Chapter 27: Greenlight Project EROFU Garden
Project EROFU Garden, minus the bunny outfits.
This is what I will call the next plan.
Isn’t it strange that a nature goddess doesn’t have any elven worshippers? Or that this fantasy world doesn’t have a hot, sexy elf in sight? I certainly think so.
That is why I plan to implement elves into this world through Green Earth Mother’s influence. However, there are a few problems with this plan.
Will Green Earth Mother be so readily willing to create a whole new population to worship her?
On the surface, this sounds like a stupid question to ask. If you think about pure efficiency—about increasing faith yield alone—it would likely be more productive to have a second population of faithful followers. This, I believe, makes sense. But is there any creature out there that bases its choices on pure, raw logic alone?
No, wait. I guess there might be machine lifeforms out there in another dimension somewhere. I don’t know. But that’s besides the point.
At least, in this world, carbon-based lifeforms often decide on instinct and emotion, with logic as a side dish. It is only natural to assume that gods and goddesses spawned from the faith of these creatures would mirror their worshippers in some ways. In other words, they would likely be emotional beings too. Loving and caring towards their faithful.
“Who is a good ent? Yes, you are! You are, baby! Here is your treat!”
Kreeek.
Chomp!
… Is it right for a goddess to treat her followers like treasured dogs?
Whatever the case, it’s clear to see that she treasures her faithful deeply. In that case, would she be so readily willing to introduce a new population of worshippers in the form of elves that might outnumber her first followers? That would be a difficult question to answer, right now.
Another issue worthy of note is the means by which we produce elves, and what role they’ll serve in their nature-bound civilization.
Ultimately, if we are to introduce elves into the equation, there must stand a mutual relationship between elves and ents. Otherwise, elves would probably take the human route of development and act independently from ents.
This wouldn’t be a problem for a while, until conflicts of interest arise between the two due to their inevitable different directions in development. And the easiest way to prevent that is to have them share their society and have them depend on each other to survive.
For that to happen, we must first make our ents a little more useful.
“So, disciple. What tricks can your ents do?”
“Tricks?”
“Their abilities. Animals and insects all have special abilities that allow them to survive in the wild.”
“Like a means of attacking possible threats?”
“That is one type of ability, but I am referring to something on a broader scale. Rabbits in this world, for instance, are capable of running at crazy speeds. This allows them to escape predators hunting for them in the wild.”
“Ah! I see! Well, my dear ents have recently come up with a trick of their own!”
“Oh? Could you show me?”
“Of course, mentor!”
Green Earth Mother approached a tree where Ramube was relaxing on the branches. She dug her hand into the dirt. Oh—right, ents don’t have ears either, do they? She must be communicating with the ent right now through the mycelial network they share.
Wait, what was the point of praising the thing verbally earlier then?
“Alright, honey. Go ahead! Show us what you have learned!”
Kreeek.
Suddenly, the ent’s body began to twist from the base. Then, rising from the dirt were… really misshapen legs. No, aren’t these its roots? They’re shaping their roots like feet.
The process was really slow, but after pulling its roots out of the dirt, the ent managed to stand on two makeshift feet. Ramube, who was chilling on top of its branches, scrunched up his face as he felt sunlight come through the leaves and onto his face.
“Oog.”
“Oh! Sorry, sir Gorilla!”
Green Earth Mother dug her hand into the ground once more to communicate her intentions, but…
“Huh? They cannot seem to hear me.”
“Their roots are out, so they are practically deaf right now.”
“Oh no! What do I do then?”
“Sign language, maybe? Try gesturing to them your intentions. I am not certain if they will understand, but their sight is the only means by which we can communicate with them at the moment.”
“I will give it a try!”
Kweeek.
“Oh! They understood! I am so proud of you, baby!”
Now she’s acting like a doting mother, hugging the tree with a prideful smile. I wonder if the ent can even understand that gesture of affection?
Still, though, this will be a useful ability in the future. Perhaps not useful for hunting, as the ent moves far too slowly on its two… feet? Roots. Let’s settle with roots. Anyway, this can be useful for relocation, which will be necessary for the ents to no longer be victims of Green Earth Mother’s shade.
