----------------------------------------

Marigold (song not used) - Start

Evil If you Want

You said it was all in my head,

Every thought, every word left unsaid.

Whenever I tried to share my truths,

You painted me as broken, far from my roots.

So no, don’t call me crazy,

Don’t drown me in lies or silence my cries.

Don’t speak for me; I’ve found my voice.

This time, I’ll make my own choice.

-

If you break my heart again,

I’ll never let you go—call me evil, call me cruel.

If you want to play pretend,

Not with my heart; I won’t be your fool.

When I curse you and you scream,

Call me evil—call me your darkest dream.

-

Remember when you smiled at me,

Sugar-coated lies as sweet as could be?

I should’ve listened when my mother said,

"You’ll end up broken—better run instead."

But I believed in love, and it made me blind,

While you fed on the pieces of my mind.

Whenever I stood up to fight,

You’d say, “You’re prettier when silent, right?”

You called me crazy to keep me small,

But now, my love, I’m breaking it all.

-

If you break my heart again,

I’ll never let you go—call me evil, call me cruel.

If you want to play pretend,

Not with my heart; I won’t be your fool.

When I curse you and you scream,

Call me evil—call me your darkest dream.

-

Your love was poison, sharp as a blade,

A game of make-believe, but I won’t be played.

So remember me well, etch me in your mind—

I’m the storm you’ll never leave behind.

---

How do you like my revenge?

Cold, served on a silver tray,

Or hot, spread across every word you say?

I’ll watch your world crumble into the abyss,

And that’s the price for the love you missed.

So call me evil, scream my name,

But you lit the fire, you set the flame.

If you want to play pretend,

I’ll be waiting to start it all over again,

But don’t call me evil when you’re to blame—

Because you made me evil,

Evil, evil, evil

Marigold (song not used) - End

----------------------------------------

----------------------------------------

Marigold (Chapter 62 - Discarded) - Start

Aurum - Year 3 {2 Weeks later}

"Food production started to increase, the general quality of the food is lower than previous harvests, but it was still approved by the culinary club, the magic club asked to have access to the grinding machines in the industrial zone. But the culinary club is using all of them for nutrient paste production and ingredient processing.” Yan reported.

"Very well, continue producing food, when we get out of this crisis we can worry about the quality of food, until then we need to establish a safe and constant source, tell the magic club that your request was denied, the cooking club has priority in uses of heavy machinery until further notice."

"Very well then, the sewing club has been stopped for some time, they have been making repairs and some items for the production club, but in essence they are completely out of work." Yan said.

"That's a problem... I need to find something for them to do.... Can they help the magic club? As seamstresses they should know better than anyone how to sew magic, they could help the alchemy, artifice and magic club building some new items."

"Of course, I will send the command to Zuki." Yan said, writing everything down on a wax clipboard.

"The next problem, the beasts coming from deep in the forest have suddenly increased, and seem to be targeting the tower. So far the kobols have been intercepting them, and helping to control the ordes, but some beasts have managed to reach the walls, and cause damage to the tower." Yan said worriedly.

"Damn... I'm sure this is the work of that creature I felt in the spiritual world, it feels like I pissed off someone I shouldn't have messed with."

The monster hordes weren't dangerous, not for the kobolds at least, the monsters that came were small and weak, and with our support they managed to hold their own very well.

Now, I would need an entire swarm to shoot down one of these creatures, and many of my children would be injured from this conflict, and we had to be extra careful, because the blood of these beasts was poisonous, I almost lost some soldiers to the poison, if not If it were for [drops of life] I would have to bury my babies for some stupid reason.

"These pests, how long do you think the outer wall will last?"

"Not much, his blows are powerful, and destructive, the most accepted plan so far is to reinforce the wall with [Metallifolia] like we did with the tower walls." Yan said.

In my free time, I would go outside the tower and make the [Metallifolia] that grew between the cracks in the wall spread more and more with the [Wild Growth] spell, this caused the tower made of yellow bricks to have gray roots growing all over the place, it was not beautiful, nor ugly, but it was what kept the tower standing and stable, the root of [Metallifolia] was in a special room, and was very well guarded, the small trees served as the skeleton of the tower, while the wax bricks served as the meat.

Now, if we were to use the [Metallifolia] on the outer walls, that would mean that I would have to go there personally to do the work of spreading the branches across the wall, which was really dangerous in the eyes of the hive.

"I think we can do that, we will also cover the wall with live moss, and fill it with [Metallifolia] thorns. This way we can increase its resistance to the maximum."

"That's dangerous mom, don't you think it's better to wait until Max and the magic club develop a more compact and efficient version of magic wands?" Yan said visibly worried.

"Max is on vacation, and to develop a portable magic wand, he would just need to create a smaller and more stable catalyst crystal, they would be wands with fixed spells, but still infinitely better than the "thing" he made."

"If you insist on leaving, I will activate the Lifeguardians to serve as your personal guards, and I will call a swarm of squires to serve as your meat shield." Yan said.

"Meat shield? Stop the nonsense! I'm not using any meat shield! I have my [Crystal Fur], and I can defend myself if necessary."

"Security died of old age! We can't afford to lose you! If you die, the hive dies with it!" Yan insisted.

"Ugh... Fine, but just call Jon and Hans, they'll be enough to defend me."

"I'll also call in Trouble and Zack as extra backup, and I'll keep Aldy and Ral on high alert." Yan insisted.

"Fine..."

----------------------------------------

As I repaired the walls of the hive under the protection of several worried and nervous members, I thought again about the kobolds, currently they are growing a lot, and that worries me in a way that is indescribable, but at the same time I feel like I should help them, because they are my anchor with my "human" part.

But was I really doing this for a noble reason like "saving the poor", or was I just being stupid? After all, feeding a beast that might one day eat you is the definition of stupidity, but at the same time the kobolds provided substantial help in protecting the hive.

The hordes of monsters continued to come, each day larger, at increasingly shorter intervals, I had no way to kill these creatures, my kind is known for our resilience, not for our firepower.

Some specific members were "strong", but they alone would not be able to defeat a single one of those mini boars, to do that we needed to weaken them (Something difficult), and then attack them in large groups, and there were always injuries coming out of that.

But when we left the work to the kobolds, the task became much easier, we could relax and reap the benefits, while the kobolds were the ones who dealt with the problems.

But there is no free lunch in the world.

By leaving all the heavy lifting to the kobolds, they were getting stronger every day, and we were getting weaker every day, were we growing in strength and size? Clear. But nothing compared to the kobolds.

It filled me with anger, fear, and disgust. Outsiders who didn't belong to the hive and were close to me were starting to become a threat.

Some hive members thought about sending fewer resources, while others suggested that we purposely poison the food, but I didn't want to do that. Why?

The babies.

No matter how much my humanity breaks, even if it turns to sand and is blown by the wind, I would never hurt a poor, defenseless baby, or a child.

And the kobolds were full of them. Puppies everywhere, if I poisoned the food the first to die would be the weakest children, so I would never be able to sleep at night again.

If I provided less food, everyone would probably prioritize the warriors, members who can fight, then the women who keep the village running, and finally the children.

I shot myself pretty well in the foot.

If I had ignored them a long time ago, they would have been dead a long time ago, but now it was too late for that, I just hate keeping them, I realized that I really can't force myself to feel something for the kobolds, but the children... I feel my heart burn whenever I think about letting them die.

It's not the kobolds that maintain my "humanity", or what's left of it, it's the children, perhaps because I'm a "mother of many", I can't ignore the suffering of a child in silence.

When I see their little bodies wrapped in swaddling clothes and being gently cared for by their parents, I am immediately reminded of my adorable little larvae, the way they are adorable and cuddly, and how fragile and lovable they are. And when I see those little children running around and discovering the world around them, I remember the boys' first experiences with the world, they are so equal, so curious, and fascinated by everything, and I simply refuse to think about ways to take these children away from their families, I needed to find another way to live with the kobolds.

'I need more XP, I need to evolve more, and faster. If I grow big enough I can guarantee that the kobolds won't be a threat.'

My crazy plan was basically to become a mystical guardian for the kobolds, like a mountain god or something, but to do that I had to be scary, someone worthy of respect and fear. If I could, I would like the kobolds to be in a situation similar to the Wappos, where they don't cause me problems, and live in peace and harmony with us.

"Mom, this area is already good, let's go to the south!" One of the guards said.

"Oh?"

While I was immersed in my intrusive and somewhat psychotic thoughts, I ended up finishing part of the job in altomatic mode, and now the wax walls were full of gnarled gray roots, there were scores of long, menacing thorns protruding from the roots. , and I could see a large group of gardeners arriving with jars full of moss to spread it over the wall, with the intention of creating something resistant and threatening.

"Alright, let's do it."

As I prepared to head to the southern region, I felt a chill down my spine and my senses began to flicker like Christmas lights, looking in the direction of the sensation, I saw nothing but a rustle of leaves, and at that moment I knew problems were coming.

"Boys! Ready, attack coming northwest!"

As soon as my words fell, Hans and Jon stepped in front of me, and a large swarm of bees began to gather around me, forming a large orb of not-at-all-happy bees.

Soon from the shadows a kind of hawk appeared, but it didn't look as intimidating as those big hawks, and it had a curved hook-shaped beak. Its colors were primarily brown and gray, with just a few colorful feathers on the tip of its wings.

[Status] [Information] Attributes Name: N/A Species: Quicksilver Hawk Life: 82.4 Def: 7.3 Level: 5 Type: Hawk Vit: 10.3 Int: 1.3 Mana: ----- Stamina: ----- Dex: 15.2 Wis: 1.4 ------- Affinity: ----- Spr: 120.4 Str: 42.2

"Damn! He's strong and dangerous! Everyone on high alert!"

The falcon seemed to be very strong by our standards, but the worst of all was that it was a puppy. I could see soft plumage still clinging to its newly acquired feathers, and my sixth sense told me there was something watching in the shadows, probably the creature's relatives who were teaching it to hunt.

And what's better than a fat, juicy bee that's nothing more than a bag of XP walking around?

'Shit, shit! Even if we kill this guy, the parents might still come in retaliation, I have to think of something...'

While I was thinking, the little hawk started his attack, throwing himself at us like a bullet, but in the middle of the way a rain of small thorns falls on him, which made him stop in the middle of the way, the thorns were thrown by Zack, and they contained a special little gift from Aldy.

