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Chapter 1084 - Tree Thinking
🕑 Added 2022-12-04 12:16:03 +0000 UTCThe Mother Tree had a name. At least, she’d had a name. The memory was there, vague and distant, tucked in the recesses of her mind. She could recall that she’d had feet, and hands, and eaten food, though such memories were so faint that she couldn’t really recall what it was like.
She’d done it, certainly, but how it had actually felt. That, she could no longer recall.
Birth, or rebirth, on Pangera, now that she could recall. The cold and heartless System welcome followed by her awakening as a brand new life-form.
A plant-type monster. The sense of horror she’d felt was visceral, though now it was hard to relate to the person she’d been in that moment. Back then, the memories of being human, of being Rose, had been fresh. Trapped in a sightless, limbless form had been a nightmare. She hadn’t even had a mouth with which to scream.
Roots and leaves had seemed so foreign to her then, strange and useless. How attitudes shifted with the times. Were she offered a human body now, she would reject it out of hand. The plant was superior to the animal in every way. She’d just needed time to realise it.
[Rosa Spina.]
That had been her species. Perhaps a play on her name? Had that been enough to convince the System to reincarnate her as a plant? Or perhaps her work as a botanist had been the deciding factor.
Regardless, those early weeks had been difficult.
People often think of the animal kingdom as brutal and heartless. They see wolves fighting, or bears clashing, or snakes stealing eggs and young from heartbroken birds and think of how tragic it all is.
The Mother Tree knew better, as had Rose.
There are vines that will strangle trees to death over the course of decades. Every plant is locked in competition with its neighbours every second of every day in a battle that will last until one of them succeeds and one of them dies. Competition for sunlight, for water, for nutrients in the soil. Never ending.
Inside the Dungeon, that battle played out too. It was faster, but no less merciless.
Her roots had pushed into the wall, seeking what every plant-monster around her had been seeking: mana. The more she had, the faster she grew, the faster she grew, the better she could compete.
Fear had thrilled her little plant heart the first time she had touched another of her own kind, several days after her rebirth. There had never been any hope of cooperation between them, that wasn’t how things worked. That plant had probably been a sibling of hers, in a sense. They’d been spawned together at least.
Her first conscious act on Pangera had been to strangle that plant to death. Over a period of weeks, her roots had invaded, choking her neighbour out of the precious mana supply, which she stole for herself. As the monster withered and died, she had been quick to grow into the space made available, to claim it before anyone else could.
A lesson, an excellent one. She would repeat that action thousands of times over the decades.
Deep within her trunk, she felt her soul-space emanate with light. Could the massive tree smile, she might have in that moment. Her children were playing. As creatures of pure energy, they intermingled and conversed with each other using the language only those born of the same soul could understand. It warmed her cold, wooden heart.
As they felt her gaze fall upon them, the braun’chii danced and waved, and her spirit waved back at them, sending them zipping around each other with glee.
So innocent, her children. Too pure for this world.
When she thought of how close she had come to losing them, she felt anger shake her branches. Even after all this time, even after all the strength and power she had accumulated, it still wasn’t enough. Without the intervention of the ants, she may have been crippled.
Even now her roots, buried hundreds of kilometres beneath her trunk, writhed with fury at the thought.
That there would be someone who dared to engineer an entire species to target her weaknesses. She hadn’t encountered anything like it before. A million flowers across three stratum hissed with frustration, but she soon settled herself.
The mana was rising.
Her tap-root already thrummed with power collected deep within the Dungeon, and soon her entire root network would do the same. It would take time for her to gather the power she needed to recover she’d had to spend.
Regenerating after the Legion assault five decades ago had been a long process, one that still wasn’t complete. When her strength had fully returned… she would ensure that those who had tried to steal away her children would get their just desserts.
Until then, she would be patient. In all of the Dungeon, with its long-lived races, immortal monsters and slumbering Ancients, there were few who could be more patient than a tree.
Comments
Rahsheem Reid
Mother trees views are refreshing tbh! Love that we get some more info on her thoughts and how she thinks.
Rahsheem Reid
Yeah I think a tree/folk/colony alliance is in the works.
Hamish Gamma
The assault by the legion happened 50 years ago when they burned the tree. the assault by the termites is completely separate from that and by the Karmodo not the legion
Brandon14754
The assault was 50 years ago, 1 decade is 10 year so 50 years and 5 decades are the same.
Dan K
She did help the ants when they were threatened by the legion but I think in past chapters they mention how close of ally’s the tree and the colony are in the future.
BelligerentGnu
Feat -> Fear. Third to last paragraph has a weird last sentence. Enjoyable, but I'd have liked to know if the mother tree intended to repay the ants at all.
Frank Moore
Legiin assult on the tree was in the past. Thanks RinoZ. Love the side POV chapters
Gopard
I thought the Assault maybe started 50 decades ago? Like that was when the Termites were first created? But I'm not sure could also be this is from the future :)
Centuri
I believe it is referring to an assault the Legion performed. It was one of the side stories from when Anthony was evolving to his current level.
Gopard
Thanks for the chapter!
Anton Shomshor
5 decades ago…? So that was a POV from the future of the main storyline? Which means that in 50 years the second Rending still hasn’t happened.
Patrick
Love these tidbits of other views
