Stars illuminate the world around me as I fly. Was it hubris or ignorance that led me here? Nevertheless, here I am within the cosmos. It was a blissful existence, a perfect aimlessness that I appreciated but my thoughts were interrupted when I heard the familiar sound of loud metal screeching along my side. My roots stretch beneath the soft soil bed, soon protruding outwards towards the sound near me. I had no appendages to perceive my surroundings in detail, only discerning general positioning from noise and getting more precise information from the feeling my roots provide.

They reach their destination, wrapping themselves around the metal container and swiftly pulling it into the earth as my roots retract. As the grating sound halts as the container enters my core, several gruff voices are heard behind me, around me, and above me. Everywhere the voices echo, all saying different words with the same meaning expressing their astonishment.

Soft-voiced figure: "Incredible!"

Squeaky voiced figure: "Amazing!"

Their manner of speech was foreign to me and yet I understood their words all the same. I gave up questioning all manners of my life long before now and this was merely one mystery that I didn't have the energy nor the drive to explore. This time, however, an explanation came to me in the form of a voice, more monotone than the rest yet it pierced into my thoughts more than any other.

"Minor Passive Skill: Translation has been gained"

That was new, I cannot describe how perplexed I was at that moment. Alas, I had little time to ruminate as a surge of pain coursed through my stem spreading to my roots to my core. I felt lifted from my fertile soil bed as my pain soon turned to weakness.

Soft Voiced Figure: "Careful where you touch it, its petals are poisonous and we still need to get this thing back to home base"

Squeaky voiced figure: "Roger that"

I was unable to discern their tone this time, I tried to move my roots but that failed me as well. Soon it all felt numb and I thought that was it for my suffering. Until I felt a pain snap at my roots, like hot iron I could feel my skin melting off my body laying to reveal the bloody walls within.

Victor: "Bloody hell Stephany, you never said it was that freaky lookin' inside!"

Stephany: "Shut the hell up Victor, you've been whining the whole trip here. Just ignore the weird shit and keep moving."

Their voices became even more enigmatic as the painful stimuli coursed through my roots. I wasn't sure what was happening but I tried my hardest to ignore my skin melting to focus on what I heard. The squeaky voice was Victor and the Soft one, was Stephany. They act surprised at my anatomy, perhaps their information on me is limited. Do they know I can think as they do? Feel as they do? It's a possibility that I need to ponder more on but the frequent spikes of pain and draining of my blood makes it difficult to concentrate. This is where my life ends it seems, this pain will soon be over and I can drift back into the cosmos...

Victor: "We've got enough stimulation from the specimen, all information on Genie's Sprout has been stored in a preservation chamber. Permission to discard into the concept incinerator or stasis box?"

Stephany: "... Neither, Yan loves these things and we need a gift for her birthday."

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Victor: "Whatever you say boss"

"Minor Passive Skill: Acid Resistance gained... Vulnerability contradicts gained skill, adjusting..."

I heard that voice again, acid was it? Odd, I could feel the pain lessen in my roots, and the weakness I once felt dulled ever so slightly. I instinctively knew that I could last for months in this acid now thanks to that skill but that did nothing to save me from the anguish the melting bestowed.

I remained in constant agony for a long time, the monotone devil had prolonged my purgatory. I had little concept of time but the bits and pieces I could gather from their idle chatter meant it was over a week before I was freed of my pain. It wasn't long after I gained the skill that the pain made the voices near impossible to decipher and it had taken a while for me to notice when I had been pulled from the acid into artificial soil. My roots dug into the fresh dirt, although I felt myself becoming healthier by the second; it was extremely uncomfortable compared to my previous soil bed. It took longer, but I could move my roots once again and two voices pierced into my thoughts.

"Minor passive skill: Tremorsense has been gained"

Suddenly, I had vision. It was jarring and subdued, no color was visible only detailed recreations of objects and other matter. This allowed me to sense others of my species all within the same ground. I tried to look up to see the state of the others, to see if we shared the same painful process that led us here but I couldn't, it was as if my eyes were glued to the ground.

Yan: "Hello! I hope the acid didn't fry your hearing too much. I'm Yan and I'll be your caretaker from now on. I'm sure you must be very confused, as we all were. The discovery of the genie sprout was very harrowing for many on-site, a plant that could manifest desire all for a bit of blood. We've studied your kind for a while now and yet still chalk your proficiency at gaining skills to magic, it's not a common trait to gain passive abilities at the rate you all do but all the useful information has been gleamed from other sources so now you'll be my little set pieces on display!"

I'm not sure what happened but I felt agitated at her remark it didn't feel like my own feelings but the feelings of the others on the ground with me. I could hear a violent race of shaking and rattling with lingering futility mixed within the mess.

Yan: "Calm down, you all know you signed up for this. It shook the scientific community to its very core and became a gateway to the many supernatural wonders that littered this earth. You were the stepping stone that humanity needed to continue to thrive in the darkness. As for our new subject... I sense desynchronization with the hive. Your memory must be flawed so allow me to refresh you so you can follow the herd without flaw."

I felt other roots coil in the ground coil around mine, tightening their grip painfully. My hearing was beginning to deteriorate against the pain just enough for me not to hear the next words she said but then, I felt a brief shock as the roots lessen their grip.

Yan: "Cute, another futile attempt at trying to hide the truth. I suppose I could let you live in ignorance if your fellows want you to avoid it so much, assuming you continue to synchronize with the hive that is..."

After that, I felt the grip on my roots loosen until it only touched the tip of each and then, my mind became not my own. It progressed through the various roots connecting themselves in the soil and merged into one, all thinking of the one desire to escape.