“That was a good trick. Can they do anything else?”
“Um… Let me see. Give me a moment.”
Green Earth Mother dug her hand into the ground again and communicated my question to the ent. After a few seconds, she shook her head with a frown.
“It appears they cannot do much else. Um. They can swing their branches around in retaliation against threats, twist their bodies, and reproduce through seeds, but…”
“They lack much in variety.”
“Yes, that is correct…”
That isn’t too big an issue. Green Earth Mother, while a goddess of nature, is also a creation goddess. Perhaps not as powerful as Esphera in terms of destructive power, but she should have a wider range of options with what she can do from the get-go.
“Disciple, tell me. Have you attempted to alter the bodies of your followers yet?”
“Alter their bodies…? No, I have not. That… sounds a bit dangerous, would you not agree, mentor?”
Fuck if I know? I’ve never done that myself, so I wouldn’t be sure if the process has any particularly bad side effects after success or failure to change them. And the only person I know of who has is busy trying to run her religion by herself to impress me, so I don’t think it would be wise to contact Esphera right now.
Hm. I should try to give a more neutral response, in that case.
“... It is a necessary endeavor.”
“Yes?”
“Tell me, disciple. Do you think your followers are strong?”
“Well… They can kill small beasts on their own…”
“Do you think that small beasts would truly aim to harm your followers?”
“No, but…”
“Then, shall we put that to the test?”
“Pardon?”
I pulled out a headband I hadn’t used in a long time and wrapped it around my head. There was text written on the headband that simply read “EMULATION.” I then stood before Green Earth Mother, postured like an army sergeant about to put a recruit through hell. She grew visibly intimidated as I put on a menacing grin.
“Are you ready for some emulation, maggot?”
“MENTOR, I CANNOT DO THIS!”
“EMULATION! Move your ass, maggot! If you don’t, you’ll get turned into charcoal!”
“MENTOR, PLEASE! THIS IS TOO CRUEL!”
“Oog?”
The Constellation, Gorilla of Fates and Twisted Futures, asks if you do not think this is a little too much?
“... It is a necessary endeavor.”
Right now, Green Earth Mother was running around the plains in an ent cosplay.
To be more specific, she was wearing the body of a tree she had grown to mimic the shape and flexibility of an ent. While moving this body around like an amusement park worker in a mascot suit, she was getting chased around by a familiar monster I’ve grown quite attached to: a winged cow rex.
“MENTOR, PLEASE! I DO NOT WANT TO BURN!”
“Shut your trap, maggot! You’re a goddess! There’s no way this uddered lizard can kill you!”
“BUT THE FIRE STILL HURTS, MENTOR! I DO NOT WANT TO–”
“Just keep moving your ass! See what you can do to ‘survive’ this encounter with a beast that can match that ent body’s size!”
“Oog…”
The Constellation, Gorilla of Fates and Twisted Futures, says they cannot watch this anymore. He believes it is much too cruel to put such a young goddess through a painful experience.
“Oh yeah? Then how about you go give her a hand?”
“Oog?”
“We still have a second suit.”
“OOG! OOG! OOG!”
“SIR GORILLA! DO NOT RUN THAT WAY! YOU WILL–!”
Trips.
Crash!
“OOG! Oog?”
“SIR GORILLAAAAAA!”
“ROOOOAAAAR!!!”
Fwuuuooossshhh!
Ah. The fresh scent of charcoal, burnt hair, and sizzling gorilla meat in the morning. What a way to start the day.
The two constellations were struggling in a life-and-death scenario with that weird-ass dragon with cow boobs, running around the plains, trying to figure out how to “survive” this encounter. No, I suppose this wouldn’t really count as a life-and-death scenario, seeing as there’s no way that weird lizard can kill them, but it sure gives off that air.
Ramube was already down for the count. Unfamiliar with the way an ent’s body moves, Ramube struggled with running and twisting its body, so much so that when a fairly large stone got in his way, he couldn’t steer away in time and tripped on the stone, leaving him open to getting cooked alive by the winged cow rex.
Now it was just Green Earth Mother and the lizard.
“This is my chance!”
