World Keeper

Chapter 1187: Cultivation

After returning to Olympus, Julia had been advised to study her new inner world, that way she could better understand the finer points of universe construction and management. At the same time, this would let her explore her new powers, as she was largely unfamiliar with controlling such powers on a massive scale.

Within her room, Julia got into a comfortable pose for meditation, and closed her eyes. She directed her senses towards her inner world, and was surprised to discover just how detailed her perception was. Is this because I have World Sight? She thought to herself, as she was able to perceive her inner world as if the entire universe had been bathed in her World Sight.

If this was before, the influx of information would have overloaded her mind, causing her to shut down or recoil back. However, at the moment, she felt as if there were no problems with her ability to process everything coming in.

Without even trying to locate them, she noticed millions of different seeds of magic scattered throughout the universe. Some of them were hidden within the caldera of a volcano. Some were in the heart of a black hole, and some were buried within the brine lakes of the deepest oceans. Each seed, she could distinctly feel as though they were laid out before her. At the same time, she felt every tree, every blade of grass scattered across every world.

Her senses focused on one of the largest trees, an ancient Sylvan tree. Clearly, this was taken from the World Seed game system. However, because there was nobody managing it, there had been no research done, and the tree simply existed.

With a single thought, she was able to access the tree and begin the basic research. When she did, she was surprised to discover that this research counted as a form of growth for the tree, as she had the option to instantly complete it.

She thought about blitzing through the research, aiming to reach the upper limits of what the game’s system allowed. Yet, with a shake of her head, she put that off for the time being. She would be able to take care of that later. For now, she was still exploring the possibilities at her disposal.

I wonder what would happen if I planted an actual Sylvan Mother Tree in my inner world? Would it instantly give birth to all ten golden Sylvans, and become fully grown? She couldn’t help but imagine the scene, one where she created a thriving population of Sylvans within her inner world.

No, I shouldn’t do that. Doing so would cut them off from the other groves in the real world. She thought with another shake of her head.

Her next experiment was to manifest her powers in the real world, something that Chelsea and Dana said was the true nature of an Origin’s power. Opening her eyes, Julia extended a hand in front of herself and focused. Moments later, a glowing seed appeared above her hand, radiating heat and light. Its exterior looked like a jagged rock with glowing lines running through it.

This was the Earth Flame seed, a common magical seed found within any active volcano. However, Julia studied it curiously, seeming surprised by its appearance. This was to be expected, as the seed had manifested in the same form as it did within her inner world.

I expected it to appear in the form of a token, like when we create the seeds with the Digital Conversion system. She thought to herself. The fact that the seed itself had appeared in its true form seemed quite significant to her.

Closing her eyes again, Julia found one of the ancestor trees and began to speed through its research path, gathering all of the materials needed to form plant-based magical weapons. Afterwards, she combined the Earth Flame seed with an oaken rod, creating a staff that allowed one to control molten stone. Interesting… Julia smiled as she realized the possibilities that came with this success.

Moments later, her thoughts were interrupted by a familiar voice. “Having fun?” Aurivy asked, and Julia opened her eyes to look at the halfling goddess, who smiled back at her. “You had the same expression on your face as when you found the secret passage in Dungeon Delver.”

“Did I?” Julia responded with a chuckle. “I’m just doing some experiments. It seems that the two of them gathered some particularly special systems for me, though I’m not sure how effective they would be when facing divine-level threats.”

“Oh?” Aurivy walked over, sitting across from Julia. “Why not? You shouldn’t have any problems with your new upgrade, right?”

“Not a problem, per se. I just don’t know if anything I have at my disposal is able to properly threaten a deity.” Julia explained slowly. “I think it’s because of my World Sight, but I can perceive everything in my inner world at the same time. And, there is nothing there that is really strong enough to kill a god.”

“Hmm…” Aurivy crossed her arms, tilting her head. “Maybe you just need to develop? They said that you have the trees from World Seed, so you should be able to create weapons that rival gods if you take that path far enough. Otherwise… just make your own!”

Julia gave a dry chuckle, knowing what Aurivy meant. “I might be able to do something, if I take advantage of the research system. However, I’m not sure how I could go about creating my own god-killing plant. From what I can tell, I can’t just wish a special type of plant into existence. It has to be created through normal methods.”

