Spending My Retirement In A Game

"An incredible way to enhance potions? Not just a different way to make potions?" Stahl asked a bit confused after listening to Jyuuk’s explanation, and the Beastperson swiftly nodded. "Yes, a way to enhance potions. There’s two issues that are basically non-avoidable while making potions usually. First, that there will be some impurities in the potion itself, and second, that not all the essence will stay inside the potion. Your grandfather usually keeps the water he gets after making potions to use as a base for later potions, but it would be much, much more effective to simply get back regular water without any essence in it. So basically while working on a potion through alchemy, you have to do what I just did and pull all the essence in a plant into the center of the reaction that happens with the mana crystals. I’ll show you this part of things now, and Xenia will show you alchemy some other time." Jyuuk explained, before scratching the back of his head and then took a look around to make sure nobody was listening in.

"She’s at the police station right now because of what happened with her ex, and the situation has to be figured out a bit more. She said she doesn’t feel comfortable in her apartment anymore, so she might move again..." He explained, just to get Stahl caught up with everything, before the young man scratched his cheek.

"Oh, I see... I mean, whatever helps her feel safe, right? That’s the most important thing right now." He added, and Jyuuk immediately nodded his head. "Yes, of course. Erm, anyway, let’s start this lesson now. What I want you to start doing is one by one go through the marked pages in the ’Floressence’ book, and then make that plant grow. I have written on all the bags what they are, so don’t worry about needing to figure that out." Jyuuk suggested, and Stahl swiftly nodded his head.

"Alright, sounds good. So it’s Plant Control first... and the first plant that I’ll control is... grass?" Stahl asked surprised, and Jyuuk immediately smiled. "Yes, exactly. Grass may not seem all that important, and it’s not necessarily something you’ll need in combat, but it’s one of the greatest assets you can have outside of combat. Grass with deep-running roots are a great part of what keeps the ground underneath our feet stable. And not only that, but if you control its size, it can be a great cover in situations where you want to stay hidden, while being a great staple food for herbivore monsters you may tame." He added, so Stahl continued to listen, before Jyuuk added the most important reason.

"That, and it’s one of the easiest plants to grow, so a great practice for beginners to figure everything out." Jyuuk explained with a smile, so Stahl slowly nodded his head. "Gotcha. So, I have the seeds here, and what do I do then? I just pour my mana inside of them?" Stahl asked, before Jyuuk nodded.

"Yes, basically. Just by pouring your mana into a seed, you will give it natural nutrients and have the plant grow in the most natural way it can, albeit at high speeds. Then by letting your mana flow into the actual plant that grows from the seed, you can control its growth, such as the shape it grows in, how tall it grows, and what areas should be focused on." He explained, so Stahl grinned and swiftly got to it. "Alright, I guess I should start, then."

And so, Stahl held the tip of his finger against the seeds on his palm and poured his mana inside of them, before the seeds slowly cracked open and a few roots came out of it, although nothing happened after that. He managed to gain the Plant Control skill through it, but he was still incredibly confused, so the young man then looked over toward Jyuuk. "What just happened? I thought you said it would grow like normal?"

"I said it would grow in the most natural way it can. You were barely able to give it enough nutrients through your mana to start its growth, so it immediatley died afterward. That’s just how it is for the first time, I’m sure you’ll be able to actually have it grow grass now that you have the skill." He pointed out, so Stahl slowly nodded his head.

"I see... Then I’ll just try again." Stahl sighed before sorting out the few seeds that actually reacted to his mana, and then continued with the ones that didn’t grow. And this time when he tried to pour his mana inside, the roots grew a bit larger and there seemed to be just a tiny inkling of grass forming, before the plant died off again.

"Let me know when you can make it grow to 10 centimeters just by controlling the seed itself." Jyuuk said with a smile, before Stahl nodded his head, staring down at the seeds in his hand again in disappointment. Noticing his expression, Jyuuk then chose to give him a little something.

"You know, once you can properly control your skills and mana, you can do great things." He chuckled as he cupped Stahl’s palm in his own two hands after placing a small, special seed in the center of the pile of grass seeds. This surprised Stahl of course, but he could feel some movements inside of the now closed-off space, and before he knew it, Jyuuk had removed his hand while the seeds on his palm began to completely cover his hand, then his arm, his shoulders, and then the rest of his body. It felt as if he was being completely swallowed by a plant, until he wasn’t.

Instead of having grass and roots cover him, he now only had a few thin vine-like roots covering his arms and fingers, filling his body with a feeling of hot and cold at the same time.

"There, now at least your mana shouldn’t run dry for a little while. It reduces the speed at which Mana Manipulation gains proficiency as well as a negative side-effect of increasing your mana regeneration, control and output, but in your case, you only have positive effects, because you don’t want to rank the skill up again for a little while. So just keep going for now." Jyuuk smiled and turned around, before stepping over toward his undead again, leaving Stahl to his task.

"Whoa, this is so dope..." Stahl muttered excitedly, before grabbing another handful of grass seeds and continuing to learn plant control.

