Just a Sprout (3)

Every day begins with dew.

When the moisture-laden dawn air touched my cotyledons, dew began to gather. I would wait until it had beaded up nicely, then carefully tilt a cotyledon, letting a droplet of mana roll about and swallow up all the dew.

As it absorbed them one by one, the mana droplet would swell before I knew it, and my cotyledons would be left spotless. It was like washing my face first thing in the morning — it freshened me right down to my spirit.

I think I like this.

A cold shower of rainwater felt lovely too, but a dew face wash, performed with such careful effort, left my heart feeling calm and easy.

Afterward, resting the plumped-up droplet on a cotyledon and basking in the sunlight was its own pleasure. As the dew evaporated, it tickled my cotyledons with a cool, refreshing touch.

Sometimes a fan's breeze is more welcome than an air conditioner's in the height of summer. That gentle coolness brushing over my cotyledons let me feel the tender presence of the sunlight itself.

Thank you for the warm sunshine again today.

Still, along with this new morning routine came a new worry as well.

I think my mana droplet has gotten bigger.

Of course it had grown — it had been swallowing dew. But once the swallowed dew evaporated, only the mana droplet should remain, back to its original size. And yet, repeating the dew face wash day after day, I couldn't shake the feeling that the droplet had somehow grown.

It wasn't just a feeling, either.

Something's off with these numbers. As I understand it, the left number is my current amount and ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the right is my limit, isn't it? No idea how I'm holding more than I'm supposed to.

The mystery was solved when I paused my enjoyment of the dew face wash long enough to observe the droplet closely.

Looking carefully, I saw that the dawn dew still carried ambient mana from the atmosphere. As my droplet swallowed them one at a time, the mana mingled in and swelled its scale.

The scale had grown, but the result was somewhat unstable. Most of the mana evaporated back into the air — as if warning me not to be greedy all at once. Only the portion that had properly assimilated remained.

Whoa, the droplet got bigger.

Amazing. So with the dew face wash, I can grow my droplet, can't I? Doing my morning face wash with a giant droplet would feel so refreshing.

I love it.

I devoted myself to the dew face wash every dawn thereafter.

I didn't let my routine stop me from continuing my underground expansion.

My thick roots bored into the earth, dividing into smaller roots along the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠way that spread in every direction.

A boulder blocked my lead root at the front line. I prodded at it, exploratory. A clean surface, no cracks on this one.

That made my usual strategy — slipping fine rootlets into the cracks and widening them until the stone split — difficult. Ordinarily I would have given up and gone around.

But I had already achieved a hierarchical root network design. Before and after that innovation were as different as heaven and earth.

I surveyed the boulder's length and width. Once I'd confirmed its elongated shape, I stretched out my roots. The thick roots gripped both long ends, while smaller roots branched and wove together to anchor the boulder firmly in place.

All that time spent trimming fine rootlets and growing the thick ones had paid off — my roots had grown strong. Strong enough that a boulder no longer frightened me.

I tensed my roots. As force pressed in from both sides, a faint grinding of stone rang out. The surface trembled, cracks spread — and with a mighty boom, the boulder shattered.

Highway opening successful again today.

Yoo-hoo! I'm strong enough to smash boulders now.

Pushing aside the stone debris, my roots claimed the territory completely.

Alright, nutrients — direct delivery via the highway!

The nutrients spread through my entire body, roots and all.

About four days passed.

My cotyledons had grown larger and plumper. A single one of them now dwarfed my neighbor's bundle of yellow petals. It was the size that made me wonder whether a dicot sprout was really supposed to get this big.

My field of vision had widened considerably as well. Having become a sprout different from its cotyledons, the expansion of my sight radius was impressive.

Looking toward the flower field, I saw that the entire enlarged radius was now filled with the yellow extended family. What a huge family they are. At that scale, they might be something beyond mere family.

I checked whether any neighbor resembling the lone pink flower existed, but everything was yellow. Even in the midst of that yellow-drenched field, the pink flower was still blooming all alone. You're beautiful today, too.

This time I scanned the weed patch on the opposite side. There too, countless nameless little grasses simply covered the ground — no great difference there.

But if I examined the very edge of my vision carefully, I could spot one very small difference. A shadow had fallen across the grass. A sapling-shaped shadow.

Whoa, there's a tree in the neighborhood too!

I can't see it clearly yet, but it's right there, practically under my nose.

Finally, I'll get to see a tree. Every time the moment of deciding my future came around, my heart kept drifting toward the flowers — I'd been half-wondering if that was only because flowers were all I had around me.

I wonder what I'll be able to do if I become a tree. A tree may not be able to dance as flashily as a flower, but I'm sure I'll be able to do something just as wonderful.

What came to mind right away ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠was branch-swaying. On a day when a crisp wind blew hard, if I swayed my branches and played my leaves like an instrument, there'd be no more joyful moment in all the world.

Ever since I discovered the sapling's shadow, I found myself observing the surrounding shadows I'd never paid attention to, even while tending my roots.

For several days, nothing much changed. But one day, I caught a shadow I had been missing all along — a bird's shadow. It flitted across the flower field in an instant, a sight I would have missed entirely if I hadn't been paying close attention.

Whoa, a bird!

Not some tiny humming thing, but a bird racing across the sky with great wings spread wide.

The flower field was the sky all along.

I'd thought a rounded vision radius couldn't show me the sky — but I was wrong. The sky had already come out to greet me here. I hadn't given up on it; it had already arrived, and I was the one who'd stopped looking.

When rain fell, the shadow of clouds draped over everything.

Thank you for sending down the rain again today.

Today feels extra special, because now I can look up and greet you.

Raindrops soaked the earth. Having drunk their fill of the sky, they came down to the ground and seeped even into the soil, wetting the world through.

