The mercenaries were already back on the road. The moment they awoke a usual dose of fights met them. Everyone had progressed in strength and fighting ability rapidly, most especially for Eshu. All he lacked was a fortuitous opportunity and he could finally awaken his demon mark.
Feng naturally placed close attention for anything that could help him breakthrough and awaken his demon mark, but in the meantime, he went to Long Hu's subordinate for tips on connecting with nature.
Her name was Nisha, she was a nature lover, hence her affinity for nature magic; this could have been amazing, but unluckily her mana was not pure, so she was unable to fully utilise the power of her affinity.
"So Nisha, think you can teach me how to connect with nature, I still have some things I need to do, so make it snappy."
"Why are you in a hurry, nature can't be rushed," Nisha says serenely, looking at him.
"According to my life, it seems nature can be rushed with montages and time skips" Feng replies to her with a straight face.
". . ."
"Whatever I'll teach you!"
"Heh, good!"
"Now focus and remember these words. The key to connecting with nature is simple. Clear your mind of all thoughts, put your hand on a tree."
Feng did as she said and put his right arm on a nearby blood-coloured tree. It took a few minutes before he could feel anything. Suddenly a large amount of negative emotions found their way into Feng's mind and soul. This was precisely the tree itself. It was a large mass of leaves, wood, blood and last of all negative emotions.
Feng squeezed his face in disgust, and Nisha laughed.
"Judging from your expression it seems you've discovered something, but it was a little faster than expected, you have talent kid. The trees in the Blood God Forest are made of blood-sucking wood, well the wood is blood-sucking wood to be precise."
"The trees deeper into the forest are red, but the ones on the outer parts look normal. Yet, according to you, all the trees have blood-sucking wood. Why is this?"
"They haven't absorbed enough blood, think about it. People rarely die in the outer areas because they normally leave after getting scared of the terrain, puppet generals, and rumours. Apart from that, it also has to do with the quality of blood. People like us who managed to reach the inner areas of the forest are expected to have good, healthy and strong blood, which means this wood will obviously have a different colour due to exposure towards quality blood. But we're getting off track here, let's focus on what we were doing before."
Feng nodded in agreement and let her continue.
"Well, since you've managed to pick up on feeling the tree so easily, we can move onto the next level. This is somewhat difficult for me since I've never done it before. The druids and which are now extinct have this ability. Dryads are the only race apart from the druids that also have this ability"
Feng inwardly had a bitter smile which extinct druids, she was talking to one, how were they extinct? even his 200 person clan were made up of only druids.
She continued, "This ability you have to figure out yourself but I can give you other tips on connecting with nature."
"Thank you for your kindness Nisha,"
Saying this, he sat cross-legged near a blood-sucking tree. As he tried to communicate with the tree, his demonic bloodline involuntarily activated and his facial features switched to that when he was in his pure celestial demon form. Another force also seemed to awaken within him. One of the originally dormant colours of mana on Feng's mana wheel became bright and lively, giving off the feeling of being one with nature and the world.
The feeling this mana gave him was quite contrary to what the celestial demon mana gave him. But they were still able to survive and co-exist in the same body without attempting to wipe each other out. If anyone else saw this they would be quite surprised.
At that moment Feng seemed to be pulled into a different space entirely. A set of foreign thoughts drifted into his mind.
{Grow, grow. Reach that ball in the sky, absorb more red liquid to grow grow grow!}
The thoughts seemed like those of a child, but to Feng, these thoughts held a bit of semblance. At that moment he realized that he was hearing the tree's thoughts, seeing this he tried to reciprocate and sent a ball of thoughts towards the tree.
'Hello!'
{Wah, a person in my head!}
Although the tree's thoughts were chaotic and frightened, on the external appearance it appeared stable, steady, and calm.
'This ability is so…'
To test the limits of this ability, he began conversing with the tree, using internet slangs that the tree couldn't have heard before. While he was amused, the tree was getting increasingly frustrated at the way Feng was toying with him, but sadly he was merely a being stuck to the ground, he couldn't even kill flies, not to mention killing Feng.
After half an hour of harassing the blood-sucking tree Feng pondered on how to control it. He could use raw mana to force it, but that would never work.
In his cross-legged state, Feng played with the raw druid mana. Sometimes he even sent it towards the tree. If he had paid attention to when he did that, perhaps he could have figured out something by now, but sadly he didn't.
Only after an hour did he realize something, "I see now! I can use my mana to coerce the tree!" Saying this, he wrapped his mana around that particular tree, the raw mana had a holy feeling that belonged to the Heaven and Earth, this was the mana that all druids had.
The tree could be seen bending, the red colour and the twisting feature of the tree. The blood coloured tree had now transformed into a blood-red wooden dragon.
{Wah! Let me turn back. This is painful!}
Feng was unlike the druids of the past who cared for the emotions of trees, he couldn't care less whether this tree was in labour, all he needed to do was achieve his goal.
"Hehe, since I figured it out, I wonder if I can connect with the laws of nature now?"