Did I Try Too Hard?... OH-

One must remember that Cari has been in the same spot for over 6 hours, while that isn't enough time for a regular plant, Cari isn't exactly 'regular' to start with, he doesn't even know if he qualifies as a plant.

None the wiser, once he 'woke up', he noticed grass was covering every inch of his eyesight.

"Oh yeah, forgot about that, well, it's not like it is obstructing my movement, time to get moving towards that flower."

But as Cari tried to shuffle forward, he found he couldn't move at all, he felt himself 'rooted' to the spot.

"Wait a goddamn minute..."

He felt himself, and sure enough, his 'roots' had taken their place in the ground... again.

"Oh COME ON! All of my energy has settled down, there is literally no point in them being in the ground right now, you all come right back here this instant!"

He didn't know why he commanded them like they were dogs who disobeyed him, but it worked, they immediately started fading away, the energy previously flowing through them began to course back into his body and the roots started to dissipate and return along with it.

As this process happened, Cari noticed something.

"The roots had the same change back when I was containing my 'radiation', and they weren't boosting the growth of the surrounding grass? So I don't need to worry about that anymore."

After a few moments, the retraction of the roots were complete, and he could move again, but as Cari tried to move, he stumbled and fell forward through the dense patch of grass.

He hadn't used his body for a whole quarter of the day, leaving his body numb and dulled from inactivity.

"This is one way to have a wake up call.", Cari thought in a rough voice.

He struggled for a bit trying to get up; getting used to his body again was a hassle, while Cari had adapted to it before during his 'playing', he has barely existed for merely a day, so his control didn't mean much in the long run; he had yet to fully get accustomed to his small, weird body, and unable to even properly move.

"This sort of body is too inefficient for movement, but there isn't really any other option I have right now, maybe if I get bigger... no, even if I do, I'd still have to shift my body just to move forward, it might get harder to move a bigger body, so it doesn't help at all, besides, I'd need to evolve first to even change my body, and I'm a long way from that right now, I don't even have an idea for how I would move faster."

"..."

"Ugh! I'll just think of an answer later, for now, I need to make due with this, besides, I'll think of something else for the time being to get around faster."

After finishing his thoughts and getting used to his body again, he was finally able to get up and start heading towards the flower that was exhibiting such unpleasant feelings.

As he got up, he noticed his body changed again, it was barely sunrise, so his body had changed hues, this time, his body was the same white, but more gentle and subtle, not as bright as in the midday, but that didn't matter; his light green glow was also following his body's example, it was still noticeably light green, but it had a more soft, 'lesser' sort of look to it, but that isn't the point here.

These 'feelings' that he's been receiving have always been there ever since he first started feeling them back in that 'special place', but they were always below the surface; underlying... if he were to focus on them, they would start to take hold over his mind, overwhelming his thoughts with these negative sensations, it was like a conscious body of water was trying to drown him, surrounding his body.

He didn't like that, it made him think & feel all sorts of wrong things, but there was an unforeseen benefit from this, he would be able to better empathize with the original victim of these feelings, in this case, the flower, which was good in a number of ways in Cari's book, both materially & mentally.

It would help him heal the flower in the first place, first of all, and it would help train his mind by putting it against these negative thoughts; the more he faced things like this, the more his mind would develop and grow to resist these types of things, and there was a personal reason mixed in with all of these benefits, Cari believed it was a good thing to understand what others were going through, then he would be better in understanding and helping them through their pain and hardship, he liked to believe that by feeling their pain, he would be taking it away from them, leaving less for them to deal with, and in the end, get a greater understanding of that person.

"Huh? Wait... why do I like that?... I never really thought of this stuff before, so how..."

"..."

"I guess I really did change back then when I learned about, well, everything, I can feel the difference between now and then when I didn't know anything, to think there really is such an incredible gulf between understanding and not understanding... before, I couldn't think of anything beyond exploring and curiosity, but now... I'm already having my own beliefs and, "morals", I think that's the appropriate word, I've done well so far in taking in the knowledge and forming my own outlook, perception of the world and everything in it, but I still need time to 'tune in' some of this information, the flat facts like nature and all that was easy to apply and learn since they were straight information, but the more complicated stuff like the sentient races cultures, beliefs, and the actual practice of taking in life energy to grow stronger still needs time for me to actually process and put it into practice, and then there's the stuff about 'genders' and that technique En said I should practice for my safety, I already have a grasp of genders, but I still don't fully understand them fully, not to even mention "Life's Cocoon"... oh well, I'll learn about them eventually, maybe I can even ask about them once I meet someone."

He was smiling(despite not having a mouth) at the prospect of that, while Cari has gained a terrifying amount of information about the world and adapted to it at an insane speed, it was still flat information from a completely unbiased source, meaning that when it came to certain subjects, like personal conceited beliefs, tacit things, he wouldn't be able to further his own comprehension of it on his own no matter how much he hypothesized, he'd need another person to fill in the gaps, another's 'opinion'.

