He was at a crossroads. On one hand, he never desired to meet with Cervus again. Conversely, the item had an interesting use and granted plus two intelligence points.

“So long I don’t use its active ability, I should be fine. Right?”

He was hesitant initially but placed the hide on his back, and a strange sensation sparkled in his heart.

Thousands of years ago it was completely normal to wear the skin of animals as clothes, mainly because they had no other options to defend against the cold. The temperature of his realm was mild, putting on the hide did not make him feel hot. Unnaturally, it was much thinner and easier than he would have expected.

Equipping the hide did not make Cervus appear. Instead, a neat message popped up in the corner of his vision.

[ INT: 11 -> 13 ]

With the hide out of the way, two dungeon-specific items remained. The next one appeared with the same unique light, and as it emerged before him, Tanuki’s excitement rose through the roof.

A ring made up of brown roots appeared before him, a small rectangular emerald stuck between. Immediately, Tanuki felt the same magical aura around it that he felt from the hide, but unlike that one, this felt much nicer, almost familiar in a sense.

[ Ring of Growth ]

[ + 1 Max HP ]

[ + 1 Max MP ]

[ Accelerated Growth: Touching a living plant speeds up its growth to reach adulthood immediately. ]

[ Cooldown: 24 hours ]

Judging by the stat increase and the lack of negative effects, Tanuki quickly concluded this was the reward tied to the King’s defeat, and the big thing he fought all those battles for.

He tried to be happy about it, he truly did, but ultimately he was torn about the usefulness of the ring. It could help him do a few party tricks if he so desired, maybe even make some carrots grow faster. Yet none of those made it seem worth what he had gone through.

“Perhaps I’m being a bit pessimistic?” he thought. “After all, it does increase my health points, making me harder to kill. But the mana…”

He had no way of casting spells without a staff. Unfortunately, it was a useless stat.

The ring found its place on his right ring finger. As soon as he put it there, he felt a rush speed through his body, like adrenaline in bungee jumpers when they fall. It lasted only a second. He thought it might be his magical adeptness growing as he suddenly increased his intelligence and mana, which was the right idea, but his health could not be explained so easily. Was it magic that made him harder to kill or something beyond his comprehension? Now those were some shower thoughts, too bad he had no way to take showers.

Finally, he reached the last item in the box, and to his surprise, it was another one of those misty fireballs he knew only as essence.

[ Nature Essence ]

Like the dark essence, it had no description, making Tanuki wonder about its actual use. It matched the other perfectly in appearance, but the gassy substance that burned around the pearl appeared emerald green.

Gears turned in Tanuki’s brain. While he could not use the other essence, as he had promised the mysterious Professor he would give that one to him, he was free to do with this as he pleased.

The only question was, how could an essence be used?

As proof of his ancient monkey ancestry, his first idea was to sniff it. When he smelt no smell, he put it in his mouth for a test. It had no taste, he barely felt anything in his mouth.

Problems arose as the gas tried to find a way outside, and while it could creep through his nostrils, it found a much wider path to his lungs. Moments later, Tanuki experienced what huffing carbon dioxide would feel like.

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He almost passed out on the spot.

Before he could have, he spat out the essence and fought to refill his lungs with air. One thing was for certain, this is no way to use essence.

His next idea was birthed from the realisation that the essence was shaped like one of those fever medications that had to be inserted in a different hole. Fortunately, before he could have done something he would greatly regret, an unfamiliar noise caught his attention.

“Seagulls?” he jerked his head towards the sky. Ever so faintly, he could hear what sounded like a flock of seabirds. Above hung the mild yellow ball he came to know as the Sun, but no animals were on the horizon.

A new voice joined the birds, and as he looked towards the hill, he found its source to be a distressed Edgar waving for him.

“My Liege! My Liege! Come fast!”

Tanuki ran after him to the fields. The plantfolks stood motionless, looking at something in the distance. He would not have seen it, had Edgar not pointed directly at them.

Black dots in the distance. Birds. Or at least things that seemed like them.

“What the hell? Where are they coming from?” He looked at Edgar as if he would have known the answer.

