My apprentices were returned to me today knowing how to fly. So I got them to work on the next training exercise I had planned for them. I know they haven’t mastered the previous one but this should definitely help with any type of healing they do going forward. I am, of course, talking about dissection.

I created a room with a bunch of tables with bodies on them. Next to each table was a bunch of information and diagrams about the body that they should use for reference while cutting them open. One advantage of recently writing a book was that I had all of that information readily available. The goal is to get them too, on their own, dissect and study the bodies of countless creatures, learn about how they work, find common themes, and overall figure stuff out that can help them learn how to heal better.

Junior got right to work without a second thought, but Askos was a little unnerved by the whole thing at first. Though he did eventually give in to his own curiosity and is figuring things out even faster than Junior is.

Junior was slow and deliberate, it takes her a while but nearly every observation she makes is correct, or at least getting close to the right answer. Askos, on the other hand, figures things out really quickly but is often wrong. If I weren’t there to subtly guide him back to the right train of thought then he likely would end up in a worse position from this exercise. He is getting better though, the more he understands the better he understands new things.

Watching the pair work together to understand something they are both genuinely interested in warmed my nonexistent heart.

Despite knowing that every time I fail to get what I want my Fate is growing I am still getting frustrated. Fate isn’t exactly something I can make use of in my every day, it’s something best saved for emergencies. That being said it is growing rapidly, and it is growing faster and faster the larger the caverns grow. More fate is produced when causing an unfortunate thing that is unlikely perhaps? I know my own perception of the event is the biggest part of it, but it looks like actual chance does matter as well.

At this point, we are thoroughly into bedrock with our expansion. I had considered expanding outward more but I didn’t really want too much of my forest being over this cave system, that and there is a lot more ore this deep.

I’ve gotten to the point where I am able to sense the location of ore veins through the dirt and the stone with the Digger Root I integrated into my body. I’m not very good at it but overwhelming amounts of mana solves most problems.

Naturally, we have extracted tons of metal over the last couple days. It is valuable, but we don’t really have many uses for it so far. Par is trying to rectify that by actively encouraging people to learn how to work with metal. With any luck, this will cause a massive increase in the number and quality of metal items, something that will definitely come in handy if the enemy keeps using plant destroying magic.

According to the scholars, the method we’re using to build the glass caverns is very similar to a method used by powerful stone manipulators when they want to make a quick buck. The reason it isn’t more widespread is that there aren’t many people capable of it and it usually very quickly crashes the market for metals, making them incredibly cheap.

I am definitely in a position to allow people to do this kind of mining quickly and easily, and if we can get the whole metalworking thing going then a cheap supply of metal can only be a good thing. I wanted to start teaching some Ents and other plant manipulators how to do this, but Par persuaded me to wait until he got some things set up first, or rather Tiddol got some things set up first, as she is always the one in charge of that kind of thing. I’m not entirely sure why, but apparently having too much metal on hand can be a bad thing?

That being said, I did come across a vein of metal that was radiating the same type of poison left behind by nuclear fire, which was odd, and a little worrying. I decided to leave it in the ground until I could get a chance to talk to people who know more about the stuff than I do. In the meantime, I am going to give it a wide berth.

With the last of my paladins having my plants integrated into their bodies I have them all constantly going on dungeon dives. They don’t need to sleep, they have Ergen keeping them awake, Flore keeping them from feeling pain, and Whitefoot healing any injuries. They don’t need to eat as they can just create food inside of their own stomachs and they don’t need to drink as they can do the same with water. And they never run out of mana because Requiem produces more than they could possibly spend. And they love me even more for all of that.

They would train day and night if I let them, constantly approaching challenges with every moment. Of course, I know from experience that doing so is a quick way to burn out that really gets in the way of learning, so they have to rest for at least two hours a day, or at least do something different during that time. Several of them have taken to doing alchemy and practicing other crafts during that time, and what one of them knows all of them know so they are improving at that very quickly. A couple others are being very social with the people, working with them, solving problems, and trying to figure out how to be charismatic. My dad has taken a couple of them under his wing for that. The rest are pursuing other interests like other forms of magic.

Other than that I spent my time with Azrezel today, who had Emericus with him. Apparently, Azrezel is able to manipulate the mood of the cultivator, in addition to a bit of crude mind reading, through the piece of his soul he used to seed the corpse. Azrezel has been using that to try and make him want to stick around, make this place his home, and hopefully work for us. This isn’t something Emericus seems to have noticed, or if he has it isn’t something he is irritated by, so hopefully it will work out well.

That plus the piece of Azrezel’s soul inside him and my own innate abilities should get him to join our cause sooner or later. With him on our side it should be a lot easier to destroy the people who invaded our home and destroyed the center of my forest. Before that, I was willing to make peace and let all of our differences settle by the wayside, now not so much. People will die, which is a shame, and I will try to prevent deaths where I can. But my own people and my own home come before anyone else. There is no peaceful resolution anymore.

Anyway, Good Night Diary.