The Great Core's Paradox

I commanded plant-flesh to rise, and so it did.

Stalks of greens and golds and blues and browns thrust themselves towards the ceiling of the many-nest’s cavern, growing at a pace that caused the many Coreless around me - their numbers having grown ever greater over the previous days - to break out into an [awed] susurrus. Even I was a little taken aback; though the speed didn’t approach what I had once managed in the spore-covered many-nest in which I had first gained the ability, [Verdure Parasite] was feeling strong, the result of growing seed after seed after seed in recent days, with the power and speed of the ability becoming ever-greater with each new bit of plant-flesh from which to draw.

And now, I was finally making use of all that I’d created.

In my mind’s eye, I could make out the lines of yet-to-be-grown plant-flesh that stretched across the cavern. They ran from tower-nest to tower-nest to tower-nest again, each bit of plant-flesh painstakingly placed by the faithful in preparation for this very moment.

The moment that the Great Core’s might would once again be revealed for all, even the most blind among the Coreless, to witness.

Where once there was empty space, with nothing to stop the approach of bad-things and blasphemers both, walls of dangerous plant-flesh came to be.

First came massive pillars of darkwood, placed in great droves along the paths’ edges, the first line of defense against any invaders. Each was an offspring of the Darkwood Guardian itself, that massive example of plant-flesh that had presided over the many-nest from which I had gained [Verdure Parasite] in the first place - and though they were nowhere near its strength, given the sheer difference in size between offspring and ancestor, I knew that each held the power to crush many a blasphemer or bad-thing beneath its boughs. Darkwood creaked loud enough to echo through the cavern around us, overpowering even the susurrus of amazement that continued to flow forth from the lips of watching Coreless, like a constant roar to announce the Great Core’s claim over its newest territory. Just as quickly as they were grown, much of their insides were shattered into fine dust, wrought by the constricting grasp of spore-roots into new homes for the Coreless in the same shape as what I had made previously. Great plumes of dust rose into the air, coating the stone for many, many not-Needles in every direction.

Next came something simpler; glow-caps, formed in a great multitude to light the way for any traveling Coreless and mark the safety of the Great Core’s pathways. One by one, they sprouted, giving off an overwhelming wave of luminescence that formed along the vast lines of darkwood and the bits of empty stone that still lay between them.

Darkness fled.

After the glow-caps came plant-flesh of more deadly varieties. Each was one that I’d used before; barbed vines that hung from the darkwood above, waiting to lash out at any invaders; tangled moss that formed upon the stone below, eager to grab at the bodies of bad-things; sacs of plant-flesh filled with noxious spores, ready to burst at a moment’s notice; bushes covered in succulent berries that would serve to spread spore-roots to any enemy foolish enough to consume them; and even more besides, the previously-empty space between tower-nests filling with a multitude of colors that had not existed there before, each a mark of the Great Core’s dominion over the area.

I hissed quietly, the sound a mixture of glee at my success and a voicing of my continued struggle.

Despite the advantages I possessed, it was not an instant process; individually, each bit of plant-flesh grew visibly, quickly enough to elicit gasps of [awe] and [wonder] from the Great Core’s faithful, but there was far too much plant-flesh for me to focus on.

My head-scales were beginning to pound, aching from the strain of focusing on so many different things at once - of shifting streams of time and potential growth back and forth, twisting them together and passing them between waiting seeds of plant-flesh again and again.

It had to look effortless, even if it wasn’t.

It needed to look divine, because it was.

In enacting a miracle before the Great Core’s faithful - and even more, before the blasphemers and the bad-things that were surely watching from a distance - the Great Core’s chosen Champion could not be seen to struggle.

So I hissed beneath my breath, and the walls of plant-flesh continued to rise.

Kala squinted. It wasn’t really necessary; her mana-enhanced vision had been growing stronger recently. More than she’d really expected it to, if she was being honest. Kala was sure that, like most of the changes that had been happening recently, thanks was due to the powers of the Little Guardian. If nothing else, the constant healing provided by the [Little Guardian’s Totem] hanging from her neck meant that her eyes were always in perfect condition.

