Ecosystem Maintenance 2
My once-pristine ecosystem, neatly divided into distinct zones by latitude, no longer featured those predictable regional boundaries.
Its layout had grown extraordinarily complex and even inefficient, yet the various terrains refused to cluster conveniently. Instead, every kind of landscape imaginable lay scattered across a mere sixty thousand square kilometers.
This arrangement followed Wahando’s advice. It represented my optimal configuration after weighing the ecosystem’s efficiency, diversity, and the harmony between neighboring biomes. Of course, it might shift again as the game progressed.
I would continue to grow as I accumulated knowledge, and the ecosystem would never stop evolving.
The World Shaping ability was a godsend. No matter how violent the changes, I could rearrange the terrain with a few satisfying clicks.
As the world expanded, the divinity cost of terrain editing had become staggering even by my standards. World Shaping slashed that consumption dramatically and shattered previous limitations.
That being the case, the current terrain was twisted beyond my own ability to describe. Better to view it on a grand scale.
The first region demanding attention was the Nectar Well. Level 13. The headquarters of my ecosystem, occupying its highest elevation.
Abhojuth, acting as its fairy, converted every flow gathered from across the world into pure Nectar. That Nectar then traveled through the Syrup and Creamland, spreading across both earth and sky. The Well itself covered roughly eight hundred square kilometers. Given that my entire ecosystem now spanned sixty-six thousand, it accounted for only about 1.2 percent.
Not long ago the Nectar Well had occupied nearly a third of my territory. Back then the Nectar constantly overflowed its basin, forcing the Rock Jellies to devour the surrounding bedrock. Now the flow ran short. The Guremmy Bear Reefs had begun crawling above the waterline and across the ground in search of sustenance.
I therefore took the magic stones acquired from other players, packed the Well with them, and fed them to Abhojuth to forcibly replenish the current.
What else would I call it? Anyone listening would think I’d held a knife to their throats and demanded the stones.
Three hundred thousand points’ worth of magic stones could never equal three hundred thousand points in Mystery value. The other players needed to turn a profit too.
Still, collecting millions of points’ worth from eight different sources provided a respectable surge of flow. The total mana volume of my world had simply increased. I had gathered the stones indiscriminately, but Abhojuth proved capable of digesting virtually any type of mana current and converting it into Nectar. As a result, the Well’s level had skyrocketed.
It now stood at level 15, covering roughly three thousand square kilometers—about 4.5 percent of the total. As mentioned, I had inserted four new “island” terrains inside the Well itself. After reinforcing them with additional features and adding six more islands, ten distinct sub-ecosystems now thrived within the Nectar Well.
The change in depth proved even more dramatic. Abhojuth managed the lake admirably as he grew, yet its sheer scale remained staggering. Different ecosystems had formed at varying depths and locations. Fish, amphibians, reptiles, Gamchi, and other creatures had evolved along separate paths, each perfectly adapted to its niche. They now served as highly effective defenders of the Well.
The Bisyakheet population had exploded. Some lived inside the lake, others outside, and speciation had occurred between the groups. There were even aquatic variants that had fully entered the water. These monstrous biscuit-like creatures would undoubtedly become devastating defensive assets should the Nectar Well ever come under attack.
The Guremmy Bear Reefs, working alongside Abhojuth, had produced small bear-shaped organisms. These acted as sentinels, resisting Bisyakheets that tried to devour the corals or use them as building material. I had not suppressed their combat growth; as a result the Bisyakheets grew even more ferocious in their attempts to rip away the reefs.
That was the situation inside the Well. The surrounding watershed proved equally fascinating.
The watershed teemed with Gumis and Jellies that drank Nectar and radiated mana without end. Giant Puddings smashed and devoured the Gumis. Massive Gamchi and enormous Sugar Lumps roamed alongside them.
Gumis had become pure producers, having lost all mobility. Jellies retained some movement, consuming Nectar, water, and stone to generate mana. In many ways these organisms truly served as the keystone species of my ecosystem.
