After discussing it with everyone, I used the admin controls to acquire a basic Strong Wood seed for myself, and then saved it with the Digital Conversion system. With that done, I logged out, pulling the visor off of myself in the ‘real world’.
Now, in World Seed, this seed took a form similar to an elongated egg with wisps of green light and smoke circling around it. When created with the Digital Conversion system on Earth, it took the form of a small, circular token. On the front of the token was an icon of a tree, and I could sense rich mana and natural energy from it. Narrowing my eyes, I focused on appraising the token and activated one of my more rarely used Keeper abilities.
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Magic Seed: Strong Wood Ability: Reads the user’s mana to recreate their intentions via manipulating wood. Can be absorbed by the body for more convenient use. |
I blinked as I read through the description of the ‘seed’ in my hand. Like we thought, it’s different than the ones Aurivy made. There will probably be a few companies trying to figure out how to reproduce these in the near future.
I shook my head, pinching the token between my fingers hard enough that it shattered, dissipating into mana and natural energy. Afterwards, I leaned back in the seat and slipped the visor back into place to log back in.
When I arrived, I found the others all waiting for me, so I quickly explained the effects of the token that had been created. At the same time, I got rid of the one that had spawned. Honestly, if I wanted to keep a seed, it would be a much more powerful one. Our characters were already essentially high level druids and shamans, so that particular seed only gave a slight enhancement when using wood-based abilities.
“So, my seeds earlier were a failure?” Aurivy asked, pouting her lips. Julia quickly shook her head to deny Aurivy’s statement.
“I don’t think that they were a failure. I think that they were a proper integration between the seed system and the regular geometric system. This is just a complete translation.” She assured with a bright smile, causing Aurivy to nod her head.
“Alright… so, now what?” She looked around, Dana being the first to answer.
“Monster hunting! That’s the whole point of this game, right? Finding, taming, and fusing monsters?”
“That’s right.” Ryone agreed, seeming a bit eager herself. “With the ten of us here, there’s no reason to wait for the tree to finish growing.”
“Makes sense.” I closed my eyes, nodding my head and focusing. With so many of us, I had no doubt that we could take on some monsters on our own. “There’s a pack of monsters resembling wolves off to the east, about three hundred meters. It looks like they’re slowly moving towards us, so they’re probably on the hunt.”
“What element can you sense from the creatures?” Tsubaki asked, causing me to arch a brow. “I discovered when I was playing this game with Dana that all monsters release a faint elemental fluctuation in this game, which showcases their affinity.”
I gave a small nod, sensing them once again. “Water… no, ice. They’re releasing a faint aura of ice in their surroundings.”
When I opened my eyes, I saw Aurivy, Dana, and her familiars all grinning at one another. “You girls thinking what I’m thinking?” Aurivy asked, the other three nodding their heads.
“Thunderstorm!” They shouted in unison, before holding their hands up to the sky and focusing. Natural energy surged around their bodies, forming a thin pillar of light that shot into the sky. Immediately, the clouds began to darken, rolling and thundering.
“Isn’t the rain just going to make them stronger?” Leowynn asked, though Julia shook her head.
“The rain will only fall if they want it to. They’re condensing the clouds and building up the charge in them. It’s a basic Druid principle to save energy on creating larger streams of lightning.” As Julia finished speaking, we could see the wolves in the distance approaching for the first time. Frost spread where they stepped like footprints, and they were charging over to surround us.
At a glance, there were twenty of these beasts, though I knew that there were a few more hiding in the back from when I was sensing. I felt a surge of energy, lightning bolts as thick as my body striking down and gathering around the four girls. They did not hit the ground and dissipate, rather condensing into orbs that hovered around them.
When Aurivy and the others opened their eyes, these balls of lightning shot out arcs of electricity, leaping from wolf to wolf. In the distance, I could just imagine the hiding monsters turning and fleeing at the sight of the pack being incapacitated like this. Their bodies slid along the ground, twitching as the electricity clung to them.
Well, that was anticlimactic. I thought to myself with a shake of my head, looking at the wolves. “So…it looks like there’s enough for everybody to have a starter pet.” I said, only to be interrupted by Aurivy.
“Wait! This is a perfect chance!” The others all looked over at her for an explanation, Aurivy grinning. “The monster fusion system! Fusing a monster with its own kind has the highest success rate! It won’t change into a new species or anything, but it will strengthen the original monster in all aspects. With so many frost wolves, we can create a single pet, strengthened four times over. That’ll be more useful than having all of us with a single frost wolf!”
“I… see. In that case, who wants this one?” I looked around. None of us had any particular affinity with the ice element, so it was really up for anyone to pick.
“Oh, I’ll take it! I’ve always wanted a puppy, ever since Dana got hers!” Lifre jumped into the air, waving her hand.
