Wraithwood Botanist

Description: If you thought that scary soul monster was cool, imagine having one that’s smarter than you and has a penchant for eating your soul force as a food source. That’s what a guardian is—in practice. In theory, they’re amalgamations, like Yakana, that refine a single soul instead of creating a network of many.

When guardians aren’t threatening to rip your mind and identity apart, they are extremely useful, making up for your inadequacies. These parasites become part of your body, allowing you to borrow their unique abilities. If it’s a ground beast, you can ride it; if it’s a small creature, you can use it for reconnaissance or spying missions. It’s different for each beast, but it’s almost always powerful. And unlike people, guardians can heal from any wound unless they’re obliterated by an aura attack or stolen by a soulmancer, making them ideal bodies for fighting your battles.

It is just a seed that you need to help grow. So, like you, it will be a useless, blank slate when it arrives in Areswood Forest. That said, an eighth evolution seed has been refined with the souls of gods, so its potential is solely determined by your effort. It’s a legendary reward worthy of your achievement.

Don’t get too excited, though. It’s illegal to push legendary artifacts and resources into the lower domains, let alone eight evolution souls, so it will require a good deal of legal jujutsu and a multiverse-wide corruption scheme—and that pales in comparison to the difficulty of actually obtaining an eighth evolution seed. The law is one thing—the chance you’ll find one is slim to none this year.

Unless, of course, you conveniently have a powerful soulmancer as a patron, and he likes you. Then it just might be possible.

I will provide you with more information on the soul guardian once I secure one.

Seriously, Mira, congratulations on your achievement. Your talent, drive, and will have led you to greatness. I will stop at nothing to make sure that you get the value you deserve."

I read the screen in wonder and disbelief. The thought of having a god-level resource on my side was almost too much to take, and I had wild delusions of grandeur about riding on the shoulder of that colossus I saw at the pond.

Unfortunately, things weren’t as they seemed. I learned that the next day at breakfast when I explained the gift for the sake of transparency. I was hesitant to do so out of fear that the gift was actually a curse.

Turned out, I was right.

"What a fucked up gift," Kyro said. He released a long, passionate groan and leaned his back against a large rock. The meat I cooked him was left untouched.

"What does that mean?" I asked.

"Well, for starters, if you don’t feed it, it’ll eat your soul, and well, once you feed it a lot, you can’t feed it a little. So once that puppy’s tied up on you… you’re pretty much stuck here… forever."

My stomach sank, and I suddenly lost my appetite. I stabbed a piece of meat with my fork and fed it to Kline, who didn’t seem the slightest bit concerned.

"Plus…" Kyro swallowed and took shallow breaths. "Someone’s gotta bring it here, right? That means they’ll be collecting people to come live in this forest with you… This’s gotta be a scheme. I’d consult Nethralis first. You accept that gift without permission, and she’ll probably sic the Drokai on you."

I dropped my fork on my plate and cupped my face.

Kyro whined and looked at me pleadingly. "Don’t tell me you accepted?"

I shook my head. "I don’t have a choice. Last time I got a reward, the Oracle held the competition that started this nightmare."

He looked up. "Why?"

"’Cause it governs the multiverse through rewards. I think… it’s how it gets people to do what it wants. And since I’m part of its governance, it’s forcing a pipeline for taxation… and stuff. I don’t really understand it. It just said, It’s not all about you, Mira… One sec."

I swiped my finger in the air to communicate what I was doing to Kyro, then opened The Guide and said, Lithco. Can I refuse this reward?

A pop-up materialized.

"If you’re stupid, I suppose you could try. But I’ll still refuse."

Why?

The pop-up turned white, and new letters wrote themselves.

"You are the Oracle’s citizen, and as such, it’s her job to bog you down with laws and bleed you dry with taxation. Establishing a reward and taxation network with you is vital to her function. On a side note, it’s extremely rude to keep calling me ’it’ after all we’ve been through. It’s also inaccurate. I’m an isolated deployment. I take orders from the Oracle—but I’m not the Oracle. It’s my job to keep you alive and help you grow. It’s her job to scheme and rule the multiverse."

I scoffed at my screen and swiped it away.

"What was that for?" Kyro asked.

"Guess I can’t. Worse, it sounds like you’re right. This’s definitely a scheme."

"Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck." He leaned back. "We’ll figure it out... somehow."

I nodded, determined to work it out. The Oracle may have had rules, but I refused to be pushed around by it. Once I knew the situation, I would plan accordingly. That said, with the exception of being sent to Areswood, Lithco had yet to land me a bad deal. So even if it was a scheme, it was bound to have perks. That’s why I decided I would ask Lithco one night and consider the situation carefully before jumping to conclusions.

Kyro and I sat in silence for a few minutes after thet. Then, I stood up.

"You… um… you good to go?" I asked.

"Just give me an hour."

"Hmmm… Okay." I opened up my guide and did a bit of research. Then I looked at Kline. "You wanna go for a hike?"

Kline stretched his limbs and meowed.

"You can’t be serious?" Kyro said weakly.

"It won’t be long. And if we die… it doesn’t sound like we would’ve made it far at the Crypt." I turned to Kline. "Let’s go."

Kline trotted off beside me as we disappeared into the woods.

2.

Kyro tried to convince Mira to hold back, but it came out in jumbled whispers. He was tired, so tired. He couldn’t even remember the last time he was so exhausted. Probably when he got the curse that stole his magic from him. But this was worse. With his callasp damaged, he was leaking aura and losing neara that was bound for his nervous system. He was losing energy… and vitality… strength…

It didn’t matter… Gods, he was tired. So, so tired… He fell asleep.

