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[Chi Power Upgraded: 3rd Stage]

[Unlocked Combatative Roots[D] skill]

What the hell is…

Those words froze in Haylock’s mind as the root currently sampled by a creature moved back further into the soil, changing its position by about three feet in just a matter of seconds.

He could feel the ground moving near where his root had been. Whatever the creature was, it had decided Haylock tasted terrific and was trying to eat more.

Oh, you sneaky little bastard… Haylock muttered to himself, wondering why the creature wouldn’t just give up.

When the snack-happy critter was about six inches from the new location of his root, it suddenly lunged forward, spearing through the front of the creature’s face. His root tip had hardened much more than Haylock could believe.

As soon as it pierced the creature, traveling three feet inside it, the root grew barbs that sprang up all along the edges.

The creature thrashed, trying to bite and free itself, but Haylock could feel the creature's life already starting to flow upward to his body through the denser root.

The creature's teeth cut only slightly into the tougher shell, and occasionally, a small spike would appear, damaging the face of whatever it was trying to fight back.

His roots began to pull closer toward him, and the creature was dragged through the soil, fighting less and less as more of its life began to flow like a milkshake through a straw up his root. Less than a minute later, the creature stopped moving.

Damn right! No one gets to eat me unless I say so!

Haylock wished for a pair of lips so he could smile. There was no real way to show his excitement at successfully defending himself and actually killing something.

And then, a twinge of fear started to creep into his mind.

If I’m just a flower and can do all this, what else is out there in this world? What am I going to be eventually running into in order to climb the food chain?

As those thoughts floated through his mind and the power of the creature he had defeated reached his stem, Haylock was finally excited to hear noise from around the property.

Shouting and laughing echoed across the ground, and he anxiously waited, hoping that he would soon see Nini and Mimi coming to pay him a visit.

Especially with snacks and a treat!

—--

An hour had passed, and still neither had come. As the sun started to shift above in the sky, taking away the warmth and power he felt from it, Haylock began to grow anxious.

They never avoided me like this… is something wrong?

Finally, after what felt like an eternity to a plant that couldn’t move and had limited sight, five minutes later, Nini's laughter and Mimi's humming flooded his range of detection.

The shed door slid open, and Nini dashed through the garden toward him, running quickly. Then, she slowed down halfway before she got to him. He could see her face react to the sight of him.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“MIMI! The flower is fricking huge!”

The humming stopped, and Haylock focused on the older woman. He saw her gaze at him and a massive toothy smile on her face.

“Did you expect less, dear? I told you it would happen. Now hurry up and go say hi while I tend to these other plants first.”

Nini started walking toward him, her eyes wider than the floret section of his flower. She struggled to handle him being much taller than she was. His flower portion was almost two feet wide when measured from tip to tip of his petals. The white petals were growing longer and thicker every day, surprising him with how they felt.

They're not limpy or floppy at all… thick and firm, not like the rest of those puny flowers Mimi has to care for.

“Mr. Flower, what happened to you?” Nini asked as she stood a few feet away. “You’re massive, and your stem… it's so thi… uh… big… no… how about wide…” She nodded her head, cheeks slightly red as she gazed at him from roots to petals.

“Have you been eating?”

Haylock shook himself, glad to see her smile as he answered her question.

“Something other than what we fed you before we left?”

Shaking his body again, Haylock realized that it took more effort to do so. He really had gotten thicker, his shaft now at least three inches wide. The leaves he had were long and heavy, so moving everything was getting a bit too much.

Let me see… nod, damn, you nod!

He willed the flower portion of his body to move, the area connected to the stem, and slowly it did. Up and down, it moved, making Nini’s eyes go wide again and her jaw spring open wide enough to eat a whole cupcake.

“Did you just… nod?”

Haylock slowly made the flower head to move up and down again.

“Holy shit!”

“Language!” Mimi called out from across the garden. “Do not let me hear you talk like that, or I’ll wash your mouth out with the laundry water!”