Aurivy nodded her head, explaining the process. “Go over and tame sixteen of them. Then, split them up into groups of two and fuse them together. Repeat this process until you only have one left. As for the other four, you can create a double-strengthened pet in case we find more frost wolves in the future for you to continue strengthening.”
Lifre nodded her head, running over and placing her hand on the twenty spasming wolves. Each one was wrapped in a faint glow, vanishing briefly before reappearing and standing calmly beside her. As I watched this process, a thought occurred to me. “Why don’t we just save one as a blueprint, and then recreate it repeatedly to further the strengthening process?”
Lifre’s ears perked up, looking at Aurivy in excitement. Unfortunately, Aurivy shook her head. “There’s nothing like Blood Heart or Mage Heart in this game. If we want to create a monster, we need another source of ki and mana, or else we’ll be bleeding ourselves dry every time we make one. There might be upgrades we can get for the tree to produce large quantities, but until then, we don’t have an option like that available.”
That earned a small pout from Lifre, who sullenly returned to taming the wolves. However, halfway through, she looked over in a panic. “Aurivy! I only have ten pet slots!”
Aurivy simply rolled her eyes at that. “Just merge them in pairs as you get them. Make sure that you only merge them with ones of the same level, though. Otherwise, there’s a risk of negative mutation.”
Lifre blinked, quickly fusing the ten she had already acquired, before resuming the taming process. Every time the wolves fused together, the result was a larger, more powerful beast. Originally, each of these wolves was as tall as my waist, but after she was done… There was one just as tall as I was when standing on all fours, and one that was more than double my height.
The taller of the two released an unmistakable aura of ice, the ground beneath it freezing. Just standing near it caused the temperature to drop by tens of degrees. Its breath was a cloud of frost, and Lifre happily climbed up on top of it. “I’ll call you Fenny!” As she spoke, she unsummoned the smaller of the two, looking over at us.
Although the beast was quite large, it was not enough for all of us to ride together. At most, the smaller five could ride together with two of the others. Seeing this, she pursed her lips. Reluctantly, she dismounted from Fenny and unsummoned it, causing it to fade away.
“Well, let’s find the next batch, then!” She quickly cheered herself up, leading the way to continue.
When Ashley released the news that World Seed had been released, there was a rush of activity. Players from every game eagerly went to check out the new product. It had been so long since Fragments of Acidia first came out, they were looking forward to seeing what awaited them in this new game.
There were those who first checked Darkflame Technology’s website, making the connection between this game and the old Natural Seed game. However, the fact that this was a ‘real’ game opened up so many possibilities. There had always been people wanting to bring the effects of elemental seeds into the game world, with only varying amounts of success based on personal experiments.
Additionally, many were interested in the prospect of playing as a Sylvan, given that the vast majority of the population never had the chance to interact with this relatively reclusive race. Finally, there were the monster tamers of the world, eager to see what sorts of creatures they could create within the game.
Like Aurivy, many of them quickly realized that they wouldn’t be able to bring their own pets into the game, but the reverse was entirely possible. As long as they created a sufficiently powerful monster in the game, they would be able to reproduce it in real life. The only real downside was that they would no longer be able to fuse that monster in the real world, as that system was exclusive to the game.
Regardless, there were billions of players for World Seed within only the first three hours of the game’s launch, scattered across the various worlds. They were coming together to form their own trees, some opting to skip the tutorial while others experienced it for themselves to get a better understanding of how to utilize their new abilities.
Meanwhile, as World Seed became flooded with players, various research institutions received a message from the Ashtanu Research Foundation led by James. This message, which came with the God-Queen’s seal, gave a priority order to these research stations to focus on void defense plans for an indefinite period of time, with the God-Queen herself agreeing to handle the relevant research fees..
Although there was no explicit reason given, this message was already quite effective. Few people would refuse an order stamped by the Greater Pantheon, and these institutions were chosen due to their excellence in void studies to begin with. Although some were reluctant, they put aside their current projects to begin looking into better defense plans for the void.
While this was happening, various churches of the Greater Pantheon were likewise being given a mission to select skilled candidates to ascend as Fallen Gods. As with the researchers, there was no explanation given, only the mandate that candidates must be chosen and trained for this new position.
With most of the world distracted by the new game, World Seed, there was a silent operation in the background to help prepare for the inevitable. And although this operation was missed by most, there were naturally those few able to pick up on it, due to their connections with various sectors.
The clan elder of the ninjas, as a prime example, looked at the various reports that had been compiled. With their information network, it was an easy thing to piece together. Despite the secretive nature of the research teams, many had long been infiltrated by them. “So… there is some void threat anticipated by the Greater Pantheon, perhaps even the Keeper himself?” The elder muttered to himself as he looked at the reports.
With the information in front of him, the elder naturally had one objective, and that was to prepare on his end as well. If there was a void threat, then they would need skilled soldiers to fight it.
