Book 1 Chapter 23: Lord, and mission

Chapter 23: Lord? And mission

After everything settled down people ran down to the village to grab their friends, and meet with the people who were locked up.

Yuki was walking with Shadow back to the tree line next to the pond he had come from originally.

"Teacher why did you make me the lord? " Yuki asked curious.

"it is because you saved them, and gave them their freedom, it also because having people under you is a good lesson as a leader when you grow up. This shall also be a form of resource creation for you, by doing this a ranger can become well known and loved by the people. You aren't of age yet, so the strongest here shall take leadership until you are, then you can lead them when you have grown.

We do this time to time, to have plots of land ourselves, as well as control territories." Shadow said decisively.

This made perfect sense, as Yuki now had acquired a plot of land, he could come here in the future for shelter, resources, recruitment, and it was like being a city lord. The more he pumped into the town, the stronger it would become and the larger it would grow.

"How did he control so many?" Yuki asked the second question on his mind.

"That is because he places a 'Blood Mark' on them, he divides up his mana and creates a seal on the mind of someone, merging it with their blood, then then become paralyzed… when he chooses, he controls a specific group or person within his limits, placing seals though just relies on how much mana he has at that time before restoring it. He had a limit to this, so he kept the guards without them and rather had contract seals on them instead." Shadow said with thought.

"Finally, that makes sense." It wasn't that the blood lord was high level and could control endless droves, he just had a superficial seal and then sealed it in people. That's why he had killed him so easily, he was weak!

"What a coward and asshole! A pig headed sadist freak with a small dick!" Yuki shouted aloud as he was walking, people looked over and yelled, "yeah fuck that devilish piece of shit! Thank you for saving us!" They called out, news had spread fast of Yukis saving of everyone from that evil devil.

"Hahaha, see Yuki" Shadow had proven a point from earlier.

"Oh I almost forgot, I found some things." Yuki pulled Shadow over after they had left the village and finally got back to the tree line.

They moved about 90 feet into it, and was met by the others in the group. Yuki still had the Lipstick on him, the two women laughed at this, and pulled out two sticks of lipstick and placed it on their lips before walking over and kissing each cheek.

Creating two contrasting black lipsticks on Yuki's cheeks who blushed from it, rubbing his toe into the ground side to side with his arms behind his back acting like an innocent child.

"You little skamp!" One of the men laughed out loud. Yuki was very good at playing the part, as espionage was taught to him as well.

Yuki waved his hand, and a massive pile of gold, gold bars, silver bars, rubies, diamonds, emeralds and all types of expensive jewelry and things appeared. The group had long since known of Yukis ring, as in some places it was actually a common tool.

It required someone with abilities in the laws of space to create them, so it was expensive but not impossible to acquire. They assumed it was from Asher and never asked of it.

"WOW! Boi, you did goooood this time." The group gleamed at the pile, this was their take from the mission and it was several 100,000 gold alone, not counting the gems or other items. Yuki pulled shadow over, before forgetting something and grabbing a fifth of the share, this was the rule of the group whereas the rest would be split with them. They didn't mind at all.

He walked back to Shadow, and pulled him over a bit, before taking out the Crimson scythe, scepter, handle, and obsidian daggers.

"Oooh, I like I like…" He grasped the scythe and examined it, "This came from a fire user, I can still feel the residual energy in it."

He held the obsidian daggers, "This came from ….huh, no affinity. He poured some spiritual energy into it, and waved it. It created after images in the air from where he swiped, "ohhh! I don't know the material but it creates after image blades that have half the power of the swing from the start.

Very nice." He looked at the handle, "oh this is an energy saber."

"Energy saber?" Yuki asked with awe.

"Yeah, they create these in clans and are a common thing. They call them energy weapons, as it uses the energy of the user to create a weapon. If you are a water user for example, you can use this as the handle, and then freeze the water into a blade. Or coagulate fire into a flaming blade, or even from what I know the users of light of the north continent have what they call….Light sabers that cut through anything. I don't know it's just a rumor….

