Food. Water. Sun. Even a new friend. Not bad, all things considered.

I watched as the ever-busy ants scurried around, each with a job to do. Some were heading beyond my little patch of territory to forage, while others stayed behind, reinforcing their home. It was still surreal to see their ziggurat-pyramid-thing, with ants neatly marching up and down the ramps like tiny, determined commuters.

So… what now? I could just grow, which, yeah, is a valid plant goal. Or I could focus on getting stronger. Or… something else? I basked in the morning sun as I mulled over my options. The warmth kissed my leaves, soaking into me in a way that just felt right. With my newfound access to water, my green sheen had returned, and I had to admit—I was looking good.

Then, for just a moment, a shadow passed over me. Not directly blocking the sun, but enough to dim the light. A flicker of shade.

"What the what?!" My leaves stiffened. "Miryam!"

A nearby ant, one of the workers tending my mulch and enriching the soil, paused and climbed onto one of my roots. "Yes, flower? What's wrong?"

"Did you see that?"

"Oh, did you mean the bird?"

"Bird?!" I did not like the sound of that. "There are birds here?"

"A few," she replied casually. "They're one of the predators I mentioned before. Don't you remember?"

I thought back to our first 'conversation'—which, at the time, had been mostly me catching every third word and hoping for the best. "Only a little. I didn't have Communication then, so I couldn't really understand much."

"Ah, I see." Miryam turned her gaze toward her fellow ants, watching them work for a few moments before continuing. "Well, they don't come over here too often. There's better prey a few courtyards over. That's actually where I came from."

"Really? Can you tell me about it?"

"Sure. It was a courtyard, similar in size to this one. I would say…" She paused, her fellow ants giving off little pheromone puffs as if helping her think. "The courtyards are roughly square-shaped, about six of your well's lengths long and wide. It's hard to tell at our size, but I think your well is about six feet in diameter."

Mana: 3/23 (27)

As she spoke, I got an idea. I shaped an illusion, forming a tiny projection of her description. A wall of miniature bricks formed a rough square, with a small circular shape in the center. I placed a green dot inside to represent me.

Miryam's antennae twitched in surprise. "Oh my, that is amazing!"

Several of her ants abandoned their tasks to scuttle over, crowding around the illusion like fascinated spectators.

"Alright, let's see." Miryam turned her attention back to the projection. "There's only one way out of this place, and it's over here."

One of her ants scurried to the wall in question. I adjusted the illusion, shifting the 'stones' aside to create a gap.

"A little larger… there you go," she instructed. "It's like a small tunnel. To clarify, I think you're in the courtyard of a single building, and this passage opens up to a road."

Under Miryam's guidance, and with her ants acting as guidelines, lining up to show distance and widths, I built out the surrounding structures. As the picture took shape, it became clear—I was in the courtyard of what looked like a Middle Eastern-style home. A square, two-story building with an open courtyard in the center. Several arches surrounded the courtyard, leading to several doorways. Some broken, open, or closed. Across the street, the buildings were more uniform, almost adobe-like, their blocky forms surrounding the courtyard house with narrow alleys or small roads winding between them.

Further north, the road led to at least two more similar courtyard homes. Mine, apparently, was the only one with a garden. The next one up? Just a barren, empty patch of dirt. But the furthest of the two had something different—a pool at its center, covered by a tattered awning that spanned the courtyard. That limited shade was enough to protect moisture, at least somewhat, which meant bugs. Lots of bugs.

Including the glass ants.

But where there are prey, there are predators.

The nastiest of the bunch was some kind of weird scorpion-like creature. Nearly three times the size of a glass ant, its stinger had been replaced with this bizarre, flexible cup—almost like an organic cone. It didn't sting; it snatched. Its tail would whip forward, snap the cup around its prey like a high-speed Venus flytrap, and then… digest the poor thing alive.

Miryam had lost more than a few ants to those things. She seemed to be a bit subdued and not keen on talking about the details. It didn't take me long to remember her ants were a hive mind of herself.

The shade also made a decent home for other creatures—the bird.

Miryam suspected it might be a sparrow, but she had never dared to get close enough to find out. She'd spent most of her time hiding, defending her home and hive, while desperately sending out little expeditions to find a safer place. Since moving in here, she hadn't done much more exploring.

"Would you like to?"

Miryam's antennae twitched. "What do you mean?"

