Tyrion woke up to a loud noise coming from his room.
He groaned, stretched and yawn. At that time, he opened his eyes only to see a 2-meters tall Three-Arm Monkey as well as a man in his late 20's in his room!
The beast and man were both turning his room upside down, seemingly searching for something.
Tyrion's heart dropped and his face turned pale.
'Have I been found out?' Just the thought made Tyrion's heart pound hard in panic. He just got hold of the ancient bronze watch and now he was about to lost it?
"W-who are you? B-better scram before I scream thief!" Tyrion tried to sound threatening but the person gave out a cold snort without even staring at him.
"We've been given permission to search this place. If you don't agree, go fight it out with the village head. Now shut up and let me do my damn job."
With that, he approached Tyrion's bed which was on the floor and raised it up with Tyrion still resting on it.
Tyrion gritted his teeth in anger but held his mouth. Quickly climbing off the bed, he trotted outside.
The principal and the village head were both standing in the yard, smiling crudely. His mother stood opposite them, with her fists balled up and her jaws clenched tightly while she furiously glared at the two old men
What was even more shocking was the fact that there were several men ransacking the entire house, the farm and the barn with their summoned Symbiotes.
The storage shed had been torn open, the careful irrigation channels Tyrion and his mother had dug by hand over the course of a week were completely demolished!
It didn't even feel like a search at this point and felt like they were purposely being humiliated!
'All because I didn't summon a damned dragon?'
Tyrion was livid. But he was well aware it wasn't the only reason. They most lite have figured out that Grant was missing and were searching for traces of him. But how did they know to search here?
His mother's voice tore through the air in anger.
"I paid for this land and it belongs to me! You have no right to come here and search my property without an Enforcer present!"
The old vice-principal maintained his smile, but there was a visible sneer on his face. "There's no need to involve the Enforcers. We've searched every property in the entire village. Yours is the only one that remains. It's simply a routine matter, nothing to be alarmed about."
"Yes, yes, Madam Maxwell, please calm yourself." The village head waved his wrinkled hand as though waving off a fly. "Don't take things so seriously. it isn't personal."
Tyrion's mother glowered at the two of them. She felt like slapping the two old man to death but she didn't want to ruin their lives over one simple matter.
Seeing her angry but didn't dare do anything, the two men smiled even more.
The village head turned to the young men and raised his voice. "Make sure to search every inch an corner if this place. Dig the ground if you have to and leave no stone unturned!"
The men relayed the command to their summons, which doubled their thoroughness.
On the old man's hand was an ancient compass. Tyrion noticed it immediately and his eyes squinted.
"Mom? What's happening?"
Two pairs of old eyes snapped to him. The principal and the village head exchanged a quick glance and chuckled, amused.
The Vice-principal immediately scowled.
"Why aren't you in class, boy? Just because you managed to summon a trash beast doesn't give you the right to slack off! The Beast Technique: Cosmic Shield is being taught today. Do you have any idea what you're missing? The university registration window won't stay open forever! You'd better—"
"Thank you for your concern." His mother flatly cut the old man off with an indifferent tone.
"I'm perfectly capable of teaching my son the Cosmic Shield myself. And the university registration has been handled. Please — finish your search and leave. My son and I have no interest in being harassed any further."
The young men eventually returned, shaking their heads. Nothing.
The two elders' expressions flickered unpleasantly before their polished smiles snapped back into place.
"Sorry for the intrusion," Vice-principal Henry apologized with no single hint of sincerity in his tone.
They left without arranging what they destroyed.
"Did they say what they were looking for?" Tyrion turned to his mother and asked.
Mrs Maxwell exhaled through her nose and shook her head. "Those assholes."
She looked across the ruin of their yard for a long moment, then rolled up her sleeves.
"Come on. Let's fix what we can and see if any of the crops can be replanted."
It took the entire day.
