Tsubaki opened her eyes slowly, looking around at the wide plains that she had appeared in. There was a slight sense of discomfort in her body, causing her to look down at herself in curiosity. She had heard that the Keeper was working on a new game, and had even accompanied him to talk to Philia about having the player characters be based on the Sylvans. Thus, she was not surprised when she saw the golden, plant-like skin as well as the dress covering her body made of leaves and vines.

“This is cool…” She heard a voice next to herself, looking over to see a much more petite Sylvan.

“Dana?” Tsubaki asked for confirmation, the Sylvan quickly nodding her head in response.

“That’s right, Tsuba! Now… let’s go monster hunting!” Dana was eager to get started, pumping her fists together. However, Tsubaki was far more cautious.

“We don’t have any of our real world power right now. Whether it’s magic or martial arts, our ability to fight is extremely limited. If we want to catch a monster, we will either need to establish a base to create weapons, learn the local method of utilizing special abilities, or start from an incredibly weak monster.”

Hearing Tsubaki’s analysis caused Dana to purse her lips. “Well… are we even able to establish a tree with just the two of us?”

In response, Ashley’s voice spoke up from within their minds. For the purpose of this test, I am allowing the two of you extra freedom. The requirements to establish a tree and spend time conducting research will be removed. Think of this as a sandbox mode.

Dana nodded her head eagerly when she heard that. “Alright, then! How do we set the tree up, then?”

Merely place your hands together, and focus on wielding the power of nature. Like this, you can create the seed. When Ashley explained this time, Tsubaki and Dana reacted almost immediately. Upon placing their hands together, they focused, finding that their connection with natural energy was far stronger than when they were in the real world.

A moment later, a small seed appeared between their palms, which Dana abruptly snatched and planted within the soil at their feet. “Now, given the time constraints, this will probably be sped up a lot, so…” She grabbed Tsubaki’’s wrist, turning around and sprinting away from where she buried the tree.

Tsubaki’s eyes went wide as she was suddenly pulled away, but soon heard the sound of the earth splitting behind her. Like Dana had said, a massive tree formed almost instantly in the spot that they were standing previously, its body constantly expanding as they ran.

Dana kept pulling on Tsubaki’s arm until Tsubaki herself took the initiative to sprint forward, and it was only after ten minutes of such a sprint that the tree finally stopped growing behind them. Now roughly five kilometers wide, the tree appeared to be a fully grown version of the ancestor tree revered by the Sylvan race.

“So… what first?!” Dana asked in excitement. “We seem to be the equivalent of a high level druid, so we could probably take out some decently strong monsters with the two of us.”

Tsubaki thought about it for a moment, before shaking her head. “We just went through the trouble of creating the tree, so let’s use it first. Once we get ourselves some basic weaponry, we’ll go hunting.”

Ashley sat within her office, sweat forming on her brow as she focused. The strain of hosting this game within her divinity was far harsher than she had expected, even when it was only for two people. Her eyes were closed, brows tightly knit together.

I definitely need to get a server-type artifact set up if I want to do anything like this in the future. She thought to herself. Thankfully, she was only simulating a single planet at the moment. With the time limit of six hours, even Tsubaki and Dana in sandbox mode wouldn’t elevate themselves to space travel in the game.

Even so, she had to simulate everything about the game within her divinity, whether it was the wind, the systems, every individual monster… She had initially thought that it would be easy, given her status as a Companion. Her mind was already used to multitasking on an extreme level to handle so many different prayers.

Unfortunately, it was not enough to prepare her for this. Especially when she had to note down any potential glitches that occurred within the system as it was running. Some of those may merely be because of the fact that she was hosting this within her divinity, but there could be some that originated from system conflicts.

One hour into their game time, and both Tsubaki and Dana had acquired some simple weapons for themselves. Each of them wore reinforced wooden armor, and carried a wooden spear with surprising strength. Initially, Dana had wanted to take advantage of their sandbox mode to get stronger weapons, but these were the best that they could acquire without fusing special elemental seeds with the tree.

Now, they prowled through a deep forest, their eyes scanning their surroundings. According to Ashley’s explanation, there were numerous methods to tame monsters. If the proper food or drug was acquired, they could be tamed without any sort of violence. If the monster itself was docile, it could also similarly be tamed. However, the most common method would be to fight the monster, and force it to submit.

The key point of this was that they couldn’t kill the monster that they wanted to tame, or else their efforts would have been wasted. Thus, they had to be very careful to control their strikes. Tsubaki was confident in this, as she had an ample amount of combat training in her various Trials of Blood. Dana, on the other hand, did not engage in physical combat nearly as frequently.

