Research Trees_Tree of Aeons

Research Trees

 Year 76 Month 10 Continued

 So. 

 Now that things are returning back to normal for me, somewhat, is to focus on the volcano. The volcano clearly is a point of great interest to me, as it generates so much heat and energy, something I would need for my valley.

 But, the next phase involves defeating the magma monsters that spawn near the volcano, and protecting my trees. And from the initial skirmishes between the beetles and the magma monsters, they didnt do well at all. It takes about 5 beetles to beat 1 magma monster, because the magma monsters are able to burn the beetles when they get near, and the beetles attack by ramming the magma monsters with their horns.

 So, bad matchup, really. And thats one problem I need to fix. I cant manually go in and use root strike on the magma monsters. Okay, actually I can, but its just that, if I do that personally then I dont have time to do other stuff, so I need the beetles or whatever solution Ie up with, to be able to act somewhat autonomously.

 Horns, any ideas?

 Research fire resistant protective shells, and magical horns, for more power!

 Thatll take 3 and 6 months, master. Trevor giving the numbers, But thatll dy our other research on further enhancements to the trees resistances.

 Ugh. I want all the research. This feels like ying those games with huge tech trees and you just want to choose all of them avable options, because in some ways, you do need them all. Rmendations?

 We could spread out our time on both of them. Trevor and Dimitree said in unison. But itll be a 2 month dy for the other 2 projects.

 No. I want them too.

 So, the next step is more forest minds, but clearly I am limited in this aspect.

 Are you willing to consider my help, now? Alexis speaks up.

 ... Ill think about it.

 Year 76 Month 11

 Winter! Well, its ratherfortable this winter, thanks to the hot water piped from theke, and my new winter resistance aura.

 The New Freekans are doing well, fortifying themselves and they did manage to build up arge stockpile of food. It seems their indecision led to Sh denouncing the truce, and now they even use the New Freekas of coborating with the enemies. So, the truce is off!

 But, even though the truce is off, it did not descend into war directly. After all, Sh is still tied up in their conflict with Nung and Takde, and the winter also severely impairs their ability to wage any assault on New Freeka. Its actually a norm in the world, that war is dered but actual fighting does not happen until some timeter, and for certain human nations, there are even rules of engagements that the rulers follow, or they find themselves having awarded cursed titles, for falling out of favor of the human war gods.

 Gaya, apparently, is one such god that demand certain rules of engagement. That battles are fought on open fields, each battle starts with amander leading the charge, there is clear publicly dered casus belli behind the conflict, and that arge prayer is held before eachrge war.

 Strangely enough, despite how restrictive it sounds, Gaya as a god, participates rather directly in terms ofrger conflicts, often grantingmanders tremendous gifts. It is said that if heroes, the singr most powerful humans in the world failed, they would turn to themanders of Gaya to defend the world, though, in reality, there is still a huge gap in their power. Gods in the world interact with it in a few ways, one through gifts, and there are rules around such gifts, that all gods follow, even the dark gods native to the world.

 Well, I partly learned this from Alexis, because Alexiss first acts whening to this world, is actually to figure out how to go back, so she went on head on diving into books on gods, magic and all that. But of course, there are restrictions on going back, and one of those restrictions, ced by the million-headed hydra that watches over earth, is that the souls return clean. In short, they return without their powers or memories, though they may still experience dreams which reminds them of their past lives.

 So back to war. The New Freekas are of course annoyed by the development, but knowing that Shs engagement wont happen so soon, they decide to fortify themselves, to prepare for theing conflict. Despite the cold winters, New Freekas poption is a respectable 35,000, and so, they have the ability to field close to 13,000 fighters to the battle, which is a decent fighting force.

 Sh may easily sent 50,000, or perhaps 100,000, but they are a farrger state with morepeting priorities, and an ongoing war with the Nung and Takde. So unless Sh really provokes them, they may just let this little conflict carry on for a bit more.

 Yvon though, is still trying to avoid war, so her negotiators now are instead focusing on whos the real culprit of the Blood Blizzard, which, increasingly, is pointing towards the acts of a terrorist group that infiltrated the senior army leadership of all three nations, in order to carry out such arge sacrifice.

 In short, even if they did find who was behind this, the emerging fact still points to all three nations contributing to the blood blizzard, and none of the three nations will want to implicate themselves in the spell, so the wars just going to go on.

 So too bad.

 This week, I converted one of therge [subsidiary trees] into a training room at Lausannes requests. The weather outside is now far too cold forbat practice, so their swordfighting practice goes indoors.

