Lucky Landing

Vasari walked through the door and into the spatial portal that felt similar to walking through a layer of water.

He felt a similar energy wash over him when he entered the Dark Winter field. He instinctively knew what it was and he felt he could easily control this energy but he needed to comprehend the profundities of mana before that happens.

This sensation lasted for 5 seconds before Vasari felt his feet press against the hard earth underneath him.

*SNIFF*

"Ahh, it's good to be back in the wilderness." Vasari took a deep breath, taking in the fresh air and the earthy fragrance.

'So I have two options I can go for. First is to open my eyes and quickly go over the list or I could just wing it and use the different fragrances that plants emit to identify them. The first option is easier but I don't know if Miss Covington can see me or not and I definitely don't want anybody knowing about my eyes, at least for now. the second option is harder but safer. I think it's pretty obvious what option to go with.'

Vasari sorted his thoughts before walking off in a random direction and following wherever his nose took him.

----

*Boof!*

"Son of a bitch that hurt." Asher picked himself up from the floor after suddenly arriving in Mammoth Grove. His landing was nowhere near as smooth as Vasari's, crashing hard against the earth.

Asher checked his surroundings and marvelled at the sight around him.

"Woah they're massive." All around him were trees with trunks as wide as an average house and seemed to ascend forever. He could just barely make out the green leaves atop the trunks. It was no wonder that this place was called Mammoth Grove.

The canopy of leaves blocked out the blue sky but the sunlight still seemed to pierce through the leaves making it more than visible enough for these students to easily find any plants on the surface.

After appreciating the marvellous sight for a little while longer, Asher got to work and used all the information he learnt in botany class to search for any of the plants listed. He took off in a northern direction where he could see a few plants with a bright green stems connected to a flower with pale purple petals.

"False Night Daisies!" Asher shrieked in excitement when he recalled what these flowers were. False Night Daisies are used as a key ingredient in the production of many alchemic products that deal in concealment and illusions.

Asher approached the flowers but suddenly a rustle in a nearby bush attracted his attention. He quickly brandished the spear he always carried on his back. The spear was 1.6 metres (5.2ft) long, the shaft was made with Obrium Metal which was considered one of the densest metals found on the Westernord Continent, The shaft weighed well over 200kg (440 pounds). The head of the spear was shining in a red hue giving it an impressive appearance.

'Don't tell me that I already ran into a beast. My luck isn't that bad right?'

As if to mock his thoughts, a 2m(6.5ft) long shadow leapt from the bush. A claw filled Asher's vision causing him to instinctively raise his spear in a defensive position.

*Clang*

The sound of metal impacting metal sounded and Asher was able to get a good view of the beast before it scurried back into the bush waiting for the opportune moment to strike again.

"A silver-clawed Raccoon." Asher's expression turned solemn. He readied himself in his battle stance waiting for the raccoon to attack again.

The raccoon did not use the same tactic again but quickly dashed towards the nearest tree and used its excellent climbing skills to scale the tree. Asher watched how the raccoon climbed a few metres up the trunk before pushing itself off in his direction and brandishing its claws.

Asher bent his knees slightly and thrust his spear diagonally to pierce the raccoon.

"HAAH!!"

*SCREE*

*Clang*

Once again the spear and claw met each other but Asher seemed to be the victor in this exchange as the raccoon was sent smashing against the tree trunk. Asher did not dilly-dally around and took full advantage of the raccoon's momentary lapse of concentration as it tried to stand up again. The raccoon noticed a shadow loom over it causing it to look up only to see the lanky figure of Asher towering over it.

"Hehe, you picked a fight with the wrong guy buddy." Asher mocked the poor beast and stabbed downwards piercing the raccoon's skull and killing it instantly.

Asher ignored the dead raccoon and focused on the False Night Daisies not far from him.

"One down, fourteen to go."

-----

*Hiss* *Hiss*

"A mere snake wants to hunt a dragon. Foolish."

Talia glared at the 13 metres (42.6ft) long snake in front of her with indifference. She has the bloodline of a dragon, why would she ever fear a small snake? Her blood and pride would not allow it.

The pride of a dragon was impossible to suppress and it was the reason why she viewed others with cold eyes and seemed aloof to others. However, there was an exception to this behaviour of hers...Vasari. She did not know what it was but the moment she saw him at the entrance exam she was drawn to him and her proud and defiant bloodline turned meek whenever he was nearby, turning from a mighty dragon to an obedient cat who always sought out for his attention

"Tch I don't even need to activate my bloodline for you."

Talia charged towards the snake while taking out pair of daggers with both the blades looking like the scales of some beast rather than conventional blades. The snake hissed angrily as if it understood the insults thrown at it.

The snake opened its mouth wide baring its large fangs with yellowy transparent liquid dripping from it. Its fangs shot out 2 streams of toxic venom towards Talia intending to catch her off guard.

Talia was indeed caught off-guard but reacted quickly by somersaulting over the stream of venom before continuing to close the distance between them.

When Talia was 5 metres from the snake beast she circulated the Qi in her Dantian and meridians before screaming out loud.