Soon the hawk showed signs of being bothered by the poison, but seemed to recover quickly and began to advance towards me with its claws open. Halfway through, Jon threw himself into the path and allowed himself to be grabbed, then he held himself tightly to the hawk's legs, and activated his skill [Heavy Weight] which allowed him to become heavier at the cost of Sp.

Soon the hawk felt Jon's weight, and began trying to tear him from his paws with his beak, his strength was impressive and frightening, and he opened Jon's natural armor as if he were someone removing an orange. Jon, who couldn't do anything about it, just let go of the hawk and fell towards the ground like rotten fruit.

Soon I could feel Jon's pain through the link, and my vision began to turn red and blurry, my cranial bone felt like it would split with rage at any second and the next thing I knew I had let out a guttural scream that I had no idea I could emit.

The effects of my scream were immediate, because soon a large cloud with about 90% of the hive exploded from the tower, all the troops that could fight appeared, in the meantime Jon's group of bombed bees threw themselves on top of the hawk, and they started clinging to him with all their strength, Aldy and his group took advantage of the distraction and started stinging the hawk's blind spots, and I started running towards poor Jon who was lying on the ground and covered in crimson blood, his once powerful armor it was completely shattered, and I could see its visors scattered

by the armor.

"JON!"

Without wasting time I started to invoke all the healing spells I had available, and to activate my healing skills, slowly I could see Jon's flesh returning to its place and growing again, but Jon showed no sign of waking up.

"Take him to the infirmary! NOW"

At my command a small group of guards quickly grabbed Jon by the four arms and ran with him towards the tower, looking up I could see the hawk still fighting with the hive, and without showing signs of falling, the tankers were holding on to its legs and beak, which were its greatest weapons, and Aldy and his group injected more and more venom into the hawk, I could see Hans off to the side waiting for an opportunity to attack along with Trouble, and Ral and his small group of wizards casting spells like [Weakness] and [pain] in the hawk.

When I thought we would get the upper hand, the hawk suddenly stopped and seemed to activate a skill, because soon his feathers changed from an earthy brown, to a metallic silver, then he began to struggle and throw all the bees that were blocking him away. .

I could see that his eyes were red, and the hawk was panting, probably a result of the poisons and spells, but he showed no signs of falling.

"You bastard, you think I'm going to feel sorry for you just because it's your first hunt?! You hurt my babies for the first, and last time."

"You're not getting out of here alive."

As soon as I said that I started sending small mana spirits charged with [Imperiality] which soon hit all the Lifeguardians present, then I activated the 40% bonus and lastly I activated my [Healing Aura] and [Aura Suggestion].

"KILL HIM!"

With my command, everyone began to advance furiously towards the hawk, and then I began to hear strange and melancholy music coming from somewhere, and looking up I could see a large group of bards surrounded by swarms of bees, who soon became enraged. eyes red like blood and veins bulging across the body.

'Damn, that's the song [The Fury of Many], that shit is dangerous.'

With no time to react, the hawk was then swamped by a large tornado of angry bees, the bees then began to grab and bite him, some began to gnaw, and soon my adorable little babies went from gentle vegetarian bees to beasts with thirst for blood and hunger for flesh.

The hawk didn't know how to react when the bees started gnawing at his eyelids, and then eating his eyes, all he could do was throw himself to the ground viciously and rub himself against the ground in an attempt to break away from the carnivorous bees, but the furious cloud of bees didn't care about the damage caused to their bodies, and as long as they could move they continued to attack, gnawing at the hawk's feathers, beak and eyes, when the creature opened its mouth. The smallest bees in the group entered his throat and gnawed at him from the inside, and soon the hawk went from hunter to hunted.

In a short time its feathers lost their metallic shine and color, and returned to being common feathers, which were soon ripped out by furious bees, its flesh was then attacked, with workers and soldiers tearing off small pieces of its flesh, soon the creature stopped fighting. , and I got a huge wave of XP.

[Warning]

You earned 140 Xp from your bees

I was really relieved that it was over, but my angry bees weren't done yet, and were now digging through the dead creature's entire body, hollowing it out and spreading visors and blood all over the place.

'Make them stop!'

'It does not give! The music already had an effect, they stayed in this enraged state for at least another 5 minutes." Said Steve through the link.

A large swarm of angry, bloodthirsty bees on the loose? This is not good at all, the bards' songs seemed very powerful, but they had terrible side effects, so I banned them from using the skill [The Concert], but my momentary fury made the hive use the "big guns".

As soon as the angry bees lost interest, they began to fly away in a large swarm to reveal a bone carcass full of feathers, blood, and piles of flesh that had once been a hawk, and then quickly flew towards me and began to surround me. in a large sphera-shaped tornado, all the bees were covered in blood, and their eyes were red and sombre, nothing like the standard black we had, their once well-groomed and combed manes were now nothing more than a pile of hair disheveled and stained with blood, their nails were covered in pieces of flesh and blood, and many were injured, but did not show the slightest discomfort.

My aura and healing skills were still activated, and I could see white smoke emanating from their wounds that slowly disappeared into the smoke, but I didn't feel good around them. The link between us was numb, and cloudy, as if I had been "drugged", and I couldn't feel anything coming from them other than very clear waves of pure hatred.

"Damn it, back off! There might be more of them around!"

The young hawk's relatives didn't show up, perhaps because they didn't want to get involved with us, or because they didn't think a single chick was worth the risk, I didn't know that, but apparently we are very dangerous when threatened.

"I think we're not as weak as I thought... But I hated it, I need to strengthen my boys urgently, I can't make them go through this every time we're in danger."

Marigold (Chapter 62 - Discarded) - End

----------------------------------------

Marigold (Drafts (Some things were reused)) - Start

The dead were buried, and the living continued to live.

We healed what we could of the injured, but there were still limits to what we could do, and healing lost limbs was one of those limits, all I could do for them was prioritize drinking [Life Drops] and killing the mushrooms.

In recent times we have been helping the werewolves, we took some wax pots full of honey, some mushrooms, saint's tears and some honey mixed with [Drops of life]. We left everything inside the most accessible tent there was and left.

We took this "kit" once a month, and it made the werewolves very happy, the first time we took it they didn't seem to understand what was happening, but in the second month they were very happy to receive more things.

The problem came this month, when the soldiers left Kit in the tent again and then Trevis discovered that they were being followed.

It sent a chill down my spine, if the same thing that happened to the fairy happened to the werewolves, then how many bees would have to die to take one of them down?

Because of that I made Trevis drive them away and I never let them go back there, I had said I would help them, but I won't allow them to find my house. Even if it means letting them die.

The spell casters had created a spell to create a magical misel, it was too weak and useless for any of us to use, but it became quite popular among the soldiers, as they could use it to distract their victims, or simply cause a little more damage, and spellcasters have finally proven themselves useful by creating a spell that is actually useful.

They created a spell that could create wind, with this we were able to increase the efficiency of the mills and further expand our production of materials.

I laid so many eggs that I gained another level in [Lay Eggs] and now I only needed 2 to reach the maximum level.

This time I chose the [Rancher] and [Alchemist] classes, these classes seemed extremely useful to me, since we would have someone who knows how to take care of animals, and someone to take over the experiments once and for all.

Many workers had evolved through pollination, Isaac and Albert too. Most lost the ability to evolve through pollination, but they gained cool classes like [Craftsman], [Builder] [Cleaner] [Organizer] and other more common ones like [cook] [carpenter] and [weaver], it was a surprise that workers they could become classes that I already had unlocked, but everyone seemed happy, and Albert and Isaac had become the very rare [scientists].

These guys gained a hunger for knowledge that even I didn't have, and they lived locked in the laboratory doing crazy experiments, they had the ability to remember experiments they had already done and skills that increased their precision and mastery in handling dangerous materials, they also had a slight immunity to poisons and a very keen sense of danger.

They were responsible for creating things such as shampoos, soaps, olive oil, brown sugar, bread dough, perfumes, skin creams, conditioner, nails, common glue, hand mixer clamps, uniquely shaped gears and chemical mixtures.

And now they were working together with the [Artisans] with [Drops of Life] to create god knows what.

I had gotten to level 2, and sadly back to level 1 after spending all the .

The skill hasn't evolved yet, but it would happen soon. And my new skill [Cursing] was really interesting, I could apply an effect to something if I paid a mana value and cursed it. The effect could be weak and short-lived, or strong and long-lasting, it just depended on how much mana I used.

Another thing was that I had been learning magic from spell casters, and now I had some experience with mana and magic itself.

My magical energy was "Living Mana" because it had been "contaminated" by my affinity for life, so even if I could use spells I would have to use that living mana to power that spell. And what's the problem with that? It's just that the living mana has its preferences.

This mana tried to convert all the spells I activated into a type of healing, but when I focused on feeding a spell with living mana, without "corrupting" the spell, I ended up using about 2x more mana.

Now when spell casters gave me scrolls with healing spells, I could activate them with just 1/3 the amount of mana they needed themselves.

Another thing was that this mana seemed to not be "harmful". The spellcasters told me that the natural energy of the world was toxic if used in large quantities, but that my mana did not cause any harm to any living creature if used in large quantities.

It seemed boring to me, I thought that with live mana I could cause great damage to a living body, but it seemed like live mana was harmless.

But the spell casters told me that it was all about "intentions", the natural mana of the world didn't have any intentions, but the affinities did, so when the mana was "tainted" by the affinities they would acquire "intentions", and the Living mana was naturally passive and non-harmful to the crop.

But depending on the wielder's intention, any mana could be harmful or beneficial to the body. Turns out I couldn't control this energy, only spell casters could. And all I could do without a skill was "spill" my mana, which was what I was learning now.

"It's not like that, mother... Imagine an energy coming from within your soul, flowing through your body and then exiting through your hands!" Said a spell caster

"Really? What kind of instructions are those?!"

"I told you that mom wouldn't understand it like that..." said another spell caster

"Then do better!"

"With pleasure! Humg Huff... Mom! Imagine that you drank a lot on a Friday night and then went on a roller coaster, then when you were leaving the mountain everything started to come back but you had to hold it back because you were in public, but Instead of coming out of your mouth, imagine coming out of your hands!" Said the spell caster

'What the fuck?! Did he get this thing with one of the beacons? That was personal information, it was a long time ago...'

'So it's like vomiting? Like creating honey? It shouldn't be that difficult...'

