In a third floor office of one of the two prominent merchant guilds calling Westbend home, a large man was reading through a stack of papers detailing the new residents joining “The World” this year.

“Ugh, quite a few went off and became adventurers outside of the city. They could at least have the manners of staying local for a few seasons in order to pay back the community some for hosting them!” The man said angrily to himself. “I swear, the mayor needs to do more, in order to entice them. Doesn’t he know that the town’s gotta grow? Well at least the ones that did stay helped to increase our monster parts acquisition rise. Although, I am curious as to why a significant portion comes from a farmer….” He ended softly in thought.

After a few minutes of shuffling reports and profile slips, the man yelled out to his secretary. “Margret! Get me the profiles of a ‘Bradford Wallace and a Mia …’.” The man slowly letting his voice fade out upon remembering someone else of the same name. “Well isn’t that interesting….”

“What? What’s interesting Mr. Gald? Also, I apologize but I didn’t get that last name.” The secretary shouted from the adjoining room.

“That’s quite alright, I kind of got lost with my train of thought.”

~~~Brad~~~

“Woah….” Brad and Mia said in almost perfect unison, doing their best to replicate the wonder of small children.

“Rumble, you look awesome! Like really awesome! Kind of freaky, but in a good way.” Brad eagerly told his companion, now standing before him after his evolution cocoon faded away in a brilliant display.

“I agree whole heartedly, Rumble, you look amazingly fearsome! Your retaliation perk from before definitely had an influence if I had to guess.” Mia said, agreeing with Brad.

Standing before the human couple, stood Rumble, now five foot tall with a strong wooden core with four powerful branches extending out in a humanoid like configuration. With two legs and two arm like appendages, that was where the similarities ended. With a bundle of smaller root like clusters ending all four main appendages, Rumble appeared as if he could really grasp onto things with an almost unrivaled strength. Also near where a humans wrists would be, a single long protrusion exended past his hand-root clusters on both sides. The protrusion came to a single deadly point. With similar looking weapons existing across multiple areas if his body, Rumble now had quite the arsenal…. And with the weapons came armor of sorts. The armor came in the shape of thick slabs of bark covering exposed and easily hit areas without bogging him down with the weight that would’ve come with a complete shell of it. But the most striking feature was none of these, it was the glowing ghastly blue and green glows that circulated throughout his body in vein like structures. If they were not striking enough when standing still, they also pulsed whenever a nearby joint moved. It was as if the glowing veins fueled his movements.

As the pair watched in amazement as Rumble started testing out his new abilities upon their request, although Rumble seemed to have been happy to see them for itself anyways, Brad received a new popup.

Congratulations!

With the added trait “Mana Grown” the evolution has been successfully altered!

Evolution further altered due to Domain bonuses and prior experiences.

Your familiar has finished evolving into a “Mana Strike Guardian”

“Uh, what? Wow. Mia, you won’t believe what happened.” Brad told the girl standing next to him, still not taking his eyes off of his familiar completely.

“What? What is so unbelievable? Judging by how he looks, he obviously changed quite a bit from that trait.” Mia replied, also focused on Rumbles movements.

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“Apparently my Domain and all of the things Rumble has been doing affected his evolution.” Brad told her.

“That makes sense, unexpected but it makes sense now that it has been stated. It would be pretty boring and awful for Rumble if multiple people could have the same familiar. This way, Rumble is quite unique.” Mia said

“He is most definitely that.” Brad agreed. “I wonder how he compares to other familiars though. I’m almost positive that he would be on the stronger side, but I could be entirely wrong since I haven’t actually seen any others fight.”

“While in your domain, I would almost guarantee that he is beyond anything else his level spawning here. He may run into difficulty with some of the harder nest guardians though.” Mia theorized aloud.

“Well, what do you think Rumble?” Brad asked before being greeted with quite a few new emojis.

“It appears that Rumble now has way more emojis to express himself. He seems to be super proud of his new capabilities, along with his new weaponry. I’m not sure if I am reading this right or not, but I think he wants to go fight something and to let us watch.” Brad translated enthusiastically, despite his hesitance with a few of the meanings.

“Well, where is last Lasher nest? We need to clear it anyways in order to get a better one to fill its place.” Mia said encouragingly.

With a quick orientation, Rumble had them marching down a new path to the east of the shack. With the tall grass almost parting out of the way for Rumble, the somewhat too narrow path, expanded to fit his new frame comfortably.

“What is that about?” Asked Mia, while elbowing her boyfriend for his attention.

“I am not quite sure to be honest…, must be something to do with an interacting with him being a domain guardian. At least that is what I think. It kind of looks like the plants are showing him subservience, as if he was some kind of noble here.”

“When you say it like that, it does look like the grass is showing him respect as if he was part of some kind of nobility. That being said, he is more or less nobility in regards to your domain.” Mia said thoughtfully. “He is the one and only domain guardian, only answering to the druid himself. His sole mission is to protect the fiefdom that is your domain, with him being by far its strongest warrior.”

“That is true. Honestly, I hadn’t every thought of it that way. To me, Rumble is my friend, nothing more, nothing less.”

“That does not surprise me. I like you both, but neither of you really sit down and consider your relationships beyond liking someone or not.” Mia said half jokingly.

“Wait, if the grass is bending for him… why isn’t bending for me, as the druid of the domain? That honestly doesn’t make sense.” Brad asked confusedly.

“Maybe it has nothing to do with your domain then. It might just be that the plants recognize something in Rumble now. I mean, Rumble literally pulses with mana as he walks now. The plants may just be recognizing him as potentially the source of their continued survival or something…, but honestly I have no idea Brad. We will probably need to pay more attention to it for now.” Mia said with a shrug of her shoulders.

