Master Of None

Midnight came up behind Walker surprising him a little since she was curiously holding a few flowers she had found. ”What are those? You usually don’t go collecting flowers.” While different from what he was used to seeing in her hands since food was her primary carrying item, Walker still used his all around appraisal.

’Withering lilac

While this plant is a dark affinity herb that grows in the shadows of larger trees or bushes, it is actually extremely beneficial to the environment. They often consume the nutrients from rotting leaves and broken branches from the larger plants they grow under. This allowed for the soil to always be refreshed and clean in the long run.

Their flowers are a deep purple that almost appears to go black, however, these flowers can also be dried and used to create a powder that attracts monsters that consume dark elemental herbs. Often they were adored by the night cats which were a species of monster that hunted in the night using their pitch black fur and surprisingly small size…’

Seeing that these flowers had an ability to attract monsters with their dark affinity flowers made it clear that Midnight’s original dark affinity played a part here. With a single hand, Walker sorted the flowers away so Midnight could enjoy the smell of them later. She seemed very happy with this before looking ahead in the direction that he had been traveling.

”I am trying to reach the larger rocks that lead up to what used to be the mountain top. I have a feeling there might be a few interesting plants or monsters. I also might happen upon a cave or something.” Walker shrugged since he really didn’t know what he might find.

”It smells weird.” The sniffing from Midnight only increased now that she wasn’t infatuated with the withering lilacs. But her nose was naturally sharper than Walker’s, so he trusted that she was on to something and let her take the lead.

He wasn’t at all surprised that the trees around him barely grew larger than the bamboo. They were part of an island that used to be a mountain, the tallest mountain in his perspective as well. That meant that any tree that used to grow this high up had to be smaller and grow in shorter lifecycles to be able to survive.

The winds and temperature at the highest mountains were always brutal. Something that not many monsters or planets could survive. But being smaller meant that they could grow rapidly in times of fortune for them and then break down easily to become part of the next generation.

As the mountain became an island, that meant that these trees would have better conditions and explained why there were so many. Enough that it was nearly impossible to be able to walk in certain ways without breaking some of them down.

’Rubber trees

These small trees are called rubber because they mimic the condensed sap from a larger tree after being hardened. It bounces back from brutal winds and even from extreme changes in temperature. This makes the branches valuable to craftsmen who are making certain traps or making small parts that must be made of wood.

The sap is very toxic since the sap has small crystals of earth in them due to consuming some of the minerals within the rocks their roots take hold of. Otherwise, the leaves can be used as a packing material in sleeping bags since they will retain warmth fairly well.

The small fruits that grow on their bark are often mistaken for the food called bark nuts, however, they are actually small fruits that attract incest type monsters called boring gnats. They live within the park and act as a way of deterring and destroying diseases within the bark that would normally kill the small trees…’

A lot of what Walker read related to other plants but the all around appraisal also presented a unique symbiotic relationship based on the monster that needed food and found a way to live with the tree without causing harm. It also was showing a reason why other demonstrators might mistake it and end up in some trouble. Not that this was odd in nature.

As Midnight kept moving forward and Walker continued to use his all around appraisal skill, he somewhat wondered what happened to Remey. Then again, the odds that she was focused on an herb she found was more plausible. She would catch up with them later.

But the broken stones ahead appeared to be the target that Midnight was sniffing out. An open space that had proof that some rocks were harder for the trees to anchor their roots in. but it was a perfect spot for some deep yellow moss to grow.

’Sulfur mosses

This moss only grows in extremely high sulfur areas. Most of the time it will grow in rock outcroppings that used to be part of a volcano. There is also the fact that they will consume the remnants of past volcanic eruptions. Most of the time signalling volcanic tunnels in larger mountains.

The remnants of this moss are often consumed by fairy drains with fire elemental affinity because they need the sulfur to survive and grow properly. Otherwise, this moss can be used in forging to help increase the strength of a metal or an alloy. There is also the fact that it can be used to clean up areas affected by volcanic eruptions and harvested for beneficial uses afterward…’

Walker read the all around appraisal out loud since he realized the value that it had. He hadn’t just been led by Midnight to a good material to harvest. He had been led to a material with hidden beneficial knowledge.

The forging uses were amazing since he would be able to bring this moss back to be used to test out new forms of forging. The wandering blacksmith could utilize it so that he would see what else he might be able to achieve. And since he had seen the wandering blacksmith take a residence within the flying ship workshop to forge with whatever new materials they found, he had a good idea that he would be giving the wandering blacksmith something he wanted no matter what.

It wasn’t like the wandering blacksmith had plans to head in to the elemental aliens anytime soon. The discovery of another con intent had captured his interest enough to explore it as well. It was literally what he did as a blacksmith.

There was also the fact that this moss could be used to help clean up areas with volcanic activity. The lava fields would have times when larger plumes of smoke and ash would be dropped all over a nearby area. The wind currents and rains might accidentally cause trouble for those that lived there.

This being an issue for clean up already meant that mages and other specialized cleaners were needed. There were quite a few farmers who searched for crops that would revitalize the land affected by these troubles.

This moss would allow for a larger portion of damage to be recovered.

But most of all, the thing that captured all of Midnight’s attention and sparked a glimmer in her eyes was the part about the fairy dragons.

They had not heard of a species of dragon called the fairy dragon and now they had. Nothing on any of the places they had been or explored said that smaller dragons the size of a fairy might exist. If this was the case, then they might be venturing in to the perfect places to look for them. Whether they were intelligent or a monster didn’t even matter.

If the continent where monsters had reigned supreme in ancient times over all other races had a new form of dragon, then Midnight would be the first one to find them. That was already major. But what if the dragonkin who came with them also found them and could report that back to the royal dragons?

Nothing about this discovery in the appraisal was small and even Walker was ignoring the fact that he wanted to see the once had been mountain top. Although, he was desperately trying to appraise other plants hoping for more hidden information about the fairy dragons. Not that he had enough success.

”We are going to harvest a bunch of this moss and I will even store away the stones that have sulfur in them.” This was when Walker replied that they had missed the biggest part out of all of this.

”This mountain range might have once been a volcanic mountain range… not that the world has returned to proper flow, do you think it might become active again?”

Now they had a potential danger to consider.

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