As morning came, Ben woke up, only to find Delair already at the ready to help him put together breakfast for everyone, eager to practice what she’d been shown only the night before as he watched from the side, prepared to step in at a moment's notice but not needing to in the end as the meal came together and the other two joined.

It was only after they ate that everyone parted, each of them off to prepare for their own tasks for the day. Thera going off to Hentath’s home, wanting to check if any of the dryads had any medical issues that they weren’t able to take care of themselves, as Ben went into the woods with Delair, ready to start his main goal that had brought them there as he stared at the closest tree of the grove.

This is it. My last idea. If practicing with these trees for weeks isn’t enough to push me over the edge then I’m out of options.

“So what are you going to do anyway?” Delair asked as she watched him lean down against it.

“Ha, I’m afraid it’s not going to be the most visual thing, but I can probably help teach you while I’m doing it too. Want to do me a favour and find me a couple large stones?”

He only really needed one mind to go to helping Delair and she ran off to fulfill his request as he worked on how he would organize the others. Even if he was taking a risk, he really didn’t want to gain a level of parallel thought or mental expansion, and with thirty-one left he decided on twenty-eight going to the trees as the remaining three focused on meditating, hoping that would be enough as he connected to them.

As with the last time he did, he felt his mind being assaulted by the sheer force of the woods, all of the trees in the grove linked in their own way, and each of them far more powerful than that standard mind of a plant as he took it all in, feeling them pull back as they noticed not only him, but the strain he was immediately placed under by the power of their massive collective mind.

Wait, don’t pull away. He thought to the woods, filling the words with feelings to be understood. I’ve been through worse. I connected to you in the past if you remember me. Give me all you’ve got, I can take it.

He felt hesitation from the plants, but he wasn’t willing to give up.

Please, The harder it is for me the better the odds I can grow from this.

He tried to attach all of the feelings he could to the thought, his desire to improve himself, the knowledge of all the good it might do, the time limit they were all on, and more than anything his desire. He didn’t care if it hurt a bit, he wanted to push beyond his limits, and that feeling made it through.

All at once he felt the trees change, no longer pulling back, instead pushing forward as all of the minds he had on the task went to face it head-on, the strain he was feeling from it being close to the pain of the migraines he’d had to deal with for so long, but that was a pain he had practice dealing with. He wouldn’t back down, no matter how many days of it he was going to have to put up with till he reached his goal.

“Ben!” Delair yelled as she came back with rocks in hand, seeing his face not hiding all of the pain, along with the sweat dripping down his brow. “What happened?”

“Ah, don’t worry,” He told her, trying to seem reassuring but failing completely in the end. “I’m not actually doing as bad as I look.”

“Are you sure? ‘Cause you look really really bad.”

Ouch.

“I am, this is just the sort of thing you might have to do if you’re feeling desperate to push a skill beyond its limits,” He told her. “Comparatively, some people have been through a lot worse. Heck, I know a guy who had half of his body eaten while trying to awaken his unarmed combat skill. Worked out for him since he got to meet his wife after, but still, if this works I’m getting off easy.”

Though admittedly not as easy as I did for my crafting and enchanting. He thought to himself. Unless you count Galwax’s trial as being a necessity for awakening enchanting, then dealing with this is still a lot easier.

She still seemed unsure, but as most of his other minds were focused on the woods behind him, the one he was dedicating to training her was focused on the stones in her hands as he held out his own.

“Here, hand one over and we’ll get started trying to teach you how to enchant.”

It was going to be an interesting experience trying to help her learn it. Since it was his blessed skill he’d never had to go to the trouble of gaining it himself, but he’d read more than enough books on the topic to know how it was done.

The fact they were getting started also proved to be more than interesting enough to her to distract from the look on his face as she handed over the rocks, watching intently as he used his magic to blend them into one before dividing them again into two equal pieces and shaping them into stone knives.

They wouldn’t be as useful as a properly made metal one, but they would do as a medium for enchanting as he handed one over as Delair looked on, gripped with excitement.

“Alright, so the simplest thing an enchanter can do is place the effects of a spell onto an item. Given that you have plant magic, the goal would be to place something that would give this knife an easier time cutting wood when a bit of mana is running through it. Have you ever used your magic to do something like that before?”