When she fought, she tended to do so with magic, or through the use of her World Shadow. There was hardly ever a reason for her to practice wielding weapons in melee combat, so she was far less confident with her own prowess.

It didn’t take long for the two of them to find their first monster, a small creature with black skin and a red tail. Its pudgy body darted around a clearing with surprising agility, and Tsubaki nodded her head when she had finished studying it. Given that they did not have the same control of mana as they did in the real world, they had spent most of the last hour while the tree was developing their research to understand how to communicate via natural energy.

I’ll restrain it, and then you move in. Tsubaki whispered mentally to Dana, who nodded her head in agreement. After a few moments, Tsubaki softly placed her hands on the ground, focusing her energy. The pudgy black monster halted its movements, head shooting up and glancing around before vines pierced out of the ground. The monster jumped in shock, wanting to run to the side to avoid them, but the vines rose up in a complete circle, forming a dome over the monster.

When Tsubaki pulled the vines tighter, they wrapped around its body, forcing it to stay still as Dana rushed forward. Seeing that the monster had no power to resist, Dana placed the tip of her spear over its heart, staring at it. “Submit.” She said, transmitting her intent via natural energy using the method that Ashley had taught them.

The monster attempted to struggle for a few seconds, before its movements died down. At that point, there was a small flash of green light, and Dana could feel something in the back of her consciousness, a connection to the monster that she had just acquired. Her face split in a wide grin, and she jumped up in joy.

“Well?” Tsubaki asked with a knowing smile, walking over to examine the creature. When Dana nodded her head, the vines removed themselves from the small creature, who rolled to its feet and scratched at its ear. After being tamed by the system, the creature was now far more docile in Dana’s presence.

“It doesn’t have a name yet, but its speed is… well, we saw it earlier. Apparently, it’s good at using water based abilities, but there wasn’t a water source nearby for it to take advantage of.”

Tsubaki nodded her head at that, looking around thoughtfully. “In that case, let’s try to find another monster for you to test the fusion system with. For now, keep it in your monster inventory. We don’t want to risk it getting eaten.”

Dana’s eyes went wide at that, nodding her head rapidly. The black monster vanished in another soft flash of light. “Do you think that there is perma-death for the monsters in this game?” She asked with a hint of worry in her tone, glancing around as if worried that something would still manage to come out and get her new pet after she put it away.

It wasn’t Tsubaki that answered this, but Ashley. There is, but there are also ways to prevent it. For instance, if you acquire a certain research with your tree, you can create an upgrade to your pet inventory that lets you invest in a form of insurance. This insurance can be refreshed only by visiting the tree, so if a pet dies twice before you make it back, the only way to retrieve the pet would be one of various forms of resurrection.

Dana gulped, offering a small nod of understanding at that. “Got it. So, be careful with what you send your monsters against. It’s not worth it to send them into a fight that you don’t have a good chance of winning.”

Tsubaki thought about that for a moment before speaking up. “At the same time, if the trainer fights together with their monsters, they can take on more and more powerful creatures. If the original monster survives, it can be fused into the new monster for an overall increase in power. Is there any sort of limitation on the number of fusions a monster could go through, or a cooldown between them?”

That would be a no to both questions. Ashley answered promptly. However, not all fusions are upgrades. If you fuse two incompatible monsters, you could get something that is far weaker than either of the original. For instance, the monster you just acquired is incompatible with most bird-type monsters, as its body is too heavy to sustain flight at its size. Unless you are incredibly lucky, the most likely result would be an overweight bird that can barely move its body.

“Right!” Dana pumped her fists together. “So it’s a matter of finding what works, and running with it. In that case… since Little Pudge is good with water abilities, let’s look for another water-based animal to fuse it with. Tsuba, which way is the nearest river?”

Tsubaki closed her eyes, tapping into the natural energy. She had dabbled in Shaman techniques before, so she was familiar with the method of communing with natural energy. “Twelve kilometers to our four o’clock. However, there are some disruptions from that direction, and it feels like a fight is unfolding.”

Dana’s golden eyes practically sparkled when she heard that. “Let’s go! Maybe there will be two strong monsters that wear each other out, so we can take the credit and tame them!” After saying that, she started sprinting in the direction Tsubaki had given her. Twelve kilometers was not a small distance, so she was in quite the hurry to make it there before the monsters involved had managed to resolve their fight.