Should the Gumis and Jellies perish, nothing would remain to emit mana.
Syrup? It certainly generated flows, and the mana it produced was far from negligible. Yet rather than releasing that energy outward, it transported mana to other regions. In essence, it functioned as a canal system.
The true primary producers of my ecosystem, yesterday and today, remained the Nectar Jellies and Gumis. They consumed Nectar, absorbed sunlight, drank water and minerals, and exhaled mana to sustain the Well.
As the number of predators feeding on these Jellies and Gumis increased, the prey’s body sizes grew steadily larger. Gumis had always been enormous, having replaced both trees and corals. The Jellies, however, had become truly monstrous.
How large? Two-ton rhinoceros? Too small.
Five-ton elephant? Still too small.
These creatures had reached the scale of ten-ton Triceratops.
Jelly morphology seemed to have stabilized into three forms: six to eight legs, no legs at all with snail-like locomotion, or a hybrid of both. Their shells were now encased in carapaces of such insane density that a grenade detonation would barely scratch them, let alone an axe or hammer. Angular knees and protruding heads sprouted spikes and horns capable of crushing attackers outright.
With the world vastly larger, these Jellies might one day rival the ancient sauropods—thirty meters long and over fifty tons, absurdly massive land animals. Or perhaps magic would push them even further, creating two-hundred-ton behemoths. These were living creatures? They were essentially whales crawling across the land.
The immobile Gumis could reinforce their bodies even more, growing larger still. After all, trees usually dwarf animals in size.
The largest Gumi Trees now matched giant sequoias in volume. Height offered little advantage, so they had not grown much taller, yet their bulk was staggering. Specimens exceeding one hundred meters in diameter were commonplace.
The truly astonishing part was that Gumis shared a close relation with jelly-type organisms like Jellies and Puddings. Consequently, they had begun to resemble sea squirts.
When young they gorged on Nectar like ordinary herbivores, digging soil, licking the Syrup River, and expanding their bodies. This proved far more survivable than growing from tiny saplings.
Once they aged and became too formidable to attack, they rooted themselves in the earth and grew vastly larger. In the process they digested their own eyes, ears, sensory organs, and brains, becoming immobile feeders that existed solely to absorb energy.
These colossal sequoia-like Gumi Trees had become monsters that devoured Nectar and nutrients seeping into the ground along with every nearby mana current. Growing twenty meters tall and hundreds of meters wide, they blanketed the Nectar Well watershed.
Occasionally their roots reached the Well itself to drink directly. I allowed it. Countless creatures lived off the sticky clumps the trees produced for mating purposes.
Naturally, the carnivorous Puddings had grown enormous to consume these gigantic Jellies and Gumis.
Restricted to the Nectar watershed, they remained near the Well yet possessed devastating power—whip-like tentacles, hammer-like limbs, and jaws capable of crushing anything. They served as the Well’s guardians. Should the Nectar Lake ever cease, my entire ecosystem would collapse. Because Nectar was a universal resource capable of supplying limitless energy, these creatures would always rank among the largest and most powerful monsters in my domain.
Their timidity was another excellent trait.
"When a herbivore is timid, it means that if you invade its territory it will tear the intruder apart out of sheer terror."
"Ah."
Some Puddings ate Gamchi or Sugar Lumps that crawled in seeking Nectar. Others remained quite active. The established formula had become simple: first encounter equals evil thief trying to steal Nectar. Anything entering their domain triggered insane hostility.
They would be useless for offensive operations. Their terrain dependency was far too high.
Because Nectar was a universal resource, these creatures had evolved to eat nothing else. They could no longer consume anything but Nectar.
They still differed from young Bisyakheets, which hunted other beasts. The sheer perfection of Nectar as a resource had allowed the countless life forms within the Well and its watershed to completely dominate the area.
Did that mean other creatures simply idled? Of course not.
