Tree wants more trees (1/2)
Year 78 Month 1.
An eruption.
A fine way to start the new year, really.
The damned volcano erupted and destroyed every single thing near it. Close to half of my beetles failed to escape, so they died, all buried under debris, dust, lava, rocks and well, all the other things that volcanoes tend to spit out.
I mean, I sorta figured that volcanoes, especially one still pumping out lava would be somewhat dangerous, but I guess after not seeing any major eruption, I thought it’s one of those ‘stable’ volcanoes. To some extent, I guess I’m a little complacent there…
But still, why didn’t my roots sense anything? Don’t volcanoes have tremors or minor quakes before going off like that? Or does the magic in this world messes with such processes?
Oh well, this is a minor setback, a bit of delay to my volcano expansion plans. If life went too easy, I’d probably think something bad is gonna happen real soon. Probably pushes the plans back by a couple of months, to let the environment settle down and also rebuild my forces, since I do need to regenerate the beetles before attempting my assault on the magma golems, that spawn closer to the now partly exposed caldera. I’m rather eager to test out the new large beetles in combat, since they are bigger, and have bigger legs and horns, to see how they perform against those golems.
So, I turn my attention to the next few things I have in mind.
In New Freeka, there’s a massive hall with a few [external biolabs], and Jura is helping to guide the Valtrian soldiers. The hall itself is filled with animals… and plants, gathered from the region, an exercise we started last month.
The men were sitting idle, so, we sent them out on missions to collect different kinds of plants and animals. As many as they could find, whatever they’ve not seen before, or whatever they notice that’s different from New Freeka, and bring it back. Thanks to this exercise, I’m now going through all the plants and animals they’ve brought back. 5 biolabs, side by side, and the soldiers, under Jura’s supervision, help to put all the specimens in.
After the analysis, some soldiers are tasked to bring them to a patch of empty land and pass them to a different group, those with [farming] or [planting] skills, for them to plant.
The intention is fairly simple, there’s a lack of plant diversity in the valley, and that needs to be addressed. Secondly, I’m hoping to somehow unlock more [unique trees], like the [ginseng trees], such that I can produce new items. Third, new species of crops would lead to me having more [subsidiary tree - crops] variety.
And now, I have the manpower to push these guys out on a regional ‘harvesting’ mission.
The process of analysing the plants took 5 days, and the animals another 4 days. The reason I asked for the animals, is actually just to throw off whoever’s watching us, but it’s a waste to not analyse the animals after collecting them, so after the animals were ‘scanned’ by the biolabs, they’re placed in an area that’s meant to be a menagerie.
[New crop species unlocked - Wheat, Jackfruit, Light Corn, Blackpotato, Rye, Red hops, Blueberry, Fireberry]
[New Tree type unlocked : Common herbal bushes. Bushes containing a wide variety of herbs. Herb varieties appear at random]
“How’s the register coming along?”
“It’ll take some time, Supreme Counsel.” The young man, a junior [herbalist] bows when responding to Jura’s question.
“It’s something the Tree Spirit wants done as soon as possible. This is a big task.”
Well, actually Trevor and Dimitree already built a compilation of the plants we now have in the valley, and their characteristics that they can identify using the data from the biolabs. But, I had Jura hire a herbalist to start work on a physical copy of a register. Just to compare the kind of information a herbalist would normally take down, and one prepared by my tree-minds.
The young man bows. “I’m honored, and I can tell it is an important exercise.”
The herbalist, together with the ‘gardeners’ and other farmhands, will be the ones managing the ‘garden’ in the compound of the Valtrian order. It’s one of those odd jobs.
As for the animals, I’ve left them to some of the rangers to care for. In the town of New Freeka, there are some rangers, and some [flock tenders] or [herders] that have some skills with animals, so they are the ones looking after the collection of animals.
It’s not a perfect match in terms of skill and job class, but oh well. Maybe they’ll gain the class someday.
Year 78 Month 2
The Valtrian Order separation exercise this month. The military force that’s transferred to us is a little too large to my liking, and their competencies a bit lacking, so, like what companies do when their staff size is not optimal… we have… retrenchments!
I kinda feel like walking up to guys and tell them, “You’re fired!”
But that’s not exactly a nice way to do things.