“Um, no, but I think I can!”

“There’s no rush. Grab a branch and practice it a bit first. If you get a feel for the spell you’re trying to apply then it should give you an easier time to do it. I’ll explain what you’re trying to do, but unfortunately on this part, I won’t be able to give you a decent example.”

The basics of it was using mana to weaken the connection between wood fibres where they’d meet, while at the same time weakening them elsewhere to cut through them. It wasn’t the most common application of plant magic, especially for the dryads whose main goal was to preserve their woods, but it wasn’t unheard of either. Anytime they wanted to expand their grove they needed to knock down some of the trees that were native to the world they currently lived on instead of their old one, and doing that still took work.

It was only after an hour of practice, Delair taking a few breaks as needed to restore her mana, that she was finally confident that she’d gotten it, smiling broadly as the twig in her hand almost fell apart as the connection between fibres broke down.

“Excellent work,” He told her. “Now this is where it gets a little harder. You need to prepare the spell, feeling the mana it would use, but instead of activating it, you need to drape it across the knife, attaching the mana to the blade to essentially create a path for other mana to follow when people want to use the item you’ve made in the future, understand?”

“Uh huh.”

With that she put on an intense look of focus, directing it at the blade itself as she worked her magic, grabbing onto the stone knife tightly as she tried to do what he’d asked, only to fail immediately.

He could see the look of discouragement in her eyes as he reached out to ruffle her hair.

“Don’t worry about a few failures,” He told her, wanting to seem reassuring as he did. “It takes most people weeks or even months to get the hang of enchanting, but you have one benefit that others don’t.”

“I do?”

“Of course, you have me as your teacher,” He told her confidently. “As long as I’m working with you we’ll get you the skill before I leave, so don’t you worry.”

Despite her first failure, she’d been fully motivated to continue, but as the hours stretched on she couldn’t help but feel defeat after defeat, even as she kept trying while Ben gently guided her.

“I know it can be disappointing, but I can already see you getting closer, don’t worry. I’m sure in just a week or two you’ll have it.”

“But that’s time I can’t use to learn other things,” She said with a pout. “Can’t you stay longer?”

“Ha, I wish I could kiddo but I unfortunately have some other work I need to help with.”

“So then I need to get this soon.”

He could see how hard she was trying, eager to get it as fast as she could and it did leave him smiling. It was nice to see someone try so hard to learn, there were just always going to be limits to how fast something could be done and not many ways to beat them.

Although, haven’t I helped someone learn a skill before? He asked himself in a flash of inspiration, remembering what Thera had tried when she’d first gained her life magic.

“Here, take my hand for a second and we’re going to try something. Just focus on the feeling, okay?”

She didn’t know what he was thinking but did as he’d said while he opened up the connection, blocking out almost all of his minds and the entire forest behind him to keep from harming her, leaving just a part of one to be felt as he used the eighth level plant magic ring on his finger, ever so slowly gathering his mana and placing it on the knife.

He didn’t work anywhere near as fast as he could, nor did he use any of the more advanced techniques at his disposal. All he did was lay the spell down, making sure he felt every bit of the process as deeply as he could so the feeling could be passed along to his prospective student until he was done and broke the connection.

…And there’s another ninth-level skill. Sure would be nice if that was the sound of my dreams coming true instead.

He’d understood why it had leveled up, the need to not only hide the mess that was his head, but also the force of an entire forest being a pressing concern to ensure Delair wasn’t hurt, but he couldn’t help but feel just a touch of disappointment it wasn’t the notification he’d been longing for.

Still, that wasn’t a priority as he instead focused back on the child with him. “Alright, try and remember the feeling I just showed you and apply it yourself. I believe in you and if need be I can show you again.”

She didn’t even respond, she was too focused on her knife, trying to replicate what Ben had just taught her, and as he watched he could already see a large amount of improvement. Not to the point that she got it, but enough that it looked like she would have it in a couple days instead of weeks, as her following attempts got closer to what she’d just felt.

It was only as another three hours passed, connecting with Ben to be shown again a few more times in that span, that she succeeded in getting the skill.