“My Liege, were you not the one to invite them?”

“No, I did not invite anyone.”

He considered it might be the Professor coming for the dark essence, but he was doubtful. From all the clues he had gathered about the inner workings of this universe, there were gods much like him, some who he had fought, and they owned a part of reality. Whether these fragments of space were connected or not, he doubted they were, as the Professor could not make it to him, only establish a connection through a star, and even that at a great cost of power. He seemed incapable of coming in the physical form.

Which left him with no possible explanations for these creatures.

Those who worked in the forest also noticed the strange sounds and gathered by Edgar’s house. They stood a safe distance from the ledge, giving some place for the creatures to land.

As they flew closer, their unordinary appearance shocked all. They were less like birds and more like dog-sized butterflies whose entire body was made up of skin. Instead of feathers, a pair of elongated bones stretched out of their spine on both sides, loose folds of skin connecting the front and hind. Their skull size was relatively small compared to their body, much like their pea-sized eyes. No mouth could be found on their face. Rather, they had what appeared to be goat horns instead of a nose, circling back under their head to reach below their wings, or rather, gliders. This appendage was light and barely drew the creatures down. Functionally, they were like elephant trunks, drawing air and blowing it back to push their gliders, making them fly up. What Tanuki thought were seagulls chirping was actually the sound of a dozen of these trunks blowing to remain high in the sky.

As the twelve or so creatures landed on the field, Tanuki saw their name above the health-bar.

[ Void Glider ( LvL. 1 ) ]

[ HP: 1/1 ]

Fragile, unique wonders of the world.

Edgar poked Tanuki with his elbow and whispered his concerns about the creatures digging out the seeds, but Tanuki reassured him that would not be an issue. They could not lower their head to the ground as their horn-noses stood in the way.

The creatures lowered their gliders and used their thin bones as legs to walk around with. Grotesque and ugly as they were, it did not stop those more friendly with animals to try and feed them. The shopkeeper and the lone plantfolk child tried their best to offer apples to the shy beasts, but once they realised the two meant no harm, they just ignored them.

Clearly, the void gliders were not creatures that would make for a fine feast, as more than three-quarters of their body was skin. They were aware of that fact to some degree and thus remained peaceful as they walked around in search of… something.

Whatever it was, they were not finding it.

“Hmmm. Do you think they are thirsty?” asked Edgar while touching one.

Tanuki grimaced. “I don’t know.”

“If so, they are out of luck. If things go on like this, this realm will turn into a desert.”

He closed his eyes and sighed. Letting gravity do its work, he fell back on his arse.

“My Liege. Maybe we should pray.”

“To whom?”

“God. Maybe he’ll take pity on us and bring rain.”

Tanuki shot him a displeased look. “You know I’m the god of this realm, right?”

“Hmmm,” he stared into the distance, speaking with no ill will, “Maybe there is one above you. The one who brought us here. Perhaps he can bless us.”

As much as it hurt him, Edgar’s words were the wake-up call he needed. When he was alone, all that mattered was how he could empower himself with better spells and loot. The world existed to be exploited by him and by him alone.

But now, he had people who were to him like peasants to a king. He had to watch out for them and give them what they required to live a decent life, lest he be the target of his subjects’ loss of faith, perhaps even an uprising.

He had to do something about the water problem or the realm would fall into chaos. Unfortunately, the system did not seem to wish to reward him with a way to solve this issue. It only cared about improving itself by rewarding him with stronger weapons and equipment, but not his subjects with what they needed to survive.

This was an issue he had to solve not as a god, nor as the owner of a Gaia Core, but as Hachiro Tanuki, the person responsible for his people.

Changing his approach to the situation rewarded him with a thought that made him turn towards the shopkeeper. Despite being one of the plantfolks to stay in line when the King so willed, he had something others of his kind had not, something that would be clear from his name.

Tanuki remembered his words about tokens rewarded for slaying pretenders, that he could spend them at his shop. Though it remained no more as a building, he wondered if that also meant the shopkeeper would lose his power to exchange those coins…