CH441

“Did we take the wrong gate?” Thera muttered as they passed through, seeing the strange view beyond.

It was a question Ben was asking himself as well, even though he knew it couldn’t be the case. It was clearly marked before they went in, something he couldn’t have missed, but still he couldn’t help but wonder if there’d been some sort of mistake.

The last time they’d been through, the entrance had led into what had seemed like a pretty standard forest. Strangely lacking in animal life before they got to the town in its depths, but that was about it. Now though, they were both being confronted with a far more alien environment.

All of the trees that had stood there in the past, looking like strong, ancient things, had vanished, leaving the area as if they’d never been there, while in their place they’d been substituted with something that looked far more foreign.

With the shape of prickly cacti and giant succulents, strange new plants were stretching into the sky, all larger than he’d have any hope of wrapping his arms around, nor would he want to. Giant thorns were jutting out of them all, and bearing a distinctly blue colour, he didn’t want to make any bets on how poisonous they might be, even with his resistance to such a thing.

Stranger than that though was what seemed to be making its home in that unusual new land. Mushrooms and other fungi-like beings, not bound to the earth or plants around but instead wandering on mycelium legs, creeping silently through the thorns before digging into the trunks around, slowly feasting on the present life in their own strange way.

He knew there were plenty of lifeforms and sceneries that would look distinctly alien to his earthling sensibilities on the world he now called home and he’d seen a few in the past, but what was before him now was pushing it to a whole new extreme as he tried to take it all in and make sense of it before Funa moved to explain.

“There’s probably been one or two ecosystem collapses since the last time you were both here,” The dark spirit told them. “Some say you never walk through the same land twice, but that’s doubly true for this place.”

“Dad’s told me before, but it really isn’t the same as seeing it with my own eyes,” Thera spoke, completely captivated as she looked around despite her misgivings being there.

“And I’m definitely going to need more context,” Ben asked, doing his best not to get pricked while they walked.

Thus time it was Lux who explained, her affinity having the closest similarities to life as she took her own interest in what had formed around them.

“Overwhelming levels of life mana promote growth and change, and at the amount you’d find here, it’s at an unsustainable level. An ecosystem will rapidly grow and adapt until it breaks down after a few months or years, only for something else to take its place. It’s a constant cycle, though admittedly interesting every time. There really is no way to know what will grow or how it will change the location, it makes it worthwhile to poke your head through the gate every now and then so long as you aren’t particularly sensitive to the mana.”

“Wait, so you’re talking mass extinctions as often as every few months of life that never existed before?”

“That’s right. It’s beautiful in a tragic sort of way.”

Tragic was putting it bluntly, at least as far as Ben was concerned. Of all of the crafting paths he practiced, alchemy was one, and an important one too. It led to the advent of his strengthening potions, and its applications with smithing let him place more powerful enchantments on the things he would make before they would break under the magical strain. The very idea that so many creatures and new branches of life would die out before they could be properly studied genuinely hurt to hear. In the thousands of years of races joining the world, how many panacea and elixirs could have been made from the things that got to enjoy their short lives in the valley, if they’d only been discovered in time?

Of course, I guess you could say the same thing about a thousand lost worlds too. He sighed to himself. Basically none of them were technologically advanced global civilizations before being conquered, there were bound to be hundreds or thousands of magic secrets just waiting to be discovered that are lost forever now. Okay, going to stop thinking about this, it’s just going to bum me out.

If they weren’t all dead in a couple years, he resolved to put some of his money towards building a whole new research institute for studying and preserving seeds and samples of the things that would appear in the life valley to see if anything extraordinary ever popped up, but that was a future concern. He’d come for a completely different purpose, and as they broke through the strange forest they saw the same castle Vividus had the last time they were there and made their way toward it, going through the town as they did.

Like the last time they visited, the land was filled with a mix of races as Ben couldn’t help but wonder if any of them had been changed by the life magic they would give off too, seeing a diversity in body plans that seemed to be a bit more than he would expect of any typical mixed breed groups, while Thera dealt with a different bit of attention.

Life affinitied fairies, each no bigger than a hand despite their human-like shapes and one of the three mana-based groups that existed in the world were swarming her in a way they hadn’t during their first visit, landing on her shoulders and playing with her hair, buzzing around and laughing as they each tried to talk to her, all while she just looked more and more lost as Funa chuckled.

“Now that your magic’s awakened they can feel the life mana in you a lot more now than they ever would have in the past so it’s drawing them in. You probably look like a giant fairy in their eyes. If you’re having trouble with this then I don’t know how you’ll manage if you ever meet any dark or earth ones. They’ll go wild for you.”

“Oh, well hello, I’m not a fairy but it’s nice to meet you all,” She told them gently, holding out a hand as she would for any spirit and feeling them land along her arm to rub up against her. “They aren’t going to be charmed, are they?”

“No, all the mana-based have resistances similar to spirits. With how little you’re putting out with your brace on, they’ll be fine.”

“Okay, good.” She gently rubbed the cheek of one that was nestling against her thumb, captivated by their cute appearance before turning to Ben, feeling his eyes on her. “What?”

“Fairy princess.”

“I’ll kill you.”

He held in his laughter, settling for enjoying the intense grin stretched across his face as she did her best not to react, lest she disturb all of the fairies that were comfortable clinging to her before they finally arrived at their destination, with Lux gesturing at the fairies before they made themselves known.

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“Now now children, we’ll be having a bit of a talk so we’ll have to play another time,” She told them, motes of light coming from her fingertips and luring them away as they waved their goodbyes. The entire exchange had been unexpected yet nice, exactly what they needed before knocking on Vivudus’s door.

Since it was Ben who was coming with a request, it was he who reached out to do it, stopping only as it opened itself, the great life spirit already behind it, looking at them all curiously.

“Well well, I can’t say this was really unexpected. Rather, I’m surprised you didn’t get here sooner,” She said, tapping her cheek and eyeing Thera. “Though I wasn’t expecting you two as well.”

The moment she opened the door, Ben couldn’t help but be distracted by one thing. The sounds of screams from somewhere within the mansion. It was quiet, subtle even, but it was there, and undoubtedly due to a single source. Iberu and the rest who had been knowingly involved with his project had been gathered, and he knew the spirits had been the ones to decide their fate, not giving room for any other race to voice an objection. He’d thought that had meant that they’d been killed, possibly tortured first, but if what he was hearing was any indication, they still weren’t being allowed to rest.

He didn’t feel bad for them. As far as he was concerned, they deserved whatever they got, but it did make one thing stand out in his mind. Even if he hadn’t known, he’d had his own role in the death of so many spirits, yet had still let himself get used to the acceptance of those around him that he wasn’t to blame.

Now though, standing before the one who seemed to be carrying out the punishment of the involved parties, he couldn’t help but feel his gut tighten thinking about just who he was looking to ask a favour. Someone who’d been willing to kill him before they had a reason nearly as strong as what they currently did.

Huh, you know, I think my greed might have begun trumping my survival instincts at a certain point, I wonder when that started?

<Are you really only noticing that now?>