This one…is oooh, meant for plant affinities! Good catch man." He sent energy into it, and a blade that was dark and green of grass sprouted from the handle and lengthened from both sides. It curved into a bow, "it's a bow formation type, suited for ya." Shadow said, He pulled on an invisible string of shade and sent a shadow grass blade into the distance which cut through over 15 trees without stopping before fading off.

Shadows Shadow Blade spirit was a Grass type that could form deadly sharp grass 'shadows' that he could use as ranged weapons almost infinitely. They were deadly sharp, and the grass was also a rare type of the shadow plant variety, he could cover his body in it and use it to conceal, lengthen it into unseen blades in the darkness, this was especially deadly at night as an enemy would think the grass blade was only so long, but the real blade which was double that was completely concealed in the dark and invisible; Hence his nickname, Shadow.

"Teacher, I have a question about this…" Yuki was very curious of a matter.

"Yeah sure what is it?" Shadow said with focus.

"If when you pump your spirit into this, two blades appear right? If I put my spirit through it, what would it form even if it's structured as a bow?" Yuki was pondering over this, as it was a formation type weapon for utilizing energies. His was the Amalgapod, and this question was pertinent to his strange lord type spirit.

"Oh uh…I don't know. I've never met someone with your spirit, although I do know of it as I was told. It pertained to small bits and wisps of info, and not to things of this. Try it out? You can add things to your spirit, you can always add something that would utilize this to its greatest effect Yuki. Remember that, be creative as you have the spirit of creation itself!" Shadow said with amusement, as he didn't know, he actually had given an answer to the question that would allow Yuki to answer the rest.

"I see…I'll have to test it out"

As they headed back to the camp, the group assembled up and moved out until they reached their caravan and set off.

Yuki moved to the back, and sat in the empty caravan being moved by Shadow.

He revolved his essence into the energy handle, and two pods appeared on either side of it, much smaller than his own. He chosen the burien spider spores and the pod opened up releasing two micro clouds on either side. As it was for a bow, the spider spores began to assemble and until they condensed into the shape of a bow.

"Amazing! That means….oh that means a lot." He turned to face out of the back, and took out an arrow from the quiver that he had been given by a teacher of his, who was best at crafting these.

He strung the arrow onto the thin wire made of Spider spores, he controlled the explosive spores onto the arrow tip and shot them out, when it struck a tree he motioned and it exploded leaving a dent in the tree.

"So…I hadn't thought of this, if I can add the spores to ranged weapons then the attack of them is infinite in uses… to what I add to them. I thought that they could be most deadly carried in a blood dart that would inject into someone, but I didn't think of adding it to a blade? Gods I'm stupid!"

With this sudden inspiration, he took out a piece of paper and began to draw away at different designs…he may not be as clever at crafting, but he was just as creative as Spectre and knowledgeable of plants and the mixes of them.

He drew up different casing type darts, which had a hollow tip at the end like a crevice which could contain the spider spores. The spider spores were in fact not too far from the look of spiders, except they had no back carapace or eyes.

They were like the walking willow plant's legs attached to his Amalgapod, except without the pod. They were 8 legged, when they grew they looked like 8 roots growing from a branch piece.

He looked at the bow, which would form the spiders into shapes. They were so microscopic, and yet he hadn't thought of shaping them at all and had just let them run in waves or be individually moved.

He looked at the drawing on the table, and released a thick cloud of the spider spores. They slowly formed into a stick that was a foot long, this might seem small but the density was unimaginable as it was made of thousands and thousands of the spider spores. It slowly grew in length, a millimeter at a time, Yuki consumed a lot of energy to constantly form and create these spores at an unprecedented rate through his plant, which had a strange ability to cut in half the amount needed to make things grow, this was powerful as a trait on top of its other attributes and capabilities.