 Shes going to turn 8 soon, and despite her earlierck of talents, she somehow managed to pick it up. Perhaps through abination of [dream tutor] and [powerlevelling], she did acquire sufficient swordfighting skills to have simple spars with Jura.

 And she has also started to gain levels. There seems to be some kind of barrier from gaining levels for very young children, but this level barrier is inconsistent, and varies across races. Out of curiosity I had her dip into one of the bibs, just to check on her. I had a theory previously that young children, where their spring that connects their body to the soul, and vice versa, is not yet fully mature, then that person is unable to gain levels. I mean, prior to this I could not even have an assessment of Lausannes estimated soul rank, but now I could.

 And my intuition is right. Indeed, her spring, the fountain which produces mana now has a consistent shape. This raises a big set of questions, as in, what exactly influences the size and shape of the fountain? I also have a few thoughts about this, one is whether all souls are the same, but there is some other thing which acts as the link between the soul and the body, and that then influences a persons full potential, or, if the souls are different, then there should be a way to manipte and change the qualities a soul have.

 Master, your using my root-brain to augment your theories again Trevor grumbles. Ah yes, it seems I sometimes unknowingly tap into the processing power of the trees to think. But this has the effect of taking away processing power from Trevor, which then impairs his performance. Think of the root-brainplex as aputer processor, and if Im using it, Trevor cant.

 I should have more root-brains. Its logical, no? Ie from a world of quad cores and more. It would be fascinating if I somehow stitch all these root brains together into some kind of collective super-brain, no?

 [Special project unlocked]

 [The Grand Mind Tree - significantly boosts tree-rted research output, and grants wider understanding of soul magics. Gains additional psychic-type magical abilities]

 [Requires 10 x root brainplexes, and 1 ton of gold and 1 ton of quartz crystals. Once all prerequisites areplete, construction will take 1.5 years]

 Ah. My own supeputer. Well, kind of.

 Alexis, youre redundant if I get this.

 Noooooooooooooooooooo. Alexis sighs, but then she pauses, But youre not going to get it so quickly. Itll still take time. So, assign me to a bib, please? Youre going to have to wait probably 2 to 3 years before you achieve it. Maybe more.

 Shes right though. Its going to take a while. Construction of the root-brainplex itself requires 10 x Blood Crystals, and 50 x fresh animal heads, and so 10 root brains means a whole lot of blood crystals, and that means money, which we probably do not have.

 Youre right, Alexis. But I still dont really trust you, so, Ive decided that I will merge you with a bib someday, but you will be watched and observed.

 Thats okay. I rather tinker in the biological structure of trees and beetles than being stuck in this dark and dreary ce. Cant you do something about how gloomy your soul realm is? A bib it is then.

 Its a transit lounge for souls to reincarnate. Not helpful for it to be a pleasant ce to be. I cant have too many souls not wanting to move on. Well, to be fair, the souls only linger around for 6 months to a year, and after that they will move on. The soul realm, whether pleasant or not has no influence on this.

 I got side tracked again. I mumble to myself and resume watching Lausanne. Her bodys really young, after all shes only 7 turning 8. All the dream tutor has given her a rather varied set of skills, and so shes actually pretty versatile as a person.

 She still wants to be a hero, buttely shes starting to understand that theres a gap between herself and the true heroes that could change the world with their power, though somedays, she still believes she can stand up there. Shell have to gain a lot more levels if she wants to. Only with levels, can she even think of standing up to a hero, whos blessed by the heavens.

 TreeTree, do you have powers to you know make me stronger?

 I do. The ginseng tree, and it grants a permanent boost. But the problem is that they just keep dying, usually after their first unlock. If I grow a ginseng tree inside me, maybe thatll work. And it doesnt help that they die within two to three months in this cold weather, so Ill have to wait till the wizards actually manage to weaken or dispel this cold weather, before resuming my renting of my 3 ginseng trees.

 I do, but youll have to wait.

 Okay! Ill need all the help I can get! Lausanne raises her hand, like hurrah. Uncle Jura says heroes are super super strong, and Ill need all the blessings the world can give me to be as strong as them.

 Hmmm

 Thats actually possible. Perhaps throughout the world there are various permanent blessings, simr to ginseng trees. If a person could gather enough of them, they could be as strong as heroes.

 I think I should go on a journey someday, with Uncle Jura and mom. To get those blessings.

 Thats a good idea Lausanne

 Juras healed, but his bones still need to fully recover. So hes just doing simple exercises, and relying on Bamboo to provide training to Lausanne. Bamboo and Jura actually manage to achieve some kind of bond, and Bamboo now manifests itself as a flexible wooden arm for Jura, so Juras back to being two-handed.

