The Cornflower Witch

Book 2: Chapter 167: Tree Sprouting

Vol 2 Chapter 167: Tree Sprouting

Lantern Town, the greenhouse garden.

Inside the hemispherical greenhouse with its varied, interlocking diamond-shaped panes, clusters of light blue cornflowers bloomed. The deeper-hued flower tubes wrapped around the base of the petals, which radiated outwards to form larger flower clusters.

Slender stems bowed slightly under the weight of the clusters. As far as the eye could see, cornflowers of varying shades of blue dotted the view, making the interior of the greenhouse exceptionally beautiful.

In the round pavilion at the center of this sea of flowers, Sylutia sat at a circular stone table, organizing the knowledge she had learned.

Currently, it seemed the secret arts and knowledge she had studied could be roughly divided into four major systems:

The Verdant Nectar Gardener System, containing the Dew Prayer Method, Branch Grooming Method, Fertile Soil Method, Flower Blooming Method, Vine Overgrowth, Vegetation Frenzy, and so on.

The Luminous Moon Secret Arts System, containing Sylutia's Clear Spring, the Lunar Radiance Breathing Technique, and the Awaiting the Moon Ceremony, among others.

The Castle Knight System, containing the Breathing Technique, Amos's Sword, and the recently crammed Pure White Shield, Fearless Lance, Gallop, and Sun Sword—these legacy abilities of the Holy White Knight Hall.

The Alien Star Secret Arts System, containing Astral Traversal, Piercing Ray, Lock Within the Pupil, Fog-Breaking Eye, Intimidating Gaze, Evil Eye Shot, Dim Vision... and so on, these abilities acquired by filling the gaps through that ceremony.Viewed this way, she currently possessed the highest number of abilities within the Alien Star system, with the greatest talent bonuses. The Verdant Nectar system ranked second, the Castle Knight system third, and finally the secret arts under Luminous Moon.

She had so many abilities related to the Alien Star system that she couldn't even use them all, which had greatly bolstered her combat power. Currently, her Alien Star rank had been elevated to the Fourth Tier due to the advancement of the Castle Aspect. Unfortunately, she lacked the core secret arts related to Alien Star, preventing her from fully unleashing the formidable strength a Fourth Tier should possess.

The core secret art of the Hundred-Eyes Sect was Demon Pacts, which involved contracting with Eye Tyrants from another world. She had no desire to walk that path and waste her core abilities. Furthermore, even without a contract, she could still command those few Eye Tyrants, making it truly unnecessary.

After summoning the vulture-lion last time, Sylutia had become very interested in that vanished Star-Gazing School. Sadly, there were now extremely few records of knowledge about the Star-Gazing School. She might only be able to find things left behind by the former Star-Gazing School in certain hidden ruins.

It seemed finding the legacy of the Star-Gazing School was a very necessary endeavor. Sylutia noted this down.

After reviewing the Alien Star system, she turned her gaze to the Castle Knight system. In this regard, she had actually received the core secret art legacy from the Holy White Knight Hall.

The core of each knight school differed. For the Ironwall Crown Furnace, it was expelling the Twilight Beasts. Many of their abilities and secret arts were specifically targeted at Twilight Monsters. To combat physically massive monsters, they developed the Steel Body ability. To counter Twilight Beasts of the Distortion and Alien Star Aspects, they established the oath secret art Amos's Sword.

The Holy White Knight Hall was originally the royal knight order of the Blazing Sun Empire, renowned for their noble character. Their targets were often individuals skilled in various evils. Many of their abilities were designed to avoid the influence of negative status effects, resist attacks in the mental realm, and also possessed decent self-enhancement capabilities.

Speaking of which, her relationships with both the Ironwall Crown Furnace and the Holy White Knight Hall were excellent, to the point where she could receive the legacy of their schools even without joining. Since she had returned to the Darkmist Mountains this time, she might as well pay another visit to Ironwall Precipice next time.

Then came the Luminous Moon system. Most of her knowledge and abilities in this area were obtained from the Silver Radiance Church's holy scripture, Meleranke Praying in the Lake. She had studied occasionally, but it wasn't comprehensive. However, this area wasn't urgent. Many of the powerful secret arts within it required her Luminous Moon Aspect to reach the Fourth Tier and Fifth Tier before she could learn them.

Finally, there was the Verdant Nectar Gardener system, on which she had spent the most thought and effort. This was the system she had mastered most proficiently and completely, and it still had significant room for expansion.

For example, finding an opportunity to supplement Tree Sprouting to fuse with Vine Overgrowth and Vegetation Frenzy. Then, learning the extended spells of the Verdant Nectar Aspect to enhance combat power and develop special applications.

For ordinary people, advancing in a profession under each type of Aspect required endless time and energy. It was already exceptionally fortunate and indicative of high talent that she could master so many abilities from other Aspects in her spare time while focusing on being a gardener. Ordinary people simply didn't have the energy or resources for it.

Her primary task now was to continue perfecting the secret art abilities of the Verdant Nectar Gardener. Second was to make up for the abilities of the Knight Path from the Ironwall Crown Furnace and the Holy White Knight Hall. Finally, if she had any spare capacity, she would search for and study the ability secret arts of the Alien Star and Luminous Moon Aspects.

After sorting out her own situation, Sylutia first fetched the materials on Tree Sprouting, preparing to study it.

This ability was one of the widely circulated secret art abilities within the Gardener profession rank. Even without attending a specialized school, one could find many materials and learning methods.

Similar to Vine Overgrowth and Vegetation Frenzy, Tree Sprouting was an ability to stimulate tree growth. However, its difficulty was somewhat higher compared to the previous two. It required pairing with the Fertile Soil Method to obtain stronger nutritional supply and root support.

"So, I first need to use the Fertile Soil Method to prepare a batch of spellcasting materials before I can use them to perform Tree Sprouting," Sylutia murmured softly after reading the materials.

The common Fertile Soil Method required three basic materials: Fish, Water, and Stone. Water and Stone were easy to solve. She had her own prepared Clear Spring Holy Water, which was very suitable as a raw material. For stone-type materials, being located in the Darkmist Mountains, she could also purchase many gems and special raw stones.

Only Fish-attribute materials were scarce in the Darkmist Mountains. She flipped through the materials on Tree Sprouting and the Fertile Soil Method. The explanation stated that if the nutrition and Aspect required by the tree happened to match the Fish-attribute material, better results could be achieved.

So, what tree should she choose as her learning target?

Sylutia thought of the two types she had planted in her manor: the Golden Lump Pear and the Frost Blue Apple. If it was the Golden Lump Pear, it would require a Fish with metal characteristics. If it was the Frost Blue Apple, it would require a Fish of the Slumbering Winter Aspect.

Would there be Fish of these two attributes within the Darkmist Mountains? She went to the town library to search through the collected information books from nearby garrisons.

After some searching, Sylutia actually found an inconspicuous record.

Within the Dark Sand River Valley garrison, there was a type of small fish at the river bottom possessing magnetic and metallic characteristics. They relied on flexibly changing the magnetism of their metallic scales to gain the ability to swim rapidly in the river. This should be the required type of fish.

Unfortunately, this fish wasn't highly valuable, and Dark Sand River Valley didn't specifically collect or stockpile it. If needed, she would have to go there and find it herself.

Coincidentally, Lantern Town was recently going to communicate and trade goods with various garrisons in the Darkmist Mountains. She could accompany them on a visit there for a while and tour the local area.

She vaguely remembered that the very first task after establishing the town was to prepare purification spring water for them.