Plants and insects had infiltrated the ecosystem with ease. The flora and bugs created by Nyaltartep parasitized both the Nectar and the Jellies, drinking their sap.
The giant Caramel Camels continued to enlarge, attaining body mass that rivaled the titans of the Nectar zone. Their necks had grown so long they resembled alpacas more than camels.
Well, alpacas do belong to the camel family.
The Sugar Lumps had changed in fascinating ways as well. Both Magic Sugar Lumps and Martial Sugar Lumps benefited from consuming Nectar. Using what little intelligence they possessed, the higher-ranking individuals had formed bandit groups. They hunted Jellies in the Nectar zone, devoured both the Jellies and the Nectar, and crudely fashioned the discarded shells into weapons.
I still couldn’t gauge exactly how intelligent these Sugar Lumps had become. They clearly could not build a civilization, yet watching them craft crude armor by weaving Jelly tentacles and carapaces into axes and spears suggested their intellect was not as low as I once assumed.
"Do I look insane?"
From what I observed their intelligence had risen, though not to Homo sapiens levels. Perhaps a little below Homo erectus. They could handle fire, understood the practical applications and interactions of magic, and employed basic strategy and tactics.
Chimpanzees could manage similar feats, and chimpanzees had never built civilizations. The same held true for the Sugar Lumps.
Geographic speciation had occurred among them. They now treated certain groups as entirely different species rather than mere external tribes. They engaged in rudimentary politics while fulfilling the role of “highly intelligent animals” within my ecosystem.
It seemed inevitable that such intelligent life would emerge through evolution.
Regression is not the opposite of evolution but one of its subordinate processes.
The Sugar Lumps moved with surprising vigor. They had become as prolific as the Gamchi, displaying high intelligence, pack sociality, martial arts, magic, and Mystery developed in both physical and arcane directions. All these factors had driven their successful evolution.
If left alone, the Sugar Lumps might become the dominant species of my ecosystem. They could naturally claim humanity’s former niche and begin developing civilization across the Dessert Desert without any external guidance.
"……."
No. I would not allow it consciously.
I watched the Sugar Lumps with care. The Martial Sugar Lumps operating around the Nectar Well watershed—hunting Jellies and carrying prey back to nearby valleys—were especially striking. They resembled primitive humans.
The growth trajectory of those with the potential to evolve into humanity was relentless. With superb reflexes, tactical minds, rudimentary language, and potent Mystery, they hunted the Well’s Jellies. They were distorting the ecosystem, if only slightly. I had intended to evolve countermeasures myself, but none proved necessary. Solutions had arisen automatically from within the Nectar watershed.
"Catch that one."
"Good, good."
The Sugar Lumps communicated in low voices and crept toward a small Jelly, weapons ready. Before the creature could flee in alarm, they sprang forward with ferocious leaps.
Crunch!
Something else burst from the side, snatched the Jelly, and began devouring it.
"No… I don’t think so."
The Puddings here rarely ate meat. They simply killed intruders.
This one, however, devoured flesh with obvious relish. Its form was sleek and agile. It lacked the shell typical of jelly-type organisms.
"Attack!"
"Uwoooh!"
The Sugar Lumps charged, but the creature evaded their strikes with insane agility. Then its neck whipped forward with fluid, almost invisible speed, striking the Sugar Lumps one after another and killing them instantly.
Even the Martial Sugar Lumps’ extraordinary reflexes could not match that velocity. This evolution seemed designed specifically to hunt Sugar Lumps and Gamchi rather than the slow, massive jelly-types.
"Martial arts?"
"Yes. Any Mystery derived from the body falls under the broad category of martial arts."
Hmm.
Four legs. A mysterious life form that wielded its neck and head like a hammer to bludgeon or fling enemies to their deaths. It had certainly evolved from existing Pudding and jelly-type stock, yet it qualified as an entirely new species.
Since you’re so chewy, you’ll be Tteok.
It possesses the potential to become the fourth commander of the Dessert Legion. Let’s take a closer look.