Kyro shot awake when he smelled an intense scent of charcoal. He looked around and saw Kline lying beside him, sparing him a glance before turning away. Mira looked over as well. She was in front of her pop-out stove. He groaned and laid against the rock again.

"You’re burning it," he said.

"That’s the point."

"The point? What type of point are you making?"

She smiled slightly. "I’m making activated charcoal."

"Why?"

"For your hangovers. You’re pretty much useless half the day."

"Well, it’s gonna stay that way." He felt a dull throb in his head, and he wished that he could just die and come back to life when the pain was over. "If I wanted to cleanse myself, I’d just drink the water."

"No… you don’t drink the water because you can’t," Mira said. "Not sure why. Maybe it’s because you don’t wanna be sober. Maybe it’s because the water’s gotta cleanse your body and fight off the alcohol withdrawals. Or maybe it’s just ’cause your curse won’t let it—but I refuse to think you wouldn’t end your misery right now."

Kyro groaned and ran his fingers through his hair, staving off the gray static in his mind. He didn’t want to deal with any of this, especially because Mira was right. If he drank the water, it would remove the alcohol and send him into an alcohol withdrawal seizure that the water would also have to heal—a process that sucked really bad. Worse, his whole body would clean out and then drinking again hit him really hard.

He knew this because he didn’t have the neara necessary for advanced healing, so he had to do it once a year to prevent his body from being permanently damaged by his alcohol addiction. It sucked.

Mira smirked in triumph and pulled a skillet out of her pop-out stove. When Kyro saw it, he leaned against the rocks.

"That’s not how you make charcoal," Kyro said. "If you don’t remove the oxygen, it just turns to ash."

"It’s fine," she said. "I got an oxygen-free domain around it. That was the easy part. The hard part was finding an alternative for calcium chloride. Turns out, even the rocks are useful here. It’s like Candy Mountain… only for drugs."

"She can use isolated domains… of course she can… of course…" he mumbled. "Well, I’m still not gonna eat it. So you can save the effort."

Mira paused and then pulled out her pestle, grinding it up.

"Didn’t you hear me?" he asked. "I said—"

"You know what the cool thing about activated charcoal is?" Mira mused, floating charcoal into the air in a hypnotic stream.

"What?" he asked dryly.

"You can mix it with alcohol."

He opened his mouth to protest but held back his tongue. "Son of a bitch, she’s got me."

Mira smirked in triumph once more and finished grinding the charcoal and mixing it with a mixture of water and kianite powder to activate it. Once she finished, she grinned like a psychopath and forced some down his throat. Since he didn’t have a cup, he just had to chew it and wash it down. It was terrible, and he vowed he would never let her do it to him again.

But it did work, and his stomach calmed down, allowing them to hit the water at noon, floating down the river at a brisk pace.

The weather was warm, and the wood he was whittling with mana blades left satisfying shavings on the bow of the canoe. The wine had finally overtaken the charcoal, and it brought up his spirits, so he finally decided to get to know Mira.

"I hear you want to be a botanist."

"Yeah. I love plants."

"Even here?"

"Especially here." Mira smiled and looked through the mist to see the forest beyond. "Just because I haven’t been able to study them doesn’t mean that I don’t love waking up around them every day. I think that sychis are beautiful and that esca brush is fascinating. And just the thought that there’s natural aphrodisiacs and poisons and hallucinogens dotting the landscape is wonderful. This place’s a paradise. And once this bullshit ends… I really think I’m going to love it."

"Hmmm…" Kyro stopped shaving down the wood in his hand, realizing that he was carving out a cup—wondering why he would carve a cup mere moments after declaring he would never drink charcoal again. It made him realize that Mira had a powerful, almost charismatic will, and when she said something, it came into being. So he stopped questioning it and continued. "Where’re you gonna live?"

"In a big ’ol tree," she said proudly. "Gonna hollow it out right quick and make myself a house. I’ll add vents and a place for my stove and make bedding from esca brush. And then I’ll read and train and eat all winter until I can go out foraging again. I mean… I have all year before these Harvests. It’ll be a good a life… I know it."

Kyro saw the deep sincerity and hope and belief in her eyes and turned away. He was learning not to doubt her as much. If she wanted to be a botanist, he’d just have to wait to see it.

Unfortunately, he didn’t know if he ever would.

The mountains that were so clear two days prior were now blanked in a thick fog that blotted everything it touched like white paint. It was immersive and cold, haunting even, and he knew exactly what was within that white and distant expanse.

As they approached the fork that separated the Keliam River and the Diktyo, Mira was silent, staring up, realizing that they would soon be surrounded by the soul fog.

"Are beasts gonna scream at us constantly?" she asked.

"Not that way…" Kyro pointed northeast toward the Diktyo. "I mean, you’ll hear ’em but it’s diluted."

"But we’re going that way?" Mira looked to the west and saw a bleak wasteland of white mist and mountain silhouettes. "Ye~p. It’s the overflow for souls that refuse to be purified. So everything out there’s screaming like it’s getting tortured, and you can’t see them ’cause the mist. It’s really messed up."

Mira gulped. "So… how do we…?"

Kyro slowly unscrewed his flask. "That’s the trial. Find the crypt while all your senses are being bludgeoned to death. And… survive all the corrupted beasts lurking in the fog…" He took a long swig. "Yep. It’s a suicide mission alright. But you’ll be fine… You’re a self-starter. If anyone can learn soul sight on the verge of death… it’ll be you." He lifted his flask a second time to get his day started. "Probably."