The act of [Healing] was great to have, the skill providing much-needed utility while also putting off a burden that the Core knew that it would have to carry. That being the fact that none of its creatures could heal as quickly as they needed to. Sure, they had the natural regeneration to keep them afloat, and the air packed tight with Mana certainly helped accelerate it even more, yet there still wasn't close enough to actually provide a meaningful edge while in combat.

It was all too little, all without the needed boost to have a positive effect. Yes, it would help a single health point every minute, but when those points were lost by the dozen every second, would it really matter. A creature could be dead by the time it even thought about the regeneration possibly impacting the results.

But that’s where the [Healing] came in. With the efficiency of a perfect specimen, the Core could now [heal] a minimum of a hundred each time it used the skill. With how little the creatures had, to begin with, it basically allowed the Entity to heal them up from near-death instantly. It would stop mindless losses while also providing it with the edge needed to make it survive larger battles. While, yes, the number of ants it had at its disposal was severely limited, the healing would likely make up for it. There was nothing like it. At least not from the ant’s side, the creatures never showing any hint of being able to [Manipulate] the vital energy around them.

Though… no, it was not good to speculate on such things. If the Core went down such a route, it would simply deprive itself of peace as it would try to figure out how to circumvent it. And that was more than a fool's path. A more powerful foe with more powerful creatures under it? That wasn't something that could be prepared for, no matter how much the Entity wished for it.

With the [Giant-Ants] now sat up in neat rows, all perfectly healthy, the Core could only wonder how much of a fight they could put up. There had been a hope that all the ants on the opposing side would have the levels be the same as the ones that the Entity had for itself, yet that was likely not true. A single battle seemed enough to increase their levels. Since the other side likely had existed for longer than it, there was more than enough chance for many ants to have survived several of them. Chance along with time allowed it. And the Core knew it would likely need to try the same things with its own creatures. It needed them to be stronger.

It needed many things nowadays, most of them being related to time. With how hard it had started pressing down on the Entity, there was hardship found in simply planning on what it wanted to do in the future. No matter what it tried, there always seemed something more pressing that needed tending to. Always something that needed to be made differently, something that could be done in a way that would provide more back in return. Yet… it was hard to figure out what to actually focus on in the long run.

One step at a time was perhaps the most efficient route to take, yet those steps needed to be planned out beforehand. When the Core hardly knew the landscape, how was it expected to have any ideas about such things? It was better to simply hope for the best as it moved on, for any further thinking would only be wishful and foolhardy.

On a note related to how it would encourage further growth, however, there was one thing that the Core had been setting off. It was the act of looking at just what the many ants had brought back from their journey. The Core had been preoccupied with figuring out a better process of healing creatures, yet this did seem much more interesting. And with the time available at the current moment, nothing else instant striking out as being more important, the Entity started to focus on just what stood before it.

It had been brimming with energy since the start, to the level where it seemed like a miniature version of the ants. But, it likely wasn't sentient enough to do much, seeing as it simply laid on the ground, showing off its green-coloured Mana. With a more in-depth look, it seemed like the green tendrils in the ceiling before that ceiling in question had collapsed and brought more boring sights to see. Yet… this one was very interesting. Instead of lying in elongated parts, it was all bunched together. Mana flew through it without pause, some parts being taken from the air itself. The little thing was taking the Core’s Mana. It wasn't a quick process, barely enough to be noticeable, yet the Entity still very much saw it for what it was.

While not alive, instincts likely fuelled its continued existence. No sentience. Only reflexes developed through trial and error. A random chance had luckily allowed it to survive in the start, and it had likely just grown, step by step, through a lot of time.

It was an interesting method to survive, though the Core hardly thought that luck wasn't a factor in some parts of it. If there had been a mind inside the peculiar flesh that it could see, then it would have likely thought the same, never allowing for such dependence to be had. It would take one bad day and then it would all be lost. But, perhaps the current day was as bad as it could get, for the Entity could see a living, pulsing piece of flesh that was alive, and it wanted to know how it was made. But, first, it needed to do a customary [Appraisal]. It was a procedure, after all.

Moss

Common plant found in the wild

It was a… plant? The name sparked no recognition in the Core’s mind, though it did seem like a peculiar name for a living thing. Could the plant be planted, made to grow even further beyond? That could perhaps be what the naming scheme was for, designating things that could grow for longer periods of time at the cost of not being aware of itself. Truly a harrowing way to live, but the long-term benefits were perhaps larger than the Core could fathom. The memories of those long tendrils of green were brought to the forefront of its mind. They had run through the dirt for more than a few meters, the Entity never able to see where they had come from or where they had ended. Likely, the [Moss] could do something like it.