"Timore Dagger Art: White slash"

Talia swung her daggers diagonally creating an 'X' of white energy that blitzed forward, easily slicing through the hard scales of the snake and killing it soon after as the white energy wreaked havoc on its body.

*Huff* *Huff*

Talia breathed heavily while she bent over with her hands resting on her knees. The technique she just performed was her family's dagger martial technique which was a mid-Heaven grade technique and used a lot of her Qi just to perform the first and weakest move of 6.

After resting and replenishing her Qi for a few minutes, she walked past the corpse of the snake she just slaughtered and found a single plant with olive green paired leaves and 2 large light grey flowers. The stem of the plant was filled with thorns but did very little to stop Talia from rooting the plant and putting it inside her spatial ring.

-----

"The Tassel Cap is a very rare, modest plant and can be found almost anywhere. It blooms once a year, for 4 months.

It has tiny, spoon-shaped leaves, which are usually mint green. It also grows large flowers, which can be dark grey, dark silver or blue.

These plants grow in large groups, but it's quite straightforward to control and maintain their growth.

They can be dried and used in cooking.

As a defence mechanism, the tassel cap relies mostly on its surroundings to survive.

They rely on animal pollination to reproduce. Once pollinated, they grow fairly large, delicious nuts."

Witney recalled the words of Miss Covington during one of their morning botany classes as she looked at the large group of tassel caps in front of her. She unceremoniously picked 3 of them one with a dark grey flower, one with a blue flower and one with dark silver colour. She planned to take extra just in case she ran into Vasari where she would sneakily give it to him.

"That is my tenth plant ticked off from the list. Once I get 5 more I'll spend the rest of the time trying to find Vasari."

Witney was lucky to land in the middle of a natural glade that was filled with a plethora of different plants that was all on the list.

In less than 20 minutes she identified and extracted 10 plants and another 10 minutes later she had the 15 plants needed to receive the cloud points.

"Okay, time to find Vasari. Maybe we can spend some alone time together if I find him hehe~" Witney's ears turned beet red as her thoughts turned indecent as she imagined all the naughty things she and Vasari could do in the grove.

Witney circulated her Qi and activated a technique that she learnt from her father.

'Solar Steps: 1st movement'

The beautiful figure of Witney glowed for a second before shooting off in a random direction in search of Vasari.

-----

*Sniff* *Sniff* *Sniff*

"It's close. I can smell it."

"Getting closer...closer..."

"Aha found it!"

Vasari pulled a plant from the ground and held it near his face before sniffing deeply.

"Yes, this is definitely a Yellow Thyme. It is not as fragrant as lavender or rosemary plants but it is much sweeter. Hopefully, it is on the list."

That was the third plant that Vasari managed to find in the 40 minutes since his arrival in Mammoth Grove. He was having a hard time finding any plants, fortunately, he had not run into any beasts so far.

'Let's try heading east, hopefully, my luck will get better.'

Vasari decided to change directions and not even 10 minutes since he changed his course, his nose twitched and a pungent odour coursed into his nostrils.

"That smell is definitely a Devil Corpse Flower but it has not fully bloomed yet. According to Miss Covington, once fully bloomed the Devil Corpse Flower releases an even more pungent odour that is said to drive those who smell it to commit suicide. Alchemists can use the petals of the flower to create deadly stink pellets. Haha, that would be fun to use."

Vasari approached the flower and put his hands on the stem to pull it out but was shocked when he could not close his hands due to the stem being so thick.

What Vasari did not know was that this Devil Corpse Flower was over 4 metres(13ft) tall and the stem was the width of an average human body.

*Screee!*

"Oh come on!" Vasari squeezed the stem as hard as he could, his nails pierced the outer layer of the stem and used all the strength he could to pull the plant out from the earth. He quickly stored it in the school spatial ring and hastily pulled out the sword that he left in there.

Without warning he swung his sword horizontally above him.

*Kree!*

*Thud*

A talon bigger than Vasari's hand dropped on the ground next to him with a mini shower of blood raining down onto him.

"A Swift Falcon? No, it's too slow. A Mammoth Hawk." Vasari concluded after his quick exchange with the bird hunting him down.

Vasari held the sword vertically in front of him as he waited for the Hawk to attack again. He knew that it must've been furious after losing a talon but he cared very little about its feelings.

The hawk circled the trees above Vasari trying to visually distract him but how could it know that Vasari was blind? These sorts of tricks would never work on Vasari.

The Hawk dived bombed towards Vasari who acted like he didn't notice. Just before reaching the human, the hawk brandished its remaining talon and raised its wings to slow its descent intending to crush the human's head in its talon.

'Stupid beast you tried this tactic before and it didn't work, what makes you think it will work the second time.' Vasari mocked the beast in his thoughts while swinging his sword horizontally above his head, slashing off the remaining talon of the hawk. Immediately after he swung the sword down with most of his strength, chopping off a wing from the mammoth hawk.

The hawk crashed into the hard earth and screeched in pain after being dismembered not once but twice in less than a second.

Vasari walked to the hawk and without remorse, he decapitated the bird with one swift slash.

"I have 4 plants now. I need to find at least 11 more." He did not give the Adolescent stage beast another thought and continued using his trusty nose to sniff out any plants.