Doing nothing as a seed sucks. You have absolutely no idea how hard. I mean, I just got those new cool things, and I can't use them without risking killing myself at the moment. I might be a little insane, but I'm not suicidal! thought Iva—who was actually more than a 'little' insane—and focused her thoughts on something that repeatedly occurred the last two days.
Somehow, she felt how huge insects were crawling over her roots for whatever reason. Like, those ants before were really small, but these...Iva shuddered. It seemed that her little 'harvest' offended someone, probably the ant queen, but she didn't expect that ants could get this big in this otherworld. Somewhat spooky, if you asked her.
Now, every other sane person would have just said, 'Oh yes, let's stop doing this, I could enrage some powers I can't handle right now!' or, 'This is creeping me out, I will just let them be!' but not Iva. After she realized how big those fuckers were, she began to laugh. Some might say it was only seconds, but it was hours on hours of hysterical laughter. Not even Orbinia could calm her down—which was kinda obvious...she was an orb.
Nonetheless, even Iva knew that she had to wait for her full mana to decide on her next move. She already had some sort of idea but no plan for how to execute it. In theory, what she had to do next, was relatively easy: collapse the tunnel on both sides, cut off reinforcements and kill them in one go. Repeat this over and over again till all ants were dead. She would obviously start with one ant at first to estimate its strength and calculate how many she could handle at once. Of course, this plan was perfect and had no flaws at all—whereas Iva patted her own head—if there wouldn't be a tiny teen problem. She was blind.
'Duh', was what a cultured person would have said, but they also wouldn't walk around and say that a seed could have self-consciousness thoughts at all. But there we were, with Iva, a maniacal magical seed with world domination fantasies. Only with her you could get a hundred percent ant-free environment. If you would tell her that ants are kinda crucial for nature too, she would only laugh at you while throwing you into a dungeon, cutting off your limbs, squeezing your eyeballs out, and slowly ripping you apa—, figures that she would only have a nice talk with you about her almighty goddess's teachings. Even if she had no idea what those were.
Iva saw herself as a saintess of the seeds. That someone like this wouldn't commit extinction because of something she found disgusting and repulsive didn't come to her mind at all. To all contrariety, however, she liked spiders.
At least those murderous tendencies kept her mind busy. After thinking about more ways to tor— welcome her new companions, something rather unexpected happened.
'Ding' 'Mana Root' (tiny) reached (small). Its branches have grown big enough to use 'Branch Augmentations'. Three different paths available.
After that, some kind of icon behind 'Branch Augmentations' in her status blinked up. She clicked on it, and a separate window opened. Aghast, she looked at the new screen.
tPEKISm.png [https://i.imgur.com/tPEKISm.png]
Iva never imagined that there would be so many possibilities, and it was only one root! She studied the window more carefully. A single box reading 'Mana Root' was on the far left. From it, three orange-marked paths led to one further field each. The outer ones subdivided themselves in the following still further, while the middle one always led to only one continuation. Iva quickly noticed that underneath the boxes, a sort of division of augmentation or rather additional skills happened at different levels. These went from the original 'Mana Absorption' skill of the 'Mana Root', which was understandably titled Tier 0, all the way up to Tier 5. Unfortunately, she found that Tier 4 and Tier 5 were still completely locked and not viewable.
In addition, many of the augmentations were labeled with question marks instead of a name, and the paths that went to them were also highlighted in red. I guess that means I haven't met certain requirements to be able to learn them, or my general level isn't just high enough yet.
However, to her satisfaction, she was able to read five of those boxes, and when she mentally clicked on one, it even showed a detailed description of what they did.
Mana Perception(T1) – lvl 1
Erects a spore-like mana sphere around you with which you can perceive the world around you.
It only consumes your mana when it creates the sphere and adjusts the radius.
50cm(19,68in) radius
+2% Mana-Regeneration
Okay, that doesn't sound so bad and is probably what I'm looking for. But 'perceive' is a little bit vague. Let's first see what the skill after that says.
Mana Touch (T2) – lvl 1
You are able to perceive the world around you in greater detail. Everything your sphere touches constructs a detailed outer view before your inner eye. It will now be easier for you to distinguish between objects externally.
+2% max. radius
+2% Mana-Regeneration
Oh? So it's like an upgraded version of 'Mana Perception'? I must admit that it also has some nice bonuses, at least for lvl 1. So, 'perception' gives me only a rough draft about things around me whilst 'touch' lets me grasp the surface? I really can't tell without having tested it first. Next.
Mana Equilibrium(T1) – lvl 1
Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.
You are in tune with your mana. 'Mana-Overload' is less likely to hurt you.
+5% resistance against 'Mana burn'
+5% Mana-Regeneration
+5% Mana
A safety mechanism, huh? It could be kinda useless in the future, I guess?
Mana Thorn(T1) – lvl 1
You can create thorns out of mana to defend parts of your body. If somebody touches it, they will suffer 'Mana Poison' that deals certain amount of damage (5% of your max. mana*Int/every 5s for 60s).
It only consumes your mana when it creates the thorns or recharges them with it. Otherwise, they will serve as extra mana storage.
+2% Mana up to 10% depending on the quantity.