"I guess what I mean is… would you mind doing so?" I kept my focus on the illusionary 'map' as I spoke, adjusting a few details here and there. "I can't exactly go check it out myself. And I don't want to ask you to put yourself in direct danger or anything. But, well… I think it'd be cool to explore the house."

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She hesitated, and I noticed several dozen of her ants slowing in their tasks, as if her uncertainty rippled through the whole hive.

"Do you think it's necessary?" she asked carefully.

I considered that. "Necessary? Not yet, at least. But… I don't know if you've noticed, but it's been getting hotter."

Miryam didn't respond right away, but I could feel her thinking.

"Wouldn't it be nice to find an awning here?" I continued, nudging the idea forward. "Maybe we could even open it. Or, better yet, what if there's a pump inside the house? Something leading down to a well? That'd be a way more secure water source than relying on this receding groundwater."

I let the words settle. She didn't have to do it, but the logic was solid. At least, I thought so.

"I see your point, I suppose. But if I am going to risk part of my hive, I would like something in return."

It was my turn to hesitate for a moment. "I don't think I am ready to lose any leaves."

She chuckled, "No, not that. But, uh, the water. I guess the wet soil below you. Is there anything you can do to get me down there?"

"What have you been doing for water?"

"I've been sending out groups to steal some from the other courtyard. As you can imagine, it's been diminishing returns."

"I can definitely do that. It might take a short while, but I think I have something in mind that could work."

It was strange seeing an ant sag in relief. "Oh, thank you. I'll start organizing the searching of the house."

…

I got to work immediately.

Without hesitation, I activated Growth, silently thanking my past self for experimenting with the honey pots so early on. That little breakthrough had turned out to be really useful, and this idea wasn't all that different.

My main root—the thickest one—was already anchored deep in the damp soil below. I traced its path downward, mapping out a plan in my head. Then, just like I had with the honey pot, I began ballooning it outward, carefully expanding sections along its length to form a new structure.

It was slow work, but noticeably faster than the honey pots had been. Probably because I wasn't building from scratch this time—I already had a root guiding the way.

By the time the sun dipped below the horizon, the project was complete.

Running along the outside of my main root was a carefully crafted tunnel, following its entire length. I'd widened it just enough that two of Miryam's ants could walk side by side without trouble.

Miryam was just as busy. Several of her ants remained clustered around my illusory map, relaying reports from the scouts she had sent inside. And hot damn, her ants could move. Not only that, but instead of creeping through one room at a time, she had them sweeping the entire house in coordinated teams, covering multiple areas at once. Efficient, thorough, and slightly terrifying in the best way.

The house itself was exactly what I expected—old, abandoned, and worn down by time. Even as I adjusted the illusion based on Miryam's descriptions, it was clear: this place had been empty for a long time.

The main entrance was nothing more than an arched doorway, long stripped of any actual door. It opened into a hallway that wrapped around the central courtyard, a large open-air space where time and neglect had claimed what was probably once a well-kept garden. Now, only sand and dust remained, though Miryam's ants noted patches of cracked, compacted earth—evidence that something had once been planted there. Above the courtyard were a few guides or leads that an awning would have been run along at one point in time. Now they just hung uselessly over the yard. Maybe we can do something about that.

Several small storage rooms lined the outer walls of the house. Most were completely bare, their purpose lost to history. One, however, still held the rotting remains of wooden crates, long since emptied by time, decay, or scavengers.

The kitchen was identifiable, barely, though it was just as abandoned as the rest of the house. However, in the farthest corner, tucked away from the courtyard, was something potentially invaluable—a worn, stone water pump.

"Called it." My leaves trembled with excitement at the thought. If that thing still worked…

The second floor wrapped around the courtyard, forming a balcony that overlooked the center of the house. What had once been bedrooms were now hollow, lifeless spaces, long abandoned. The decay was even worse here—these rooms hadn't seen life in decades. There was one thing of note. One of the rooms looked to have a chest, and while old, it did not look as broken down as everything else in the house.

A larger common area sat at the far end of the second floor, possibly once used for gatherings. Now, nothing remained but dust and the faint impressions of where rugs or cushions might have rested.

The whole house felt deserted, untouched.

Except for one thing.

Near the kitchen pump, the sand and dust were disturbed. The ants noticed it immediately. Something had been here recently. The tracks weren't fresh enough to tell what, but they were too new to be from whoever abandoned this place originally.

I didn't like that.

"Miryam, are you seeing this?"

Experience: 121.5/300

Mana: 23/23 (27)

Stamina: 42/42 (62)