That night, Tyrion waited until the house was quiet. Then he took an head lamp and went to the farm where he buried the items.
The place had been dug out.
Luckily, Tyrion had been very smart when he buried the items.
He had buried them three-feet into the ground, covered the dirt up to two-feet and then buried some cow dung and chicken poop over it and covered it with sand.
The person who dug that particular site only dug till he hit the poop and left it in disgust.
Tyrion didn't even know how he thought of this method.
He only used it just to be safe, he didn't expect the method he used offhandedly was the one who saved his life.
He learnt a great lesson from this. It's never too much to be over cautious.
With a sigh of relief, Tyrion dug through the poop with his shovel.
Then dug further into the earth until he found a plastic bag of items. Filling back the hole, he washed his hands and went back inside.
Sitting cross-legged on his bed, Tyrion spread everything out on his bed.
The loot he had taken from the two Life-bound expert.
The box filled with two herbs in them, the four manuals and the most important item, the Ancient Bronze Watch.
Excitedly, he opened the wooden box and touched one of the herbs.
[Name: Twin-Star Herb]
[Grade: 2]
[Lifetime: 121 years]
[Description: A rare dual-stemmed herb with leaves that shimmer faintly under moonlight like two distant stars.]
[Extract Plant LifeTime? — Yes/No_?]
[Transfer Plant LifeTime? — Yes/No_ ?]
'A grade 2 herb?'
Tyrion was slightly stunned. Grade 1 herbs costs hundreds of thousands of Crowns to acquire and can actually be used to feed Symbiotes to level up and even evolve to a particular attribute. He didn't expect Grant to be with one just like that.
"Probably his university gifted it to him." Tyrion muttered after thinking about it.
Focusing on the watch's ability now.
He used 20 minutes to roughly figure out the ability of the watch.
The Ancient Bronze Watch is actually truly miraculous.
It could extract the lifetime any plant, herb or tree had lived for then transfer that absorbed lifespan into another herb!
Thereby increasing its grade! The older a herb is, the higher its grade!
For example, one could absorb the lifetime of a Mahogany tree that has lived for 100 years then transfer that 100 years to an apple sapling, making it grow and evolve into a tree with fruits!
Except in this world, cosmic herbs are magical and incredibly powerful!
However, he could not extract from a plant he had already transferred into.
He could also not transfer lifetime of [plants] into objects an also could not transfer the lifetime into living creatures or himself.
Plant to plant.
That was the rule.
Tyrion had fantasized about transferring thousands of lifespan into his chicken, letting its absorb thousands years of vitality to evolve to an ancient and powerful monster. Sadly, he couldn't transfer [plant] lifetime into his beast.
But a thought came to him. The watch specified it as [Plant Lifetime]. Could there be other lifetime it could absorb such as [Animal lifetime] or even [Human Lifetime] Could he absorb the lifetime of dead creatures and transfer them to his symbiote?
He really wanted to test it. But he couldn't afford to kill one of his mother's chicken just to test the ability and saved the thought for later.
***
Tyrion slipped out of the house again, moving quietly to the edge of the farm where a cluster of oak and mahogany trees roughly stood.
He pressed his palm against the tree.
[Name: Oak Tree]
[Type: Tree]
[Lifespan: 5.8 years]
[Extract or Transfer Lifespan?]
Tyrion clicked the watch and he saw as the years began to fall.
5.8… 4.3… 1.0.
It wasn't instantaneous, but it wasn't slow either, roughly a second to drain nearly 6 years of life from the tree.
Tyrion stopped once the lifespan hit one year. He had no intention of letting a tree collapse overnight.
He moved to the next tree. Then the next. Oak, mahogany, a stubborn old pine at the fence's edge.
After extracting the lifespan from the nearby trees, the lifespan he absorbed was just slightly over 100.
Not satisfied, Tyrion gritted his teeth and began to absorb lifespan from the stubborn grasses too.
By the time he finished, 3 hours had passed.
