Chapter 469: Unexpected Nice Friend

The walls before Ed were tall, but not tall enough. They fell short of the wall in Sanctuary and they fell specially short of stopping obstinate intruders. To be fair, most walls could fall rather easily if there was no one to defend them.

Still, gazing up at the top of the wall invoked some sort of… melancholy. The cracked and unmaintained walls were likely the source of this unknown sadness.

Giving into this melancholy, Ed turned off his sixth sense for a moment. He wanted to take in the environment past the walls as it was, without any obstructions whatsoever. Though the chances of him finding anything with life in there was slim anyway.

As there were many cracks on the wall, it was pretty easy to climb. The edge at the top extruded making it a bit uncomfortable to get up but Ed's slim limbs did not lack strength.

He overcame the precarious edge with relative ease and managed to climb atop what he would hope were city walls. From the bottom they did appear to stretch out rather far.

'Wow…' It was just as underwhelming as Ed had expected it.

The wind blew in dust and dirt that dirtied the decadent buildings. They all seemed to, just like the wall, have come from a more prestigious past. A past where the white paint was not chipped by the buffeting sand but rather… where one was awestruck by the clean city of the mighty elves.

The whole place was shaped sort of like an octagon. From the wall to the very center there were gradual changes in elevation that suggested this was a carefully thought out city.

But it now felt desolate and abandoned. There were no sounds, only the sound of the blowing and sandy wind as well as the water running beneath Ed's feet.

'Right! The water!' Ed approached the inner edge of the wall and looked down. He could see a narrow canal with water running wildly. It looked like it could overflow, its abundance surprised Ed quite a good bit.

But the water was dirty, as if it was washing away decades of dirt and dust. Ed wanted to hazard a guess.

'The lake water…?' That was the only thing that could have opened up the waterways which had been dry for what Ed assumed were decades. Given the age, Ed had to ask himself one question.

'Where is it coming from?' Trying to pinpoint the direction of the water, Ed turned his head to the right side.

He started walking atop the wall alongside the roaring water until he finally came across a small building on the wall. It had some elegantly crafted steps that led him off the wall to the first floor.

'The place looks a lot more crowded from down here' Ed thought now outside the walls. The population size of the city must have been astronomical. Though there was one thing Ed was super curious about.

'Weren't elves supposed to live in nature?' Ed didn't think the elves would construct buildings out with stone and paint under normal circumstances. Perhaps the story of this floor was far more tragic than he imagined.

'If the only water source was the lake and that was sealed…' Would the entire floor really perish this way? Surely but...! No! Ed refused to believe this hypothetical scenario. The hydra's lake couldn't have been the only water source, that would be a planned failure on the part of the dungeon.

Still following the water while deeply immersed in these thoughts, Ed started to climb towards the elven city's center. The water continued to zoom past him occasionally splashing on his skin from the rapid's sheer power.

Eventually, Ed was face to face with what looked like both a palace and a temple.

'A temple, why is everything a temple?' Worshiping the dungeon was starting to get old.

'Eh wait, the lizardmen were worshiping the hydra' In that case, Ed no longer had a problem with it. These elves just had to be worship a tree or something.

Without having further stray thoughts, Ed walked into the open palace. Inside, there were only a couple of rooms with an open doorway.

'They must have liked the open concept' It might be that the elves were simply too trusting of one another. Why would a man that feared nothing create a door?

'Hm? For privacy actually' Ed's ask question answer them moments later mentality was showing off its prowess at this moment.

But just because there were multiple rooms with doorways, that didn't mean Ed was directionless. There was one doorway in particular that was eye catching. This was the center doorway, it looked grand and allowed a peek into a seemingly dark empty room.

Entering this mostly empty room there was a large pool of water, most notably however there was a tree that hovered over it.

"They are actually worshiping a tree?" Ed muttered in disbelief.

[Divine Sap Tree (Severely malnourished)]

{ A tree held as a sacred by the elves. Thought not an object of worship, it still held great value in the local elven society thanks to its magical sap. }

The system's words dispelled Ed's thoughts that all temples were temples of worship. Ed imagined those couple of words in the assessment were dedicated to him. He didn't feel very grateful though.

'You should tell me what this sap does!' If all the sap did was preserve tree leaves his disappointment would be immeasurable. While preserving things for eternity was not a common attribute in tree sap, it was usually resin which turned into amber, such an ability was not worthy of elven praise.

"Sigh…" Ed suddenly sighed. He was thinking too much, he could figure these things out slowly. Dismissing the idle thoughts, Ed could focus back on his main task.

Finding the source of the water, and thus finding the entrance and exit of this new floor.

Ed approached and looked into the pool of water.

It was dark.

'This can't seriously be the entrance' The pool in this temple was the source of the city's water but Ed refused to believe it was the entrance to this floor. The notion was simply scary.

'How is anyone supposed to get past this?' Any intruder might drown in the hydra lake, never mind if they had to climb out this bottomless pit of water!

[Assimilation is off cooldown]

'Hm?' How timely, this new body was lacking in attributes. Maybe once he got enough he could swim down and find the entrance.

The problem was Ed didn't know what exactly there was to assimilate in this new place but he did have a prime candidate.

'Hm…' The problem was that with the darkness in the room, Ed could not see any sap. Worst of all, he didn't even think this was the fault of the poor lighting.

'The assessment says it's severely malnourished' Taking a closer look, there were no living leaves on the tree. It was apparently still alive but it could not produce any sap in its current state.

Ed decided to activate his sixth sense to verify this.

'What a strong consciousness' For a tree anyway. The brightness was at least at the level of a regular skeleton maybe even a bit higher.

'I wonder if that means the tree has some intelligence' Ed was not able to communicate with trees under normal circumstances but what if…

Ed placed his hand on one of the tree's dry roots.

[<Link lvl. 0> Activated]

The link skill activated and Ed's mental power immediately put itself to work. If he could link successfully he could then try to revitalize the tree by passing on some of his own vitality.

After a little, Ed felt a close connection to the tree in front of him. Thanks to this connection, the tree's malnourished and dry state made Ed quite saddened.

Now the only problem was that Ed didn't actually have any vitality per his status. Assimilating a tree or grass for the vitality seemed impossible as well.

'The things outside are fakes' They were good fakes too, the decoration felt incredibly realistic. The fact that someone took the time to plant blades of grass in the arid dirt as well as glue leaves onto dead trees was praiseworthy.

'At least they have a thing for the arts' But that aside Ed was facing a very real problem. While the tree might recuperate on its own thanks to the excessive amount of water the process would definitely be slow.

'Oh wait' Ed for some reason seemed to have forgotten an important detail.

A mushroom suddenly appeared on the palm of Ed's hand.

'I don't have to start from scratch anymore' With each body, Ed's abilities and or resources increased. If there were to be any more bodies, getting them to their peak would be a piece of cake.

[Vitality +1]

[Mana + 3]

'...' Ed almost forgot that the assimilation skill didn't reset either though. He was still in need of exotics. The mushroom he assimilated was a water mushroom but Ed believed the yield would not be this small normally.

Still, although the yield was small as long as he had something to give he'd give it!

[Link is on cooldown]

Ed passed on his singular vitality onto the connected tree. This caused a sudden change in the sap tree.

'Happy' Ed received an emotional response through the link.

[Divine Sap Tree (Severely malnourished)]

The assessment didn't change but since Ed only gave it one point of vitality that much was expected. Regardless, Ed could rest easy knowing he was able to befriend the sap tree. Who would have thought it possible anyway?

'It's divine' Ed said jokingly.