There was only one way to find out, however. While the plant was already showing some interesting signs in the instincts department, smaller pieces of itself being shoved into the air, the Core still needed to know more about the actual creation. The colouring was so radically different from what the ants had at their disposal, making the flesh it was made out just as different. It would be impossible to recreate without knowing the pattern and to do that it needed one thing and one thing only. It needed the moss to stop moving, pulsing, and being alive in general.

Throwing off an order to one of the nearby [Giant-Ants], the Core made it take many bits out of the plant, taking each part apart from eachother as quickly as possible. The act seemed futile at the start, yet as smaller and smaller pieces came and went, it seemed like the plant itself had trouble keeping itself afloat. The intake of Mana slowed down radically, even if the total mass was still the same. And with the ant not stopping in taking them more and more apart, it was only a question of time before the Core was allowed a look inside.

It took two full minutes, but those minutes were well spent. With the intake gradually losing efficiency, the Core was allowed to see it all wither up quickly, finalising itself when a burst of Mana came. The size itself was not the largest in the world, but that was neither here nor there. What mattered was the small bauble right in the middle of where the Moss had laid. It was exactly the same size as the one for the Ants, leaving the Core to imagine that size didn't matter at all with the Mana. The information inside was the most important thing instead.

And the information would be brought inside. With a quick tendril, the recipe for the Moss was brought inside of the Core and made to join the Mana-Cycle that had been shown off prominently before. It melted into the Cycle without a pause, and new information was unlocked for the Core. It was… terrific.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

[Moss] had no roots, no tendrils that it dug into the materials around it. Neither was there a need for much in general, the air and the moisture within bringing a habitat that was liveable for them. Sudden changes in temperature were apparently not well-liked yet that didn't stop them from surviving that as well. The plant… was extremely tough. Not in the way that it couldn't be harmed, of course. It was just that it was so utterly resilient that it took so much work to actually kill it.

But aside from how it could survive, most of those effects were from how it was built. The actual structure seemed so… peculiar. The actual salability of the plant seemed near-infinite, the only requirements being the moisture and a place to grow. As long as those two were fulfilled, nothing stopped them from continuing growth. Not that such an infinite pattern would be seen normally, even the Core was able to realise that the air inside its sight wasn't enough for such a thing, but that didn't mean that much couldn't be grown.

And the benefits were huge. While the Core was sure that it wouldn't truly understand it before it had seen it in practical use, there seemed to be a point where the Moss would grow to critical mass. It wasn't the largest piece in the world required for such a point, but the benefits of it seemed to make it self-sustaining. Instead of taking Mana from the Core to make itself grow faster, the rate at which it produced Mana itself would grow to be too much, making it continually pump it out of itself. That meant that, with enough time and effort, the Core would be able to… give itself more Mana?

It was a hard idea to make practical, the actual size and requirements needed to make such a mass of Moss seeming quite large. The Core wasn't even sure it had enough space to properly grow such a mass at the current moment. And the requirements for proper moisture in the air would be hard to fulfil naturally as well since so much would be taken from it constantly, likely forcing the Entity to do much of the work itself. It was just a project that was hard to get around to.

But it was also a project that needed to be done. It was a possible boost in regeneration. A boost that would allow for more expansion without having to wait for another increase in level. If the Core ignored such a possible gain, it wouldn't be able to accept itself for it. But… the costs. They were much too high to instantly make do with.

Moss, while relatively cheap when compared to the [Giant-Ants], was entirely based on their small starting size. If the Core wanted to make more and more of them repeatedly, the Mana-Cost would rise up to levels like never before. The Entity wasn't sure it had even spent enough Mana throughout its entire existence to measure up to just how much would need to be spent.

While Mana perhaps wasn't the largest problem in the world, the sheer scale of what was needed to be spent would take more than a few hours for a gain that wouldn't be obvious for a very long time. The Core needed to figure something out before it would decide on such a route of action. With how hard it was to do, there needed to be an alternative before it could move forward.

…

The Core watched the Ants for a few minutes, wondering what it needed to do to get out on top. It was hard to not emulate the creatures before the Entity, the things simply standing around, waiting to get orders to put their way. It seemed a small bit of a waste, now that it thought about it. The Creatures had been created for the protection of the Core, yet that task was not currently needed since there was nothing to protect it from. For a large part of the day, they were without any tasks, nothing better to do than stand around doing nothing.

Or the Core supposed it could send some of them out again to find something else. But, even then, not all of them could be sent out at once, some still need to stay behind to do that one task they were good at. It was unpredictable when something would come in to attack the Core, and they always needed to be in the vicinity to protect it then. So… no going outside the vicinity of its sight but still refraining from doing nothing and simply being a burden on expenses.

Two problems. One big solution. Or, it was a possible solution, the fact of the matter not completely solidified yet. One question still needed to be answered, after all. How good were the ants at maintaining plants? If given the proper instructions, could they… cultivate the Moss?

