1 Reborn

Edwin Dust was a renowned botanist. A rising star in the scientific community who had done incredible work on the symbiosis of fungi and forests. Unfortunately, the newspapers now carried the obituary of his untimely death.

Edwin Dust passed away at the untimely age of twenty five, falling prey to a rogue landslide while he was gathering samples of rare plants in the chalky cliffs of Dover, England as part of a new research on vegetation that grew in alien environments.

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When Edwin opened his eyes, he couldn't place himself. His surroundings looked misty, his eyesight blurry and his senses seemed to be hazy. As he tried to move around, he noticed his arms looked like those of a toddler within the hazy vision. Soon tiredness overcame his senses and he fell asleep.

A few months had passed by, and Edwin had finally come to terms with his bizarre new reality. The hazy memories of the final moments in his past life now brightly seared into his memory. He had found a bizarre looking plant that he had never seen before, a plant so unique that he lost all sense of caution as he approached it hanging precariously from the steep vertical chalky cliff he was hanging by.

The plant was a simplistic one, a singular stem that jutted out of the cliff, bluish green with purple spots over it and full of thorns. Attached to this alien like plant were tiny branches that formed pearly veined white colored leaves while the top of the stem had a singular flower, a deep black hibiscus like flower dangling about royally against the ocean winds.

Edwin had, in his haste, managed to prick himself on the tiny thorns of this bizarre looking plant which caused a most bizarre phenomenon to occur as the plant disappeared in front of his eyes and fused into his body like a ray of light. The disappearance of the plant was a trigger for the landslide that would eventually lead to his death, and thus bring reborn in this most bizarre new world as a toddler also named Edwin Dust.

As Edwin's senses began getting clearer over the months, he was gradually able to process more of the world around him. Edwin was just another child in the large Dust family that controlled this town, aptly named Cedar town. This world, Edwin realized, didn't use metals, or plastic or any other non organic material. At least the civilization he was now a part of didn't.

Instead, this world, called Plantae by its people, was a bizarre world where all kinds of unique and surprising variations of trees took place, which were used to create items for all kinds of human consumption. The more bizarre part was how humans could actually form a soul bond with a plant and literally gain what Edwin could only describe was superpowers. This world of Plantae, Edwin realized, was his dreamy utopia.

Edwin Dust was the fifth child in the Dust family. His mother was Rudwina Dust, the wife of Cedar Town's lord, who went by the name of Rowan Dust. Rowan Dust was the most powerful man in Cedar Town and in this world, authority derived from one's own power and backing.

As the years had passed, Edwin realized that he was unable to talk. For some reason, he vocal speech had not yet manifested even at the age of three, though he was already able to understand the language from the spoken words of the servants and the rare occassions where his mother sang him to sleep. His father, on the other hand had not come to see him even once since he had become self conscious.

Edwin couldn't leave his room often, so most of his time was spent crawling around the room and observing everything. Everything around him, literally everything was made from some kind of plant or tree.

Whether it was the cradle, the bizarre network like some shaped room he was placed in, the bottles made of wood and even the floors were all made of the most unique Flora that Edwin had never before seen in his life.

When Edwin turned four, he spoke his first word. His mother seemed most proud about the incident. "My son is a clever one!" She would embellish to anyone who would care to listen. The only thing that surprised her was that first word out of the child's mouth was the word "Book!".

Edwin got his wish. The Dust family wasn't lacking in resources and the books were lavished upon him. Books about history, books about geography, books about plants and beasts and books about legends of the past. Edwin devoured them all, though he was initially quite surprised by what actually books were in this world.

Books were tiny slips of bark made out of a most curious tree known as the Memory Tree. The bark strip, or book, could then be held in the hand and the contents stored in the book would automatically appear in the mind of the beholder. This kind of technology, Edwin gawked, was so alien and fantastical that he half suspected that this was all a gigantic hallucination in the final moments of his death. The incredible details and the rich vividness of the world exceeded anything he could have possibly imagined himself, and thus he discounted this possibility.

Dust Town, Edwin learned was a town like thousands others dotted across the Green Valley Estate. The Green Valley Estate was the equivalent of a Nation back on Earth. This nation, however, was very decentralized. What happened inside the city usually remained internal matters, though there was a council of twelve sages who ruled over Green Valley Estate.

These twelve sages were the most powerful individuals in the entire nation. Edwin did not skip the stories of their achievements, being able to fight toe to toe with the terrifying monsters that prowled in the wilderness beyond the territories of the towns and the cities.

A spark had lit up within Edwin. He wanted to become strong. As strong as these sages so he could go out and explore the world freely and learn about this astonishing biodiversity and bizarro features that the world developed contrary to the relatively pale variations back on Earth.