As Cari wrapped up this train of thought, he squirmed onward, and he saw a few more tree roots around.

He couldn't lie, he was tempted to jump over them again like before, but he kept himself on the path this time, Cari would not be pulled off course to his goal by his small wants or desires, not now, and not ever again.

'Wait... again?'

That reminded him of something, when he first woke up and started moving, he decided to go towards the northeast, which he only knows now thanks to En, but after getting over his first hurdle, he started actively seeking out tree roots instead of following his decided path, so, was he still going on the same path-"

Before he could finish that thought and discover his mistake, he already arrived at the flower, thanks to his mind wandering and the flower being a straight shot from where he started, he didn't need to focus on moving ahead.

Cari didn't think about it as he looked as the plant, he remember how it looked through his 'Life Light', empty with only a little amount of life energy left, most of its energy was forced out of its body due to being crushed, while this didn't fully get rid of all its energy, it did push out most of it, leaving it weak and hardly being able to recover at all, but that was normal for a plant.

Everything plants did was slow, if they felt sunlight and wanted more, they would slowly grow in the direction they get the most sunlight, if they need more water, their roots would naturally extend where it felt the most water, all in the hopes of getting more.

But that isn't the case here, it was physically crushed under the weight of a person, leaving physical damage along with crushing most of its life energy out of it, pushing it close to its deathbed already.

He looked around for any sign of where the person is or heading, but there was no sign in Cari's surroundings; with nothing in his vision, he assumed it was safe.

Usually, life energy can't be forced out of a living being through sheer physical strength, at best, someone can physically injure another to make them leak life energy at a faster rate temporarily, but in this case, the plant has such a small and fragile body along with it not exactly 'knowing' how to contain and slow the leakage of life energy, these factoids led to it being exempted from this rule.

Cari didn't think about it any further and got to work, first, he focused on what he wanted to do, he wanted to heal it, but not just that, he wanted to restore what it has lost, its life energy.

Then, he concentrated on the target, the flower, it itself wasn't anything rare, the information En gave to him in the form of his memories was basically an encyclopedia of all things nature, at least, for this general area, especially about all the kinds of plants, this plant was called "The Polloi Flower", literally meaning "Many Flower", there were two reasons for why it was called this, the most accepted reason was that this plant was very common, so the term "many" fitted in quite well.

But the other reason was actually the main drive behind its name, this flower actually had many uses when it came to alchemy, it makes up a good part of the base for many common potions, pills, etc, it even takes a part in higher grade concoctions, this granted it a different name among the alchemist of the world to contrast the common peoples interpretation of this 'common flower', "The Evgnomosini Flower"... "The Gratitude Flower", alchemist around this world saw this name as a way of paying respect and thanks to such a flower, no matter how 'common' it is; the flower is useful, and it's common enough that they don't need to worry about running out in supply, to an alchemists whose entire job is to create useful things through the combination of ingredients, that's all that matters to them.

It was something along the lines of a misconception to some people around the world that common things are naturally useless, bad, and they rarely are something useful, and the complete opposite stands true as well; the rarer something is, the better it's supposed to be.

Some know that this isn't always the case, with alchemist being a good portion of these people, as this lesson is learned naturally as they work to gather ingredients, learn how to mix them together to make something useful and sometimes, lifesaving.

The profession of an alchemist is hard and cumbersome, and the practice of alchemy is kept under lock and key, so this knowledge isn't widely known, this is why the flower has two distinct names, one for the alchemist, and one for everyone else, leading to its 2-sided view.

The whole reason why this is all important is because all of this makes up the plant's 'identity', just knowing the target is enough, but what Cari is looking for is a complete restoration of the plant, the more clear the 'want' is and the more you understand the target's identity, the more effective the healing is.

He didn't know it, but this was the most discouraging, but at the same time, inspiring reason to why "Healer" practitioners are the more uncommon; it requires more understanding, empathy, and most of all, perception, for they need to understand who their healing as well as what exactly they want to accomplish to successfully do what they do effectively.

It was widely known that ones emotions can take a part in the outcome of using life energy, none really knew how far ones emotions can change the control and power of using it; if you really felt you didn't want to hurt the other, your usage of life energy would follow suit, offensive and harming usages would weaken even if you were lessening your power naturally, and if your emotions went unchecked, so would your abilities.

Cari's emotional outlook of using this 'sensing of others pain to help understand and help' would actually amplify his healing process.

Unfortunately, he knew nothing about this.

With these two things in-mind, Cari began to fuel the process with his own life energy, making sure to keep his mind unadulterated with any other thoughts.