"Focus," I told myself, as I struggled to visualize this 'energy' within me. It was like trying to hold a ray of sunshine in my hands, a task that seemed impossible. But I couldn't fail. Not when the entire colony depended on me and my skills.

With renewed determination, I spread my wings and began to channel the energy that I knew was there. It was like opening a floodgate, letting the surge of power flow freely through me. It was an electrifying sensation, almost like flying.

As the energy flowed within me, I could feel its effect on the world around me. Colors became more vivid, sounds clearer, and even the air seemed to vibrate with renewed energy. It was as if I was touching the very essence of life.

When I finally stopped, I felt exhausted but also invigorated. And there was a small ball of glowing sparks in my hand, the ball of light glowed in various rainbow colors and pulsed excitedly.

"That's right mom! Congratulations!" A spell caster said excitedly.

[Warning]

You have gained the [Mana manipulation] skill that will evolve up to level 10.

[Skill]

[Mana manipulation] Lv 1

Use your will to command the mana inside your body.

"T-This is incredible, what do I do with this thing?"

"I don't know... Put it here on this rock!" Said a spell caster who presented me with a small stone.

Obeying his command, I placed the glow on the small stone and soon all the mana was sucked by the stone, and after a few moments the stone cracked and released some sparks.

"Hmmm, how interesting, it seems like the stone has collapsed and the mana has dispersed." Said the spell caster holding the broken stone.

"What if we used an empty mana crystal? Couldn't we store mom's mana!?" Said a spell caster

"It might work! Bring one of them here!"

After a while a large crystal was brought before me, I placed my hands on it and tried the same process again, this time everything was much easier, and I managed to pour out a small amount of mana before I felt tired.

[Description]

A mana crystal with [Fire] affinity.

Quality: Good

"Damn, it didn't work, it seems like mom's mana only converted into fire mana, is that possible?" Said a spell caster.

"Hmmm... I don't know, but I believe it's a matter of mana decay!" Said another spell caster.

"How did this happen?"

"My theory is that Mom's living mana is a combination of several other forms of mana, and that once that mana leaves Mom's body it begins to decay into simpler forms. That's why the stone broke and didn't left no trace of mana, because it reverted back to mana very quickly." Said a spell caster.

"But it could also be the issue of affinity, right? Mom is a "Vessel" with life affinity, so all her mana and living mana, but trying to put that mana into other recipients with different affinity only ends up turning that mana into another type of mana." Said another spell caster.

"So how do we create a natural container of living mana like this crystal? If this thing can store fire mana, then there must be ways to create containers for specific types of mana."

"Boys, I'm physically tired, and your conversation makes me mentally tired... Could I take a break?"

"Oops! Of course mom! We'll discuss this elsewhere, thanks for your help!"

"I thank you for the classes."

After everyone left I took a nap, and when I woke up I was excited to try new things, the first thing I did was ask for the jar of moss and pour living mana into it.

The result was that the moss began to glow for a few moments, before quickly beginning to rot and turning into a pile of stinking mush.

"Ugh.. What a stinky thing, but isn't that good? I can kill other living beings by flooding them with mana? But I think for that I need a lot of mana...."

Leaving the workers to get rid of this jar of rotten moss, I ask them to bring a small branch and try to put small amounts of living mana into it.

The branch began to slowly grow and take on a darker color, and after a few moments it began to create small pink flower buds.

[Description]

A stick of living wood, it has traces of living mana.

Quality: Good

"That's cool... Can I create a magic wand with this?"

"Damn, it didn't work, it seems like mom's mana only converted into fire mana, is that possible?" Said a spell caster.

"Hmmm... I don't know, but I believe it's a matter of mana decay!" Said another spell caster.

"How did this happen?"

"My theory is that Mom's living mana is a combination of several other forms of mana, and that once that mana leaves Mom's body it begins to decay into simpler forms. That's why the stone broke and didn't left no trace of mana, because it reverted back to mana very quickly." Said a spell caster.

"But it could also be the issue of affinity, right? Mom is a "Vessel" with life affinity, so all her mana and living mana, but trying to put that mana into other recipients with different affinity only ends up turning that mana into another type of mana." Said another spell caster.

"So how do we create a natural container of living mana like this crystal? If this thing can store fire mana, then there must be ways to create containers for specific types of mana."

"Boys, I'm physically tired, and your conversation makes me mentally tired... Could I take a break?"

"Oops! Of course mom! We'll discuss this elsewhere, thanks for your help!"

"I thank you for the classes."

After everyone left I took a nap, and when I woke up I was excited to try new things, the first thing I did was ask for the jar of moss and pour living mana into it.

The result was that the moss began to glow for a few moments, before quickly beginning to rot and turning into a pile of stinking mush.

"Ugh.. What a stinky thing, but isn't that good? I can kill other living beings by flooding them with mana? But I think for that I need a lot of mana...."

Leaving the workers to get rid of this jar of rotten moss, I ask them to bring a small branch and try to put small amounts of living mana into it.

The branch began to slowly grow and take on a darker color, and after a few moments it began to create small pink flower buds.

"That's cool... Can I create a magic wand with this?"

To answer my question, I asked them to bring me a sliver of a mana stone, and I placed it delicately on the branch and then wrapped the whole thing with silk.

I poured [Pipgo de vida] onto the mana stone and continued sending live mana to the stick, with the intention of turning it into a magic wand, since apparently the intention was very important.

After a while and spending all my living mana, all I had was a stick of living wood, with a stone tied to the top, I don't know why it didn't turn into a wand, but I wasn't going to give up that easily.

----------------------------------------

[Description]

Living wand

Created by a low-level bee, this magic wand has an affinity with [Life] and is capable of reducing the cost of spells using living mana by 5%. The wand is capable of storing 3 points of living mana to be used later.

Quality: Bad

About 3 days later I had managed to create my "wand", it seems that it takes a lot of mana to be able to create magical items, spell casters could create some scrolls because they had dozens of members to inject mana into a scroll, but I needed fuel items with living mana alone.

The wand had grown and taken root around the shard of mana stone, the silk that held it all together had taken on a bit of moss and a worn color, a single flower bud at the top of the wand had opened and gave off a small glow. Inside, the wand still looked pretty cool even though it was a pretty shoddy job.

I gave the wand to my "wizards" and let them take care of it, in the meantime I had to worry about something else.

Werewolves.

They were getting close, in the last few days they had sent exploration parties and each day they got closer, they were clearly looking for us, as they must have wanted our "help".

"I told you it was a bad idea to help these people, now they're hunting us!" Hans said angrily.

"Can we kill them? Or at least keep them away?" Ken asked.

"I think if we swarmed around them we could kill them, but many would need to die, and if we were attacked by a large group we might not be able to scare them away." Trouble said.

"So what do we do?" Said my representative Yan

"I think the best option is to try and keep them away, we can get some larger creatures to engage with them, and make sure they don't get too close." Hans said.

"Do you think we couldn't negotiate with them?" Carl said.

"Of course! Just like that fairy wanted to negotiate with us!" Ken said.

"Let's try an approach first, if they're aggressive we'll go with Hans' plan, if they're friendly we'll try Carl's plan." I said through Yan.

"This is very dangerous..." - Hans.

"I guess we'll never find out if we don't try, won't we? If we bury ourselves deep in the forest and say 'everything is dangerous' then we'll turn into a bunch of weirdos." Ken said.

"It's better to be a weirdo living a peaceful life, than to live in conflict with other weird species." Rebutted Hans

----------------------------------------

The last few days have been a bit hectic, we've been "probing" the werewolves, and trying to keep them away from the nest, but I must admit that it's not easy to hide a tower made of wax in the middle of a plain.

A few days ago they tried to approach our house, but when they were greeted by a shower of angry bees they moved away, the only thing that stopped my children from swarming around them was that they didn't seem to want to attack us.

They were shouting to the tower in a strange language I've never heard before, and they were making gestures with their hands, but I couldn't tell what they wanted, after a while they set up camp and now they were here, they stayed away, but the Sometimes some members tried to run to the tower.

This scared the hell out of me to tell you the truth, one day we were just watching them all standing around and talking, when out of nowhere one of the wolves started to stretch and then started running towards the tower at an incredible speed.

If it weren't for the soldiers who immediately swarmed around him and began to sting him, he would have arrived. The guy didn't die, but he was wounded so many times that he looked like Stay Puft.

Hans didn't like their presence, nobody did. But keep a low profile, we wouldn't attack these guys unless they came looking for a fight first. It may seem hypocritical of me, I allowed my soldiers to hunt the weak and massacre them, but I showed my gentle and sweet side to very powerful species, but who wouldn't do that? It almost seems like I would pick a fight with someone I can't beat.

The wolves stayed in front of our house for days, shouting at us, some threw stones and others just sat looking at the 20 meter tower of wax. I don't know what they wanted, but they all looked so... Dejected.

At first I thought it was just an exploration group, but after a few days it became clear that these few members were all that was left of the werewolves that came here months ago, I felt sorry for them, but if I helped them now, who Can you guarantee me that in the future they won't try to kill me?

I helped them a little and they came after me as if I owed them something, what would they do if I "adopted" them?

"This isn't working... This paint is useless! It just serve to get on my nerves!" Shouted one of the spell casters.

For now the development club has been trying to create magical scrolls with the ink we created. But just because we change the ink, doesn't mean that drawing strange symbols and random words on a sheet of silk will create a magical scroll.

This new ink could conduct living mana, serving as a conductor, but much worse than living wood, and with a lot of wasted mana. It was like graphite, by creating a line on paper you could create an "electric" current, but it only served to create a parlor trick. It wasn't really useful at all.

We tried creating circles, pentagrams, runes, Egyptian designs, anything, but nothing worked. The magic ink didn't seem to have any use, as it couldn't carry the intent of a spell.

'Intention? Is this what's missing?'

"Boys, let me try once..."

"Um? Of course mom! Bring new paper and a quality brush!" Swore a carpenter.

When I picked up the brush I made with bee hair, wrapped around a branch and paper made from silk. I dipped it in paint and began placing small amounts of living mana onto the brush. Soon the ink at the tip of the brush responded to my mana and began to emit small golden lights, without wasting time I tried to write the word "light" in English, while pushing the intention to create light.

The end result was a sheet of silk with the word light written in dark gray ink with gold glitter that was slowly fading.

'Failed?'