He raised the watch and checked the total.
[Lifespan Stored]
[Plant: 300.2 years]
300 years.
Even an ordinary weed would transform into a legendary grass after 300 years.
Back in his room, he opened the wooden box and touched the first herb.
[Name: Twin-Star Plant]
[Type: Plant]
[Grade: 2]
[Lifespan: 121 Years]
[Extract or Transfer Lifespan?]
Tyrion clicked on Transfer without hesitation and the lifetime of the herb began to rise rapidly.
125 years… 150… 200… 280… 350 years
The Twin-Star Plant seemed to wake up, its two leaves started to darken as it turn into a deep shade of green.
The veins on the leave began to twinkle as new leaves budded and unfurled.
Then, like ink bleeding through wet paper, a soft purple trace began to appear along the edges of every leaves and even the stalk.
The herb became a three-color herb, which is equivalent to a Grade-3 herb.
The air around the herb was soothing like mountain plant after a morning dew. Just breathing it in made the tiredness in Tyrion's muscles loosen slightly.
[Name: Twin-Star Plant]
[Type: Plant]
[Description: Increases frost or water attribute monster pets by one stage.]
[Grade: 3]
[Lifespan: 350 Years]
"Hehehe."
Tyrion could not help it. A giddy and undignified laugh escaped his mouth but he quickly closed his mouth with his hand.
Comporting himself, he picked up the second herb and closed the first one inside the box.
[Name: Flint-Leaf Clover Herb]
[Type: Plant]
[Description: Can be consumed by fire attribute monster pets to increase fire intensity.]
[Grade: One ]
[Lifespan: 3 Years]
With the amount of Lifetime left, it was almost impossible for this herb to reach grade 2.
Tyrion thought for a while but then decided to infuse the lifespan inside.
Much to his surprise, it only took 55-years of lifespan to enter Grade-2.
Tyrion stared at the herb in excitement.
The edges of its three clover-shaped leaves was ember at first but now, there was a tinge of blue color on it, marking it as a Grade-Two herb.
It was after a long while did Tyrion set both herbs aside and calmed himself.
While his symbiotic neither have fire attribute and frost attribute, feeding it these two herbs would surely increase its strength by a lot!
Most people wouldn't dare to waste a Grade Three Herb and Grade Two herb like that and would choose to exchange it or sell it to those whose summon have Fire and Water attributes.
But Tyrion couldn't afford to do so!
However, he wanted to increase the herb to the highest he could before giving his symbiote to eat.
He was looking forward to how his strong his chicken would become when it consume the herbs.
Especially when he raise the herbs to a very high grade. As for whether his beast could handle a high grade cosmic herb, Tyrion was too ignorant and greedy to have thought about this conundrum.
***
Tyrion pulled out the Four books he looted from the corpses of the two powerhouses.
The first book was actually a Star-technique called Cosmic Shield Barrier technique. It was the technique Vice-Principal has said they were teaching in school earlier.
As a summoner, this was a must have technique.
One's survival depended solely on the barrier.
It's a protection for the summoner if the summon is battling with a foe. And this require primal energy to sustain.
When a summon is released, it creates an anchor in the fourth dimension, a channel through which primal energy could flow from the void into the practitioner's body.
That energy settles within the beast seed. The seed blooms into a flower and the Primal energy condenses into a spark in the body.
That spark came be used to power various Star-techniques such as Cosmic Shield.
Cosmic shield is a must learn technique in this world as it forms a protective shield around you to protect you as your beast battle.
Tyrion read this for a while before settling it down. He wasn't particularly excited as this was a foundational technique learnt by everyone.
The second book was called the Fireball Spell.
Tyrion had seen how destructive the attack was even when Grant had limited energy to activate it. Yet, it burnt through Frank's body.
It was the move Grant had thrown in the final seconds of his life. With his spark attributless due to his summon attributeless, Tyrion couldn't learn it.