~~~ Rumble~~~

Walking through the tall grass, that was now only a foot taller than himself, Rumble noticed that is was bending away, leaving the path forward clear of obstruction. Not sure why it was happening, but honestly not caring in the slightest, Rumble could only be curious about the battle ahead. Having chosen the last remaining Lasher nest, it would be a good comparison between the current and pre-evolution capabilities.

Now walking around the last bend in the game trail, Rumble with eyes on the nest a mere one hundred feet ahead, decided to wait for Brad and Mia to see it before charging ahead in combat.

As soon as his companion and Mia laid eyes upon the target and having been given a thumbs up, Rumble charged ahead. Feeling the ground compress slightly as the now explosive foot falls pounded down at it, the new form surged ahead, body rippling with power.

The lashers, all being aware, were eagerly awaiting Rumble’s arrival. The first lashing out at the oncoming opponent was met with a block using the new wooden stake on the right, with the left one stabbing forward in a jab that easily pierced its stalk. With a spinning roundhouse kick into the second lasher, the first target flew off from Rumble’s weapon into a third, knocking it over.

But all was not perfect, the remaining small lasher along with its nest guardian were able to land strong attacks. Both were injured due to Rumble’s natural retaliation trait, but they both did damage.

Knowing that the lashers still posed some danger, Rumble knew that charging in sloppily was still not an option for future fights if improving was the goal. Sure, tanking the hits now was easy with the new body barely suffering much damage, but improvement demanded perfect execution.

Grabbing the follow up whip from the smaller opponent, Rumble had duck quickly in order to avoid the guardian’s strike. Knowing the ultimate attack to come, Rumble beat the guardian with its minion before slamming the small lasher into the guardian’s face to prevent the annoying ultimate.

With the major attack avoided, Rumble sped through wrapping it up completely. With the new stakes lashing out quickly, they were able to cut deep wounds with the sharp points. And so with a final explosive stab, Rumble’s arm pulsed a powerful green before the stake burst through the guardian’s stalk with enough force to sheer it completely in half.

And so the test run for the new evolution concluded. The results being an incredible increase of speed and power, with a slight increase of durability. The lack of solid armor did not bother Rumble though… getting hit just meant that improvement was needed and that a reminder was apparently required .