+5% Endurance
Honestly, I expected something more like 'Mana Shock', but this might be nice to have. Alone the extra mana capacity should be beneficial to me in the early stages of my growth. Also, the wildlife should avoid me with that. I am curious how much stronger Tier 2 of this path is.
Mana Spark (T2) – lvl 1
Thorny tendrils grow out of the earth around you and protect you against anything that comes too close. A continuous mana pulse is sent through the tendrils while also bouncing between them to cover the gaps. If a living being is caught by this pulse, it suffers third degree 'Mana burn' (Initial damage 10% of the target's max. health, and 20% of your max.manaInt + 5% of its health as burning damage over the next 300s). Parts of the body that are hit are also paralyzed (5% of your max. manaWis in seconds). It only consumes your mana when it creates thorns or hits a target with a pulse.
+5% Mana
+250 Mana
+5% Endurance
+2 Endurance
Okay, okay, okay. I want this at some point. The description sounds like an electric fence paired with a Tesla coil, except they work with mana. And these stat boosts are awesome and at lvl 1! Ahh, what path should I take!?
Iva was at a loss. All those augmentations went in a totally different direction. She would have loved to take all—except 'Mana Equilbrium'. Without knowing what came after that one on its path, she wouldn't choose it. So she weighed between 'perception' and 'thorn'.
It's kinda sad that I can't just skip T1 and directly choose a T2. If I only knew how I get those 'Branch Augmentation'...but caution is vital, and as long as I'm not sure how fast or how many I will get off them, I shouldn't rush anything. Mhh, let me think for a moment again.
And so she did. She tried to figure out which of those two would be more beneficial to her growth right now and concluded to take 'Mana Perception' even with its vague description. The reason behind that decision was that 'Mana Thorn' required creatures to walk into it, but what if they didn't? What if those ants just moved around them? It is way more practical to be not totally blind and use the 'Domination Root' to kill those ants step by step, decided Iva.
'Ding' You learned 'Mana Perception'.
Iva was hyped at what was happning next.
...
...
...
Hello?
Perplexed, she looked around in her inner world and focused on anything that might have changed. Oh, yes, she said and 'facepalmed' herself. I forgot, I still have no mana...so let's see and...*sigh* wait...
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During her holdup, she felt how more and more ants ran over her roots. It made her squirmy. Iva didn't like the sensation of those insect legs touching her over and over again. She felt exposed and weak and wasn't even sure she could kill them with 'Mana Shock' before they destroyed the roots if she decided to use it. They are definitely here for a reason...thought Iva and tried to calm down by 'hugging' Orbinia. She hadn't noticed it first, but Orbinia was less fractured than before. The sickly orb glowed now in a soft blue color, and the more mana it absorbed, the deeper the blue got.
At one point, Orbinia emitted shiny mana spores. Amazed, Iva watched as they slowly left her core. As they crossed the threshold, some sort of map began to build up in front of her, piece by piece. The longer the process continued, the larger it became. It was very bizarre for Iva because she realized how small she was compared to the world around her for the first time. Well, 'world' was a bit exaggerated, there were only 50 centimeters around her that she could perceive, but in comparison to her, it was huge. And unfortunately, perceiving seemed to be everything she could do. Iva was able to tell where tunnels and empty spaces were, how dense the mass between them was—that is, whether there were stones, metals, or just earth—and where something was moving. Basically, it was like an atlas with GPS built into it without any legends. That was all, but still better than nothing. I'm a bit like a bat...under the ground...as a seed...
Another thing she could now clearly understand was just how many of those *insert youth-friendly word here* were around her. If she had a real face, you would probably see now a face distorted by disgust and fury, which also gritted its teeth. J-just, a little bit more. Yes, Iva, just a little bit more, and you can start this war, and we will begin with the one that is currently gnawing on one of my poor little roots to make more room for their tunnels. I will rip its legs out one by one, and then it can see what this feels like. Yes, yes.
To be correct, Iva was not only furious, she was already in a state that verged on madness. A good sign for this was that she repeated 'Just, a little bit more' so long till her mana was fully refilled. As soon as she saw this, you could hear something snap.
The 'Domonition Root' drilled itself through the earth as fast as it could while Iva kept an eye on every change around her. Then, she cut off one of the tunnels with a swift movement and retruded her root back so it could now make its way to the other possible exit. The insect, in turn, detected that something was wrong and rushed in the direction of the buried path. When it noticed that it was blocked, the ant instantly released pheromones to alarm the others while it tried to exit this tunnel through the other side, but in vain. Iva already destroyed it.
The ant tensed up in panic and didn't know what to do next. It was not a worker like the others and only helped out sporadically; its job was to fight and not something like this here. The queen had been right—something was undoubtedly wrong with the upper areas. The ant was about to go back to the other end to see if there was maybe a small gap where it could get through as quickly as possible and report back to the queen, but then it felt a root bore into its chitin and impaled it. The last thing the ant could see was how a part of the body lay away from it before it finally died.
'ping' You have killed young warrior ant(medium-sized).
'Ding' You reached level 6. 8 Stat points rewarded.
'Ding' You reached level 7. 8 Stat points rewarded.
'Ding' You reached level 8. 8 Stat points rewarded.
'Ding' You reached level 9. 8 Stat points rewarded.
"This was the bad root's first trick,
But the second follows quick," rhymed Iva laughing, a slightly rearranged phrase.
And thus the war had begun.