"Try to put mana into the scroll boys."

Following my command a small group of spell casters began pouring their mana into the parchment, soon the tissue paper began to show small tears and after a few seconds tore completely alone.

"It failed... Or could it be considered a success? After all, it kind of glowed when we injected mana..."

"I don't think it really glowed, it should just be the remnants of your living mana escaping..." Isaac said.

"What the hell! Why is it so hard to create a scroll?!"

"I think it's because we have no real foundation in magic, all we know are theories, and amateur work. If we really want to learn about magic we need time and resources, or a qualified instructor." One of the spell casters said.

Learning to use and manipulate magic was not an easy task, even with months of research we barely scratched the surface, our greatest magical achievement is the mana pool, and it's not that big of a deal. The most powerful magic I could use was a magic capable of causing random illnesses. And our greatest achievement in artifice was Muck, the moss that spent the day sleeping.

"Alright, that's something, keep up the research, one day we'll discover something really valuable.

----------------------------------------

Aurum - Year 1 [ 5 Weaks later ]

Our little infected Wappo friend started to... Change. The disease was consuming him, but he was not dying. He looked like a zombie or something, but in reality he looked more like a dog infected with the rabies virus.

The mushroom, which previously had a healthy appearance and was friendly and peaceful, had now turned into a withered, yellowish mushroom, all wrinkled and trying to attack everything it saw. The creature was becoming increasingly thirsty, it continued drinking large amounts of water and running around the enclosure while making some noises.

Casting a plague on these Wappos was quite easy to tell the truth, but it seemed to be because I was stronger than them, I was literally "Attacking targets that can't defend themselves". Wappos appear to be the base of the food chain, and the only reason they never became extinct was that 2 Wappos alone could create thousands of other Wappos over the course of their lifetime.

On our farm they were kept in a controlled manner, fed with organic waste and watered daily. We healed them when they were hurt, and even gave them a little living essensia from time to time.

But now we were going through a period of scarce XP, which meant a reduction in the production of [Life Drops] and I was getting really nervous about it. The 'training' of the soldiers was a long-term project, we created a few other groups with Hans and Trouble's group, each led by an elite member of the defense club, but even that wasn't enough.

Hans and Trouble were in their 2nd evolution, which made them the hive's trump card, they were responsible for getting around 40% of the colony's XP, the rest came from polonization, and from the ranch. But there's no denying that killing other living creatures provided the most Xp.

And this sick Wappo just gave me an idea.

If I find a nest of insects or low-level creatures, of which there are as many Wappos, I could infect one of the members of the nest and then have it kill the colony from the inside out. That would give me a lot of XP!

For this test I asked the soldiers to go find something I could use, and for the last few days I've been working on an ant, an aphid, and some larvae. At this point they were sick and would soon be released back with their groups, if everything went well in a few days I would have a lot of XP served on a platter!

----------------------------------------

The plan to kill entire groups of insects from the inside didn't work out as well as I thought...

When we released the ant, some soldiers sneakily followed it into the anthill, the ants looked more like ordinary ants but were highly protected by armor and more robust. And when the "spy" we created got close to the anthill, some other ants started to smell it and check it out.

Soon the spy was being held by several ants that looked just like him, as he tried to free himself from his brothers' agar. Before long, other ants gathered on top of him and then ripped his head off.

The spy had been discovered, long before he even arrived inside the nest, it seemed that he "Stenched" with disease, and the insects were not stupid enough to ignore the smell of death. The same thing happened with the aphids and the larvae.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

The aphid had its body split apart by what appeared to be the mother aphid, the larva was rejected by the other larvae, injured and left to die.

The creatures of this world seemed to be able to identify members of their species who were sick, and were quick to eliminate them, so the Trojan horse plan would not work. Not without some adaptations.

Over the next 7 days I dedicated myself to creating several contaminated echoes, then I 'bubbled' them with the help of the spell casters, with the [mana bubble] spell. And I gave these bubbles to the soldiers, the plan was for them to throw these bubbles on several different creatures, and if we were lucky we would get some kills with it.

[Warning]

You killed a [Thorny larva] x 3 using a plague! You gained 46 XP

After a few days of waiting, the first notification finally arrived, the plan had worked, now I was the crazy pest-spreading bitch.

"Sweet XP! 46 XP for doing absolutely nothing! Well, I never really did anything for my XP, but now I'm getting whole chunks of XP for doing nothing!"

These last few days we have been trying to expand our magical knowledge, I had a lot of time now that egg production has been paused. Research into magic ink revealed that the ink didn't have much use for us, not with our current level of knowledge.

But the paint still gave scientists the idea to create a mana life superfluid. The goal was to create a liquid that could be flooded with living mana and remain stable.

And with this idea, the boys ended up creating a liquid similar to petroleum. It was made with mana crystals ground into powder in mills, high quality magical plant resins, living essence, and a little of my "secret ingredient". The result was a pitch-black liquid with a foul smell and suspicious appearance, but when the liquid was energized with mana it began to turn golden and lost its bad smell. Once energized with a lot of mana it became stable and the mana began to decay at an extremely slow speed.

[Description]

You killed a [Thorny larva] x 3 using a plague! You gained 46 XP

The fluid gave me an idea the moment I laid eyes on it, Battery Fluid!

We only needed a "container", the solution then was to use the wax alloy, along with new materials provided by carpenters and alchemists. The end result was a wax alloy jar filled with mana fluid, a living wood root that served as the energy conductor, and a lid made of more wax alloy to insulate it all. The result wasn't pretty, but with this we were able to create our first mana battery that could be transported.

Tests showed that it was far from perfect, the wax alloy was not a good insulator, but it was still the best we had. The mana fluid couldn't store much mana, only 1 point. And it still had an expiration date, after a few days it would start to rot and lose its ability to store energy.

The solution was to charge these batteries and bubble them. The boys managed to create 5 of these batteries, and now they were thinking about how to make them more stable. I had asked them to create more living cores. So at least we could create a better version of Muck, maybe even a moss that is capable of providing us with living mana, and doesn't spend all day sleeping and making messes.

Now we are having problems with the kobolds, space problems. In the last few months we have been helping them, providing food, cloths, medicine and things like that. They moved from where they were before, and got closer to the tower, close enough that we could see them on the horizon, but far enough away to be considered respectful.

The soldiers didn't like this "Space Invasion" one bit, but I wouldn't risk sending a swarm to drive them out, just to find out that these Kobolds could kill us with ease. Until now we maintained a co-status with them, they seemed to be afraid of us, and what we could do, and we were afraid of what they could do. The difference was that we knew we were weak and they were stronger than us individually. While the kobolds seemed to be intimidated by the possibility of us being "Divine Beasts", and our overwhelming numbers.

I don't know how people in this world identify divine beasts, but thanks to the holy goat that it is not through [Beast Contracts], because otherwise this hoax would have already fallen to the ground the day Hilda made the contract with Ciel.

Because of this we allowed them to stay there, we tried to ask Hilda to tell them to stay away, but Hilda was determined to get a place close to us for her group, if it were for her the new kobold village would have been built from the cave where she was now living, but we demanded that she get as far away as possible. And what we got was about 5 km away.

The kobolds managed to create houses made from scraps of silk, mud and branches, it was quite poorly constructed to be honest, and Levi spent the whole day pointing out the flaws in the construction, but I wasn't going to build a city for the kobols. All I wanted from them was their knowledge, not adopting a bunch of dogs.

But that still didn't stop the kobolds from approaching, from time to time it was necessary to send a swarm to disperse onlookers, but nothing serious so far. All this proximity was bothering me, but we didn't have much to do about them, we couldn't kill them cleanly and clearly, without losses on our side.

Expelling them was not possible, not now. If we stopped helping them they might revolt against us, and they were focused on getting closer and closer. They built small wooden pendants which they then painted with yellow paint. And they used them as amulets or something, it seems that we became their guardians or sponsors. I didn't like this, I already had problems being responsible for my colony, now I needed to take care of kobolds?

----------------------------------------

Aurum - Year 1 [ 5 Months later ]

The last few months were busy, a lot happened, the main one was the stabilization of the kobols, they were kind of imitating us, and started plowing terar, and planting fruits. There were children running happily through the field, and adults watching the perimeter.

Hilda became some kind of emisaria or elder. Her abilities shared with Ciel allow her to provide a small amount of healing to her allies, and bonus health in area. Ciel believed he had achieved everything he could extract from Hilda, but he was reluctant to ask for the contract to be annulled.

Ciel became very involved with Hilda, the two had similar personalities, but Hilda was more extroverted. Ciel listened to his stories about the world, and how there were many things he had never seen in his life. Ciel was also formally introduced to the kobold village and everyone loved him, he kind of became a popular pet there, he played with the children and most of the time he could be seen tending to small wounds on the kobolds.

This made the hive believe even more that Ciel had been "corrupted" and they wanted me to sever the link between us once and for all, but even if I knew how to do that I wouldn't do it. Ciel was like a son who left home and discovered a whole world outside. He was in awe of everything, and was the only one who really understood what the kobolds were saying.

Ciel sort of learned the kobold language through osmosis, while talking to Hilda he learned a few things, but he still wasn't fluent. And I could only understand Hilda clearly, I wanted to extract this "dictionary" from Ciel, but the link was too damaged for me to be able to access her memories, and even when Ciel tried to send me the translations directly, a lot was lost along the way. , and all I received was broken and useless information.

This still didn't stop Ciel from working hard on a small dictionary, the dictionary was very poor, containing only the literal translation of some popular words. But we still had the main stuff, like "Stop, Friends, Enemies, Death, God, Bees, Attack", we couldn't create anything really coherent with that, but it was still better than nothing.

In recent months research into mana and spells has continued, we haven't made much progress, but spell casters have managed to create another spell [Bind]. The spell created a pressure of energy around the target, and attempted to force them into place. The spell wasn't powerful at all and could be easily broken with a little effort, but it was a starting point.

The magic club also started to create a book of spells, the book itself couldn't cast spells, but it contained step by step instructions on how to cast each spell they created and they didn't want to put it in the [Spells] tab.

Other spells created were [Pull], [Mana Wave], [Mana Dart], [Mana Thread], and [Glow]. The most useful spell of all was the [Brightness] spell. The spell could create an intense white light, at a small mana cost. If we could create magic lamps containing this spell we could free workers from the exhausting work of a lamp.