 Kinda like a prosthetic, but with a summon. Quite a cool oue actually, I frankly didnt think of that. Its not as good as a real arm, of course, but as workarounds go, its pretty good since Bamboo and Jura as a familiar has a mental link.

 Bamboo is due for upgrade too. Yes, So is Horns.

 I think ill go on a journey when I turn 15. Thats when they say were old enough to start travelling. Then Uncle Jura can go with me.

 I nod. Lausanne talks to me a lot and that means she listens to my thoughts about the future. Strangely, I think this means Ive influenced here to think about what she wants to do, unlike the rest of them who tends to look at things at a shorter time frame.

 Hows Brich and Wahlen doing?

 Theyre working in New Freeka. I think Brichs working in a shop selling potato breads.

 Ah Wasnt she doing something else. Ah well. Not everyone has ambitions of the grand kind, and thats not a fault.

 Wahlens working in the treasurers office as a administrator. Hes learning how to read and write too.

 Literacy. Its a mix and match in this world, most of them time it is taught by a vige elder in the small viges, and to some extent it is a valuable skill, useful in government matters and trade. Some cultures have stronger emphasis on reading, some less. Elves surprisingly do not have much emphasis on writing and reading, as their long lives tend to mean they will pick it up over the years. They also seem to favor oral traditions, having an appointed old one in every vige to remember the traditions and ceremonies. Certain subtleties that the written word cannot capture.

 I should learn to read and write too. A hero must be smart!

 Knowing how to read does not make you smart, Lausanne.

 Is it? But at least Im not stupid!

 Not knowing how to read does not make you stupid.

 Less stupid. She mumbles. I can work if I know to how to read and write. Good for travelling.

 Good point. Writers are useful, they are often paid to write letters and messages. Some writers double up as messengers, and sort of mailmen, and this is usually a rtively good way to gain admission into a merchant association or guild. Ever thought of being a merchant? Thats a good way to travel the world without involving yourself in too much fighting.

 A hero as a merchant? Lausanne slumps, but then she is actually thinking about it.

 Yeah. Why cant heroes be merchants?

 Shes seriously thinking about it.

 To be fair, I havent heard of a merchant hero before. Their neutrality kinds of make it hard for them to y the role of a hero, which has to take a side.

 Lausanne, rest times up. Practice. Jura calls, and he picks up a wooden practice sword and shield. Thanks to Bamboos augmented limb, he can now teach Lausanne the standard sword and shield method of fighting.

 A hero as a merchant Its still on her mind, but then she stands and rejoins Jura in the middle of the training-tree. Essentially, its arge empty room in a tree.

 As Jura and Lausanne resume their regr practice, I then turn my attention to the volcanic area once more. Some of the magma monsters are getting a little bit aggressive and I have to periodically kill them to protect the subsidiary trees there.

 The volcano is an active volcano, its caldera partly blown apart, so theres a part where there is liquidva flowing out of it. As is the norm in the world, this leads to magma monsters spawning, and from what the beetles have seen further inside, there arerger magma monsters closer to the caldera.

 So far, they are territorial, so they dont seem to attack us if we do not approach.

 Master, it is time I get an upgrade. Horns suggests. Hes fully recovered now, so he is due for an upgrade, since he capped out at level 20 earlier. Bamboo too, so I took the chance to review their upgrade requirements.

 [Horns, Level 20 Beetle Knight]

 Upgrade options avable : <ul><li>Blue - Baron Beetle - 5 x blue crystals, 30 x almostplete skeleton of arge animal

 Gainsmander effects, which grants nearby beetle increased abilities </li></ul><ul><li>ck - Beetle Dark Knight - 10 x obsidian rocks, 20 xrge ws

 Gainsbat skills</li></ul>

 [Bamboo, Level 20 Woodbear Eidolon]

 Upgrade options avable : <ul><li>Blue - Armor path - 50 small copper ingots & 5 medium red rubies needed

 Gains defensive abilities</li></ul><ul><li>ck - w path - 50 small iron ingots & 5 medium onyx needed.</li></ul>

 Gains offensive abilities 

 [Trevor, Level 27 Forest MInd]

 [Will be unlocked at level 30]<ul><li>ck - Skull Shell - 10 x Bone of a wyvern, 1 x heart of a lion and 50 x Bones of a lizard</li></ul>

 Gains a ghostly projection

 All these upgrades impose a lot of resource requirements. So Ill need more resources.

