Holding a hand up to signal to Myria to slow down, I slowly approached the direction where I saw the Crescent Mushroom disappear to. I didn't get more than a few steps in when a cloud of spores suddenly blasted toward me. Recognizing them as paralyzing spores that would stun me, I backed off.
Fortunately, I didn't need to raise a qi barrier to block them. The system's automated summoning defense called upon Xiao Huo, and my three-tailed fox incinerated the spores with her flames. The sudden ignition sparked off more violence, and when several vines from a nearby tree spirit beast swung toward us, Xiao Huo Long was automatically summoned. He let out a flamethrower that turned the poor tree into ash and cinders.
"Thanks, guys!"
I nodded toward them, then burst through the recently burned cloud of spores. There was a huge colony of red and yellow-white mushrooms gathered in a colony just beyond the clearing, each dome-shaped head sporting a crescent moon.
They all turned toward me. I wasn't that worried because I knew that Crescent Mushrooms were ordinary ranked. Admittedly, their numbers were quite the problem, but I could even that up with my fire type spirit beasts.
Rather, it was the bigger mushrooms in the center that concerned me slightly more. About three times the size of the tiny Crescent Mushrooms, the Moon Mushrooms were roughly sixty centimeters in height. Like the Crescent Mushrooms, they had red dome-shaped heads, with a yellow-white stem that sported eyes and a mouth. In lieu of the crescent mark on top of their domes, the Moon Mushrooms displayed full moons on their larger caps, a glowing yellow in the center of the red dome. However, where they differed – apart from size – was additional domes on either side of their stem-like bodies that served as hands. I wasn't sure how the mushroom caps on their sides functioned as hands, but hey, that was spirit beast logic for you.
The six of them immediately released a much larger cloud of spores, but fortunately, Xiao Huo and Xiao Huo Long combined to incinerate the paralyzing or toxic spores with their flamethrower techniques, combusting the dust in midair and sending sparks and embers flying all over the place. it was a good thing that the Moon Mushrooms were only Yellow ranked, so my three-tailed fox and Charred Salamander could fight against them despite being outnumbered. We even had an elemental advantage.
"Let me help! We have to capture one of those, right?"
Behind me, Myria lunged forward and swung her sword before I could stop her. A torrent of water poured down on the Crescent Mushrooms and Moon Mushrooms. Most of them were knocked over by the tremendous pressure and washed away, but when the tide disappeared, almost all of them simply got up and shook the moisture off them. Or drank in the droplets, absorbing it through their membranes. Myria gaped at them.
"What?! How?!"
"They are wood type spirit beasts. Water elemental attacks are not very effective against them."
"Eh? What do we do?" Myria scowled, but she noticed that Xiao Huo and Xiao Huo Long were burning huge swathes of fleeing Crescent Mushrooms and setting plenty of them ablaze. "Oh, right! You have fire type spirit beasts!"
"Yeah, but the goal is to capture one, not exterminate all of them. Not that it'll be easy." I watched as the Moon Mushrooms formed a wall of spores between them and their running charges. The mushroom type spirit beasts were so slow, but that was to be expected. They were…mushrooms, after all. And they didn't have legs. I didn't know how they even moved. Okay, they jumped or hopped rather than walked, but the point was that they were understandably slow.
That didn't mean they were going to sit around and get incinerated, though. The Moon Mushrooms had gathered enough qi to form a spore barrier between the flames from my fire type spirit beasts and the colony of Crescent Mushrooms they were protecting.
"Stop! Stop!" I waved at Xiao Huo and Xiao Huo Long in dismay. "We're not here to slaughter them! Don't burn all of them to death!"
A more ruthless cultivator would have just burn every Crescent Mushroom and Moon Mushroom until one was left, and maybe raze the forest to the ground while at it, but I wasn't an edgy murder hobo. I honestly didn't understand the need for excessive violence and needless bloodshed. I had read all those nonsensical cultivation web novels and manhuas where the protagonists and other characters go around hunting hundreds – and we were talking hundreds here, not even dozens – of spirit beasts just to pass a test or trial. Get their monster cores, and the protagonist successfully hunting several hundred, if not over a thousand, just to…prove that he is the strongest and bestest ever, while slapping the faces of his rivals. But the authors never understood the sort of ecological damage that sort of hunting would cause. A single person hunting several hundred spirit beasts, and he wasn't the only one?
Remove a large number of apex predators in the forest, and suddenly the creatures below them in the food chain would reproduce beyond control. That would put a drain on the other organisms further down the food chain, perhaps leading to an overfeeding of vital insects or other creatures necessary for the forest to thrive. Such excessive actions usually led to the extinction of entire species and perhaps even deforestation.
But no, web novel and manhua authors just assumed game logic where the spirit beasts, for some reason, spawn infinitely, and they pretend that the forests were large enough to withstand such ecological damage. Unfortunately, no such convenient mechanism existed in reality. Humans would slay spirit beasts if they rampage and invade our territory or attack humans, but we didn't deliberately venture into forests to conduct mass hunts or extermination of them because we knew how environmentally devastating such activities were.