“...looks like we got another one,” she murmured to herself, vision locking onto the sight of Elara leaving a tower in the distance with a large crowd milling about in her wake. They followed behind the girl with an air of near-reverence, and Kala could make out the pinprick lights of [Little Guardian’s Totem]s held tight between many of their hands.

A pretty clear indication of success.

As were the growing lines of vegetation that spread out across the vastness of Erandur like the spokes of a wheel; the true reason for so much of their recent success in recruitment. It was becoming harder for the towers they visited to refuse to cooperate. Mostly because, for those that did, a large portion of their population decided to up and leave, anyway.

The Tree Towers were a big draw, especially for those whose own towers were either overly full or ill-protected by null-water.

So far, the newest of the Guardian Groves - what the citizens of Erandur had begun to call the ‘Groveways’, due to their usefulness as paths between the towers - hadn’t penetrated all the way to the central towers of Erandur. They existed mostly on the outer edges of the cavern, running a full circle between the most endangered sections of the city and a few tiers farther inward. As miraculous as their little snake’s powers could be, the Groveways still had to be manually planted before they could actually grow, and the cavern that hosted Erandur was gargantuan. It was a monumental effort, though fortunately sped along by the growing numbers of participants. Kala could only imagine how long something like this would take without so many hands to take up the work.

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Other areas of Erandur were no less subject to change. From her perch atop the tower, Kala’s mana-enhanced eyes could make out the bustle of the White Towers; there was something going on over there, no doubt due to the efforts of Ewan, Elara’s newest ally and friend. There had been a fire in his eyes when he’d headed his way home, one only eclipsed by the former inhabitants of the burned out tower that had accompanied him. Over the past short while, more and more inhabitants of the White Towers had left. Some guards, and other citizens.

The guards’ destination was obvious; the rise of the Groveways wasn’t exactly something that could go unnoticed. They were a bright and shining thing, lit by fluorescent mushrooms from end to end, an obstruction visible to anyone in Erandur. And for as much as its existence helped in recruitment, it hadn’t only garnered allies. More than one group of guards, assuming the involvement of a Core or a dangerous monster, had tried to hack their way into its depths.

They’d failed, and only the desire to avoid overplaying their hand had kept the guardsmen from suffering too heavily in that failure. For now, it had been decided that the plants that made up the newfound paths would merely defend themselves enough to eventually beat the interlopers back; sure, the vegetation took some damage in the process, with its true barbs held back, but the Little Guardian could easily fix the damage.

If the Groveways were deemed too dangerous, nobody would ever attempt to enter, and - for all of the Little Guardian’s power - the null-water that surrounded the White Towers meant that it was completely protected from the Groveways themselves. All of the plants that made them up were direct descendants of the Nature Core’s creations, more mana-infused pseudo-monsters than real plants, and thus entirely vulnerable to the liquid’s scouring touch.

It was better to tempt foray after foray, at least until the groups involved became large enough that it was worth dealing a decisive blow.

On the other side of things, there were the normal civilians of the White Towers. Those, while interested in the Groveways, weren’t beaten back in the same way as the guardsmen - not that more than a scant few even dared to get close. Those that did were protected and watched, kept safe from the predations of the plantlife by a bevy of volunteers. A few were sneaky enough that they actually took some scratches and bruises before anyone managed to step in, but nobody died.

But for the most part, the civilians were less interested in the Groveways, miraculous and mystifying as the barriers of vegetation might have been, than they were in the burned-out tower and the mines. Increasing numbers of them had visited both, though Kala had noted that the crowds didn’t stay at the mines for long; after being stuck at the entrance for a few hours, they were eventually driven off. And, unfortunately, Kala’s sight wasn’t good enough to lip-read from that sort of distance. At best, she could see that they were angry.

Good.

Hopefully, that was a sign that public sentiment was turning in the proper direction. While it likely wouldn’t change what would need to be done to save the captives, Kala would prefer to avoid an all-out war with the entire population of the White Towers.