The third book made him Tyrion's eyes widen in shock.
It was actually a Medicine Formula!
Medicine Formulas were very rare to acquire, especially since it was locked down by the Geneticists Association.
Only a Geneticist had access to a Medicinal Formula and they weren't even allowed to share it.
A medicinal formula were precious because they could evolve, mutate and level up a symbiote! If taken consistently, it could shorten several hundred years of cultivation to just a month or even a few days!
As the saying goes, 'If everyone is special then no one is unique.' This was why it's so rare. Also counting human greed. No one deep in their heart truly wants others to succeed more than they could.
If not, the world wouldn't be this way. Humans are not saints.
The name of this Medicine Formula is called Flaming-Star Evolution potion.
It takes the yang energy from a Flint-Leaf Clover herb and the yin energy from Twin-Star Herb to create a perfect equilibrium. Once balance is achieved, various auxiliary herbs are introduced to stabilize the reaction and amplify the potency.
According to what was written in the manual, the medicinal potion has 1% chance of evolving a beast towards an attribute of fire or ice, a 15% chance to level up but 50% chance of doubling the strength of the Symbiote!
If taken regularly, even an ant would evolve and upgrade!
Tyrion's breath caught in his throat. Frank and Grant were truly his benefactors. He was just wandering in despair but came across the biggest opportunity of his life.
He sighed and scanned the ingredient list.
There were seven herbs total. Five, were common Grade-one plants that weren't at all expensive and could be seen everywhere, the remaining two were rare cosmic herbs.
The two rare Grade One herbs the formula required were the Twin-Star Plant and the Flint-Leaf Clover Herb.
They rare herbs were exactly the two herbs in his possession!
Grant had been gathering ingredients for this exact potion. He had died before completing it, and by some twist of fate, everything had landed on Tyrion's lap.
"Truly my benefactor." Tyrion couldn't help but mutter.
He almost laughed again, but caught himself.
There was still the matter of the five herbs. Even those, as common as they were, cost money he didn't have.
Then the idea came to him.
If he couldn't afford to buy the herbs, perhaps, could buy the seeds and grow them himself.
It was quieter, cheaper, and it wouldn't arouse any suspicion from others.
The fourth book was called the Ghost Feather Hidden Needle Star-technique.
Tyrion's eyes narrowed as he read the introduction to this book.
The Ghost Feather Hidden Needle technique utilizes hidden weapons shaped like a feather to kill the opponent from a distance.
It contained three levels. The first level is called the Ghost Needle Touch. The second level is called Triple Ghost Kiss and the third is called Yama's Nine Hell.
The Ghost Needle Touch drains every single body's primal energy in the body for one ultimate strike. It's fast and deadly.
It was what Slicer Frank had used against him.
If Tyrion hadn't stumbled, if Frank didn't have limited primal energy to power the needle making it slow, if he hadn't been incredibly lucky to have survived the poison, who knows what would have happened.
Tyrion brought out the three feather-like needles from his pocket and unwrapped the leather.
With this he didn't need to go to a blacksmith to forge the needles. Moreover, it could serve him till he reaches the second level of the technique.
Tyrion spent the night memorizing the content of the four books before burning them to ashes immediately.
***
As morning came, Tyrion did his chores, grabbed a chicken from the barn, he tucked it under his arm and started heading to the village's market.
He was barely a few hundred meters away from his house when the murmurs started.
"Oh, look at that, the chicken boy is out walking."
Two women chatting by the well stopped paddling the lever and didn't bother to lower their voice as he passed.
"His poor mother. Working herself to the bone for a child only for him to turn out to be such disappointment. Honestly, she should cut her losses."
One of the women clicked her tongue and shook her head in pity.
A group of children were chatting with each other when one suddenly saw him and nudged the others.
One of them quickly opened his mouth.