In fact, before the manifestation of spirit beasts, the world was already suffering from mass extinctions because human activities, such as overhunting and overfishing, had laid waste to entire habitats. Mining and drilling for resources had further cracked the earth and made our planet slowly uninhabitable. If the spirit beasts and other dimension hadn't appeared, we probably would have doomed ourselves, along with our planet, thanks to our greed and exploitation of the world's dwindling finite resources.
"Sorry, guys, but unless they attack us, there's no need to annihilate them." I stayed Xiao Huo and Xiao Huo Long, and they obeyed. The Moon Mushrooms watched us hostilely, but realized that we had stopped our aggression. If they were smart, they would retreat. If not, then…they would force us to wipe them out.
I didn't want it to come to that.
-Be careful, user. You are about to… -
The system issued a warning, and funnily enough, it wasn't about the mushrooms. It was about the comments from beyond the fourth dimension. People screaming at me for being a beta "Japanese" main character, whatever that meant. A weakling pushover who lacked the "necessary" ruthlessness and strength to do what must be done. They wanted blood. Violence. A show of strength. And they were furious at me because I was some beta MC more concerned with the environment than displaying my power and crushing enemies.
They could kindly shut the fuck up, I told the system. They are not the ones in my reality. They don't have to worry about environmental damage in my world. If they like killing so much, they could go fight and kill each other. Maybe organize their own battle royale or squid game. I don't give a fuck.
Dismissing the howling insults and abuse from beyond the fourth dimension, I focused on the Crescent Mushrooms and Moon Mushrooms. They had ceased hostilities as well and watched us warily. There was tension in the air, almost like a slight movement would be enough to trigger another war between us. They eyed my spirit beasts, in particular, and I thought a show of force might be required to get them to back off.
Pushing my glasses up my nose, I took a deep breath and summoned my Phantom Stumps and Tree Revenants. The Crescent Mushrooms and Moon Mushrooms realized they were surrounded by a much superior force – particularly with the Tree Revenants being Mystic ranked – and they took a step back. Even so, they didn't leave. Not yet. I gritted my teeth, wondering if I would be forced to fight. Even the mushroom spirit beasts should be able to see that a clash would only end in their annihilation. They were horribly outmatched.
After staring down each other for a few moments, the Moon Mushrooms turned. The Crescent Mushrooms followed their lead, and they hopped away, moving deeper into the forest. I finally relaxed and allowed them to go, even as my summoned spirit beasts closed ranks and formed a wall between me and the departing enemies. They were pretty protective and not taking any chances, even though the other party no longer demonstrated the intent to fight.
"Phew."
I exhaled wearily and almost fell to a sitting position. Myria came up beside me, her sword still drawn. She raised an eyebrow, perplexed, before sheathing her sword and glancing after the disappearing mushroom spirit beasts.
"Aren't you supposed to capture at least one of them alive? You're letting them go after burning a few of them?"
"Yeah, and I have succeeded."
"Huh?"
I nodded toward my Phantom Stumps, and a few of them drifted toward me and Myria. They were bearing the still body of a Crescent Mushroom. It was badly burned, but still alive. I knelt next to my Phantom Stumps, produced a healing potion and poured it into the tiny mouth. Just a few drops, but the effect was instantly noticeable. Qi glowed brightly around it, suffusing it in a golden light before the burns disappeared.
The Crescent Mushroom stood up, gazing around nervously at the surrounding Phantom Stumps, me and Myria.
"Oh, when did you…?"
"When they were leaving," I replied. "I had my Phantom Stumps reconnoiter and check the area for survivors. I knew there would be a few among the casualties who would still be alive. And given that they are regular ranked spirit beasts of such tiny size, I figured this healing potion would have potent effects on them."
"That's clever. And you did that without having to fight so much of them." Myria then frowned. "What would have happened if there were no survivors?"
"Then I would have to pursue the other mushroom spirit beasts, sneak up on one of them when it's isolated, then abduct it."
"…that's very, uh, sneaky of you. And difficult to pull off. I'm glad it didn't have to come to that."
"Well, worst case scenario, I'll have to abduct one by force, and then scare the rest off in combat. I hate causing them casualties, but…" I sighed. "I suppose I'll have to trust that Professor Ling Zhen's alchemist friend is using the spores for a good cause."
Speaking of which, the mission was far from done. I took out a container and put the astonished Crescent Mushroom inside. It tried to jump out, but I sealed it and placed it in my storage device where it would be placed in stasis until I handed it to Long Zhen.
"Mission accomplished. Now I've to look for the seed of the World Tree. I wonder where I can find it."
Before I could start searching for any clues, the system sent me a notification window.
-Congratulations on completing the sub-quest. The user will be rewarded with fifty regular spirit contracts and three Mystic ranked spirit contracts. –
Awesome! I knew the system wouldn't let me down. Now I just had to find the suitable spirit beasts for my summoning needs and my dungeon. I wasn't very interested in the Crescent Mushrooms and Moon Mushrooms, and while wandering throughout the forest so far, I hadn't seen any spirit beasts that caught my eye. I wasn't fond of bugs, and the tree spirit beast that Xiao Huo Long didn't add anything that my Tree Revenants hadn't already.
That was fine. I still had time and opportunities. Hopefully I would find spirit beasts that I like before locating the seed of the World Tree.