Jura and the captains identified those who are not so good at their jobs, based on their performance during the collection exercise, spoke these non-performing soldiers whether they have other secondary talents they want to share, whether they want to take part in the other roles happening in the Order, or take the money and go find another job.
I mean, if I’m going to be hiring herbalists and all those other ‘specialists’, I need money, and money isn’t free, so, gotta reshuffle them around. Priorities!
One must cut away the rotting branch for a new one to grow. Of course, there is plenty of crying, plenty of anger, and plenty of cussing.
Maybe some retaliation.
”Ivy.”
”Yes, master.”
”Monitor those we have fired. See whether they do anything unusual. Let me know if there are any attempted retaliation, but do not interfere unless I instruct you to.”
”As you command.”
My new tree mind, and unlike Trevor or Dimitree who has responsibility to watch the valley and the forest, Ivy's task is focused on the Valtrian Order, observing the citizens and reporting any unusual matters. I also task her to play a hidden watcher, on all financial transactions and trade transactions.
Watching the movements of some 3,000 to 4,000 employees of the Valtrian Order is a laborious affair, even if there are trees everywhere, and Ivy pretty much has little capacity to do anything else
A part of me feels like I have become that which I hated in my past life, the ”big brother” who intrudes in on everyone's privacy, that overly micromanaging boss that looks through everything I do with a fine-toothed comb, but… this is a magical world, and I have to pick the bigger baddy here.
Curbing corruption, finding traitors take priority here.
Even in their somewhat-perilous situation, people will find ways to cheat, or steal, to take a little more for themselves. So, I thought I would be ready, since I know about it and know it exists. Nobody’s innocent. But Ivy's report still stunned me. The extent of it.
All of the employees engage in at least one minor misconduct.
It's usually relatively small, like a coin or two per transaction, or a little slip of coin to move up the queue in the burial services. Some soldiers would steal utensils from the mess hall, and bring home for their family. Or intentionally tearing a piece of uniform so that they can use the cloth for something else. Or administrative staff stealing paper or writing equipment.
I sigh. When Ivy first reported the extent of such things, I just froze. But before I could lash out in anger and kill all these people.
”Were you expecting saints from these former refugees? The fact that they adapted to a new way of life so quickly is already admirable.” Meela sometimes dispenses a bit of wisdom.
Well, true. This world has no proper regimented education system to teach a sense of ‘morals’, and parents trying to survive probably have a different set of ‘morals’ than me. If there is, there isn’t enough time or stability for it to really sink in, since the world gets hammered by the demon king every now and then. If there’s anywhere with a proper education system, it’s probably in those cloud cities, or the moving giant-turtle islands, or the walking towers of the great deserts.
I wonder how many years of formal education to the citizens of New Freeka have? Ah, some other day’s worries.
Ultimately, I decided to just have the worst offenders retrenched, and decide to just put up with the minor ‘infractions’ among the rest. Perhaps some day I would get a group of morally upright employees, but for now, this is the cards I have.
“Should I continue monitoring them, Master?” Ivy’s not fond of the task, but she still obeys me.
“Well… yes.”
“It’s taking up most of my processing ability, master. Filtering through all the language and smalltalk is really challenging.”
Ah. Well…
“Fine, will it help if you restrict the scope to within our compounds and just the area around them?”
“A lesser area would mean less to monitor, yes it will help a bit. But I estimate it’ll still use up 70% of my available processing power.”
“Unfortunately I’ll need someone to watch these guys… please bear with it. Maybe it’ll get easier once you gain some levels.”
“As you command, master.”
Year 78 Month 2 Week 3
The first large beetles emerge from their pods. The volcano kind of started to stabilise, so I send the large-volcano-adapted beetles on their first missions. This is why they are created, after all. They easily dispatch any of the lesser monsters that appear, but their first encounter with the massive magma golems is disappointing.
Though they now have the size, they still lack the necessary firepower to take out the golems. At least they can take three punches from the large golems before dying, unlike regular beetles, who just get squashed underfoot.
According to Jura and the data gathered from the adventurers guild in New Freeka, magma golems are considered monsters for adventurers around the level 50-60, and with suitable gear. A person with suitable skills could possibly take one out at level 40.