After Cracton continued eating some more of the nut-butter and jam, he finally nodded his head, "It's not the most interesting thing I've seen, but it's definitely a rather unique way of utilizing special materials like this. And as the fruit of this forest's trees don't rot, using them for nourishment instead of tools or weapons is truly perfect." The Ancient Copper Dragon explained, so Eisen raised his brows surprised, "They don't rot, really?" The old man asked, but the Dragon simply shook his head.
"Of course not. They are a unification of that which lives, and that which never can live. It gained the ability to grow from the former, and the ability to persist from the latter." Cracton told Eisen, and the old man just moved his fingers through his beard curiously.
"Interesting. Well, anyway, does this mean that I've passed the trial?" Eisen inquired, and the Dragon smiled broadly, "Yes, you have. My Gift is yours." Cracton explained, simply breathing out toward the old man, who felt his body immediately warm up.
[Title <Champion III> became <Champion IV>]
[Material Growth Skill Learned]
"Material Growth, I see?" Eisen muttered curiously, and Cracton slowly turned into his humanoid form, squatting down in front of Eisen with a copper coin and a seed in his hand.
"I will show it to you once. I am sure you have learned Alchemy?" Cracton asked, and the old man slowly nodded his head, "One of my first skills, yeah."
"Perfect. Then you should know of Alchemical combination of two materials, right?" After seeing Eisen nod again, the Ancient Dragon continued to explain, "Then this will be quite easy. What you need is the material in one hand, and the seed you want to combine it with in your other. And as if you are combining two materials through Alchemy, you combine the seed and material with each other." Cracton explained, slowly just rubbing his hands together before he held a small, metallic seed, the copper coin having disappeared.
"This seed will grow many times the regular speed it usually will, but regular plant control is not possible for this. Once you reach Rank 5 with this skill, you will be able to start controlling these plants similarly, however." Cracton told the old man in front of him, who curiously squatted down as the dragon planted the small seed in the cave's floor. And soon, a small copper rose grew from it, with sharp edges around the petals.
"Well then... with this, I probably won't need to worry about running out of interesting materials, huh?" The old man laughed loudly, and Cracton looked at him with one of his brows raised, "Indeed, but be aware that the materials you can gain from such plants could be vastly different to the base material. As you have surely seen while you were working with them just now."
"Of course, don't worry. I was actually already thinking about how to make use of some of those qualities." Eisen pointed out, and then remembered something else that he wanted to ask about, and then pushed his fingers into one of the pockets of his apron before pulling out one of the small ruby-enveloped seeds that he found inside of the monsters local to the regular forest-area.
"Is this something created with that skill?" Eisen asked Cracton, who leaned in a bit closer to take a look, "It is, yes. It works quite similar to an item someone made for me a few weeks ago. I think it's supposed to be something ability enhancing?" Cracton said quietly, and the old man slowly looked down at the experimental seed.
"Can you remember who it was?" Eisen inquired, before Cracton thought about it for a second and then slowly nodded, "Yes, it was Leopard-Gazelle Beastperson halfling. A pretty rare mix as far as I remember. He mentioned that he also lives away from other people, so if you want to find him, you might have to look for a while."
"Oh? What made you think I want to find who made this?" The old man asked with his brow raised, and Cracton looked at him with a light frown, "Why else would you have asked me?"
"Fair enough. Well, thank you, then. I think I'll just have a small talk with him. He's been experimenting with local monsters, so I want to make sure he doesn't mess around too much."
"That might be a good idea. But now that you have become a Fourth-Grade Champion, you surely will want to become a true champion. Any clues toward which dragon you are meeting next." Cracton asked with pure curiosity, so Eisen immediately nodded his head.
"Yes, Ailren suggested that I should go visit Zortady in the deserts." Eisen pointed out. Immediately, Cracton opened his eyes surprised.
"Ailren? May you be speaking about Aylrentyrth?" The copper dragon asked.
"Yeah, you two are old friends, right? That's why he told me to come visit you."
Cracton's surprised expression swiftly turned complicated after he heard what Eisen just said to him, "Friends? Well, I doubt that Aylrentyrth used such words. We are not truly friends, but more like... Enemies?" Cracton pointed out, before shaking his head in the same thought, "That is not quite right either... We are not on bad terms, and we have a cooperative relationship, but friends might be a bit too far."