Blowing a raspberry, Nini cursed quietly under her breath, closing her mouth most of the way.

“So, how did you eat then…” Nini questioned out loud, tapping her chin as she began to move around Haylock. She glanced around the garden and saw nothing. “Did something die in here?”

Haylock had to work harder, forcing his stem to twist slightly, but he got the flower head to shake from side to side.

“Fu…” Nini caught herself, glancing back at her grandmother at the sweet flower box. She pulled out a few mice that had died over the last few days.

“Did you kill something?” she whispered.

Haylock yearned for a pair of lips to smile, but instead, he nodded his head and made his leaves bounce.

“How? I mean.. When.. or even what?” she stuttered, glancing around the garden again. “Was it a bird? Or a mouse or a…” she paused, shaking her head and realizing none of those questions would work. “Sorry, that’s exciting. We need to tell Grandmother.”

“Tell me what, child?”

Nini jumped at the older woman’s voice, forgetting how quiet she could be.

“The flower killed something while we were gone.”

Those red eyes sparkled, twinkling in a way that made Haylock slightly afraid of the woman. “You killed something… all on your own… That means,” Mimi stopped talking and set her basket down, moving to stand before Haylock. She held out her hand and closed her eyes.

A moment passed, and then her wrinkled face cracked a smile. Those weathered cheeks formed massive canyons, and she grinned wider than Haylock could remember.

“Stage three… that is impressive. He is only a few stages behind you,” Mimi said as she turned and looked at Nini. “You need to focus more on your training and make sure to consume the reward you were given.”

Nini nodded and then turned toward Haylock. “I meant to show you, but I forgot! I got a Chi orb! Look!”

She reached into the pocket of her simple brown jacket and pulled out a small wooden box. Opening it, she showed him a small one-inch yellow ball that shined. Haylock, however, could see that inside that ball was something amazing, something full of power. He couldn’t take his eyes off of it, and when Nini shut the lid, his leaves and flower went partially limp.

“Oh, don’t worry my dear flower,” Mimi said, reaching out to touch his stem and then catching herself. “That wouldn’t help you, or at least I doubt it would. Nini has to consume it, and then it will take a lot of meditation and even more work for her to absorb the chi inside that orb. She finished in the top ten in the village outside our woods and earned one of those.”

“Yes, but I wasn’t high enough to earn a better one,” Nini said with a sigh. “I tried, Mimi, I really did.”

Her grandmother moved over, ran her wrinkly hand against Nini’s cheek, and smiled. “No worries. We have time, and besides, with the way in which our sunflower is growing, I am confident the time will come when you can ask him for help.

Haylock watched the two women and how they interacted, feeling a desire for what they had. His whole life had been hard back on earth. No one had ever just loved him for who he was.

Who would love a dwarf…

“Now then, let me give something more than just the dead mice in my basket,” Mimi said as she moved to sit near the base of his stem. She grunted a few times, getting into a position that reminded Haylock of some weird yoga thing he might have watched a few times on Facebook.

Only for educational value and not because of the yoga pants on those women…

Once she was settled and her feet somehow on her thighs, Mimi smiled at him. “I’m going to share some of my Chi. Do not try to drain it from me as you did, Nini. If you try, I will show you the hard way what it feels like when someone takes Chi from you.

She’s going to what? Share her–

He saw a line of red coming from the woman’s wrinkled and calloused hand. It was like a steel straw, moving straight for his stem, not moving like Nini’s hand. He could sense the power in it, far different from what the girl had given him.

A hunger inside began to take over. Haylock fought everything he could to avoid testing the woman who had promised to show him pain if he didn’t behave.

Be a good flower… be a good flower… don’t piss off the crazy old lady!

Repeating those thoughts over and over seemed to help until the red core pierced his stem.

Oh crap! Haylock muttered to himself as a tiny seed fell from his florets. That shouldn’t have happened…