It was a curious question. One that the Core could see happening when given the right orders with the right intent. It would solve everything, after all. When not having anything other to do, they were made to watch over the Moss planted, making sure that everything was as it needed to be. If there wasn't enough moisture, they would take it from a designated watering hole and spray it across the foliage. If there was too much, they would remove it instead. They would also be able to split up the Moss into different parts to efficiently grow as much as possible, while also watching out for any parts of the plant that were not growing as they should and eliminate it before it becomes a problem.

The more it was thought about, the more it seemed possible. Yes, there would be issues at the start, and yes there would still be larger costs attached. But, those costs would not even be close to big enough for it to be compared to the one seen before. It wouldn't even bottom out the Core’s current Mana-Total to start it up. It was that small.

With that settled into it, the Core did a few preparations for the task ahead. Already, it knew that the current solution was a go, and it wanted to see it more than anything else. The ability to have the ants on some task instead of standing still sounded absolutely fabulous, and it would also allow for it to know if the order persisted through longer durations. It would certainly help it put in certain instructions that were meant to be permanent. No harm in it.

The water-hole was the first one. The actual creation of water was likely the easiest part, the Core already knowing the structure needed from having watched the air for so long. The actual hard part was taking a piece of stone out of the floor to make a hole for the water. That took a full minute, the Core having to figure out how to take away a piece of stone instead of the entire thing. Separating one border into several was very hard to do, to the point where the Core hoped to get its [Mana-Manipulation] upgraded soon. There was no way it would be able to do such a thing quickly without it. Or maybe [Willpower] would help. There was no way to currently know, so the Core just moved on.

The actual Moss was harder to create, the Entity having grown so used to the creation of the [Giant-Ants]. The actual process was similar enough that the Core had to stop itself from making dumb mistakes that would have been perfectly fine on the other type of creature yet able to completely ruin the process on the current one. It was hard, gruelling, and likely imperfect during the first round of attempts but the Core got through the process in the end. However… it did spend a minute or two checking that everything did work correctly before letting it finalise. It had yet to mess up any creatures, and it was sure that it wouldn't like what would happen if it did.

When the process and overlook for any mistakes finally was done, the Core allowed the changes to finalize, giving the Entity a good look at what was now laid on the ground. It looked just as it had done before, though without the larger cuts made to kill it. The size… was a bit smaller, however. Not enough to cause worry but enough that the time to finally give a bonus out would take some time. Not that such matter much anyhow, since the Core just made four more of them, each being laid on one part of the Entity’s side. There was more than enough distance between all of them to let them grow, only a few meters away from the edge.

The sight was more than good, the Core happy with the progress being had. It had initially wanted to put the Moss closer to the edge of its sight but decided against it at the last moment. The plant was supposed to grow, and since it would grow without any real control, the side would be overshot in an instant if allowed to sit right on the edge. With a few meters of a gap, the Core was relatively sure that it would be able to widen the sight before that ever became a problem.

Now, with the Moss and water set up perfectly, it was time for the workers to get their orders put on straight. Sending out the order to all the creatures in general, the Core began to formulate some straighter rules. It was started off by highlighting that not doing anything was seen as bad behaviour, with it needing to be replaced with tending to the new farm. Then it set up the different tasks and how to do them, with each having some requirements set up for them as well as a maximum amount since the Core didn't want to see the Moss constantly being doused with water that was then instantly removed.

More regulations were put up to make sure that the Moss wouldn't get trampled over time, and then how the processes needed were still under priority to other tasks that the Core could set for the creatures. It was finally finished off with making the [Giant-Ants] try to avoid walking over the Moss during other tasks if possible and then making sure that there was a reasonable limit on how many ants were allowed to do each task at once. The actual formula for the latter was set in stone, the intent having a larger focus on it.

With everything said, most of the Ants started to move over to the [Moss], clearly watching over them, getting close to check moisture levels and then manually adjusting them where it was needed. It seemed that the moisture in the air was slightly different when compared to just a couple of meters away. Or maybe the ants were just hyper-sensitive enough where they could see that the moisture was slightly different from the ideal amount. The Core could certainly not find any differences at a casual glance.

It all seemed to be set up just fine, though there was one final thing that needed to be checked out. What were the stats of the plant? Using [Appraisal], there was nothing stopping the Entity from finding out just that.

Moss

Common plant found in the wild

… Or maybe there was. While the [Moss] showed no resistance to being checked out, it seemed that there was nothing to check after. With no sentience to look out for, the plant was simply mindless flesh in the [System]’s eyes. It did make sense since there was no way the plant would be able to complete the necessary tutorial, but that didn't mean much to stop the Core’s disappointment.

Oh, well. Nothing it could do for now but watch over the process.