Humanity was supposed to fight monsters, not men.

“Looking capable enough to kill a man, these days,” Doran grunted, inspecting the spearmen and women as they trained. Just as ever, the core of the group was progressing intimidatingly quickly, training with a fervor that Doran himself had certainly never possessed.

Then again, he supposed, I never had the kinds of reasons that they do.

“Thank you, sir!” the man in front of him shouted, bouncing the butt of his spear against the ground in a sort of makeshift salute.

“Easy, Jorell,” he laughed. “I told you, I’m no ‘sir’.”

“With respect, sir,” Jorell replied, as stone-faced as always, “you are, sir.”

Doran shook his head. I still can’t tell if he’s fucking with me, he sighed. He probably wasn’t and, either way, it wasn’t worth the fight. That damn snake kept doing ridiculous things every time Doran looked away, and it meant that the growing group of warriors that Doran was training had become increasingly reverent - towards the snake itself, yes, but also towards the Seekers that had brought him.

The non-warriors were even worse, somehow. The salutes from the men and women Doran was training, he could understand. There was a master-student relationship there.

The occasional bow from people he didn’t even know, though…

Doran would never get used to that. He wasn’t some foppish dandy, needing random passersby to bash their foreheads against the ground when he walked past.

Sighing again, Doran refocused his attention on what mattered. A rather large number of trainees, the number having inflated over the past few days, faced off against one another. There was a noticeable difference between the new and the old. The new were more hesitant to take wounds in their practice, moving more carefully so as not to harm one another. Those, Doran figured, had mostly joined in to learn to defend themselves.

Which was fine, but it meant that most of his attention was focused elsewhere.

The old, those that had come from the burned out husk of the ruined tower, as well as those who had borne witness to Erik’s pretty little speech, were just different. Determined in a way that was concerning. Self-flagellating in a way that might have been outright suicidal in any other circumstance.

Speaking of….

“Hey!” Doran roared, making himself heard over the clack-clack of wood against wood. “What did I say about those Skies-damned thrusts!”

The man in question froze, pausing mid-thrust. His partner, despite the spear pushing through his side and no doubt making a mess of his intestines, froze just as carefully.

Yeah, you know I’m fucking talking about you, Doran fumed. I got you, you morons.

“Take a damn break! You’re off training for the next three hours!”

The duo groaned, hanging their heads, and began the walk of shame out of the sparring grounds and towards the array of tents at their edge. On the way there, the impaled half of the pair managed to extricate the spear from his side, his stabby partner shoving a bandage against the wound while he waited for the man’s [Little Guardian’s Totem] to heal the damage enough that he was no longer in danger of bleeding out.

As always, it was an odd amount of camaraderie for people that had willingly hurt each so much only a few seconds before. Doran hoped he wasn’t alone in finding it a little creepy, but Doran was finding himself surrounded by a lot of strange behavior and people in recent days, so he wouldn’t hold his breath on that.

Skies, some of them aren’t even bothering to sleep anymore, he bemoaned.

Some idiot had found out that the healing of the [Little Guardian’s Totem]s meant that sleep was technically unnecessary. For most people, that technicality wouldn’t have been enough. Even if the body was mostly kept safe, the mind wasn’t. Mental fatigue still tried to set in, leading to foggier thoughts and shakier decisions as time went on.

The core of Doran’s trainees just happened to be determined enough to ignore that - just like they happened to ignore the many self-inflicted wounds that they’d gathered over the course of their training, wounds that only increased as time went on. Luckily, nobody had gotten themselves killed yet, but there had been a close call or two that had required the snake’s personal attention to fix, dangerous enough that the [Little Guardian’s Totem]s alone might have been too slow to save them.

That, at least, had been enough for the group to finally sleep a little bit. Plus, Doran had started enforcing ‘breaks’ - mandated sleep time - when someone did something especially stupid.

Of course, they always threw themselves back at it a few hours later, as if trying to make up for lost time.

Doran found that he didn’t envy their future enemies one bit.

Everyone around him was crazy.