“Herbs are the friend of the physician and the pride of cooks.”
– Charlemagne
~*~
Despite waking up early, Liv had yet to fully commit to the day.
She laid in bed, staring up at the ceiling of the guest bedroom as she mulled over her circumstance for the umpteenth time. Somehow, she’d truly crossed into an entirely different world. Absurd as it sounded, there was no denying the truth at this point. This wasn’t some elaborate dream or hallucination, but an actual, tangible reality. And whether or not she was ready to admit it, she was stuck here.
Find a way to survive in the new world, her spiritbook had said.
Liv had a feeling the suggestion was easier said than done, especially if death really only applied to her. She had to wonder, though, how much the revelation actually changed things. After all, there were no redos where she’d come from and she’d managed to survive this long. Magic or no, there were still plenty of ways to end up on the wrong side of a census report.
Regardless, she’d have to be smart about all this. While Kaedric hadn’t expressly told her she’d be executed for being a type III, the whole priest or fugitive business led her to believe it was in her best interest not to advertise her alignment to cultivation. Especially in the presence of the former. She didn’t know nearly enough about the religion to pass herself off as one of them and even if she did, she had to assume the priests were intimately familiar with their own after so many decades. Which placed her firmly in the fugitive camp.
A traitor to the very goddess who had granted this world immortality.
All because of her stupid gemcore.
Never mind the fact her magic was next to useless at her current order.
Sighing, she rubbed at her eyes with tattooed fingers and summoned her spiritbook. Thankfully, it dropped onto the pillow beside her, rather than her face. A small mercy. Liv snatched it and rolled onto her belly. She may not be able to select anything just yet, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t strategize in the meantime. She had time to spare while Kaedric was away this morning, anyway.
“Good morning,” she hummed, flipping the book open to a random page.
Was there something you needed?
“I didn’t realize I was inconveniencing you,” she said, “but now that you mention it, yes. You said there were twelve orders, right? Am I able to see the skill trees for each rank?”
At your current order, you may only view the skills available at the third tier.
“Seriously?”
Yes.
“So I can’t peek ahead and see what the fifth order has to offer? Or any of the others, for that matter?”
Correct.
Liv pursed her lips. Well, that was more than a little annoying. She’d been hoping to plan out a realistic path for herself. However, she supposed the setback gave her all the more reason to progress. There was no telling how long she’d be here and if she truly wanted to survive, she’d need to bring herself up to speed or at least to a point where she could comfortably compete with everyone else.
According to Kaedric, most people never advanced past their seventh order. They either died and lost whatever progress they’d made since the surgence or found themselves unable to bridge the power gap to the next skill tier for one reason or another. Regardless, it still put most people at least six orders above her. There may be a few outliers here and there, but that was just the general public, not anyone of any higher class or import. To say she was at a disadvantage was an understatement.
“In that case, show me the third order trees again.”
Her eyes glanced over the creation options. Having access to both corporeal generation and energy generation offered up interesting opportunities, though with only a finite number of choices available, she’d have to decide which skills made more sense for what she was trying to achieve. Self preservation was her chief priority at present, so it made sense to choose either generate barkskin or arcane shield once she advanced. Arcane strike was more of an offensive skill, but she wasn’t quite sure how to categorize cultivate microorganism, if she were honest. Depending on how she used it, she supposed it could be offensive. However, all she could think of were the culinary applications like making yogurt or kombucha or mead. She could be one hell of a fermenter. Fun, maybe, but not exactly useful. Unless she decided to open up a tavern or something.
The effectiveness of anything she chose from the creation side was also dependent upon the size of her arcana reserve, so she’d have to keep that in mind too.
“Does the size of my reserve scale with my order?” She asked.
Yes.
“What about governance?”
Your authority over the physical world also scales with your order.
“So the higher my order, the more I’m able to control at any given time?”
Yes.
“Fair enough,” she said, weighing the corporeal skills against the energy ones.
