Chapter 7 Getting Neighbors?

[System Level: 6]

[EXP: 400/6400]

[Forest Size: 400]

[Vitality: 100]

[Absorption Speed: 2]

[Skills: Vitality Drain 1, Vitality Transfer 1, Dark Fog 3, Shadow Travel 1]

[Missions]

Approximately 4 weeks later, Lief's treehouse was completed. His system also reached level 6, and he completed the first main mission, which upgraded the range of his fog skill and unlocked a new skill, Shadow Travel. This skill allowed him to travel through shadows, though the range was fairly short.

Shadow Travel was quite fun, like traveling through a portal. He jumped into a shadow like jumping into a puddle, them appeared in another shadow nearby.

His treehouse was a massive structure with several rooms each with different purposes. There were bedrooms (not that he needed to sleep), bathrooms (he didn't really need those either), a room for him to keep his woodcarvings, a kitchen, a living room, and other various rooms.

The furniture was mostly carved by him out of wood, though because he lacked certain materials used for a modern house, he couldn't create most appliances that would normally be made of metal or plastic.

Of course, he didn't really need any of those things. He didn't need to eat, so he didn't need ovens or microwaves. He didn't sleep so he didn't need a bed. He didn't need a bathroom or even a sink, though he did create a basic running water system to get water from the river to the house in case he got thirsty or needed water for anything.

But basically, the only purpose he needed the treehouse for was as shelter from bad weather and as storage from his woodcarvings.

Silvester seemed to enjoy sunbathing on the roof of the treehouse despite supposedly being unable to physically interact with anything so it was questionable whether it could actually feel the warmth of the sunshine, but Lief built a balcony on the roof for it and it seemed quite happy about it.

While the treehouse was still in progress, a family of birds moved in to a nest in a nearby tree, so Lief and Silvester gained some neighbors. Lief gathered some berries as a housewarming gift for the birds when he noticed and soon had a couple of visitors to his treehouse every other day.

These birds were incredibly smart, at least compared to the birds from his old world. Although they couldn't speak the language, these feathered new neighbors could understand his words and could mime or act out responses, which seemed to amuse Silvester greatly.

The birds often brought Lief various seeds or flowers which he exchanged for berries or nuts, so he also decided to start a garden in the "backyard" of the treehouse. He had no idea how to garden though, so he kind of just buried the seeds in the ground, poured water over them, and hoped they grew.

After a week or so from when he first planted the seeds, when he was finishing the last details on the furniture for the treehouse, he found a couple of sprouts. He wasn't sure whether they were weeds or the actually plants he was trying to grow, so he had just watered them and let them be for now.

On a sidenote, Lief found out something completely unexpected. During the last week of building the treehouse furniture, it rained somewhat heavily. It was during this rainstorm that he discovered: his Dark Fog skill was not waterproof!

The rain washed all the fog to the ground, which meant the trees he wanted to transfer vitality to were no longer in contact with the fog. This effectively put a pause on his "Idle Tree Growing Simulator".

"Chirp!"

One of the bird neighbors flew down to land on the windowsill of the workshop, the room where Lief had been working on woodcarvings, interrupting his thoughts. Lief glanced up from his newest carving that he hadn't really been focusing on to greet the friendly bird.

"Good morning!"

The neighboring family of birds didn't resemble any kind of bird species he had seen in his old world, but they did somewhat resemble the images of phoenixes he sometimes saw on the internet, though without the fire of course. They had beautiful red feathers, with a golden crest and a long tail of the same color.

The bird flapped its wings rapidly to draw his attention, then began to act something out. Feathers on the top of its head fluffed up to form a pair of pointed ears or horns, while feathers on its face puffed up to form a snout shape around its beak. It flew around outside the window, landed back on the windowsill, and made vaguely menacing (for a bird) sounds.

Lief tilted his head to one side slightly as he tried to figure out what the bird meant. The last time it acted similarly, it fluffed up two long feathers on its head to represent a rabbit couple that moved into a nearby den, though there was no sound.

"A creature with horns or pointed ears, possibly hostile or dangerous, is coming near us?"

After receiving the bird's confirmation of his thoughts, he quickly called up to the roof where Silvester was staying.

"Silvester, is there an enemy nearby?"

The dark green tiger showed no intent to move from his spot but his voice still sounded in Lief's ears.

[I have detected that there is no creature hostile towards you or the forest within the forest territory.]

Despite Silvester's reassurance, Lief was still a bit worried.

"I'm going to go check it out, just in case. Can you lead me to where you saw the creature?"

The last sentence was directed at the bird, who cheerfully chirped its agreement.