While the winged cow rex was preoccupied with sizzling its gorilla steak, Green Earth Mother ran up behind it. Then, she put forth her longest and sharpest branch, much like a cavalryman would hold his lance when charging at a target.
Oh no. She’s not going to do what I think she’s going to do, is she?
“Take this!”
She charged right at the winged cow rex’s rear and… well, maybe I shouldn’t describe the rest of the scene.
“SCREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!”
After getting impaled, the winged cow rex flew off with blood trailing from its… yeah, I can’t show that.
[Sir Gorilla, mosaic please.]
[... Oog…]
[Thank you.]
There we go. That’s better. Now, with that graphic sight out of the picture, it is time to welcome our winner of the survival game.
“Excellent work, disciple. I am proud you managed to get through that ordeal.”
“T-Thank you, mentor… It was… quite the gruelling experience, I must say…”
“Now get out of that ent suit. Let us talk.”
Green Earth Mother clumsily pulled off the ent suit, revealing her sweat-covered body, soaking from head to toe. Oh. That’s kinda… maybe I should look elsewhere. This sight seems a bit too provocative.
“Ahem. Let us take a seat, disciple. I brought some of the foldable chairs with me, as you can see.”
“Y-Yes… But what about…”
“Let us ignore the sizzling gorilla in the room for a moment and talk about what you have learned.”
“What I have learned…?”
Green Earth Mother, her mind still clouded by exhaustion, couldn’t quite process my words right away.
“This certainly must have been a difficult experience for you, was it not? The limitations of a mortal body on a goddess, coupled with being stuffed into a suit, must be like being shackled to weights while running through water.”
“Indeed… maneuvering with an ent’s body was… quite difficult.”
“Do you think an ent could manage to survive such an encounter on its own?”
“Um… If there were other ents, then…”
“Sure, numbers can always even the score. But ents reproduce very slowly compared to the average beast, do they not? It would be risky to play that game.”
“Ah…!”
“They are not as sharp of mind as you, either. Do you think that they could come up with clever strategies just as you had, using Sir Gorilla as a distraction to deal a powerful blow to that lizard?”
“That is… true…”
Her head fell downcast. Seems like the realization finally hit her.
Currently, there aren’t many beasts that actively seek to kill ents, as far as we know. Heck, there might be none at all. But one day there might be.
Wood-eating beasts, insects, and so on, that might come around to feast. Such beasts would be difficult to fend off, seeing as they’d be genetically engineered for the job of hunting ents and similar wooden creatures.
As they are now, would ents be capable of removing such threats from their environment? Likely… a big no. Unlike beasts, which understand the hunt deeply, as either prey or predator, ents didn’t know jack shit.
At best, they attacked nearby animals, but they didn’t know the best way to go about hunting or escaping hunts. They weren’t animals, after all. They lacked the instinct. And even if they had the instinct, the hardware they’re rocking is lacking for the job of a hunter or an escapee.
This was my way of teaching the Green Earth Mother about the ents’ current limitations and why she needed to alter their bodies. But…
“Altering the ents will not be enough, however. Grant them brains, grant them brawn—little will change. There are limitations to what you can do, after all.”
This was something I realized while looking up random trivia on the internet.
Would it not be ideal for a constellation to modify their worshippers into powerful beings? That way, they’d remain unchallenged by the elements. They could populate the world quickly, gathering more faith generators for the grind. Yet, I have not seen a single constellation in history do this. And the answer that I realized was pretty simple: a god cannot make another god-like being. At least, not without various caveats.
In various mythologies, such beings of godlike status, if not a god or goddess at all, are often kin of gods and goddesses themselves. As for examples that aren’t kin, some were made that way, but the process likely wasn’t so simple. If it were simple, they’d have spammed creating such beings to do their bidding, yet there is little evidence to this being the case.
That could only mean that there are limitations to a creation god’s powers in creating new life.
“Then… what do I do?”
“I already gave you the answer yesterday, did I not?”
“Huh?”
“Mutualism, remember? Come on. Let us make them a few new friends, shall we?”
Isn’t this a nice way to have her warm up to the idea?
EROFU, here we go!~