With this, the stick grew to be about 5 feet in length; once it reached this size he expanded the end until it was like 6 roots were twining around an orb of hollow air, and then centralized them into a point. He motioned, and his Amalgapod began to walk over and shrink in size until it dropped into this hollow space.

The legs lengthened out before collapsing back towards the pod sealing it inside; creating a cocoon like shape. He was very satisfied with this, at it could hide his spirit while still having it out, as well as he could change the shape of the spores into practically anything he wanted, if it consumed blood….it would grow. Meaning if he stabbed someone with a blade made of the spores, as they sucked in blood and energy the shaft would expand in size.

The energy formation handle was useful, but he currently didn't have a trait to his pod or plant to manipulate that suited it. It had still given him inspiration though in shaping spider spores.

Which from what he was told, not a soul on the continent had the spirit of. Other bug plants yes, but not the spider plant as it was a rare life type. It was a plant, and darkness type. Darkness's attribute of death as it was necrotic to pulling out the life force of others to nourish itself. It was a very rare 2 aspect type; although life steal was a basic form of death energies it was still rare. Life was a natural attribute of plants that creates beings, or any other thing, so it wasn't an attribute or affinity in this case but a fundamental law.

He attached it to his back, in a holster for a sword he picked out of a box on the caravan as it was too long. He condensed the swarm until the shaft was thick enough for the holster. It was now a couple inches wide. But not a burden at all as the spores were very light.

What he needed right now were more plants to experiment with below the 3rd level Plants, level 2 was his limit and as the spores were 2 attributed, but the darkness was only minor, he was just barely able to succeed in merging it into his spirit.

He scurried to the front of the caravan and sat with Shadow, who looked over before reaching down and grabbing a rolled cigarette and sparking it, "so, how did the inspiration go?" He asked pondering the amused face of Yuki.

"Well..." Yuki told him of what he had done, and shadow gave a surprised look and then clapped him on the back.

"Now THAT is cool hahaha" He laughed out loud, puffing out a cloud he had just pulled in.

"Seems you need some plants to experiment with that could be used with the spiders, you seem really pulled to that plant type. It is a very useful type, as when you reach a certain level you can even send your awareness out through your plant, with these being so small it can be useful for watching areas and gathering information." Shadow said, with some ideas himself.

"ooh yes!" Yuki looked off into the passing trees, more ideas popping into his head.

He asked for them to detour to the south east, he had heard of a plant growing there called a Steel grass blade. A clan who had the spirit of it controlled the lands there, he was wondering if he could go there to use some of his acquired wealth to buy one from the clan. If he could add it to his spider spores they would become deadly tough blade like killers!

"Yuki…actually while we were gone, the troupe received back a messenger hawk…that clan had been wiped out by the Darkwood clan for their resources. Since they were on our side and honed swordsmen… that clan was ransacked. It is actually our mission to get intel from there and luckily we will be heading down there. If you even find a steel grass blade… you can keep it. They however destroyed the entire garden there as the fire was seen far away as a battle was heard raging. I'm sorry Yuki." Shadow said this with killing intent flaring in the air, he hated the Darkwood clan to his core.

"Those fucking bastards!" Yuki seethed killing intent in his eyes, this was the clan that almost killed his 1st brother and had caused the trio to have to scatter from one another.

"Then let us go there, and if there are any left we shall kill them all!"

The group travelled at high speeds on the road, taking several months to go the 1,000's of miles to the south east. They soon came upon different rouge groups here to pilfer the wealth of the fallen clan. Surprisingly Yuki had gone ahead each time, and killed many of them, the more powerful groups were killed with nothing left of their bodies by the rest of the troupe.

They received only little weak amounts of gold or silver the different bandits had killed others for, but it had made the road safer for any other traveler and this was also useful to the safety of the clan.

