I remember when we were back home our father would sit in front of us, watching us do our homework and studies. Anyone hearing just this would probably think nothing about it, but the truth is that our father had a rather sickening attachment when it came to doing this.

He called it a family tradition, something that has been around for generations. So, whilst he sat in front of us, eyeing every motion we made, a metronome would stand in between us.

*Click* *Click*

*Click* *Click*

*Click* *Click*

*Click* *Click*

For hours and hours, this sound would slowly bore itself into your mind until it became an inseparable part of you. That hellish unbearable sound.

*Click* *Click*

“Why aren't you more successful?”

*Click* *Click*

“Are you really that stupid that you can't solve this?”

*Click* *Click*

“Such a disgrace to our family”

*Click Click*

The insults never stopped flying, never stopped hurting, but at one point, the only thing you would care about was the monotone clicking. Stuck into your inner world, in who you were.

*Click clack*

*clack Cli-*

But one day, it broke. That moment was probably one of the happiest in our sad life that outsiders labeled as privileged. But the clicking never really stopped, even after that torturous device was gone. Whenever something bugged us, something needed a certain amount of attention, it returned.

Like now. The moment I thought too deeply about my choices, I remembered our past. And once that box was opened, the clicking resumed.

Iva cried out in pain; she didn't want that clicking—not again! All alone in her mind, the clicking grew louder and louder, and yet, she had no place to flee. There was no escape, no room for silence in that eerie void.

All I have to do is choose, then this sound will disappear. Yes, I only have to choose, but what, what? Orbinina, what should I choose? Tell me, I don't know what the right choice is!

It wasn't like she was totally clueless, but the sound kept echoing and echoing and was driving her insane. A scene from an old movie popped into her mind where the adventurer needed to choose a cup between many. The wrong choice would kill him, just as Iva’s own choice would seal her fate.

Arguing with herself, she didn't notice that her mumbling was sounding more and more psychotic. She had to choose something, but the clicking kept distracting her. She began to curse the System. There was no way that that memory, that horrible sound, would randomly appear now when she had to choose something important like this. The System wanted her to fail, to make the wrong choice.

Iva swore to herself that she would take revenge on that shitty thing one day, but until then she had to try something else for now.

Before she merged with the others, every memory was blurry or gone. So why couldn't she just isolate that one again, put it behind a wall of mana or something? Yes, just put everything that made you uncomfortable behind a wall, so you didn't have to deal with it at all. And why stop there? Why couldn't she do the same with emotions and feelings at one point? She was so concerned about her situation and how she should handle everything that she never realized that this was also an option.

Maybe I could create something like a seal to lock them all away. But isn't a world without emotions super dull? Well, probably, but for thinking clearly and making the right choices based on facts, it might be the bes—ahh, that fucking clicking just won't go away; I need to create a wall for this memory, now! thought Iva and looked over to Orbinia. Suddenly she knew how to solve this dilemma.

Iva never asked herself how the orb exactly came to be one, or how it became something that could store energy without losing it. She remembered that the surface of Orbinia lost the cracks when her knowledge and handling of mana became more sufficient. So the only logical conclusion was that the outer layer of Orbinia consisted of some kind of mana-like glass. So shouldn't it be possible to find the area in her void where the clicking was coming from and erect the same kind of material around it?

The plan seems fine, but how should I find the— she thought but stopped mid-sentence when she noticed that finding it shouldn't be a problem. This place was her inner self, her mind, her world, after all. The memories were all in here somewhere. That meant that the echoing clicking came from a specific area within.

So Iva began to move within her inner world and tried to pinpoint the exact location whilst every repeating click made her sicker and sicker. Iva couldn't imagine how her old self ever survived this long. He had to have been insane, but he acted rather rational.

Iva was saddened, yet, at the same time, she was happy to be herself now—the abstract concept of gender aside.

Suddenly, the echoing stopped. Instead, its direction became clearer every second.

*Click click*

The roaring hammered in her head.

*Click Click*

The inner world trembled. The more she closed the distance, the more everything became an abstract concept of what was supposed to be her cuddly endless void.

What. The. Fuck. thought Iva after stepping over a blurry white border that swam on the ground. Like oil on water, but reversed as the white stuff contaminated the void. This place felt wrong, even if it was supposed to be a part of her—like it was twisting the already false reality.

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Soon the mindscape changed into a nightmare for every watchmaker...or any person in their right mind.

Imagine a landfill where a grandfather's clock was half-buried in the ground every few meters. Its pendulum still swinging, but the sound it produced was a dull, slowed-down tone. Every tenth time the ticking of the clock would appear, the atmosphere felt heavy and white ripples streamed through the ground. But as soon as the metronome resounded, the effects reversed, just before the pendulum prepared to trigger its first tick.

The further Iva got, the more clocks rose from the ground, until she couldn't even think straight anymore because of the hammering noise.

But then she saw it: the hellish tool their father used. It was inside a sphere of white, and if that wasn't enough, the area inside the sphere was a whole different realm on its own again.

The metronome stood on a wooden pedestal, placed on a big broken piece of stone floating far above the ground, surrounded by giant shards of splintered glass. There were so many shards of glass that she couldn't count them all. Ultimately, the only accessible floor inside the white sphere ended up reaching only a few meters before leading into a deep blinding abyss.

As soon as she crossed the threshold of the glistening white light, a shock went through her. With amazement, she watched as an aethereal body formed around her. When it was finished, Iva looked like a creature of pure energy. There were no detailed outlines, only a feminine base form.

This is an alienating feeling, not gonna lie, wondered Iva as she moved her arms. It has been so long...no; it's the first time for me. I'm a seed, yet I have a body I can move—but why?