We had gone after some [Lumus berris] and managed to find some, but the light only lasted for 2-3 days before needing to be changed. And the light produced by the nuts was not enough to illuminate the entire hive. Then the lighting work continued with the workers.

Now I was sitting on a high-quality divan produced by the construction club in conjunction with the sewing club. I was inside a large coliseum made of wax and wood, and I was looking at the fight that would soon begin.

A few days ago the coliseum was finished, and the soldiers brought some monsters to serve as "tests" for the young soldiers. The beasts ranged from frogs and lizards, to some insects that looked like praying mantises and small rodents. They were all seriously tied up and contained in cages made from begonia wax and tightly tied branches. The creatures had been seriously drugged with poisons produced by [Poisoners] and [Alchemists], in addition to receiving debuffs from bards and being blinded by headbands.

The first challenge started with a group of 5 young soldiers against a small black rat who was blindfolded and ankles tied to make it difficult to move. The mouse didn't know what was happening and couldn't find the soldiers, as the screams from the audience of hundreds of bees confused his senses.

The group of soldiers then quickly advanced forward, dividing left and right, with the bee that seemed to be the leader moving forward. The soldiers then impaled the rat with small wooden stakes and retreated.

The mouse did not like the attack at all and began to attack furiously in all directions, but its restricted movements and obstructed vision made it miss every blow.

The soldiers then flew towards him as a team and grabbed his back and began to bite and sting him. In response, the rat then began to roll on the ground and quickly freed itself from the soldiers' grip. Leaving some soldiers injured and others disoriented, the group soon reformed and charged furiously at the rat, driving their spears into the rat's legs and paws.

The rat then released a quinque and began to spin in a circle to fend off the soldiers, but his leg had already been injured, he was staining the arena floor with increasing amounts of blood.

Without wasting time, the soldiers split up again, leaving one member behind to make noise and get the rat's attention, while the others passed behind and started attacking the rat's other legs.

In response the rat could do nothing but try to grab one of the soldiers, after some furious lunges the rat managed to grab a soldier's mane and was now trying to take his head off with some difficulty.

Without thinking twice, his companions advanced and threw themselves on top of the mouse again, throwing punches and stings all over the rodent's body, making him give up on the soldier and try to free himself from the bees. But this time the rat was much weaker and disoriented, he had lost a lot of blood, and 3 of his limbs were severely injured. All the rat could do was fall over and crawl across the ground in an attempt to get away from the soldiers.

But it didn't work, as the soldiers just continued their attacks and grabbed their wooden spears, furiously thrusting them into the rat's eyes and hitting its head. The rodent could do nothing but let out a cry of pain, and try to struggle even more, but none of that helped, soon he was running out of strength and the soldiers began to attack him even more.

Soon the end of the fight was decided, the soldiers killed the rat, even with all the disadvantages the rat was still able to almost kill a soldier, and still caused a lot of damage to the soldiers. But the soldiers didn't seem to care about the wounds, they were too busy basking in the audience's applause and boasting.

Soon a group of Healers arrived and began to heal the soldiers, another group composed of soldiers and workers came and began to take the rat's body away and clean the arena. After a few moments the soldiers were taken to the infirmary and a new fight was being arranged.

'Gee... These guys really had fun with it, I think it's true that violence creates entertainment, it became more popular than Radyo's broadcasts or Bardos' shows. It was just to teach and educate young soldiers, but it became a form of entertainment.'

Marigold (Chapter 62 - Discarded) - End

----------------------------------------

----------------------------------------

Lily's Tale (Discarded version) - Start

Tree Year 2

My blue bird friend left, he made a very beautiful home among my branches, but one day a strange, long, slimy animal paid him a visit, and I never saw Mr. Bird again after that.

Things always remain the same, I grow, I create more leaves and more flowers, I spread more roots and I go higher every day, my friends come and go, but they never stay with me.

I managed to evolve to level 3 recently, in addition to getting level 2 in [Photosynsis] and [Growth].

I have 3 skill points available, but I don't know if I want a new skill. My fragrant flowers don't seem so amazing anymore, they can't attract more friends to me.

----------------------------------------

Notice

You reached level 5, you gained 3 skill points.

Notice

Congratulations on reaching level 5!! You have gained 10 bonus skill points!

It felt like some time had passed, but I didn't even notice. I managed to reach level 5, and now I have 22 skill points.

My skills [Root Growth] and [Blooming] reached level 3, and [Floral Fragrance] reached level 2, it didn't seem to make much of a difference to me. But now seems like the right time to get a new skill.

Notice

Do you want to use 22 skill points to gain a new random skill?

Yes / No

'Yes'

Notice

You gained the rare skill: Sticky Sap

Skill

[Sticky Sap] - Lv 1

Use Sp to create sticky sap on the surface of your trunk.

'Cool I think'

Using the skill I could feel that a thin layer of sebum was being formed on my tree trunk, this cost a lot of Sp, so I limited myself to just a small area of my tree trunk.

----------------------------------------

Notice

You killed a [Desert Fly], you gained 0.02 XP

A small insect had attached itself to the area where I created the sticky sap, and after a few hours of standing in place, the insect was completely swallowed by my sap. I was a little upset that the insect had died, but I liked the Xp.

I didn't get much XP, all I got was about 0.02 per hour as long as the day remained hot. But after that I stopped earning Xp, which irritated me a little.

Because of this I started filling my torso with this sticky stuff, and after several days I had a sticky mess of this gunk.

Notice

You killed a [Desert Fly] x 5 , you gained 0.1 XP

The sap seemed to work, the insects landed on me to rest, and ended up never leaving again, the sap wasn't very powerful, so large insects like the multi-legged insect, or the armored insect were able to escape the sap very easily, but smaller insects would get stuck and end up becoming Xp.

----------------------------------------

Notice

You reached level 7, you gained 5 skill points.

After level 5, I started to gain more skill points with each level, and some time ago I also discovered that I could use the skill points to level up a skill.

A while ago while I was looking at my skills, a screen appeared asking if I wanted to use 5 skill points to raise my [Root Growth] skill to level 8, which I ended up refusing. But now that I have 10 skill points, I want to try to use everything on [Sticky Sap] which was currently at level 2.

Notice

Do you want to use 8 skill points to raise the [Sticky Sap] skill to level 10?

Yes / No

'Only 8? Then fine! Yes!!'

Notice

The skill [Sticky Sap] reached level 10 and evolved into the epic skill [Trap Sap].

Skill

[Trap Sap] - Lv 1

Use Sp to create a sap that is not soluble in water and hardens up quickly when touched, the skill can be used on the entire body.

'What a complicated skill... Soluble in water?... You mean it doesn't melt in water? Why is it important....'

Using the skill, I can see that the cost is much higher than before, and the color of this sap is more yellowish, but it must be a better skill than the previous one.

----------------------------------------

The new skill is really cool, I can use it on leaves, branches, and roots, anywhere on my body goes! And most importantly, the sap works great for catching some bugs!

The sap didn't seem to stick at first, because the insects came, touched it, licked it, and left. But after a while I always got some XP for killing the insect, and after a few days I was able to see what happened.

The insect that was smeared with the sap would begin to move, and soon the sap would harden more and more, becoming stickier, heavier, and soon making the movement of the insects impossible, killing them quickly.

I've been killing insects for a long time, and I reached level 8, gaining 5 more skill points, giving me a total of 7 skill points. Which now I wanted to useto gain a new skill for me. So that's what I did.

Notice

Do you want to use 7 skill points to gain a new random skill?

Yes / No

'Yes!!'

Notice

You gained the commom skill: Moisture Manipulation

Skill

[Moisture Manipulation] - Lv 1

Manipulates soil moisture levels using Mp to create optimal conditions for plants to growth.

'A skill that consumes Mp?? Cool!! I can't wait to use it!'

Activating the skill, I can feel my Mp reserves being slowly drained, and I can feel that the area near my roots has started to become slightly more humid, but nothing really impressive.

'It's something.'

----------------------------------------

Tree Year 3

Recently I reached level 10, I gained 20 skill points as a bonus, and now I have 30 skill points to use as I wish.

In recent times I have been adding more and more water to the land around me, and nothing has happened yet, the land around me seemed dry and desolate like everything else, the difference was that I could feel that below the ground there was soft earth and damp, and even a little mud.

I've grown a lot in recent times, and I can even see some mountains on the horizon, my branches have grown a lot and I have lots and lots of flowers and leaves to cheer me up.

My skills [Root Growth], [Photosynsis] and [Blooming] have reached level 5, and I have achieved level 3 in [Nutrient Absorption]. A skill that I could barely use, I only used it to eat the gifts left by the birds, and the remains of insects left on the ground.

Another Mr. Bluebird started using Mr. Bluebird's house that disappeared some time ago, now I have 2 Mr. Bluebirds who live in this house, 1 lives inside it sitting, and the other stays outside all day long, just bringing things to the bird that sits.

I didn't want the bird gentlemen to go away again, and the big bird that eats the little birds worried me, and the long smooth creature worried me too, so I wanted something that could help the bird gentlemen. That's why I decided to spend my 30 skill points to try a new skill.

Notice

Do you want to use 30 skill points to gain a new random skill?

Yes / No

'Yes!'

Notice

You gained the epic skill: Thorny Darts

Skill

[Thorny Darts] - Lv 1

Use Sp to create a spike that can be thrown quickly from anywhere on your trunk.

'Cool! This looks very useful!'

Testing the skill, I see that it takes a lot of time to create a thorn, and when it is ready, but when it is finally ready I try to throw it away.

Notice

You need to use 1 Sp Point to shoot the thorn, do you want to continue?

Yes / No

'What? In addition to spending Sp to do it, do I still need to use it to throw it? It doesn't seem fair... But it's okay.'

Accepting the request, the thorn simply flew quickly in the direction it was growing rapidly until I lost sight of it. 'Damn... I spent a lot of Sp for this?' It was all I could think of at the time. But now I could still use it to protect the Bluebirds.

----------------------------------------

In the last few days I've been creating several thorns all over my trunk, and whenever something I didn't like came close I threw them.

I managed to throw some quills at a big bird and it went away, but I still saw it around here from time to time. I also threw the thorns at larger creatures that tried to climb up my trunk, and that always made them run away.

The bluebirds were watching over the smaller birds, and I really enjoyed their company. The bird that stayed at home sang every day to the little birds, while the bird that watched the house looked for food.