"Well, Ailren didn't actually say the word 'Friend', I just kind of assumed." Eisen pointed out, although weirdly enough, Cracton actually seemed somewhat disappointed after hearing the old man say this.
"Is that so..?" The Dragon asked quietly, and Eisen just scratched the back of his head, feeling slightly bad about this, "But I'm sure he feels that way about you. How about you go visit him sometime to find out? Do you know where Melroe is?"
"Melroe... Melroe... That is the town underneath Aylrentyrth's nest, is it not?" Cracton asked, and Eisen immediately nodded his head, "Mhm, it is. It's a pretty cozy, nice town, so I can just recommend going there for vacation sometime anyway. But well, thank you for letting me take your trial, Cracton. I do need to go and meet my friends again, however." Eisen explained to the Ancient Copper Dragon, who just slowly nodded his head in response.
"Oh, of course, of course! Have a nice trip... That young Warforged can keep me company in your stead." Cracton pointed out, and Fluke just looked at Eisen with a wry smile, feeling a bit nervous about being left alone with the Dragon like this. And so, with a light sigh, Eisen looked back at him, "Don't worry, I doubt he'll bite you. Are you coming outside with me?" Eisen asked Fluke, who swiftly nodded his head, just to try to leave as soon as he could and finish the trial as quickly as somehow possible.
Once the group was back outside of the cave underneath the large tree, Eisen got on Cabarum's back together with the monster-children, and properly strapped the wooden jars filled with the 'rejected' jam to the Horse Automaton's sides, and then turned over toward Fluke with a smile.
"So, when do you think we're going to see you again?" Eisen asked the Warforged with a smile, and Fluke himself just responded, "Whenever I'm finished with my trial, I will try to meet up with you. Do you know where you will be going after traversing that desert?"
"I think mostly my plan is to head over toward the Harbor town that we use to travel between the continent and the islands for a while. At least that's the plan right now." Eisen explained to Fluke, who nodded his head with a slight sigh. "Alright, then I'll head over there when I'm done here." The Warforged said, so Eisen nodded his head with a warm smile.
"Then I will see you there, hopefully. Good luck on your trial." The old man told Fluke, and then properly said goodbye before riding off on Cabarum's back together with the monster children.
Of course, on his way back to the town, Eisen was thinking about quite a lot of things, mostly about what he could make with these special types of plants, or where he should best try to plant these materials. There might also be some ways to just utilize it for decoration if he ended up planting some crystal-based plants. There might also be a way to make something to cause specific effects, like a flower whose scent will increase your strength, or a tree that when you sleep under it, your stamina increases more quickly and you need less sleep.
That would be interesting, at least, even if not as useful as Eisen was probably thinking it was.
Either way, for now, Eisen just had to try and practice with this skill, and for that he would need to create a large amount of plants with random materials and just scatteringly plant them all over the place. This should let him at least figure out a different way to best increase his skill proficiency.
For that, Eisen would of course need a large amount of raw materials and seeds, however, neither of which should be too hard to get considering that this whole thing was apparently also possible with just rock or maybe even dirt. Eisen was actually rather curious if he could give a soft Cedar wood the hardness of Oak, or if this could just be used to easily cross-breed different plants.
He should definitely look into that in a bit.
But first, the old man had to get back to town to let the others know about the successful trial, and then take a little bit of time to maybe fulfill a commission or two. It's been a while since he's worked on an interesting one, so he wondered if people in this area had other needs than those in Melroe. Or rather, that they needed different thing was pretty obvious, but Eisen wanted to see just how different their needs were.
It should just take a couple of hours to get back now, which the old man used to think and theorize. There wasn't much else to do right now after all, especially not since Cabarum's back was relatively tight with all three of Eisen's monsters sitting on it together with him. Usually he may have started carving something, but now there really wasn't the space for that.
Soon enough, however, they could finally see the town again, and Eisen looked forward with a glad expression. They actually passed the dungeon as they were approaching the town, and business seemed to be booming right now, so Eisen had Melissa send a bee over there just to let Sigurd know that they were back.
And once they reached the gate in the early morning of the day after they headed off, Brak the Bear Beastperson couldn't believe his eyes.