Chapter Two-Hundred Ninety-Six

Aranya and everyone should be getting to the Southwood soon, so I should make sure I’m ready to accept the trade once they’re there.  Poppy and Titania have been working hard on the sections of the forest I’ve purchased, and I think they’re about ready for me to purchase the rest.

I’ll hold off on expanding upward there just yet, though.  While Poppy is having some good success with a yew as a base with the willow growing like a vine, she seems convinced she’s close to a breakthrough with hybridizing the two.  She’s been getting more viable crossbreeds lately, and though they don’t have the qualities I’m looking for, they’re a good proof of concept for the work she’s doing.  She just needs to select for the traits I want, and we’ll be golden!

She’s commandeered more than a few of the small bees to help keep track of everything, and when combined with the leafcutter ants and her own magic, not to mention the rainbats, she gets through a generation of plants a day!  A couple of the more outdoorsy adventurers have wandered into her lab/farm, and they seemed pretty confused at everything going on.  Poppy bullied them out pretty quickly, though, not wanting them to disturb her experiments.

It was interesting to see the soil elementals in action with the living vines.  The basic style and challenge is pretty similar to the wyrms, except the wyrms can only really target a single delver.  With the vines and the elementals, though, they practically become living AoE attacks.  They don’t do the most damage yet, but they make it practically impossible to have firm footing and move how you might want.  The buzz of incoming bumble bees was what made the delvers decide to get while the getting was good, and I got a bit of mana for defeating the delvers.

While Poppy is taking to a research and support role, Titania is more on the path of a warrior queen.  I’d call her a warrior princess, but I wouldn’t know where to even begin with making a chakram.  Jello probably could, but unless Titania expands into metal affinity, I don’t think she’ll get much use out of it.

I’m sure she’d try, though.  She’s been going through the various denizens and testing how they’d do in the forest, and most seem to do very well!  The crows and ravens are more than happy to hide shinies all over the place, same with the packrats.  I should sprinkle around some chests once I have a better idea of the layout for the forest as a whole, too.  I think it’ll really help incentivize delvers to come have a look.  Most of the denizens that have been working out haven’t been a surprise, but there is one that I didn’t expect to be able to contribute as much, but is already opening up some interesting opportunities: the tunnelbore ants.

They need a bit of help from the vines and earth elementals to stabilize things, but Titania is already making an interesting tunnel system through the forest.  It almost makes me want to ask Violet about trading for moles or gremlins… or centipedes or mushrooms.  There’s a lot of potential for them there, but I’ll hold off.  I don’t want to go stealing her niche.  Even more than making tunnels, Titania is using the tunnelbores to landscape a lot, too.  There’s a couple creeks and such running through, and I think she has a plan in mind with diverting them.

Rerouting waterways can be tricky business, but she and Poppy both are confident, so I let them work on their project without me interfering.  Coda even stops by occasionally to give his own opinions.  While the two are definitely going for a more natural look, it’s never a bad idea to have a better understanding of fluid dynamics when dealing with water flow.

I think it’s time to buy the rest of the forest now.  It’s another big chunk of what I got for the Harbinger, but this is what I’ve been planning for, so it’s not exactly a surprise.  Titania and Poppy are both excited with the new area, and I think glad they didn’t have to try to manage the entire thing all at once.  It’s good to take things in steps to avoid getting overwhelmed.

They’ve mostly worked out the kinks with the first section, so now they take to the second section with gusto!  I upgrade their spawners a bit, too.  I don’t go far enough to get a new spawn yet, but faster production for the sprites and vines will ensure they don’t get stretched too thin.

Grim is helping out, too.  He nods at the expansion and heads to the spawning crypt, opening the doors to lead a large group of fungal zombies and verdant skeletons to what will be the spring section.  A handful have been out to help Titania and Poppy before, but with the new room, might as well get them used to filtered daylight and open spaces.

Some of the people in the cemetery give the procession curious looks, but they’re not bothering anyone, so the delvers leave the undead to whatever it is they’re doing.

Time gets away from me as I watch everyone work, spending a bit of mana to put in some nodes or spawn some more denizens, and before I know it, I can feel Leo and Honey both trying to get my attention.  Looking through their eyes, I can see the border of the Southwood not far ahead, and I can hear and smell my denizens and the kobolds behind, too.

Right, I need to make sure everyone is ready for them, also.  Larx is aware of a lot of them wanting to join the enclave, so the ratkin have been working to ensure there’s room, as have the spiderkin Triumvirate.  They’re not getting quite as many, but they’re just as excited to have new neighbors as my ratkin.  I haven’t looked as hard at Fourdock’s preparations, but all they really need is a couple spare houses, which are pretty easy to find, and they’ll be ready to rock.