They ate my berries and the insects they found around, one day I saw the blue bird digging the ground with its feet to dig up an armored insect, it was really cool.

My work with [Moisture Manipulation] started to bear fruit, as I could feel that there were dozens of insects moving between my roots, some were gnawing on my roots, which hurt a little, and others were just using them as hiding places, but I could feel little creatures moving among the damp earth.

----------------------------------------

The little blue birds turned into blue birds! There were 5 bluebirds in the birdhouse and the other 2 bluebirds were gone.

I didn't understand why they left. They had food, and shelter, so why did they abandon me again? But I still had the 5 blue birds.

That was until I looked and saw that they began to flap their wings frantically, until the first bird jumped from the house onto a nearby branch.

'Where are you going?' That was all I could ask myself, but the bird just braced itself a little more and then flew away.

Soon one more jumped out of the nest and did the same thing, flying to a branch and then flying away.

'Please, do not go.' But the birds continued to go, one by one, until the last bluebird was left behind, just chirping as he tried to call someone.

'Stay with me please?'

The blue bird didn't care, and yet like all the others it jumped onto a branch, fluffed its feathers, ate some fruit, and flew away, perhaps never to return.

'Why do I always end up alone?'

Lily's Tale (Discarded version) - End

----------------------------------------

----------------------------------------

Lily's Tale (Discarded version ch2) - Start

Tree Year 4

Information Name: ----- Level: 10 Gender: ---- Age: 10 Years Hp: 64 Sp: 27 Mp: 1.3 Race: Soul Cedar Tree

Attributes Str: 0.2 Vit: 6.8 Def: 3.6 Dex: 1.4 Spe: 0 Magic: 0.1 Hp Regen: 0.8 MpRegen: 0.01 Luck: 0.2

Skills Skills Points: 0 [Root Growth] - Lv 7 Use seu Sp para criar raizes [Nutrient Absorption] - Lv4 Absorva nutrientes de materias decompostas de forma pacifica [Photosynsis] - Lv 7 Use agua e nutrientes para criar Sp [Bloom] - Lv 7

Crie flores que podem dar origens a frutos [Growth] - Lv 4 Use Sp para aumentar seu tamanho [Floral Fragrance] - Lv 6 Add varied scents to your flowers using Sp [Trap Sap] - Lv 3 Use Sp to create a sap that is not soluble in water and hardens up quickly when touched, the skill can be used on the entire body. [Moisture Manipulation] - Lv 4

Manipulates soil moisture levels using Mp to create optimal conditions for plants to growth. [Thorny Darts] - Lv 3

Use Sp to create a spike that can be thrown quickly from anywhere on your trunk.

Some time had passed, and I managed to improve the level of my skills, but I couldn't increase my own level, it seems that after level 10, it becomes much more difficult to evolve.

Nowadays there is a small region around me that has moist land, with a little grass, completely covered with a red carpet of flowers. The place was very popular with the local animals, I was visited by insects that came after my fruits and shelter, birds that built houses on my branches, and small creatures that ate the fruits from the ground and rested in my shade.

I used my thorns to keep creatures that tried to climb my trunk away, and I threw them at large, threatening birds, which made several creatures very comfortable near me.

Just eating fruit off the ground, and digging holes near my roots.

A few days ago I had a visit from a strange creature that seemed to be fully armored, had a cone nose and small eyes, and as soon as it ate some fruit and rested a little, it started digging a hole near my trunk.

The thing now lived in a deep hole it had dug, living between my roots and a long tunnel. Just going out to eat once in a while.

----------------------------------------

More time had passed, now it was getting dark, and I was seeing some lights on the horizon. After a while these lights got closer and I could see bipedal creatures carrying a bunch of things approaching me.

"Damn! Look at that! How did a tree end up growing in this place? Hey Jonny! Do you know what kind of tree that is?" asked one of the bipedal creatures with long hair.

The other bipedal being that seemed to be Jonny just looked at me and approached, I felt tempted to throw my quills at him, but he was much bigger than anything that had ever threatened me before.

This Jonny guy just looked at me as he ran his hand down my trunk, analyzed my thorns and marveled at my sap.

"It seems to me to be an Acer tree, perhaps a desert variant. Because I've never seen a tree like that with thorns." Jonny looked at me and then threw his things on the floor. "Let's sleep here tonight, it looks like a nice place to camp." Said the guy, who was accompanied by the other bipedal being.

After a while the beings had set up what looked like a house, made a wheel of stones on the ground, and were smelling my fruits and flowers.

"What a pleasant smell! I've never smelled anything like it before!" Said the being with long hair.

"This is unexpected, normally Acers don't have flowers of this shape and scent, am I wrong?" Said the other being who had longer ears.

"Whatever, if it's not a maple, the important thing is that it's pretty, right? Are these fruits edible? They have a pleasant smell!" Said the being with long hair.

Jonny took one of the fruits and analyzed it, he seemed very bothered by me, but I was even more bothered. "Yes, I'm sure they are edible, there are several bitten fruits, and even some gnawed seeds here, so the animals from this place must come here all the time to eat." Jonny said.

While the big-haired being ate some fruits and kept others, this guy Jonny saw the hole in my roots, went over to him and started looking at him.

"Britanny! I think this could be a Tantarus nest!" Said the being with long ears.

"Really!?! How lucky! I wonder if there's a Tantarus in there?! It would be really nice to be able to eat some meat!"

"I'll find out now..." As soon as the long-eared being said that, he took out a small bottle from his things, opened it and threw it into the hole, so I could feel the creature moving inside the hole, and then it ran out from there.

It turns out that Jonny didn't give it the opportunity to run, as he was already waiting for its arrival, and soon as Tantaru put his head out of the hole, he was hit with everything by a wooden club, crushing his head.

"YAY! I'm going to light the fire! Today we're going to eat Tantaru's meat!! That's it!!" Said Britanny.

At the end of it all, the 2 bipedal beings opened Tantarus with a blade, buried its vices and then stuck it on a branch to cook it over the fire. They ate lots of fruit and meat before finally going to sleep.

'Who are you?'

Lily's Tale (Discarded version - Ch3) - End

----------------------------------------

----------------------------------------

Lily's Tale (Discarded Chapter) - Start

Lotus Year 68

Something bad is happening, something very bad. I can feel it in the air and in the movement of the forest.

The animals are hiding, the fish have fled to the bottom of the lake, and I can't hear the birds singing, I can feel a cold that isn't here and I feel an indescribable feeling of danger.

Soon I can hear a big noise, like people marching or something. And before long I see a large amount of forest beasts running towards me.

Before long they begin to trample the surrounding plant life in the lake, knocking down trees and killing everything in their path. Several animals fall into the waters of the lake in the midst of the chaos, which activates the anger of my elementals, but I make them remain silent due to the high number of animals.

These animals continue to run, swim, jump, and fly away from the sun, and I can see several animals being trampled in the process.

In the midst of all this, the waters of the lake were flooded with dirt and mud, animal blood and waste fell into the water, and large quantities of leaves began to be ripped up.

The pain was horrible, so I took the initiative to cut the stems that connected me to the surface and ran to the bottom of the lake. After what seemed like hours, the sound of animals running and movements in the water began to calm down, so I slowly floated to the surface to be faced with a new horde of creatures coming towards me, these creatures had a completely unusual appearance.

Being composed of varied animals like the old order, but with animals that were clearly rotten. Pieces of their bodies were missing, and a large amount of black goo came out of their open wounds, their eyes glowed with a witchy green light and wherever they passed the land became a lifeless land.

When I saw this, my survival instincts started acting up like crazy, and I knew that this was a problem, a real problem. Everything the black goo touched died within seconds, and plants were no exception.

'Damn it!!! What the hell are these creatures?! What do I do?'

As the army of rotten animals got closer, all I could think about was trying to fight them so I sent my elementals and Earthward's to fight, soon all the water elementals emerged from the lake and merged into a single elemental with the appearance of a catfish.

Then the water elemental began to create dozens of small water bubbles and threw them towards the zombies, the problem was that even when their heads were pierced right in the forehead, the creatures didn't stop moving.

'What the hell?! What are those things?!'

Soon the black zombies were close, even closer, and my Earthward's began to turn the ground into quicksand, which worked for a few moments, until the Earthward ran out of mana and had to hide on the ground.

The slime creatures didn't stop, stepping over their allies buried in the ground and continuing their advance towards the lake. Upon seeing this, my water elemental conjured a large water tornado and launched it towards the army of creatures, but all the tornado could do was crush some rotten animals before dissipating.

When my elemental was gathering more energy to make another attack, a unicorn-like creature appeared and launched a black beam from its broken horn, then the water elemental simply exploded, turning into water.

At that moment, my axolotls bravely ran and tried to kill the black slime creatures, but unfortunately for them, when they bit the creatures, they were the ones who died, becoming part of the army of black slime creatures.

'HELLS!'

Seeing how easily the army of creatures had to kill all my helpers, I ran to the bottom of the lake with what was left of my axolotls and accompanied by Uchiki in tow.

Soon I could see the top of the lake being stained with black goo that began to spread into the waters of the lake. As soon as the thing came into contact with the creatures in the lake, they died instantly and then rose again like zombie fish. When it touched my roots, the slime burned my roots and slowly killed everything it touched.

Algae, roots, leaves, sponges, stems and flowers. Everything was dying, and I would die too if the goo got to me.

'DAMN IT!! ARGH IT BURNS!'

The feeling in my roots was as if they were slowly being burned and turned into nothing, I tried to purify the toxic substance from the water, but its quantity was astronomical.

'ArHGHAHAGH'

In the midst of despair and pain, I could see a large black smoke reaching me, and the taste of death permeating the water, when I looked to the sides I saw the fearful look of my axolotls and Uchiki, who was desperately trying to escape to some place. I found no place free from death anymore.

'I- NEED- TO RUN AWAY!'

In an act of utter desperation, I begin to create a small bubble of highly concentrated water and then force it into the lake floor. In my next move I cause the water bubble to expand rapidly creating a small explosion of water that creates a hole in the ground.

Determined to survive, I cut all my roots and stems, leaving only my core intact and run into the hole where my axolotls and Uchiki were already waiting for me, as soon as I entered the hole I used what I had left of energy and consciousness to make alarge rock from the bottom of the lake fell onto the hole entrace, sealing it completely before the black smoke reached me.

