章 15: My Root Ball Prison Cell

Thankfully, before I could pace a furrow in my six-by-six root ball cell from boredom, Ing visited daily with gifts. I usually ate what she brought me while listening to her complain about the adult elves looking down on her just because she had a baby face, her words silently proving my internal breakdown of Aure City's political factions.

Consequently, I learned that elves aged in phases. Like bugs. No, seriously, Ing mentioned she was basically late in forming what was essentially a cocoon because of her specialization, of which she would emerge from child(larval) form to a teenager(nymphal) form where they will age until they reached maturity(imago). Apparently, the specific school of magic she practiced stunts your growth.

She was also nice enough to leave me books to pass the time, feeling injustice for me being stuck in the elven prison (which was empty except for myself; either the elves were peaceful or they didn't usually take prisoners). It kept me from gnawing my arm off out of a lack of anything to do but sleep or stare at the wall of roots around me.

Thankfully, the Elvish language that was downloaded to my brain included the writing, since I mostly read her apprentice journals. There was also a Continental Standard—the language Captain Grine initially addressed me with—that I took was a lingua franca between different groups and races.

So, I was stuck in my cell but had textbooks on flora and random tidbits of magic to study. Basically, I just took it as being stuck in my room for days to cram for finals, especially when Ing gave me one of Captain Grine's travel cloaks for the cool nights so I was no longer lying on dirt.

I don't know whether Ing actually gave such consideration to her choices in reading material or that was that she could spare, but the information would be rather important whenever I managed to get out. As a city kid, I lacked knowledge when it came to wilderness survival—it hadn't been the escape that concerned me more than the after.

Sure, 37 would probably help me, but maybe this entire world was stuck in the middle ages. I would need to learn to adapt or fall.

'Scan' would be really useful right now, I recalled how Jeehan from The Gamer webtoon abused the hell out of his Observe skill.

My friendly symbiote AI popped in from his continued reorganization of information banks for Gaellia. [That can be arranged, Nori. I will incorporate that function into the HUD I am creating.]

Rather agreeable to the idea, though nothing will come of it until 37 could figure out how to implement it (a part of me wondered if he would have less trouble if I read a programming book or two. As it was, 37 was basically blindly feeling his way with just his own programming as an AI aiding him), I stood up and started stretching.

I've taken tumbles that gave me bruises and pain for days. While I bounced back pretty quickly due to a combination of being 20 and having a decent diet, my recovering from a tumble off a tree and landing badly was too quick. When I noticed, 37 had told me that while the shield predominantly prevented injury, the energy I got from our bond did improve my body minutely—hence the talk about evolution.

It was nice to know that my performance was improved like I was permanently doped up (hopefully without many bad side-effects). I seemed to heal about twice as fast which was still too slow if I got a serious injury but meant I was on my feet quicker with smaller problems.

Too bad calisthenics didn't count as physical exertion enough to Level Up. The AI told me internal manipulation of energy could be done Level 2 onward, which made me curious if I could speed up healing if I can redirect the flow. That is, of course, assuming the improvement via energy was a quantitative effect.

Bending forward, I transitioned into a handstand. Better to prepare myself physically for a break out (and lots and lots of running); I was trying to slowly read the books but had finished them already, leaving only improvement of body to occupy myself with.

Ing was going to visit soon going by her visits the last few days; hopefully, she'll bring more books or I'm going to need to start coaxing her into helping me escape by getting me some things.