Chapter 271: Withering Life
Hiss— As Jia Na climbed out of the 【Vortex Well】 once more, her snake body transforming back into a human, she looked at the massive barrier not far away and put away the 【Vortex Well】 on the ground.
"This is the place."
Wailing— Whether it was the whimpering wind or the mournful cry of the Mist Forest, coupled with the thick, unyielding deathly aura surrounding her, Jia Na's mood became heavy.
"system, open the task panel."
【Main Quest: Save the Withering Life, revive the trees in the Mist Forest that are about to die (0/500);
Quest Reward: 1000 talent points, 3000 skill points, three random rewards;
Quest Time: Unlimited.】
Looking at the red text on the task panel, Jia Na's gaze couldn't help but fall on the task quantity (0/500).
"Five hundred in total, and they need to be trees that are about to die."
Before this, Jia Na had considered whether she could directly buy a batch of saplings and plant them in the Mist Forest to replace the dead trees.
However, Jia Na only thought about this idea for a moment before directly dismissing it.
After all, besides the red difficulty level, this was also the first Main Quest Jia Na had received so far.
Jia Na speculated that this quest was likely related to her comprehension progress of the Growth Law Fragment, and it definitely needed to be completed with both quality and quantity assured.
"Hoo—"
She took a deep breath, then slowly exhaled.
After looking around, Jia Na finally chose a relatively "small and thin" tree among the many dying trees.
"Let's practice on this tree first."
As Jia Na approached, a verdant green light once again emanated from her palm, enveloping the "thin" tree in front of her.
Crackling— The trunk snapped, the bark peeled off. The power of the Growth Law Fragment had just been unleashed by Jia Na, but instead of improving, the tree, which had received the Law's boost, showed signs of its condition worsening.
"What's going on?"
Bang— Even though Jia Na had stopped, the cracking trend of the trunk didn't cease. In just an instant, the cracks spread to the roots, and the entire tree directly tilted sideways.
"Vine Entanglement—"
Just as the large tree was about to fall, large patches of vines immediately shot up from the ground, then firmly bound the tree, forcefully fixing it back in place.
"I'm sorry, because of my carelessness, I almost killed you—"
Feeling the last bit of vitality in the thin tree before her about to disappear, Jia Na slowly walked over,
Carefully placed her hand on the trunk, and while listening to its pain, she also apologized.
"But I will do my utmost to save you."
Like a child's dependence on a mother, when Jia Na's hand touched the tree, besides the painful groans, Jia Na also felt dependence, reluctance, gratitude—and apology from it.
Yes, it was clearly Jia Na's mistake that led to the premature decline of this thin tree, but when faced with Jia Na's apology, the other party not only showed no resentment but was instead expressing apology to Jia Na.
As if to say, it was because of its own weakness that it couldn't withstand the bestowed power of Jia Na. All of this was its own reason and had nothing to do with Jia Na.
"Sigh—"
She gently sighed. Only now did Jia Na somewhat understand why the Green Elves living in Florence were so deeply in love with nature and genuinely loved every living being in the Forest of Nature.
This wasn't because of an outpouring of "sympathy" or "saintly" feelings, but rather because Green Elves, who were born with high-level Plant Affinity talent, could communicate with trees even if they hadn't awakened Nature Affinity.
In their eyes, every tree was like their friend and family, not only possessing the same emotions,
But also having infinite love and attachment to the Forest of Nature. "Shape Manifestation—"
Under the Precise Control talent, Jia Na quickly condensed more than ten strands of verdant green magic threads even finer than hair.
Following the distribution trend of the tree's veins, it wasn't long before Jia Na dispersed the magic threads throughout the entire trunk, constantly moving them.
"Four-fifths of the root area has already necrotized, and the cause of necrosis, besides the imbalance of the soil microbial community and the presence of disease infection, is the loss of vitality caused by dark sun contamination."
After a thorough examination, Jia Na also successively found the reasons for the root necrosis.
Besides soil factors, insufficient root nutrients, and the proliferation of bacteria, the most fundamental reason lay in the dark sun's contamination.
And this was something Jia Na had thought of even before she arrived.
If it weren't for the dark sun contamination causing the trees to lose vitality, with the abundant vitality these trees inherently possessed,
They wouldn't have been affected by issues like soil microbial imbalance or disease infection.
After all, the Mist Forest itself is a place with many swamps and high humidity, and the tree species growing there are inherently very resilient and don't easily die.
However, once there's a problem with the tree's own vitality, it's like when a person's immune system has issues.
Diseases that wouldn't normally cause much damage can, at this time, be fatal.
"In this situation, directly using Purification Light to dispel the contamination would only accelerate death—"
In fact, at first, Jia Na had considered using Purification Light to dispel the dark sun contamination first, and then using the power of the Growth Law Fragment to give the trees vitality, thus pulling them back from the brink of death.
However, nearly half of the trunks of the trees located at the edge of the Magic Tower Barrier had already been completely destroyed by the dark sun contamination.
Once Jia Na applied a strong attack with Purification Light, the result would be the same as Jarvis Roland's original leg – it would be "physically purified" away.
Humans can have limbs grafted through surgery, but if a tree loses a large portion of its trunk and roots, it's no different from being dead.
Therefore, Jia Na initially planned to use the power of the Growth Law first to inject some vitality into the dying trees,
And after the vitality was replenished, then use Purification Light to purify the dark sun contamination.
However, this seemingly reasonable plan also failed—
"Then I can only use magic threads to remove the contamination bit by bit."
Having made up her mind, Jia Na no longer hesitated. While dispersing the verdant green magic threads, she chanted the spell again, using the power of the Purification Law Fragment to re-condense a larger number of milky white magic threads.
"Fortunately, before this, I mastered the Precise Control talent in advance. Otherwise, relying solely on my original magic control ability, who knows how long it would take to purify—"