As the stone fell into the hole, I could feel my consciousness wavering, and a throbbing pain coming from where my roots once were. Everything was so dark that I couldn't even see my surroundings, and I could only feel Uchiki hiding among my roots, and my axolotls clinging to me.

As the pain increased and my consciousness wavered, I felt increasingly tired and sleepy, and soon I fell asleep even though I didn't know if I was safe.

----------------------------------------

Lotus Year 68

When I woke up again, I could feel my HP low, without being able to do much, I tried to create a small lotus flower which soon blossomed to reveal a dim light that illuminated the hole.

The first thing I saw was my axolotls and Uchiki clearly in a bad situation, I don't know how long I slept, but the 2 were clearly starving, as Uchiki had lost a lot of fat, and my axolotls were partially dormant.

Using what energy I have, I grow a small amount of algae on my stems, which Uchiki clearly appreciates. My axolotls then eat some too and continue to stay in a state of energy conservation.

I lost a lot of things, my lake, my fish, my axolotls and parts of my body. All I managed to save were 3 small axolotls and Uchiki who took up a lot of space.

The hole was about 3 meters high and 2 meters wide, so Uchiki could barely move, and I occupied almost 60% of the room.

Trying to contact my Earthward's I feel like only 1 survived, even though they buried themselves in the ground, which makes me think of the chaos that must be out there.

Calling my Earthward to my position I can see a small earth lizard placing its head into the water filled hole while still keeping its body within the earth.

'Oh heavens, thank heavens that at least 1 Earthward survived'

As soon as I gave the order to my Earthward he began to excitedly dig the hole, until a small place 5 meters wide and 4 meters high was created, it wasn't much, but still better than before, but this left my Earthward without mana forcing him to bury himself in the ground.

'Damn it!! I have no MP, no leaves, no roots, and no access to the outside world! How am I going to survive?!?'

The situation was desperate, and I was accompanied by Uchiki and my axolotls, so I couldn't think of a way to survive it.

Using my roots, I drill a little into the earth towards the lake, until I come across a thick layer of black earth polluted with rotten and poisonous energy.

'Damn it!'

The lake is compromised, and I don't know how long this can last, it could take years or centuries before the lake is habitable again.

Looking at my options, I came across [Blossom Rest] the skill would put me in a state of dormancy until everything got better, but to do that I would have to abandon my friends behind.

Looking at my axolotls I knew I could always summon more of them, but the thought of leaving them to starve was still very upsetting to me, so if I had to do that, I would kill them. This would be the only way to spare them from a cruel fate of slowly starving to death in a hole.

Uchiki was my main problem, he was my survival friend, and I didn't want to be the person who took his life. After all, he just wanted the same thing as everyone else, to survive. That was the only thing Uchiki ever wanted.

'I'm sorry...'

Without letting myself be shaken, I create 3 small sheets of water that immediately separate the axolotls' heads from their bodies, killing them instantly, and when I go to do the same thing with Uchiki I see him swimming to the bottom of the hole and creating a small hole, where then Uchiki begins to lay a large amount of eggs covered by a stranger gelly before dying.

'Uchiki...'

This was Uchiki's choice, upon knowing that she would not survive, she left her next generation behind in my care and gave her life, just like that.

With Uchiki's sacrifice I could use her body as a source of nutrients for weeks, long enough for me to grow more roots and dig deeper into the rocky hard-to-dig soil.

Using my water manipulation, I gently take the Uchiki eggs and roll them in a large amount of dirt, then remove all the water from the mud and gently place them inside my tangle of roots, as times get better, the descendants of Uchiki will become the new colonizers of the lake.

After everything is ready, I start wrapping some roots in the cup of Uchiki and the axolotls, and absorb their nutrients to keep me alive, then as a last act I create some roots that penetrate the black and polluted earth of the lake.

The burning sensation is distressing, but this is the only way to stay informed about the lake's situation.

After everything is ready, I activate my hibernation skill, and I feel myself getting heavier and sleepier, until I can no longer move my body and enter a deep sleep.

----------------------------------------

Lotus Year 70

When I woke up again, my entire surroundings were dark, and when I created a small lotus flower to serve as a lamp, I could see green waters full of slime, and large amounts of roots growing all over the place, my body felt tired and weak, and I could feel a great lack of nutrients and sunlight.

'Shit... how long was I blacked out?'

Looking closer, I could see a lot of bones scattered across the floor, bones that were probably once Uchiki, when analyzing the eggs that I kept inside me, I could see that the majority were still intact and preserved, although some had broken and dried.

Expanding my roots out of the hole towards the lake, I was met with the same burning sensation as before, so I began to use my purification abilities.

I could feel it working at certain points, but to my utter dismay the toxins absorbed by the roots were not being processed by my body efficiently, causing my roots to become poisoned black roots.

Disconnecting from the roots, I realized that the situation was worse than I thought, so I needed a new plan. Extending another root out of the hole, I create a small water elemental that I can't see, but I know is there, and I command it.

'Empty the lake, remove all the water.'

Sometimes it is better to destroy everything and redo it later, there is no way to save these waters, the best option is to discard everything and redo everything from scratch.

As soon as it received my order the elemental began to move, I could feel it working, but I couldn't see it.

My mana was very low, and my production dropped drastically, so now I can only summon this little water elemental and wait for it to empty the lake.

'Time will heal all wounds.'

----------------------------------------

Lotus Year 71

Skills

[Roots Whiplash] - Lv 7

Create roots capable of purifying water and absorbing nutrients.

[Celestial Absorption] - Lv MAX

Absorb the magical power of celestial bodies through the process of photosynthesis, generating MP and SP.

[Undine's Embrace] - Lv 5

Use Mp to summon water-type elementals, the result of the summoning will depend on the sacrifice offered and the level of the host.

[Earthward Caller] - Lv 2

Use a catalyst and an Mp sacrifice to summon an Earthward that will follow your orders at the cost of SP.

[Lotus Blessing] - Lv 1

Bestow a blessing upon an allie that ncreased luck and fortune.

[Purified Wellspring] - Lv 2

Use MP and Sp to add magical properties to large amounts of water near you.

[Lily Pad Shield] - Lv 7

Create Lily Pads that can serve as resistant shields, Lily Pads cannot generate energy.

[Solar Beam] - Lv 1

Use a flower to generate a concentrated beam of energy capable of causing massive damage, the solar beam must be charged and its strength is limited by the intensity of sunlight.

[Serenity Blossom] - Lv 8

Use MP and SP to create flowers capable of emitting a hormone that calms and tranquilizes anyone who feels it.

[Toxic Bramble] - Lv 1

Create a small thorn trap that, if activated, will trap its victim with vines of poisonous thorns.

[Aquatic Allies] - Lv 6

Use Mp to summon a variety of aquatic creatures that can serve as your allies.

[Whispering Mist] - Lv 1

Conjures a misty veil that not only obscures vision of the target, but also imitates sounds that have already been heard by you.

[Lotus Light] - Lv MAX

Use Mp to create a small light source in lotus flowers.

[Floral Flourish] - Lv MAX

Makes plants around you grow faster.

[Pond's Reflection] - Lv 7

Use Mp to reflect any image, as long you have viewed it before.

[Kelp Keep] - Lv MAX

Use Sp to create small amounts of highly nutritious algae.

[Stormcaller] - Lv 3

Use large amounts of Mp to generate rain of intensity equivalent to the value offered.

[Enchanting] - Lv 1

Use large amounts of MP to add a random effect to an item.

[Illusory Reflection] - Lv 5

Use MP to create and maintain a mirror image of your target. The mirror image cannot cause physical damage.

[Mana Manipulation] - Lv MAX

Makes your mana control more refined

[Blossom Rest] - Lv 1

Enter a state of hibernation after suffering large amounts of damage. While in this state, the host is immune to all status effects and gradually heals from injuries.

Over the past few years I have been carefully removing water from the lake with my water manipulation skills, and creating more elementals capable of helping me.

The work was exhausting and harrowing, but over time I managed to remove a lot of dirty water from the lake. Then the rain came and filled some of the water again, but with each rain the poison concentration dropped more and more, so over time I was able to grow roots outside the hole and see the situation with my own "eyes".

What I saw was a lake completely devoid of life and beauty, with large quantities of rotting corpses floating in the water and bones at the bottom of the lake. The water contained disgusting, stinking black slime, and the entire land was black and devoid of life.

All I could do was start the treatment, creating more roots that purified the lake water slowly day by day. In a few years I managed to make the water habitable for my leaves, which gave me a greater generation of Mp and gave me a glimpse of the surface world.

The place that was once a sanctuary for wildlife was now a dead field full of bisaro fungi that grew all over the place.

Dead trees, bizarre plants, and balls of black slime were common throughout the place, and I could see what appeared to be clusters of black mushrooms growing all over the place.

'Disgusting.'

The entire place stank of death and rot, it was possible to see rotting corpses covered in black fungus that grew all over the place, and my lake was no exception.

My water elementals used the water from the lake to create their bodies, which caused them to take the form of purple fish with bits of dirt floating inside their bodies.

Once they were beautiful water elementals that were so transparent you could see through them but today they are made of a lot of dirty, poisonous water.

'Damn weird mushrooms.'

----------------------------------------

Lotus Year 74

More time passed, now the water in the lake was much better, I could still taste the poison in the water, and it was a little cloudy, but much better than the rest of the world. The land had to be purified, the stones, the water, and even the bones of the animals killed in the lake, everything was toxic.

I had to create large quantities of sponges that within a few days died from poisoning, and needed to be removed from the lake to avoid contaminating the water.

This process took all my time, MP and SP. Making me get into a fight against a bunch of black poison. The mushrooms that grew in this place were also frightening, the black mushrooms had the ability to generate more black slime, and they spread all over the place. So my only option was to uproot them and destroy them.

I used my skills to summon daily rains that cleaned the ground, but even the rains didn't do much. People may think that rain "purified" the earth, eliminating all dirt and poison. But in reality the rain just pushed all this poison to the deepest parts of the earth, creating super concentrated poisonous areas.

My only option was to continue with this, I could worry about the poison later, now I needed to revitalize the land and purify my lake.

Lily's Tale (Discarded Chapter)

----------------------------------------

----------------------------------------

Lily's Tale (Discarded Chapter) - Start

Lotus Year 76

More time has passed, now the lake waters are habitable again, not the ideal situation, but still much better than living in a poisonous lake.

