"Easy right?" Cardisys queried, looking for praise at his ingenious system. Or in other words, toward himself who the personification of the system as well.
Rialyne nodded and asked whether other creatures also had a system. Cardisys huffed and informed her that others did not; he was the sole system, at least, in this whole forest as far as he knew.
This was why Sap and Synthesis could be automatically done by the Cardinal System; plants had to 'manually' perform these actions themselves. Meanwhile, Rialyne could focus her attentions on skills that the system couldn't automate such as Engrain and Vengeance, much like active skills a combatant would have as opposed to passive or automatic ones.
Now, the next step to the world domination that the Cardinal System claimed was her destiny, was evolution. She had gained only 176 EXP from the Greyir Squirrel, just one drop in the EXP bucket for level 20.
The small creature primarily served as a means of practice. Rialyne would have to fight much stronger opponents if she wanted to evolve by tomorrow. Currently, it was about midday.
"Because you were asleep for so long, I couldn't expand our domain beyond this tree. In order to find opponents ranked higher than Common, or the occasional passing Bronze, you need to use Engrain. The most suitable opponents, of course, would be monsters instead of creatures like the Greyir Squirrel. Monsters give twice as much EXP than creatures of the same level."
Cardisys brought up the status window again and angled a thin beam of light on the Domain HP number of 34686.
"Let's see… I calculate that the optimal cumulative HP of all targets should be around 15,000. At this amount, you'll have over an 80% chance of success."
"80%? Then doesn't that mean I could still aim for an even greater HP amount and still have a high percentage?" Rialyne countered, eager to explore beyond the visible surroundings. After all, her soul was still human, so sitting in one place felt very confining.
"Heh, getting a little ahead of yourself, aren't you? Well, I suppose you could still conquer 20,000 HP with a success rate of about 60%."
"20,000, hm? How about 25,000?"
Cardisys rocked back in a gesture of, "Are you serious?"
"25,000 would be about 35%."
This was a little less than what she expected. Rialyne pondered a bit before deciding that 20,000 was her best bet. It was a little risky, but the chance of success was still higher than the failure.
"Okay, 20,000 it is." She nodded in an awkward bob of her cell body.
Since Rialyne wanted to extend as far out as she could, she decided that taking over lower forms of plant life would be best. Additionally, she would extend in lines rather than swathes of area in four directions.
When she explained this to Cardisys, he warned that her strategy was risky because animals could cut off one of the lines when they ate the plants, thereby making her lose the whole length of the line unconnected to her.
Thus, she altered her strategy to stretch outwards in a web so that areas would still remain connected should an animal unknowingly eat through a section. And later on, she could always fill in the gaps and better cultivate areas.
Unfortunately, she was limited to 5 meters from her furthermost points. And 20,000 HP might seem a lot right off the bat, but the vegetation was dense. However, this was still enough to cover the entire allowable area in a web while choosing a few select stronger targets.
As Rialyne's gaze fell upon some berry bushes, a devious idea dawned upon her. If she controlled food sources, then she could even conquer the animals to do her bidding!
"Hey Cardisys, am I able to make contracts or something with animals rather than just absorbing them for stats?"
The shiny cell looked at her with a curious gaze upon the seemingly random question.
"Contracts? Well yes, you can form contracts with creatures and monsters. Any intelligent being can form contracts as long as the parties vow to adhere to the agreed terms under the name of Aionos."
"Aionos?"
"The everlasting one. In other words, the god of our world."
Rialyne furrowed her non-existent brows. The god of the world. This was news to her. Was there a god for every world? So if she died here, would she end up in some place that was neither the heaven nor hell nor purgatory that she was familiar with on Earth?
She truly didn't understand why or how she reincarnated here with all her memories. She supposed this was another dimension in which a different god ruled over, and her soul somehow got accidentally lost or saved and sent to this world. But that didn't explain why she was supposedly "asleep" inside this tree while Cardisys waited for her to wake.
Rialyne shook her body; there was no reason to think on this deeply. What happened, happened. She would make the most out of this life and enjoy the present peace which had been destroyed in her previous one.
"Okay!" Rialyne cheered in order to pep herself up. "Let's rule this world! One plant, one contract at a time!"
When she thought about controlling the whole forest in a business form of trade and service, her imaginary orbs glowed in delighted deviousness. And from there on, she could travel and conquer new regions, meet new people and become their sovereign leader. Yes, even a lowly tree could rule this world!
"Heh heh heh…" Rialyne shook with a low, wicked laugh. "Heh heh heh!"
World domination started to sound like true fun!
The little Cardisys started inching away from this crazy, cackling cell…