert now. “Come to me, child.”
Albert hesitated. It was one thing to be thanked for his efforts by the literal spirit of nature, it was another to just approach a wild stag-like manifestation of said spirit.
“I do not mean you harm.” It said, amused. It bobbed its head up and down, shifting its weight and lifting one of its legs. At the tip of its hoof, a very bright green light coalesced out of the very same magic the stag was made, until the stag was barely visible and the light shone like a miniature sun.
“Can I Appraise it? Forgive my lack of trust in strange magic.”
The stag laughed. It was a strangely human laugh, though faint and far away. “If it calms you to do so, you may.”
[Essence of Nature.]
Ah, it wasn’t helpful. But it was calming enough, Albert decided, and approached the gift. When he was close enough, the light flew into him and disappeared, along with the stag.
In the silence that followed, the forest around seemed even more vibrant and alive than ever.
Albert’s Status had changed:
Albert Grassman.
Half-elf. (Unawakened Essence of Nature.)
[Mana]: 43FU + 32/hour