Prime Originator

Within the known universe, while it is true that all life had an equal opportunity at attaining the everlasting through divine practice, their difficulty in ascending the realms defers from one another because of existing balance.

In the mundane world, which was devoid of spirit energy, perennial plants like the elder tree still had a natural lifespan that far outstrips any other lifeforms between heaven and earth, but in return for being endowed with such a long natural lifespan, it takes a long time for them to gain sentience and develop their intelligence.

Judging by the extent of the elder tree's growth, Leon speculated that the elder tree was at least 10,000 years old. It should be possible to establish basic communication between them, hopefully.

Leon expanded his senses and reached out for the tree spirit within the elder tree with his consciousness. The tree spirit was quickly startled by Leon's sudden presence and retreated in alarm.

Within the sea of consciousness, Leon had a mental projection of his own body while the tree spirit of the elder tree took on the form of a 5yr old humanoid child adorned in leafy clothing and posses a pair of horn-like branches on its head.

Leon tried to appease the tree spirit by surrendering his hands in the air and indicate he meant no harm.

Of course, if he really did have ill-intentions, the tree spirit could easily wipe out their whole party like its doing to the ants. Even a newly ascended Transcendent would have trouble dealing with the wrath of an elder tree, let alone one that is at the peak of its class.

Leon had some hidden concerns when he attempted establishing communication with the elder tree but seeing the innocent child-like appearance of the tree spirit, his worries were washed away.

The elder tree had relied on absorbing the artificial spirit energy for survival and growth, but it was clear that something was wrong with the energy.

Leon was worried that the tree spirit would have been corrupted by the foul energy and transformed into an evil tree spirit, but it appeared that his concerns were unnecessary.

Trees were miraculous existences that could even transform human waste into something useful. Although it wasn't pure and incorruptible, it wouldn't be that easy to corrupt it like one cannot simply determine whether a child would be good or evil at birth.

Sensing no malice from Leon, the tree spirit circled around Leon and studied him curiously.

"Can you understand me?"

Leon spoke in the human language. However, the tree spirit did not understand his human language and simple tilt its head with "???" over its head.

Leon expected as much and initiated a simpler way of communication. He pointed outside the elder tree and began making request gestures of "bound men", "roots", "release" and "please."

The tree spirit contemplated for a moment. As if to affirm that it understood him, it uttered, "Rao!"

"Thank you."

Leon smiled, but it froze shortly after. The tree spirit seemed to have misunderstood his meaning and caught his main body with its binds. Leon's main body became rooted like his two palace guards.

"Pft, is this your way of communicating with the elder tree? It certainly is unique…" Lilith had evaded the roots when it happened and looked at Leon's amusedly. She failed to guard his body, but she wasn't sorry at all.

"Rao?"

The tree spirit gazed at Leon with a questioning look. It seemed to imply, "Is this what you wanted?"

Leon didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Of course, that was not what he wanted!

"No!"

Leon had a distressed look as he reattempted communication. But no matter what gesture he made; the tree spirit did not unbind him. The lack of progress made him depressed. He did not want his main body to have stuck him this…

The tree spirit seemed to have felt his distress and felt guilty like it had done something wrong. Since it's birth, it had always been attacked by insects that went after its only means of survival.

It happened so frequently over the long years that its roots and developed its own self-defense mechanism to retaliate on instinct. It was rare for it to have friendly visitors.

The bindings on Leon's body was slowly released and Leon thanked it profusely. It sensed Leon's joyous mood and also felt its own mood being uplifted.

Leon did not make any further gestures to communicate with the tree spirit recklessly, lest he incurs more disaster upon himself. There had to be another way.

Leon pondered the issue of communication, but he had forgotten one method he had yet to use.

"Can you understand me now?"

Leon carefully said in the ancient language. The tree spirit seemed to have been surprised and nodded excitedly. "Rao!"

Leon heaved a sigh of relief and continued, "Can you released my two men outside?"

The tree spirit contemplated his words carefully but ultimately shook its head with a reluctant expression. The tree spirit seemed bent on using his palace guards to produce fertilizers for itself.

Leon smiled wryly and returned his senses back to his body, before attempting to negotiate with the tree spirit. The tree spirit followed him and projected itself outside of the elder tree when Leon pulled out a single healing pill.

…

Meanwhile, the situation was growing restless in the Crawford Kingdom.

To the west, the number of berserk beasts attacking the wall had been steadily increasing, with a few researchers falling under the same state being exposed to an unknown substance found inside the carcasses of the berserk beasts after they were dissected for study.

At the same time, there was an increasing number of troop movements along the Crawford-Durham borders and Crawford-Valaran borders. Such movements were startling news to the Crawford Kingdom since they already learned that the royalties of their neighboring kingdoms had long become puppet rulers for the sects.

After learning the news, Heinrich spared no efforts to close the borders and relocate troops from both the southern and western garrisons to strengthen their border defenses.

The situation of the Wildlands had always been filled with uncertainties. This was even more so without the airships to scout the land ahead of them. As such, an abnormal amount of reserve troops had always been stationed nearby in case of any unexpected changes.

However, since these reserve troops got relocated to strengthen the eastern borders, the main garrisons of the western frontier had a sense of vulnerability and uneasiness considering the recent events with the appearance of berserk beasts in the west.

The only person within the western frontier that remained calm about the situation was the general marquis. Regarding this issue, Hendrick only needed to utter four words to quell all the uneasiness in his soldiers.

"I am still here!"

These four words may be simple, but it carried weight and conviction of the general marquis. Towards the people and soldiers, Hendrick was a hero and a symbol of hope due to his long years of successful service in safeguarding the Great Wall and campaigns against the Wildlands. The soldiers were able to firmly believe that everything in the west will be fine as long as the general marquis was with them.

Back at the Capital, Elizabeth was seen pacing back and forth in front of Heinrich's study over an entirely different matter unrelated to the current problems the kingdom was facing.

While the people became concerned about the possibility of war being upon them, Elizabeth was concerned for her son. Although she believed in her son's capabilities, she still had a reason to be worried as a mother.

The hunting team was scheduled to return after a week at the latest, but even after a week had passed, the hunting team had not returned. There's no way she wouldn't be worried. Something must have happened in the underground.

If not for the great responsibilities bearing down on her and her husband, they would have both left the palace to look for their son.

"Sigh, you shouldn't have let our son go with the hunting team, Beth. I knew we shouldn't have let him go." Heinrich sighed melancholically. He had yet to spend any quality time with this son of his.

Elizabeth raised her eyebrow and said, "Are you blaming me, Richie? Even if I was against it, I can't stop my son from doing what he wants to do. Does it even make sense that after being separated for 17 years, we can just come back into his life and impose our will on him? Even if our son accepts us, do you think that's fair for our son?"

"Instead of pointing fingers, how about you figure out a way to save our son and manage the kingdom at the same time? Hmph, hmph! Also, it's been a week and you've only reached the one-star level. Even the guards train faster than you, let alone my daughters-in-law!"

"I… Yes…" Heinrich became tongue-tied by his wife's barrage of unreasonable words. In the end, all he could only answer obediently. He was afraid of his own wife.

But how can he be blamed for his slow progress? Ever since he woke up, he had a whole pile of work dumped on him. Not only does he have to worry about the new problems propping up, but he also had to fix the old lingering ones caused by his wife massacring all his officials. The number of existing problems was enough to give him a headache. Where would he find the time to cultivate in peace?

"Haiz…"

Heinrich issued a long sigh.. He had an impulse to just wash his hand of these matters by banging his head and go back into a coma. He really wanted to ask his wife, "Why did you only wake me up now?"