Book 3, Chapter 38

As You Sow, You Shall...Oh s.h.i.t!

    "That was awesome! You can just keep awhole lot of enemies at bay if you play music like that. Your skills are areaof effect right?"

    "Yup. And the effect range is pretty big. There"sno limit to how many people I can affect as long as they"re within range. And Ican determine which targets to affect and which targets are not. But actuallythey"re not as powerful as you may think."

    "Come on. What you did just now is alreadyimpressive. People can"t use any attacks or move, how will they fight then?"

    "That"s not how it works. The effect shows upslowly. I need to play long enough to achieve something I just did to you. Peoplecan just come attack me when they notice what"s going on. My Variation song needs 3 minutesto completely immobilize someone. I have even lower HP than casters, anyone cankill me before it happens."

    "That"s no problem. So you can"t do any solobattles but you"re a deadly killing machine in group fights. You can dominatethe whole battlefield if someone protects you for long enough!"

    "That"s sounds good but...I can"t."

    "Why"s that?"

    "I can"t get out! I was teleported here just afterI left the Rookie Village. Then I found out I need to beat the minotaur at theentrance to leave this place, and it will be a one-on-one fight so I can"t findany helpers. There"s no way I can do it!"

    "You have companion slots?"

    "Six. That"sa lot right? I added a lot of Charisma on purpose!"

    That"s...quite beyond the average. Though mine is waymore OP. I can bring 9 companions after getting my new cla.s.ses.

    "Yes, that"sa lot more than others. So why didn"t you get any? Find some companions thatcan keep you safe for 3 minutes, then you have nothing to worry about."

    "I thought about it too. But...I don"t have [Capture]skill."

    "Take this." I took out the "almond"."Plant this thing into the dirt and grow it using the spring water, youwill get a plant-type companion."

    "Sunflower seed? I have lot of these." Shepulled out a handful of them from her pocket.

    Blast it. That old SoB tricked me! He gave me this dailysnack and pa.s.sed it as a companion! And I"ve been treating it as a treasureuntil now!

    "Hold on a minute. Where did you find so many of them?"

    "They grew on that tree over there. But the treebites, I have to play music and lock it up to get near and collect these seeds.They taste good too. You want some? I never knew these are companion seeds, orI"ll be out of here already."

     She buried a seed into the dirt and splashedsome water on it. A small sprout came out, and puff! It quickly turned into atree. Then the tree transformed into a green ball, before it finallydisappeared underground.

    "Huh, so it IS a companion. That old man wasn"t lying after all."

    "But... itdidn"t listen to my orders?"

    "Oh. You forgot blood. You need to put your ownblood onto the seed before growing it."

    "Got it."

    She did again, it turned out betterthis time.

    She grew several more while humming happily like a teenage girl. I quicklystopped her. "How many have you planted? You can"t change your companions,it will be trouble if you use up all your slots."

    "Oh oops... I forgot! I already got six of them."

    "Ugh. Now you"re a musician AND a gardener."

    "Gardener? It"s fine, I love flowers. I haven"tintroduced myself right? I"m , my real name is ShangGwanYuri."

    She gave that out before I can stop her.

    "My nameis , real name is Sairin. Don"t trust people too easy. We just metand you already told me your real name. That"s dangerous you know."

    "Are you a bad guy?"

    "Um, no."

    "No problem then!" 

    She smiles. I think thatmild smile is always on her face.

    "Oh right. I almost forgot why I came here. Do youhave any almonds left, Yuri? You won"t mind me calling you that right?"

    "I don"t mind. But what almond?"

    "Thatsunflower seed you were just planting. I need one as well."

    "Eh?" Her face turned red. "I"m sorry! Iwas too excited just now, I put them all to the ground! Don"t worry, I"ll takeyou to that tree."

    We reached that giant tree after crossing through somebrushes. I mean, it"s HUGE, it will take like six people together to hug thetree with their arms spread.

    Yuri pointed at some red fruits on the tree."That"s it. You can find the seeds if you crack these fruits open."

    I walked ahead. Yuri dragged me back.

    "Not yet. Thetree bites people. Let me freeze it first."

    Well that seems the saferapproach, so I agreed. Though frankly speaking, I do want to hear the nicemusic again.

    The good news is, she successfully stopped the tree after a briefperformance. The bad news is, she forget to switch her attack mode so she frozeme up as well!

    I had to ask Yuri to pick a fruit for me. I told her I need onebut she still collected any last one them within her sight!

    Then I listened to her Sun Anthem again to recover. Geez,we should really be careful with these songs. They hurt. 

    I broke the fruit to start my planting operation. First,I cut my own fingers and dropped some blood on it. That green ball monster mentioned Ican power it up by giving more blood, so I called my team and collected someblood from every one of them.

    The seed has become pitch black when I"ve finished the job.Looks like there"s something in me that will simply turn anything black when Idecide to mess it up.

    Then I dug a hole and put the seed under. I had to askYuri for help again to water the seed. I can"t do anything on my own if she"snot here.

    A small root came out of the dirt quickly. Different from the ones wesaw, this one is completely black as well.

    Something went wrong just as Yuri tried to spoon wateron it. The black vines definitely look like some sort of Dark-affinity creature.The spring water just caused a lot of white mist and fizzing noise on it. Itlooks as if we"re pouring strong acid on it!

    The root didn"t get knocked awaylike me but is obviously hurt.

    Before I decide to give up, Yuri played her Sun Anthemagain. Right, so getting hurt by holy water is considered negative effect too, whichmeans we can clear it.

    The root straightened itself up but...something doesn"tlook right. The leaves on it turned red, then all the veins became blood redtoo, like blood vessels.

    I felt the ground shook, like a herd of horses aregalloping somewhere nearby. The shaking got stronger, before several vines shotout, bond everyone including my companions and Yuri, locking us up off theground. We"re not losing any HP though, so I told the struggling Lucky to stopmoving. More vines came up and formed into something like a platform. We are released onto it.

    It"s pretty safe up here, I looked down towards thespring, which is now a total mess.

    Countless tentacles grew from the vines. One stretched into thespring water, then burned up in a blink of an eye. Without stopping, the othertentacles shot themselves into the water one after another.

    The first ones were all burned to ash. But there arejust too many, they managed to cover the whole spring up in the end. A reallythick tentacle crashed into the spring hole on the rock, breaking it apart. Thespring stopped flowing.

    Next, the vines started to spread around us, the wholegarden is covered by the vines in no time.

    The spring is now dried out, the trees died. A strongwind current blew over, turning the once beautiful scenery into a wasted desert!

    "Holy-- What the heck happened? Phantom, ask him what"s that all about!"

    Phantom paused a little. "He over-evolved becausewe used too much blood. He"s now level 900, the [Enhanced Creeper]. He wastrying to absorb the surrounding energy, this is what happened."

    "That was crazy!"

    Yuri looked atthe desert land below us with some sadness. "This is...terrible."

    A black rose and acrimson rose suddenly appeared on a vine near her.

    Phantom said: "He saysthat was his instinct to get fully grown and he couldn"t control it. He won"tand probably cannot do that again. He gave those flowers to Yuri as an apology."

    ...Is this plant actually trying to pick up a girl?

    "Okaaay. So,I"ll be calling you "Rosa" from now on. Let us down, please?"

    There. It feels safe if you can actually touch theground with your own feet. I think I"ve been "in the air" for too much today.

    Rosa recovered to his original size as well.

    We still got problems, though.