Aurivy quickly nodded her head at that. “Really? In that case, just do that, right?” She asked with an innocent smile. “I’m sure you can come up with a way to breed a plant that drains divine energy or something, can’t you?”n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

Julia hesitated for a moment, before shaking her head. “I don’t think I can. In my entire inner world, there’s not a single source of divine energy. And, without that divine energy, I wouldn’t have the nutrients to create a plant like that.” Normally, the mother trees of the Sylvan would have a measure of divinity, but that was only because they were born from the body of a demigod. Because their divine origin was removed from World Seed, the trees at her disposal had no such energy.

What was more pressing was the fact that Julia no longer had her own divine energy to use as the necessary fuel. She wasn’t even able to generate divine currency, because she was no longer a goddess. However, Aurivy wore a bright smile on her face. “If all you’re lacking is a source of divinity, that’s an easy fix.”

Julia looked up at Aurivy, seeming confused. “It is? I can’t use the plants of Fyor’s thirty-ninth floor, or divine gold from Sanctum, as both of those require divinity to propagate. It would simply be a one-time infusion.”

“True, true.” Aurivy nodded her head in agreement. “But, there is another stone in Fyor that acts as a divinity generator.”

Julia blinked, not knowing what Aurivy was talking about. “There… is?” She asked, and Aurivy quickly nodded her head.

“Yup! We just call it the divine stone. If a mortal or a deity touches it, they are able to acquire a domain of their choice. It’s how Lifre got her last domain.” Aurivy explained, but Julia looked skeptical.

“That doesn’t sound like it generates divinity. It would just be a single-use battery, right? I’d run into the same problem with that as I would with Divine Gold, or simply using divine currency.” She said with a sigh, and Aurivy blinked.

“Hmm, maybe? So, we need something that can passively generate divinity, and then you can turn that into a plant. And you said that none of the magic seeds create any kind of divinity.” Aurivy furrowed her brow in thought, before blinking. “Oh! I’ve got it! There is totally a way for you to make divinity with what you have available!” She said with a brilliant smile, confusing Julia.

“Third-tier Natural Seed!” Aurivy exclaimed. “I studied loads of this magic once it was purchased, since I was the one to come up with it. For the first and second tier, it’s all about controlling the seed that you acquire naturally. However, in the third tier, you start merging multiple seeds into one, like crossbreeding plants.”

“How is that going to help me obtain divinity to use as fuel?” Julia asked, but Aurivy simply grinned.

“Easy. We just need to find the right combination of seeds to simulate the formula for divinity. Then, throw in a few coins as a catalyst, and you should be able to create a divine seed” Aurivy said, holding up a black gold coin. “And, you said that you can perceive your entire world at once, so you should be able to find that combination easily.”

Julia blinked, surprised by this revelation. She hadn’t played World Seed in quite a while, and had forgotten about the merging of natural seeds. After all, most seeds were simply fed to the trees to use as upgrade materials.

With a faint nod, she closed her eyes, focusing. The most important seed she needed was one which contained at least a decent amount of ki. The more ki it had available, the better.

Throughout her entire inner world, there were only a few seeds which had even the slightest trace of ki in them. However, there was only one type of seed that was predominantly composed of ki. This was the Blood Heart Seed, an incredibly rare seed that formed within the heart of a giant beast after its death, but only if the body was perfectly preserved over a long period of time.

In the entire universe, only twelve such seeds existed at the current moment. She gathered two of them, one to use immediately and the other to plant and nurture more in case she failed, as she had no confidence in succeeding on the first try.

After analyzing the exact energy ratio of the Blood Heart Seed, she began to search for another seed that would complete the requirements for the divinity formula. This was a very specific requirement, so she wasn’t at all surprised when she did not find anything that was an exact match. Next, she had to search for combinations of seeds that would complete the formula.

Eventually, she settled on what she believed to be the proper components. Aside from the Blood Heart Seed, there were three extremely common seeds. These were the Flowing Wind Seed, the Clear Water Seed, and the Deep Stone Seed. Additionally, one uncommon seed, the Endless Shadow Seed.

According to her calculations, the total energy from these five seeds would perfectly match the ratios needed to create divinity. Now, it was only a matter of combining them all together, something that she didn’t have any experience with. After planting each of the seeds to make sure that she had spares, she tried to simply cheat, using her modded DC system to combine all five seeds into one.

Unsurprisingly, this failed explosively, creating a deep crater where she had made the attempt. With a reluctant sigh, she listened to Aurivy’s explanation on how to properly combine the seeds. If this did work, she would be able to create a wide range of plants that could affect even gods.

Which was nice, because right now, the best that she had available was the power to massacre armies of mortals. Admittedly, she was still stronger than she used to be in terms of scale, but her single-target damage had suffered greatly. This was her chance to correct that.