Speaking of being ready to rock, The Southwood seems pretty eager to trade with me, and I suspect the pile of mana he’ll be getting is only part of it.  Now I have the entire footprint for the Forest of Four Seasons, it just needs the climate control upgrade to make the name fit.  The central tree will be important, too, but it’ll be this upgrade that really sets the area apart and gives it the theme I want.

And soon, I won’t need to just imagine what it’ll all look like.  Leo’s tail wags in anticipation, and Aranya pats his head as they all get closer.

“Lord Thedeim is looking forward to the transaction, I can tell.  Not only a special upgrade, but two more scions as well.  You’ll make sure to help them adjust, right Leo?  You know how it feels to transfer to a new sanctuary.”

His tail wags harder in agreement.  I think Leo has adjusted well to my nonsense, though he also wasn’t exactly happy under Mlynda’s control.  Still, they’ve both grown, and he didn’t even growl at her on the occasions they met during the attack on the Maw!

I’m curious about the two new denizens and scions I’ll be getting, too.  I wonder what it’s like for a denizen to be upgraded to a scion?  Do they suddenly have complete thoughts?  Did they not before?  Is it more gradual?  Or have they always been as smart as a scion, but just never had the drive or other reason to actively make decisions?

I’d ask, but I’m even less of a psychologist than I am a biologist.  Leo, Honey, and Aranya enter the Southwood’s territory, with the throng of kobolds following behind, and Yvonne and her party bringing up the rear.  As they gather, my scions break away from the group to meet with the Southwood’s other scion: the Bear.

I think he’s a grizzly, but I also think he’s closer in size to a polar bear.  Despite his size, he seems more relaxed than threatening, and easily takes a seat before making bear noises at Leo and Honey.  Whatever he’s saying has them feeling amused, which I think can only be a good sign.  They exchange some pleasantries before another bear and a fox step out from behind him.

They make their own noises and they all chat as I get the much-awaited popup for the trade.  The window is pretty simple, and though I think I can expand it to make a counter offer and maybe try to get a training room, too, I’ll save that for later.  Maybe the Stag can come visit and I can ask about it then.  EIther way, he’s offering the Climate Control upgrade, as well as a fox and a bear denizen in exchange for mana.

By the raw numbers, it’s a pretty hefty sum, but I get the feeling he asking as little as he can get away with by the system.  I briefly consider countering with more, but simply accept.  I feel like trying to pay more would be like arguing about the bill at a restaurant.  Best to accept the first offer, rather than start unneeded drama about who will pay what.

Besides, I don’t think either of us is getting screwed with this deal.  He gets a nice injection for his projects, and I get what I need to finish my latest one.  It’s win/win!

I accept and upgrade the fox and bear to scions, only to meet a hurdle.

Denizen must be within territory to ascend to Scion

I pout at that, but have to begrudgingly admit it makes sense.  Otherwise, some crazy dungeon that’s definitely not me could spend the piles of mana I definitely don’t have to just upgrade denizens on expedition and ambush someone with a huge threat!

Fine, Order, ruin my fun.  Or delay it, I guess.  I pat the bonds with Leo and Honey, and they move forward to greet the latest additions to my growing menagerie, with Honey doing a little dance of greeting on the nose of the bear, and Leo licking the top of the fox’s head.  That’ll have to do until I can upgrade them and pat them more directly.

I’m already looking forward to getting them to their new home, and not just for the new spawners.  Soon they’ll get to meet everyone, make new friends, and come to the realization that I do things a lot differently than the Southwood.  I’m pretty sure they volunteered for this, so really, they’ll only have themselves to blame for the chaos ahead.

But they’re not the only thing I’ve gotten!  I let Leo and Honey welcome my new denizens as I return my attention to the Forest of Four Seasons, preparing to make it live up to the name I’ve been giving it the entire time.

I select the entire forest for the upgrade, and take my time to adjust everything how I want it, and I’m glad I did.  I could brute force it to make the sections fit their seasons, but even I wince at the upkeep that would take.  But, If I adjust the flows, moving the heat around instead of just deleting it, the price plummets.

I even see why Titania and Poppy were having Coda advise on the redirection of the waterways in the territory.  Water is a great place to sink heat.  I think I’ll need to change where they’re moving the creeks and streams a bit, but with putting the excess heat into them, I also get a discount on adjusting the humidity, too!  I’m sure I’ll need to have Fluffles or maybe even the Quartermaster swing by to help guide everything and fine tune it, probably at the direction of Poppy or Titania, but the discount will definitely be worth it!

I look over the adjustments once more before paying the cost, and smile as the denizens and scions in the forest pause to see the mana flows start working.  Sure, I could have gotten a dramatic sweeping change all at once, but that’d be the brute force option.  Slow and steady is the clock of the seasons, and I see no reason to rush it.