"Restoration... Polloi... Evgnomosini Flower."

His glowing, which was previous dampened a little thanks to him containing his 'radiation', suddenly increased in strength, it was even brighter than before when it wasn't restrained.

The cause of this was his goal, he was trying to help the flower recover, so his body naturally followed his will to the fullest, so his previous restraint on this ability to help the things around him grow was gone.

The area covered with his glowing stretched 3 meters, and with the 'radiation' now unrestricted, the grasses growth got kicked up a few notches, growing slowly but visibly, even the flowers natural recovery speed was increased, although it was remarkably slower compared to the grass.

Lots, and I mean LOTS of tiny orbs of life energy began to appear all around him and started to float towards the flower, and as the energy flowed away from him, more energy appeared in its place, ready to go.

They were being fully absorbed by the flower, refilling its own supply of life energy, while the flattened part of the flower balloon little by little with every orb it made contact with.

Cari was glad it was going smoothly, after a little bit of waiting, it should be back to normal, he was about to praise himself for being able to get it right on the first try, but then, he felt a certain tug inside him, and just as he felt that, more of these orbs of life energy appeared, these ones weren't near him, but were in his glowing field of green, and that's when he realized something was up upon seeing them.

"Wait a second... where did these ones come from? Did they... !!! Did they come from the environment itself?!"

His guess was correct and THEN SOME.

His glowing started to balloon; growing rapidly, past the now 4 meters, and as it spread, more and more small orbs of life energy became visible to the naked eye, revealing themselves throughout the air, the glowing already reached 5 meters, and growing fast, and with it, the 'radiation' spread further, allowing the grass it touched to grow taller.

There was something else, he didn't hear it earlier as he started the process, but there was a hum in the background that was becoming more 'present' the bigger his glowing got.

These new orbs started their flux into the flower, accelerating the healing process 10 times over!

It immediately bobbed upwards, no sign of its previous flattened body to be seen, looking healthy after a few seconds, Cari was starting to panic as he didn't know what would happen if he continued to restore it beyond its peak state.

He didn't let his panic take over though as he knew if he indeed let it run loose, this entire technique can become chaotic and things may end up getting even worse, so instead, he thought of something else.

"If I can use lifelight and attune it to not make me numb to my body, I can find out what's going on and find out what to do from there."

He imminently focused on that feeling of confidence, that feeling of knowing where those tree roots were as a basis and expanded on that feeling, he started feeling the place of the trees, the grass, and soon enough, the area was losing its color, but he made sure keep his body 'awake', he shook his body with fervor to keep it up.

With this, he successfully entered the state without his body going to 'sleep', he could still see the silhouettes of the things around him in vibrant green and, most importantly, the life energy.

"I was right..."

The life energy in the area was being pulled... before, he couldn't fully see it, but now, he saw how all the millions of tiny energy orbs in the area flowed like it was a river that was heading downhill, and the destination of that stream was the flower, there were multiple of these streams, all curving around; none were a straight path towards the flower, this was done in a speedy manner, rushing towards the flower to heal it, but at this point, they were all going into its life energy storage, which was filling as a quick rate.

Its silhouetted figure was filled with the orbs, and not a single spot was empty, yet, more and more was being stuffed in, and it's not slowing down in the least, and as it progressed, the balls of energy vibrated more and more, as if building up to something.

He found out what was happening exactly, but he still didn't have the slightest clue on what to do or how to stop it.

He was in control of making his own energy flow into the flower, which he already stopped upon seeing the energy in the environment hastening the process.

Cari knew he was the source of why the energy in the area was doing this in the first place, and when he gave himself time to think about it, he found the problem, it was thanks to his ability to manipulate the true, unmodified form of life energy, when he commanded the life energy in his body to heal the flower, he didn't restrict it to ONLY the life energy in his body, causing all the life energy around him to respond to his sole instruction... "Restore the flower", his command to restore the flower called upon ALL the free life energy in the vicinity, he guessed this was why it 'suddenly' acted up.

"Well, there is only one way to figure out if I'm right about this too."

He deactivated his lifelight and his normal vision returned and focused on the previous idea of the target and the action he wanted to take, the systematic routine of restoration... flower... evgnomosini flower but added a new command.

"Done."

He closed his eyes and concentrated on his goal being done, achieved, complete, ended, once again thinking nothing but this.

After a couple seconds of this, the humming sound disappeared, and he opened one eye out of worry, but he eased up and opened the other upon seeing the surroundings.

His glowing had retreated and returned back to its usual weakened state of just being near the vicinity of his body, as promptly, the restriction for his 'radiation' returned, the grass stopped growing at its swift speed, now a decent patch of grass, and the flower was more than just healthy, thanks to it having life energy just beyond its bottleneck-

"Wait... what?

...

... uh-oh."