Wield flora could be useful, provided there were plants nearby. Tripping someone with a stray root or swatting them with a branch might not sound particularly impressive, but in a pinch, they might make the difference in an escape. And if she grew strong enough, who’s to say she couldn’t wield them to a greater degree? A tree could be an effective weapon, under the right circumstances. If used in conjunction with shape flora, maybe she could even fashion roots into spears or leaves into razor blades? Honestly, the possibilities were endless. All she had to do was determine the extent of her capabilities at each stage of advancement.
Sitting up, she came up with a loose plan of how to go about distributing her points. Provided she had four new selections at her disposal once she reached the next skill tier, she’d choose either generate barkskin or arcane shield for a boost to her defensive capabilities and both wield flora and shape flora for her offensives. She’d run her options by Kaedric for a second opinion and, depending, might even consider some of the energy-related skills if he could offer her any useful insights.
Her book wrote along the bottom of the page, Would you like to see your updated suggestions?
The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
“Sure,” she said, wondering what had prompted the update in the first place.
The page cleared.
Suggestions:
- Find a way to survive in the new world.
- Advance your gemcore to the third order.
- Find a cultivation teacher.
“Find a cultivation teacher?” She asked, “Do you have any idea how hard that’s going to be?”
Yes, but you’ll have to find a way regardless.
She snorted, “Sure. I’ll add it to my to-do list, but I’m not making any promises.”
Liv wasn’t even sure where to start, on that front.
A nicker from outside drew her attention to the window and she glanced up in time to see Kaedric making his way to the barn with a new horse in tow. The red beast was a fair bit shorter than Kelsa, but appeared to have little trouble keeping up with her long strides. It was already saddled too, though she couldn’t recall riding being a part of the day’s lesson. Maybe he’d simply had to buy more equipment for her?
She grimaced at the thought of him having to buy anything on her behalf. As soon as they sold one of the clusters, she’d be paying him back. Being dependent upon anyone for anything made her feel icky, in a way. It always had.
Closing her book, she decided it was time to finally get up. Her entire body ached from the abuse of the prior day, but she did her best to ignore it for the time being. Lazing about all day wasn’t going to help, but some light stretching after breakfast might. Maybe Kaedric had a tea that might take the edge off as well? There was no harm in asking. Until then, she dressed, tamed her hair to the best of her ability in the absence of a proper brush, and limped out of the bedroom.
“Good morning, Liv,” Kaedric said, closing the door behind him.
“Morning,” she said, masking her yawn with a tattooed hand.
He looked her over with an appraising eye as he adjusted his saddle bags draped over his shoulder and removed his boots.
“You’ve a bit more color today. How are you feeling?”
“Well enough, all things considered,” she said, “How’d this morning go?”
“Good. I was able to forage a few staples out in the woods. Edibles, mostly, but I made a point to search out a few more medicinals. They should make for a decent first lesson,” he said.
Was that a hint of excitement she detected?
“Will we be using some for breakfast?” She wondered.
He nodded and set his bag down upon the kitchen counter, “I stopped by one of the farms on my way back and picked up some more essentials as well. I wasn’t exactly stocked for guests.”
“I appreciate the extra effort,” she said, wincing.
“Of course,” he said, “I can’t have you running off to tell everyone I’m a bad host now, can I?”
She looked down at her bandaged feet, “Even if you were, I’m not sure I’d be running anywhere. I’d say you still have time to prove yourself.”
He chuckled a little, “How fortunate for me.”
“Is there anything I can help with?” She asked, feeling a little useless, if she were honest.
“If you’d like to set the forageables out on the table, you can start detecting or reading or whatever it is you do to them while I sort the icebox? See if you can determine what’s edible and what’s medicinal. Organize them into categories and we can go over your work when you’re finished,” he said.
“All right,” she said, tilting her head as she considered the challenge.
Would read energy or detect life be more useful in this instance? Maybe a combination of both? The skills didn’t exactly give her definitive names, but she could sort general categories.