 You require more minerals. Dimitree chimes in, with a russian ent. It reminds me of a wraith. Or is that a terran goliath?

 Ah yes. Youve been taking in a bit too much of my game references.

 Ah whatever. If I want these resources, Ill get them from New Freeka.

 ---

 The tree spirit demands what?

 The advisors look concerned, when Yvon shares my resource demands with the rest of her council.

 Blood crystals, gold, quartz crystals, copper and iron ingots, rubies, onyx, blue crystals. Yvon repeats, but she clearly understands their concern.

 One of Yvons closest advisors then rifies, its more of a request than a demand, right?

 Yvon shrugs, Im not too sure if I understand the tree spirit correctly, but I think it sounds more like a demand than a request.

 Should we? One of the advisors look really worried. It feels a bit like extortion.

 I believe most of you have seen the Tree Spiritsbat abilities, and its incredible abilities throughout this valley The recent hot water spring around the tree of prayer is a recent addition.

 Its hard though, those goods are not regr stuff. They are jewels or crystals. I mean, even the cheapest of those are the blood crystals and the quartz. The trees asking for a lot.

 Well, the recent burst in natural growth, and the hot water in the valley helped us alot too.

 And it quickly seems clear that its divided into two camps, one who thinks that my demands are reasonable given my assistance to their survival, and theres a bunch who thinks its excessive and they should only give what they can manage.

 Yvon mostly stayed out of it, asking the council to decide, as her soul is contracted to me, she says she is not a neutral party to the decision.

 Of course, from my point of view, I know that these people need a bit of encouragement.

 So I decide to withdraw all the hot water piping into the New Freeka, and so in this cold month, they had a really cold week.After that week, they met up again and agreed that it is best not to offend me, so decided to support my demands. I think between Sh and me, theyve decided to be on my good side.

 Year 76 Month 12

 [Monsters in. Youve gained a level. Level 129!]

 [Youve gained a new skill : Training Treehouse]

 [Training treehouse improves experience gain, skill gain chances, and reduces injuries significantly]

 Uh. This sounds like an extension of my training room. Seriously, this system leans heavily of the nurturing, growing side of things, but really sparingly, grants me offensive abilities.

 I suppose if I want to work around the tree, I need to think like the system. If I was designing a system for a tree, what would I think about?

 My suspicions is that a system in which a soul tree is at the center of, focuses on a few core principles. Again, this is just a theory that I have, based on what I experience so far.

 Grow, nurture and endure

 This is the first, core principle with any tree. The logical driver behind any tree is to grow, to expand, and so, I should get a wide range of abilities that promote growth, and allow me to endure wide variety of damage, and still recover. And with it, the ability to support young things, and also build an ecosystem with the tree as the foundation.

 Enhance and adapt

 A tree that expands would need to adapt to various environments, and react to the challenges that are unique to this world. This is the evolutionary, research side of what I suspect is a natural inclination. If trees are unable to react in a world where magic is native, then trees would quickly go extinct. So, I believe the trees in this magical world have natural adaptation abilities superior to that of our world, and the system supports them.

 Then, theres the Soul abilities which arise as a soul tree. These are not natural tree abilities, but exist because I am a soul-rted kind of entity, and so the system has to grant me abilities that are natural for a soul-tree to have.

 Thinking along these lines, if I intend to get more offensive abilities, it would grow as a result of working towards more enhancement and adaptation, as a result of a tree being forced to defend itself.

 In other words, to game the system to give me offensive abilities, I must put myself into a situation where self-defense is a required adaptation.

 Now how do I go about doing that

 Never mind, I quickly upgrade that empty training room into this training treehouse, so that Lausanne can benefit from it.

 Oh, and I begin to test out those carnivorous nts that I got.

 They function more like traps, really, and they spring out to eat anything about the size of wolves. Which is pretty good. But, the drawback is the digestive period is quite long, so essentially, if a huge swarm of demon houndse along, theyll be full very quickly.

 So, useful under certain circumstances, but its use in arge scalebat is probably limited.

 If anything, what I would need is a firebreathing tree. I mean, imagine it, if a tree can breath fire, or even poison, that would be pretty useful. And such options are indeed avable on my research options.

 Being frustrated at how slow my research it, I eventually decide to take a chance on Alexis.

 If you try anything funny, I will kill you.

 Understood, but I am soul-contracted to you, so dont worry about it. Were aligned, trust me.

 I cant. But Ill give you the opportunity to prove me wrong.