"Hey, Tyrion! I know your family must be starving how about I buy your summoned chicken from you for 10 crowns!" He and his friend burst into laughter.
Tyrion ignored them. He had learnt to tune out their voices long ago and couldn't hear anything being said.
It was like that till he reached he market.
The market wasn't crowded but it was still noisy and loud. Stall owners shouted prices over each other, as monster summons of every shape walked between the crowd behind their summoner.
Tyrion stopped in front of a stall with a sign: Old Tang Herb Store.
Stepping inside, behind a counter filled with jars and bundled dried herbs, an old man looked up from his newspaper.
He frowned in displeasure when he saw who it was.
"It's you."
He set down his pen using to solve the puzzle. "And here I thought it might be a real customer. What do you want?"
Tyrion ignored the man's harsh word and replied. "I want to buy seeds."
Old Tang squinted. "Planning to grow Cosmic herbs and sell them, are you? Think it's that simple?"
He chuckled in derision but turned to rummage behind the counter. "Not my problem what you're planning anyways. What seeds do you want to buy?"
"Ironvine Sprout, Skythread Grass, Misty Fern, Grave-Urn Mushroom, and Blood Petal Sage."
Old Tang's hands paused. He turned back around, his eyes turned sharp as he glanced at Tyrion in surprise.
'Fire-Star evolution Potion? How'd a this kid got his hands on it?'
'Non of my damned business'
He then let out a short, knowing chuckle. "Well, well. Isn't that surprising?"
He searched through a lower drawer and produced five small bags, each about the size of an egg, and set them on the counter between them.
"Ten Crowns."
Tyrion's expression flattened immediately. "Since when are seeds two Crowns each? They were one Crowns each last month."
"Supply and demand," Old Tang said with a bored expression on his face. "Scram if you don't want them. Having a Maxwell boy standing in front of my stall is enough bad luck for the day."
Tyrion rolled his eyes and looked at the bags of seed. He sighed.
"I want to barter. The chicken, for the seeds."
Old Tang looked at the chicken his eyes squinted before going back to their usual indifference.
"Is this the chicken they said you summoned?"
Tyrion glared at the old man in anger. "Have you heard of someone selling their Symbiote? Even if I want to sell it, you think I'd sell it for 10 Crowns?"
The old man shrugged. "Difficult to say. As for that chicken; it could could be sick and die before I cook it. I'd be taking a risk here." He folded his arms.
"Tell you what, I'll take the chicken and five crowns as well and we'll call it even."
Tyrion laughed coldly. "I can sell this bird to any butcher in this market for twenty Crowns, easy. Thirty if I'm patient. I'm broke, don't think me stupid."
Old Tang's smirk thinned. "Then go sell it to a butcher."
"Fine." Tyrion picked the bags off the counter. "I'll take these five bags, give you the chicken, and you'll double the seeds. You'll give me ten bags in total. Otherwise I will camp outside your store till noon and no customer would near this place."
The old man beards trembled and he glared at Tyrion.
"Hmph. Only because I'm in a generous mood."
He produced another five bags and slid them across the counter.
Tyrion laid the chicken down and tucked all ten bags into his pockets before Old Tang could object again before heading back to his house.
***
In his room, Tyrion eagerly held a seed in his hand and the watch in another, but nothing appeared on the watch.
He frowned as he thought about what was wrong. Then he figured it out. It seems like it only works on plant.
He went out to the farm, found a secluded corner, and carefully turned the soil. He created five clean rows of beds and planted half his seeds there. [A/N: ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)]
One type per row, spaced evenly. He watered them, pressed a little cow dung into the soil around each spot as he stepped back.
Cosmic herbs typically require special soil, precise temperature or special nutrients to grow mature and strong.
But Tyrion didn't need them strong and mature. He just needed them to germinate.
Germination typically take between one and three days. During that window, Tyrion decided which to practice. The Cosmic Shield technique or the Ghost Feather Hidden Needle Star-technique.