Unsurprisingly, Kaedric was as methodical in his packing as he was in his day to day organization. Everything was neatly arranged and packaged in neat little bundles or jars. There were herbs, berries, flowers and strips of bark. She recognized a few things off hand, like dandelion and clover, but most everything else was unknown.
She started by moving everything over to the dining table, then settled herself into a seat as she debated where to begin. Rather than plucking the leaves or flowerheads, Kaedric had uprooted a few dandelion specimens in their entirety, to include the roots. She’d once read the entire plant was useful in one way or another, so she placed it in what would be her collection of medicinals. Focusing her energy, she held a hand above the plants and smiled to herself when she sensed the abundance of positive energy within. It was an odd sort of feeling, like a secondhand high, and as she layered the sense with her ability to detect life, she noted it was, in fact, an herb.
Liv repeated the process over and over again until she’d sorted everything into three distinct groups: edibles, medicinals and those she wasn’t quite certain of. She’d done her best to keep the unknown pile small, but she’d be lying if she said she was fully confident in some of her decisions. She was no herbalist. Yet, at least.
She sat back, tapping a finger to her lips as she inspected her work.
“Finished?” Kaedric asked.
“I think so,” she said.
He made his way over with a thoughtful hum and a hand to his stubble.
“What’s this center group?” He asked.
“My uncertain pile,” she said, rubbing the back of her neck.
“Well, this here is white willow bark. It helps with aches and pains, that sort of thing,” he said, moving the jar of bark shavings to the medicinal side, “and these are fiddlehead ferns. You always want to cook these before eating. Blanching them is best. Otherwise, they’re easy to overcook.”
“So those are edibles only? No additional properties?” Liv asked.
During her inspections, she’d found the level of positive energy varied across the different plants. None were quite as potent as the dandelions, but several came close. She’d come to associate the higher energy with medicinals, but she’d find out whether or not her instincts for identification were correct soon enough.
“Edibles only,” he said.
“I was leaning more toward medicinal, but I’m glad I asked,” she said, “What was it you used on my feet?”
“For the salve?”
She nodded.
“A combination of calendula, comfrey and plantain. Along with beeswax for an applicant,” he said, pointing out each of the ingredients upon the table.
She was sure to commit those to memory.
“They’re best for wound care, then?”
“I carry a small tin with me wherever I go,” he said with a nod.
“Among other things, I take it?” She guessed.
“I like to be prepared. I’ve heard dying of infection is nasty business. Now, let’s take a look at the rest of your work, shall we?”
The two spent the better part of an hour discussing the various specimens he’d brought back, going over their uses, in the case of the medicinals as well as Kaedric’s favorite recipes when it came to the edibles. All in all, Liv had been correct with a majority of her categorizations, largely due to her assumptions concerning the level of positive energy. The more beneficial flora tended to have a higher concentration overall, which she made sure to take note of.
She’d maintained a certain excitement throughout the entire lesson and in truth, was a tad disappointed once it was over. She hadn’t been this enthusiastic about anything in quite some time, if she were honest. If it weren’t for her feet, she’d have asked for a field lesson on top of it.
“You wouldn’t happen to have any books about foraging or wild medicine, would you?” She asked, pressing a hand to her chest as she felt an errant flutter.
“I have a field guide or two in my room,” he said, brow furrowing at the action, “What is it?”
“I think I need to check my spiritbook,” she admitted, eyes widening as she recalled what he’d told her about sensing the earlier advancement stages.
He gave a firm nod, “Check. You’re bound to have at least reached your second order.”
The spiritbook manifested upon the table before her, open and awaiting her attention. She sat forward and reached for it, cursing the slight tremor to her fingers. It wasn’t an adrenaline rush, exactly, but something like it.
Flowing script burned itself across the pages.
Olivia Lockhard
Age: Twenty-six
Origin: Unknown
Place of Birth: Unknown
Living relatives: Two detected
Gemcore: Animite
Designation: Type III
Order: Second
Aspect Alignment: Governance
Access to Arcane Spring: 2nd Order
Active Effects: Forsaken.
In death, life blooms anew, but not for you.
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