Nutrients mixed with the moisture came flowing in along my roots. As I drew them back through my roots, my thick ones surged outward with strength. Soil gave way, and pebbles were pushed aside to clear the path.

Yoo-hoo.

The nutrients pouring in were enough to make my cotyledons tremble. It was clearly more than a sprout ought to eat.

I might get a stomachache. But I'm a miraculous sprout, so I'll be fine.

Once I'd been a sprout smaller than the weeds; now I was a hefty dicot sprout bigger than the flowers. My digestion was more than up to the task.

Besides, I'd surpassed miraculous. I'm a squeaky-clean sprout who even does the dew face wash, after all.

I lifted my cotyledons with pride.

Upon the rain-washed cotyledon sat a mana droplet, radiating quiet grandeur. It had grown a full 1.6 times larger.

The root expansion never stopped, either.

My innovative root design blanketed the underworld of soil.

My clumsy early designs, refined layer by layer through experience, had grown sturdy. Though I was only a sprout, my hierarchical root network — modeled on the roots of a true tree — rivaled that of a small sapling.

Call me a tree, at least as far as my roots are concerned.

Roughly five days into growing my body.

At the edge of my vision, the sapling came fully into view.

It was bigger than the flowers but smaller than a true tree — a compact size that could fit in a pot, though it stood as tall as a deer. Thin trunk and branches swayed, lush with leaves.

Magnificent. It's a little tree, plain and simple. In ten years, in a hundred, it's sure to grow into something splendid.

Seeing it made me think that growing into a tree might be lovely after all. The sight of those lush leaves rustling so pleasantly in the wind was truly, genuinely beautiful.

As I watched in a daze, the sun set and night fell. Moonlight gave way to sunlight, then came the rain, and when it cleared, the wind blew.

The lush leaves played the wind like a song. Droplets scattered, forming a tiny rainbow.

Truly. Beautiful.

I had watched that sapling for only the briefest stretch of time. And yet a desire to become such a magnificent tree blazed up in me like sunlight.

I want to play the wind too.

That sapling may ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠only have made a tiny rainbow, but I want to make a far greater one. I want to shake my lush leaves from branches that reach the sky, and play the wind as my instrument.

I can do it. Because I'm a miraculous sprout.

Deeper — like a tree whose roots run deep.

I poured my full attention into redesigning my roots. Having settled on becoming a tree, I couldn't leave behind the roots I'd grown with such vague, uncertain intentions. The fine rootlets I'd kept in case I became a flower instead — I cut them away without hesitation.

Keeping only the bare minimum, I achieved a truly hierarchical root network. My territory shrank for a moment, true. But as I patiently focused on the main roots, the area each single root could absorb widened — and in the end, I was able to expand my domain even further.

And with the thick roots alone boldly carving through the underground, my expansion speed increased beyond what it had been before.

Being merely a sprout, I couldn't quite shape them into true tree roots, but they were more than worthy of the name. A monumental feat without parallel in the history of sprouts.

Swelling with pride, I shook my cotyledons. The droplet rolled and tumbled.

Then, suddenly, I felt a gaze upon me. From the direction of the sapling. Looking closer, I saw a white ball of fur standing atop the sapling's shadow. The rabbit was chewing on a blade of grass, staring straight at me. A gloomy shadow fell over it.

Could that rabbit be...?

A plump white body, ears perked high, and red eyes.

It looked exactly like the rabbit I'd once fought with my life on the line. When I shifted a cotyledon ever so slightly, the rabbit's nose twitched.

To think the rabbit that gave me the title of Rabbit Slayer would come back.

If you just want to enjoy the flowers' scent with me, I have no intention of being on guard. But the rabbit showed off its strength with a horrifying display — chewing that blade of grass without mercy. The grass crunched ruthlessly between its teeth as it was devoured.

You haven't changed a bit. But you came back far too late.

In the wild, they say you puff up your fur and body to intimidate your opponent. Following the rules of the wild, I spread my cotyledons wide. The droplet rolled this way and that across them.

A droplet twice my limit, no less.

Back then, all I could do was my growing-taller exercise — but now I can do so much more. Come at me, and you'll get hurt far worse than last time.

I rolled the droplet as if presenting it, letting it glide across one cotyledon in full, then transferring it to roll across the other.

And then I flicked a cotyledon, sending the droplet bouncing.

Yoo-hoo.

Cotyledon-play of the highest mastery.

The greatest display of power in sprout history.

Well? Scared yet?

The rabbit's eyes went round. Its front teeth bared in a slack grin, and drool began to dribble down.

...Ah. Right. I suppose I look like a fresh, juicy sprout, droplet and all. I hadn't thought of it from the rabbit's point of view.

The rabbit approached, keeping a wary distance as it licked its lips.

You're coming back even after losing once? I can feel your resolve — you won't retreat from a cotyledon whipping.

Do I really look that delicious? But I've changed so much in your absence. A word of advice: restrain your momentary desires.

The rabbit leapt with all its might. Its front teeth flashed.

Yeah, there was no way you'd give up.

I snapped my cotyledon. The droplet soared through the air.

You know what?

A lump of mana hurts when it hits you.

My cotyledon struck the falling droplet. A resounding crack rang out. A watery streak shot forth, colliding with the white beast — and the liquid exploded. Rabbit fur billowed.

The white shape spun through the air and fell, spent. The grass beneath it compressed with a soft crunch.

I shook off my cotyledons.

I didn't want it to come to this. But I'm not foolish enough to take a beating lying down.

After a short wait, the rabbit struggled to its feet — then hopped away at a stumbling sprint. Farewell.

I drew the mana soaked into the ground back through my roots. An unprecedented volume of mana swirled through my body, setting off a change.

This is...?

Whoa?!