 I initially would have preferred Me, but the soul-contract is an additionalyer of protection I have, so after some thinking, its actually better to use Alexis first. If Me gone rogue, I may find that I have less means of retaliating.

 [Initiating soul forge]

 [Combining Alexis with an external bib]

 [Combining]

 A bolt of thunder strikes the forge tree, and from it, emerges a glowing blue seed, its asrge as a dog, and it floats over to the external bib that Ive chosen, and that blue seed embeds itself in it.

 [Alexis has sessfully merged with an external bib!]

 [Alexis is now aboratory spirit, level 1]

 Huh.

 Oh wow. She mumbles, she manifests herself as a glowing blue ghost inside theboratory. Theres so much data so much data.

 Uh.

 Im fine. Im fine! This is amazing. She seems to be looking at some kind of interface, tapping into my stored records of all the bib scans I have done in the past, including herself. Even my own records are here. Ive never realised what youve been looking at!

 At this point, I decide to just observe her for a while.

 This is amazing.

 The external bib which she now possesses, and is part of her, is actually a tree with a hollow interior, filled with pods, and various equipments for testing. It has a transportation system, in which a beetle delivers any of its required materials, for research.

 Your visual way of representing the soul and the body-mind connection is incredible. Ive read books on the theoretical basis of magic, and how the souls interact with the body, but this this is mindblowing. Its amazing how intuitive it is, representing it as a spring and a field which that spring nourishes. All those magical theory books make life difficult by oveplicating the terminology and using difficult to understand words. This. This is concise!

 Oh. Okay. Shes really dived into the deep end. I honestly didnt think of it as that unique, but I suppose humans with no ess to the [bib] would find it that way.

 Alexis, are you okay? Me asks, sounding a bit concerned.

 Oh more than okay. This is amazing. This is exactly what Ive been trying to find when I was trying to research magic! You should see this.

 You know I dont like that kind of stuff. Me shrugs.

 Ah yes, but Im fine. Im really fine.

 Me sighs, I sometimes forget how much of a nerd you can be.

 Hey! Alexis floats and looks at other stuff. The representation of the demons presence as a parched fire with a dried field is also fascinating. It seems to imply the demonic energies is antithesis to our own, and opens up so many options on how we can counteract their presence. Whats this, a data set on our star mana and those floating vases pouring out star mana? Holy cow, this is like mindblowing too! What else do you have!!! Alexis is constantly floating about the bib, looking at more and more interfaces.

 Me turns to me. When she reads a great book, she cant stop talking about it. I think shes in that phase again.

 Me! Seriously! This information can advance magic research by decades!

 At this point, I decide to cut in. Alexis, your task is to research the beetles, and the countermeasures necessary to conquer the volcano. Dont get side tracked.

 Ah yes, yes. But can you give me a week, let me just have a look at this huge pile of data you have. Im sure theres some other amazing stuff in here.

 No. I will not tolerate disobedience on your first day of as a bib spirit. Get to work.

 She sighs, and then she nods. Okay okay. Ill do it, but give me daily free time alright. I work 8 hours a day, alright. The remaining hours are mine for rest and my own activities. I really want to look at all these data!

 12 hours. And you will be monitored.

 Ah fine. I know. And she gained a level. Although her gods blessing is lost when she died, she still retains quite a fair bit of perks, one of which, is the experience perks. <ul><li>Beetle winter adaptation stage II - 4 Months remaining</li><li>Volcanic adaptation stage II - 6 months remaining. </li><li>Tree winter adaptation stage II - 6 months remaining</li><li>Beetle volcanic battleform - 3 months remaining (mayplete earlier)</li><li>Beetle volcanic defensive armors- 2 months remaining (mayplete earlier)</li></ul>

 On the New Freeka front, they had an envoy from Nung and Takde. It seems that Nung and Takde now wants to aid New Freeka in their resistance against Sh, but the person sent by Nung is slimy beyond belief, so Yvon and the advisors found it hard to agree with them.

 There are no good guys in this war between the 3 nations. All of them have their own goals, and all three wants a piece of each other, though Nung and Takde are now allies as a result of their mutual enemies.

 Under other circumstances, they would probably attack each other.

 So, once again, New Freekas council cannot decide. They dont really want to turn down their aid, but at the same time, these 2 nations arent the most upstanding and honest of nations. Well, one of the key skills a leader needs to have, is to decide. Sometimes picking a choice is more important than evaluating which one is right. But Yvons style seems to be more concerned on whats right. She has a need to be morally correct, at least from her perspective, and that clouds her ability to sometimes make tough, probably cruel decisions.

 Ah well.

AliNovel

Research Trees