They arrived at a valley, and as they were at the edge of the meteoric spring valley the trees had grown massive, and begun to pierce the low hanging clouds of the massive sky. Yuki was bewildered the forests he had come to know were just seedlings, and that these trees were the adults of massive proportions. He didn't even consider the view he would have if he climbed one of these trees, as even that height if he fell scared him to death.

The troupe stopped the caravan, Shadow and the other trap Creator set a god base up obscuring the caravan and leaving deadly traps and plants around to stop any intruders.

Shadow took Yuki and they travelled off at a running pace for 30 miles, taking breaks periodically to allow Yuki to recover his stamina, eating Entera Enurugi apples that kept him going for extended periods. They arrived at a road, seeing dead body's strone everywhere.

Enemies, people from the Steel Blade Clan, and other people including whole families. Yuki wanted to hurl but steeled his heart to adjust as they moved on to the main clan town.

The town was about a 100 miles in radius, and was in a massive grove surrounded by a small mountain with only one side to enter through, trees covering the periphery. Yuki walked along this road before splitting off with Shadow in case anyone was still here.

"Be silent, and be vigilant…. From what I know this only happened just over 2 months ago." Shadow was straining his eyes between trees and even up them, like a hawk awaiting a mouse to pop up to skewer.

"I know…" Yuki whipped his staff around, and held several blades in his hand. He tapped each blade once, putting a bit of Spider Spores on it, which her controlled to converge in the groove of the blade.

He rolled on his feet like he was stepping on a ball each time he strode forward, keen eyes sweeping everywhere in a 50 foot and greater distance.

After several minutes they met the entrance which was a several 1000 foot tall cliff side, jagged on either side. This was the entrance, the mountain surrounded the clan on all sides, and since it was so, they could see blood covering the deep long mountain corridor walls on each side. A fierce battle must've been fought here.

They soon stepped through the boundary, seeing massive amounts of housing. It would be a prestigious place to live, except half it was completely a sunder still and turned to ash leaving nothing but wood in the shape of what used to be there. A hill of black earth lead up to where the main house was, which was still standing compared to the remnants of places and zones around it, they trekked for quite a while not finding even one soul left here.

They arrive soon at the large house which was just over 40 feet tall, and shaped like a pagoda. With steel wings offsetting the dark wood used to craft it, it was made well and that's why it would be difficult to burn down. Let alone those who came had already attained the things they needed, leaving this house hollow.

It was like a great tombstone to the bodies of warriors that laid around it, cut, ripped apart, and looking to have died in many horrific ways. Yuki was sad to see this, as he greatly respected clans like this who loved plants, were righteous and had a good heart and will. He truly wanted to roam the land around and meet clans making friends with them on their sides.

They walked in through the main door, finding warriors with greater sets of armor and steel blades to their sides. This was there spirit, the Steel Grass blade. Which they formed into swords and trained with, the length dictated there blood line density.

This however wasn't pertinent to strength, but rather gave a conveyance of the length they would be able to utilize as they were not able to make there blade grow. They also would have the blade disperse if it was not grasped, so sword, saber and spear play was a fundamental art here without an exception as it tied them to their spirits.

Yuki stroked the spirit of their blades, it felt exactly like steel, hard and cold. Their hands trained so well, it gripped the blades like a vice. This was why it didn't disperse, as their spirits were of the heart and everlasting of their will.

"I'm sorry this happened to you….i will avenge you all, as I must to protect my brother as well." Yuki closed the eyes of those around him, ushering their hand and blade over their chest in respect to them. They continued forth to find the simple furniture ripped apart from a battle, and roots shot up into and through walls from the Dark wood clan, here unlike outside they found the bodies of the Darkwood clan, cloaked in different brown and black sheets. They must've attacked at night for this to occur. Those bastards!

"Hell….hello…" A frail voice called out from a room down the hallway. Shadow and Yuki looked at each other, Yuki placed the staff on his back, as he held two blades at a slant for close quarter combat, while with Shadow appeared a shadow blade in his hand who stayed in the front.