Sadly, Iva hadn’t time to ponder about this—that had to be done another time. When Iva took her first step onto the cliff's edge, the pieces of glass slowly hovered around the central chunk of stone— each in a different tempo and height.

Iva sighed, I really have to jump from piece to piece to reach the metronome...

She took a run-up and—hop, with one big leap—landed on the first piece. When she looked down, Iva noticed that nearly see-through images were moving inside the glass. But she couldn’t make out any details, soIva took the next leap.

Here, the images were clearer. She saw a man and a woman arguing with each other. Somehow, she knew that scene. Iva shook her head and made her way to the next part.

This time, it felt like the images were burning themselves into her aethereal mind. For a moment, she stumbled but was able to regain her footing before falling into the white abyss.

Mother, she tried to stop him, stop his methods. She was sad that the human she had fallen in love with would turn out like th—huh, human? Why did she phrase it like that?

The following piece wasn't as bad on her footing as the last one. However the images she saw on it sent her reeling into a pit of existential dread—one she knew she could never escape alone.

Our mother didn't die? But— I— we— how’s that possible?! We saw it! We were on her deathbed! No, it can't be false. What were we?!

And like the shattered glass, something fundamentally broke in Iva. Nothing made sense anymore. Was it just another trick from the System? No, Iva was sure it hadn't gotten its hands on this matter. But why did the System hate her, hate them, hate their mother? Iva wasn't sure what was truly real anymore.

I have to go on. This place- I can't think! The clicking, the shards, everything is trying to confuse me, to stop me from figuring out what the right choice is. I need to go now—Orbinia is waiting for me.

It took Iva a few more jumps to reach her goal. The steady flow of returning memories was simply pushed aside by her sheer determination to silence the source of her distress.

*click click*

She reached the final platform—the metronome was clicking before her.

*click click*

Her anger took hold of her for a moment, and she struck.

*click click*

Her hand simply went through the tool.

Figures that I just can't destroy it like this, mumbled Iva, disappointed. So, let's try that mana barrier.

Iva wasn't exactly sure how to create it, but she was still inside herself, so it should work differently. Here, the flow of mana led directly from the 'Mana Root' to Orbinia—like a vein. So all she had to do was redirect it or build a new one. Technically, it should have been possible for her to pull the mana to her, as she did in the beginning before she had Orbinia.

Like a pump, she began to direct the flow of mana with her mind. Every thought was another thrust in her direction. And very slowly, Iva could feel how a vein pushed its way to her. It was small, but it was something, and maybe it would grow bigger over time. Suddenly, she realized that she probably was able to alter this place with mana. If something like this was possible in her inner world, why couldn’t she make some cuddly pillows inside a forest glade? Iva smiled at this.

Four hundred thousand clicks later, the vein finally reached its destination. It felt like days, but Iva had long since lost her sense of time, and she wouldn't dare open her status. She was afraid that the vein would simply vanish if she lost her concentration.

Either way, now that she had a connection to her ‘Mana Root’ here, or rather, one near her—it couldn't penetrate the white sphere—she could pull the raw mana out of it and energize the close proximity around the metronome.

When she felt it had reached its limit, she directed the mana around the device into a whirl. She squeezed the mana tighter and tighter and increased pressure on it.

After a while, she saw thin crystalline particles forming, spreading from the inside out like ice on a lake, until everything was covered by a thin layer.

From now on, she only squeezed the mana tighter until the layer became more and more transparent and glassy. Finally, the metronome went still, and blessed silence finally fell. Even if she did not know exactly what had happened, she was successful.

Not a second later, the white sphere that blocked the vein began to fracture and shattered. But instead of falling, the pieces started to rise and turned dark until they returned to the void. The same happened to the clocks. Only the splintered glass acted otherwise. They melted together into a black goo and formed a stairway to the flying chunk of rock.

The chaos that plagued Iva was gone. The System had lost this move. And now that she could think clearly again, the choice seemed too easy.

Of course, I will choose the 'True Weeping Willow Seed'. Everything else would be idiotic. I mean, yeah, some of the others seem entirely broken, but those evolutions forget to tell you something important—Where. You. Are.

I could be in a garden inside of a town. Imagine if I were in a city or a populated place. I couldn't defend myself and grow strong enough. Yes, the other evolutions are nice, but they are baits! And honestly, the 'Crystal Willow Seed' lets me wait for thousands of years. I don't want to be lonely for that long. If others can handle that kind of loneliness, go ahead— I couldn't.

The 'Pure Mana Seed' will make me a target for every power-hungry bigot. As I said, if I'm in a town, it simply means my death or a life in prison.

Well, 'Hollow Seed' is the same as the mana one. Town= Fucked. Without further information, I won't even think about it. Also, the description reads like something written by a thirteen-year-old kid who goes outside and says to other people: "I am fire, I am death!"

Let's skip the ‘Antwood’ one and talk about why I chose the 'True Weeping Willow Seed'. Well, it's the only one where I can be sure that I won't be destroyed as soon as I finally break through the soil. Also, it gives me a good scope of possibilities I can work with. I can't decide right now what I should specialize in without knowing the world I live in or at least without knowing my immediate surroundings. The 'might be harder to nurture further’ sounds fishy, but it probably isn't that bad.

Soo, let's goo! thought Iva as she mentally pressed the evolution choice.

>The world darkens.<

>We should have known.<

>The rise. The rise!<

W-what is happening?!

Suddenly, her mind began to fade away, and the System uttered in a broken electrical voice.

You chose poorly.

Then, everything turned white.