---

"Finally! Jyuuk, I’m done!" Stahl exclaimed a few hours later, finally having finished the tasks he had been given for all the different plants. He had them grow naturally, then had them grow in specific ways, and then even had to hold out against Jyuuk’s magic trying to make the plants wither. But now, he finished the last task that had been given to him in regards to plant control, despite long having passed Rank 1 in the skill. He had less skills to learn compared to what Evalia taught him, but Jyuuk had him do a lot of specific things instead of just letting him do whatever he wanted, so it took a bit longer.

"Good, good! Nice color, good quality... Yeah, we can move on to Plant Manipulation now." Jyuuk nodded, and Stahl jumped up with a smile. "Yes! Wait, do I need to do that for all the plants I made grow as well?" Stahl asked, but Jyuuk swiftly shook his head.

"No, no, there’s no need for that. It’s the same principle in every plant, and as long as you know what their features are, you can properly extract their essence." Jyuuk explained, before taking a look at the Herb currently growing on Stahl’s palm, which was the same one that Jyuuk had used to demonstrate Plant Manipulation before.

"You have just grown this herb to forget its own health and body as long as it can have the strongest healing qualities possible, right?" Jyuuk asked just to confirm once more, and Stahl nodded his head.

"Alright, then what I want you to do now is to fill out every part of that herb with your mana. Not outside, though, only inside of the plant." He added, so Stahl swiftly did as told before the Beastperson continued.

"Once you have done that, you will have to think about the plant’s property that you just enhanced, its healing properties. Have your mana mix with those properties. And then, all you need to do is pull that mana back out of the plant." Jyuuk explained, so Stahl slowly nodded his head and did just as told.

A few moments later, the herb in his hand had already crumbled up and died, while Stahl was trying to properly control the essence-infused mana.

"Now is a pretty tought part. You’ll learn with Xenia how to control it, but what’s going on right now is that you have control over is mana, but the essence is working against your will, or rather, it’s just not working with you. You should have already gained the Plant Manipulation skill, so now quickly go and use the essence-infused mana to grow another version of that herb, once more attuned perfectly toward its healing properties." Jyuuk told Stahl, who swiftly tried to do exactly what his Life-related skill-teacher explained.

"You should have a just so sligthly better version of that herb now. At your Plant Manipulation rank, it should have only been a miniscule increase, but later, doing such things becomes normal. Instead of using only one plant to get an effect, you but multiple plants in a row. Let’s take simple seeds as an example. You make one seed sprout, and have it encapsule the second in its roots. Then, you do something like you just did with the first plant and directly pour the essence-infused mana into the second seed. You repeat the same process again to get a stronger plant and effect in the third seed." Jyuuk explained, so Stahl simply nodded his head.

"Okay, got you. And what do I need to do to increase my skill rank for now?" Stahl asked, quite curious about all of this, and wondering what else he could do.

"You repeat that process until the proficiency level is at 25. Then, you do the same just for a different effect, being the effect attuned toward size. Increase its size as much as possible, and it will also be shown in the essence. Then you take that essence, and form an even larger plant. Repeat that until your proficiency level is at 50. Then, you take a plant with a high defensive nature, and increase exactly that defensive nature in the same manner until your proficiency level is at 75. And then, you will take the essence-infused mana from the plant you get from the first loop, then another strand of essence-infused mana from the plant from the second loop, and essence-infused mana from the third loop, and pour them all into a rose seed at the same time, and have it grow naturally. Take the essence from that rose, and pour it into another rose seed to have it grow naturally. Then again and again until you rank up." Jyuuk said with a smile, before Stahl slowly nodded his head, although he was smiling wryly, feeling like that process might end up a little boring, as he was really just going to repeat the same thing over and over again.

But aware that Jyuuk most likely knew the most about these skills, Stahl just did what he was told until he reached the proficiency level 75. From the three plants that he now had next to him, the one with the increased size now being nearly at his height despite being nothing but simple grass, Stahl swiftly took all the essence in three different ’strands’ as Jyuuk had told him to.

It was very complicated to do this, as he had to properly concentrate on all three at the same time, but once he got them somewhat stable, all he had to do is pour them into the rose seed that Jyuuk gave him.

The color of the rose was incredibly vibrant like Stahl hadn’t ever really seen before, while its stem seemed to have something like a light bark growing on it. And it was probably twice as big as it usually would be as well.

"Holy... Alright, Shouldn’t’ve doubted him... This stuff really works..." Stahl muttered quietly before continuing the practice, now taking the essence from this rose and transfering it over to another. He repeated this over and over, and when he finally ranked his skill up to 1, Jyuuk told him to just continue one more time.

And then, the flower that had grown one meter in size and looked as if it was a small tree with thin bark that was sprayed in red paint suddenly turned into something else. It was the size of a regular rose, the color of a regular rose, and it didn’t seem to have any peculiarities about it at all, at least outwardly. He knew that it was quite special when Jyuuk, instead of telling Stahl that he messed up, simply smiled at the young man.

"Good job, Stahl. You just made a Witherless Rose."