The waters still had a cloudy tone and a bad smell, and I could smell high amounts of a substance in the water that I was unable to purify normally, this mysterious substance made the marine life in the lake unsustainable, fish, frogs, insects and anything else. , like algae and plants, nothing grew in the lake other than me.

Even though I had to fight these mysterious substances every day, this stuff slowly killed my leaves and ate away at my roots, causing me to have to expend an absurd amount of energy every day to stay alive.

The rains and purification helped a lot, but it was still a lot of poison for me to deal with, which made my life difficult.

Uchiki's eggs were drying up and dying, in a few years there will be none left and Uchiki's legacy will die with them.

I tried to create a small lake separate from my lake, a place where Uchiki's descendants could survive, but the water wasn't the problem, the land was.

The earth is dirty with these black mushrooms and strange mycelium, after a while I realized that it was these strange mushrooms that were producing the mysterious substance that killed everything on earth.

My only option was to wait longer, my roots were slowly purifying this strange substance, and as my helpers uprooted and killed the mushrooms in the region it was only a matter of time before the waters became habitable again.

'Please hold on a little longer' Was all I could say to the pile of clay-rolled eggs inside my body.

----------------------------------------

Lotus Year 77

I discovered a utility for [Purified Wellspring], the skill is capable of creating magical water, but that's the minus, the main power of the skill is that I can use any type of water to produce this magical water.

This means that it doesn't matter if I'm using pure water, muddy water, or water full of poison, the result will always be the same, magic water.

This was a great discovery, because because of this the purification of the lake began to accelerate, the skill was capable of completely annihilating the mysterious substance that was in the water and leaving behind a glowing magical water.

It took me years and years of work, but finally I started to feel that the lake was safe again to support life. So the first thing I did was unfold myself to expose the Uchiki eggs to the world, I took them to the bottom of the lake and gently placed them on top of the earth before using a little water to gently remove the top earth to reveal a few dozen eggs still intact.

'Grow and prosper.'

For my next action, I started creating large amounts of seaweed around the lake, and summoning some small axolotls, soon the lake started to show signs of life again but nothing compared to what it once was.

While looking at Uchiki's legacy I ended up finding a black stone at the bottom of the lake, and after analyzing it I discovered that it was one of my jewels.

The jewel had been corrupted by the dark energy that contaminated the lake, and was now black as coal, but I didn't feel any danger coming from it so I kept it close to me. When searching the lake, I was able to find several of these rocks, as well as of black bones, and what appeared to be several black teeth, were all collected and stored inside a hole at the bottom of the lake.

----------------------------------------

Lotus Year 79

Life began to prosper again, few descendants of Uchiki survived, but those who made it this far have now become the inhabitants of the lake.

In the lake, Uchiki's children began to grow, only a few members managed to hatch, but these few members would continue Uchiki's legacy, I granted each of these fish a lotus blessing, and they all now had a small lotus flower. lotus in random places on the body.

Each one also demonstrated different abilities in water manipulation, one group used it to swim faster, another to keep the axolotls away, and another group used a kind of shoal effect, creating a small current of water around them that prevented any predators from getting close.

Marine life began to grow, and soon some frogs found the lake, and made it their new home, with that the cycle began again, frogs and fish became food for the birds, and the birds attracted other animals. The land around the lake was the only land for miles that supported life, but even so it was rare to see a wild animal.

The water in the lake is almost 60% converted into magical water, which attracts a lot of attention, especially at night. The water did not shine during the day, but at night a small light show began, if it was left still the water remained completely transparent, but whenever the log moved with the movement of the fish or the wind, small sources of blue light began to shine. in the lake, generating a light show together with my bright leaves and flowers.

I don't like to draw attention, but I think it's too late for that, I'm a lotus flower growing in the middle of a lake of crystal clear water, surrounded by undergrowth and animals, and I'm literally the only source of life in the middle of a dead desert full of black goo, so it's pretty obvious that I'm attracting attention.

The only solution to this was to summon a large fog that would hide me, but for that I would need amounts of MP that I can't afford to spend at the moment, so my only choice was to feign ignorance and continue praying that no one would get to me.

----------------------------------------

Lotus Year 80

Sometimes I think I was very unlucky, the forest around me had disappeared, and with that my cover disappeared. The results of this were that I could clearly see the horizon of a dead forest, while I was the only living thing here for miles.

And now I was having to deal with a group of travelers.

The members of this group were wearing an overcoat made of black fabric, and through the undercoat I could see thin, dirty-looking people.

When they got close to the lake, all the fish immediately hid, not even letting them catch a glimpse of them, but the travelers paid no attention to this and began to fall on their knees at the edge of the lake and drink the water desperately.

I could see some of the hooded figures taking off their hoods to reveal a bunch of women, these women were of varying ages and seemed not to be the same species, as there was a lady with animal features, some humans, a child with rabbit ears, and some people with reptilian characteristics.

They all started to leave their things on the ground and started talking to each other, soon I could see a large woman coming to the lake and looking closely at the bottom of it while looking for something.

Soon she looked disappointedly at the other women and said something, they were all visibly upset, I think they were looking for food, but unfortunately for them all the fish in the lake were descendants of the biggest sneaky coward I've ever seen.

The women began to argue among themselves, and looked at me, they then spoke to the wolf lady and then some women took off their coats to enter the lake. They then dived into the lake and headed towards my roots.

When they found some potato-like roots, they took a knife from their waist and started cutting everything they could.

The pain was a nuisance, but nothing I've ever felt worse, and I can understand their reasons, they are clearly hungry, and need something to eat, anything.

Soon the women who dived into the lake emerged again carrying a bunch of potato-like roots, which generated great joy among several other women.

So they started to make a small improvised camp near the lake, a woman with red hair created a small flame that created a fire pit, and the other women started setting up tents and cooking roots.

I could see them taking down my roots and breaking them in half, and to their surprise, inside the roots there were impressive amounts of water that started gushing out as soon as they made a hole in the roots.

The girls didn't mind this, and in fact they were happy, so one girl drank the water from the root and said something to the wolf lady that made everyone happy.

Soon they cut several roots and roasted them on the fire, I could see an older girl singing the children to sleep after eating, and the wolf lady taking a large book out of a backpack.

Soon the other girls began to get up and draw a large circle with various strange symbols around their camp, then I could see them all gathering in the center of the circle and then the wolf lady cut her palm with a knife that was passed on.

Soon all the girls lightly cut their palms and held hands to each other in a circle, then they started to emit a bunch of strange words before the magic circle around them started to glow.

Soon their camp was bathed in an invisible veil, which made them all disappear, but looking directly and concentrated in that direction I could see things like cracks in the air and regions trembling.

'An illusion? How do you create that kind of spell?'

----------------------------------------

As the day dawned, the illusion cast over the camp faded, and soon the women woke up and began discussing their next steps.

Soon I could see them doing some kind of vote and starting to work, they started going towards the dead trees in the forest and tried to get everything they could, until a girl found remains of Green's camp and started exploring it.

The camp had already been completely degraded, all that was left were the remains of a small earthen wall, and some stone statues fallen and scattered across the ground. The girl tried her best to find something useful in the middle of the camp but nothing was found.

Soon all the women gathered together again and started talking to each other, the children were running the camp while the adults discussed the next course of action.

The girls began to argue until one of the women pointed to the lake and said something, then a large girl ran to the lake with a small cracked glass jar, and collected some water.

She ran back to the wheel, and handed the water to the wolf lady, the lady then looked directly into the water and was amazed at how the water gave off an ethereal blue glow as she shook the glass.

'Damn, if they try something funny I need to be prepared.'

I started to put my water elementals on alert, and to warm up my water manipulation, but soon I could see that the wolf woman just took some dried herbs from the bag and threw them into the flask, then started shaking it until the The entire liquid turned a deep teal blue.

The wolf lady seemed excited about this, so she vigorously walked to the lake and started looking at it. She looked at the lake and then at me, looked at the roots that grew all over the place and leaves that dominated the surface of the lake.

And she said something to the girls next to her.

'Was I discovered?'

The girls then began to bring a large book close to the lake, and began to resound a type of incantation, all holding hands while the wolf lady read the book.

Soon a large amount of water began to rise to the sky, and rotate intensely until the figure of a woman completely made of water appeared over the lake.

After what appeared to be a high-level water elemental appeared, I saw the women panting with fatigue and sweating coldly, while the elemental just looked at them and said something in a strange language.

The wolf girl then asked the greater elemental for something, and the girl made of water looked intrigued at the water fountain that was above her.

The large water elemental then turned into a stream of water and mixed with the lake, I could feel it searching every inch of the lake until it came across my main body.

The elemental then began to get close, but soon several small currents of water formed around it and began to shoot sheets of water.

The elemental was very surprised, and just made a gesture with her hand that made all my elementals dissolve into water instantly.

'Damn it! Do you have any idea how much these guys cost?!'

Soon the elemental got very close to me, and then I started to feel scared, she then fired a large blast of water towards me, but as soon as the blast of water touched me it was completely nullified.

The elemental was totally intrigued by this, and she created a large bubble of water that spun rapidly, creating a large tornado of water in the lake and then threw it at me with a scowl.

But just like the first attack, this one was also completely canceled when it touched my body, causing me no damage whatsoever.

The elemental was furious, and began to say something in a strange language, but soon realized that she would not get any response. In response, all she gained was a small beam of light that instantly pierced her body from behind.

Annoyed, she turned to see a small lotus flower that was already charging another beam of energy, but before she could make an attack on it the water pressure suddenly increased tremendously, pushing her to the bottom of the lake, soon a current of water furiously began to circulate her body of water and squeeze it in a strong arm, then several other small lotus flowers with small balls of light began to appear around the elemental.

Unable to react, the elemental was soon shot by several small beams of light, but even so, its body did not disintegrate into water, so after a few seconds the elemental let out a scream of anger and began to create a large tornado of water inside the body. lake.

Soon everything started to spin, as if the entire lake was going down the drain, my body remained firmly in place, completely rooted to the bottom of the lake, but my leaves had already been ripped off and lost by then.

The furious elemental then began to create a small bubble of water,

Lily's Tale (Discarded Chapter) - End

----------------------------------------

PS: Don't bother sending hearts to this, they are all discarded chapters, and I certainly won't correct them.