Synexus sat cross legged in front of Progress within his vision of the garden. The sword was always stuck into the ground radiating power outward in waves.

  Soft grass surrounded the blade, and it was one of his favorite spots to mediate and work on his projects. Of course, it wasn’t his physical body. That was currently nearing the top of the steps of the mountain that led to their trail. No, it was simply a manifestation of himself as he worked.

  His eyes looked around him to see a forest of varying plants. Hundreds of different variants of bamboo, giant trees made of all sorts of materials, flowers performing feats that most people wouldn’t believe, and his plant hydras frolicking about.

  In the distance was a little pond in which his chickens were always around. His first five that he had altered within their eggs had hatched and were thriving withing his garden. One was older than the rest since it had been the one that he had made to grow quicker. The experiments had seemed to have gone well, and his plan was to start doing more complex changes with the chickens these ones would produce.

  Like his chickens, his fish swimming in the pond itself, were a success. He had used common freshwater trout. There were ten in total. One he had changed the color of its scales, another he altered to be more intelligent, a third he grew larger than the normal maximum of the species, the fourth was born with iron scales, the fifth with tree bark-like material, his sixth he made develop better eyesight, the seventh had lungs and legs, his eighth he added a little mana into and made it into a magic creature, the ninth would reproduce by itself and much quicker than normal. And finally, he made the tenth one normal except for giving it the ability to heal quickly. Each day he would check in to record their growth and the difference in their actions.

  To the left and behind the pond was a workshop he had grown from trees that held all his various materials. It wasn’t necessary to actually store them in a workshop or even be in there to work on Element Modification, but it helped Synexus to focus on what he was doing.

  On his way up the mountain, half his focus stayed within his garden and worked on using the rest of his quartz to produce a healthy backlog of recording quartz of varying sizes. Shell had been using them constantly, and even the empty ones were selling well on The Progress Nexus.

  About halfway up the mountain, he finished off the block of quartz and moved over to creating more plants capable of producing heat. He was planning to take some coats he had the seamstress make and modify the material to give off a mild heat or simply retain heat better since he knew it would get cold on their journey. Overall, it shouldn’t be a hard change since he already had some materials in mind that masterfully handled heat, but he was trying to be more creative with his changes to help with levelling.

  Speaking of levelling, in the day they were walking, he had levelled up Progress Garden twice which meant he only needed 3 more levels to get his next class level.

  Progress Garden has levelled up!

  Progress Garden has levelled up!

  Progress Garden is now level 19!

  When you were focused on advancing your skills, the levels came quicker. He should have put more of an emphasis on them while in Goldhill. However, taking a break is good for your soul and for your progress, so he didn’t feel too guilty.

  Within his garden, he only had to give a plant or a material a thought before it appeared in his hands. He had cultivated tens of thousands of plants and collected as many materials as he could. His class demanded having access to stockpiles in order to advance.

  Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.

  For the changes he had in mind, he used moss as a base and changed its foundation to be more hardy. Next, he made it so it could live simply off mana. His final change to it was to give off any extra mana as heat. This culminated in Warmth Moss.

  When that was through, he grabbed the coats and manipulated the material to hold in heat better while also making them luxuriously soft. His friends deserved the best after all. The last step was him using Progress Garden to sense the small space in between the layers of fabric in the coat and growing a layer of moss in each one.

  All in all, it took him a couple of hours, and they had already made camp for the night once they were safely on the trail and off the stairs. He took the coats out and then tested his.

  It truly was ridiculously comfortable, and he could feel the heat the moment he touched it. The moss would sustain itself on the ambient mana while giving off a little heat. However, if the wearer was cold, they could pour in some of their mana to generate more heat. To test out how hot it could get, he continued to pour his mana in until the heat became unbearable. He knew the moss could keep going too, so there was no danger of his friends freezing to death.

  He threw a seed of a variant of the liing plant down into the middle of their camp into a pile of dried sticks to immediately start a campfire and then they sat down to eat. It was a clear night, and it reminded him of his first night in the forest after leaving for his adventure. He laid back and looked up at the stars just like he did that first night except they were much more beautiful from so high up on a mountain.

  “What are you looking at Synexus? Gene inquired.

  “The stars. It was one of the first things I did when I started my adventure. Some horrible spiders ruined it almost immediately after though.”

  “Spiders are the worst.” Kumo added.

  Everyone laughed and joined him in stargazing.

  In his garden it was still sunny. It was always sunny. That was something he was hoping would change when his skill levelled up. It was something that never even crossed his mind when he was creating the skill. He was certain that his plants would grow the same since it wasn’t actually sunlight shining down on them, but that was something he would look into creating somehow. A personal star or something along those lines.

  Another round of laughter shook him from his garden and back into reality. With his perfect recall he realized they were laughing at Zuls pointing out pretend constellations that were named after her bonded.

  “Gene, do you know which star was my original?”

  “Synexus, I was a tree until a couple months ago. I am no astronomer.”

  “I know all about the stars, but even I couldn’t tell you that.” Yu said with a bit of sadness. “Sorry, Synexus.”

  “It’s okay. I was only curious.”

  “I bet it was that one way over there.” Zuls pointed in the general direction, but of course it was hard to tell which star she was actually pointing too.

  “Why that one?”

  “I don’t know. I just feel like you are an over there kind of person, you know?”

  This sparked another round of laughter from the group.

  “Would you go back if you could?” Prith asked.

  “I don’t believe I can. It’s gone, right, Gene?”

  “The planet is still there, but it is dead. No living thing can survive on it.”

  Silence fell on their camp.

  “Maybe I can change that someday.” Synexus finally broke the awkward silence.

  “That is a good goal.” Vorin declared.

  At that point a hawk flew down from the starlit skin and landed on top of their tent. A scroll was tied to its leg.

  Kumo was the closest and grabbed the scroll. She silently read it before dropping the paper and staring at Synexus.

  “What is it Kumo? What does it say?”

  “It’s a letter from the king. Two Coalition class chosen followed us up the mountain. His guards delayed them as much as they could, but he said they should be on their way up now.”

  “Alright, I guess we aren’t getting sleep tonight. Let’s pack up and keep moving.” Vorin started untying a rope that anchored the tent.

  “No, Vorin.”

  Everyone turned and looked at Synexus.

  “It’s time I face them and see what they want. We can’t live our lives running from them constantly and they clearly aren’t going to give up. If they are hostile, then I’ll fight. If they try to take me, then I’ll fight. If I can talk to them and settle this, however, then I think I should try.”

  “Synexus, you saw what they did. I don’t advise this. This might put the world in danger, not just the party.”

  Synexus sighed. “I know Gene, but I’m tired of hiding my class when I could be helping more people. I’m proud to follow the Progress Druid path. I’m proud to be a Progress Architect. I think it’s time to face the two who think it’s okay to hunt an innocent person. It’s time I stop hiding in my garden.”

  “Okay. We will stand with you, Synexus. We should start making plans, however. We could ambush them…” Vorin continued making battle plans and contingencies if things started to look bad.

  Gene held Synexus’ stare before conceding and giving him a supporting nod.

  “You really are too much like him.”