Chapter 843 – Remior’s golden century – Jade tree (Patreon)

Percy had known for a very long time that his family had once produced a Green-born. He’d heard the story of how the Divine Order had gifted House Avalon with a jade tree – a World Tree sapling of a much later generation than the ones Percy had planted on Remior – as compensation.

Nobody had ever shared any additional details with Percy, as the topic had apparently been a bit of a sore spot for Archibald, and the rest of their family had collectively decided to avoid bringing it up. After all, Percy’s grandfather had been much younger and less hardened by life when his first-born child had been taken from his wife’s arms.

Arthur was Galahad and Isolde’s older full brother. His close resemblance to Archibald, coupled with his life affinity and Clone bloodline, had presumably made the loss sting that much more.

Percy had first met his uncle shortly after the war, when Phoebe had sent the Order’s Green-borns to receive their gifts. He’d actually been quite surprised by how politely and respectfully Arthur and the rest of the Holy Children had treated him. Percy had honestly expected some of them to insult him or even challenge him to a duel to prove their superiority.

Perhaps the Green-borns had been coached by their superiors not to antagonize Percy, or maybe the sheltered mages had simply realized how foolish it would be to look down on someone who had surpassed them, and whose help they needed. There was also a chance that the majority of Holy Children simply weren’t as arrogant or sadistic as Percy had been led to believe. A handful of bad apples like Acton might have simply given the rest a bad name.

Regardless of their reasons, Percy had been more than happy to strengthen the Holy Children, since they were the humans closest to divinity and their strength might become necessary in the future. Of course, he hadn’t done it for free.

One corner of Percy’s mouth curled up as he recalled the demigods’ dumbfounded expressions when he had demanded a decade’s worth of mana regeneration from each of them as payment.

He’d joked about it, saying that it was compensation for all the trouble Acton and the Divine Root had created for him over the years. The truth was that he hadn’t held a grudge, since Acton, Deimos, Theseus, and many of the Root’s strongest mages who had acted against Percy had all paid for their crimes already.

Percy had made the request for purely practical reasons.

Clear mana was as dense as a liquid even in its unmanifested form, and could last for a very long time without dissipating. Having large reservoirs of Clear mana for most affinities on hand was useful for Percy’s projects. A decade of labour had seemed like a small price to pay, considering how much effort he was putting into helping Remior and what the Green-borns had received in return.

Luckily, the Holy Children had agreed to Percy’s terms easily enough, after overcoming their initial surprise.

Percy had only granted Cradles and Gloomy Dawn to a handful of Green-borns that Phoebe had selected. He’d naturally tried to grant Cradles to a couple of demigods as well, to check whether their mana could be compressed beyond the Clear grade. The seals in their cores hadn’t been strong enough to grant them any further promotions, but Percy planned to revisit that project in the future – perhaps when he grew even better at magiscript.

While most of the Green-borns were still stuck with Aurora Dew and no artificial advancements, they would need less than two thousand years to reach the peak of the Colour realm, which was an acceptable amount of time to wait, as they were highly unlikely to comprehend their foundational concepts sooner than that.

Percy still hadn’t figured out whether the titaness had chosen his uncle for the superior treatment due to his talent or his connection to House Avalon, but it didn’t really matter. Archibald had been ecstatic to reunite with his lost son, so Percy and everyone else in the family had done their best to welcome Arthur for the patriarch’s sake.

The problem was that Arthur himself had yet to warm up to anyone, even after living in the Camelot province for decades. Archibald had actually asked his son to join them for dinner earlier, but the Green-born had refused, as always.

Percy didn’t necessarily think that his uncle was a bad person or had anything against them, but being taken from his family at a young age and spending his entire life training to attain divinity had understandably left him somewhat cold and distant. A shared bloodline and surname couldn’t make up for a stolen childhood and over half a millennium spent apart.

‘The fact that he’s greeted us is proof that he’s making progress, I suppose,’ Percy consoled himself with a sigh as he watched his uncle fly back to his branch without speaking a word. ‘He used to not even look at us. I just hope – for his sake – that he doesn’t break Baldy’s heart.’

Archibald kept watching long after the glowing leaves had hidden his son from view. Percy looked away first, though he could still see his uncle returning to his branch and resuming his meditation through his sensory domain.

After the last few farewells, Percy rose into the night alongside Nesha, Micky, and his cousins. The forest’s song faded beneath them, while the sapling’s glow lingered over the treetops.

Gawain and Ragnelle also took off, though they used the vehicle that the Huehuan had gently dropped near the giant roots earlier, and would travel a much shorter distance to the family’s mansion. Micky hadn’t offered to carry the group this time. Without Elaine’s mother, everyone could fly as fast as him.

The Divine Order possessed around eight thousand Green-borns, of whom about half had already become demigods before receiving Percy’s gifts. A quarter had been Whites like Arthur, and the rest had been Violets. There were hardly any Greens or Blues among their ranks, because Holy Children didn’t spend that long at the lower grades.

Percy had been somewhat surprised that their grades were skewed so heavily towards the peak of the Colour realm, but it made sense in hindsight.

The low-borns had kept assassinating one another for millennia to prevent new Houses from emerging or rival families from growing stronger. Yellow-borns used to need five hundred years to reach Violet and five thousand to reach White, so it was no wonder that only a tiny sliver of the population had been able to survive that long.

The gods had designed that system on purpose, because everyone but the Green-borns had been incapable of attaining divinity. The nobles’ only job had been to reproduce, die, and free up resources for the next generation of potential Green-borns or people with stronger bloodlines.

The Holy Children, on the other hand, had always been able to advance much faster, and the Divine Order went to great lengths to keep them safe. Sure, it was important to occasionally send the Green-borns to dangerous expeditions to other planets to prevent them from stagnating. A lot of them probably perished during those missions, but most of the survivors still spent the majority of their lives in the Clear grade, trying to comprehend their foundational concepts.

Remior’s demographics would probably shift in much the same way, but on a far greater scale, now that everyone could potentially attain divinity. Blues, Violets, and Whites had already become more common, though it would be a while before more demigods appeared.

Almost all the Green-borns had returned to Mount Olympus after receiving Percy’s gifts, though Phoebe had allowed some to remain on the surface of the planet if they had demonstrated a useful talent or expressed any interest in working in one of the government’s magical departments.

A couple had received Scribing or other traits that helped with magiscript or alchemy, while Arthur had probably been told to stay with his family both as a favour to House Avalon and because meditating near the sapling was good for him.

“It’s funny if you think about it,” Elaine said, drawing level with Percy.

“What is?” Percy asked as they flew over their family’s mansion.

Owain stifled a yawn before gesturing at them to pick up the pace.

“Remember how Grandpa wouldn’t let you borrow the jade tree to activate your second core when we were younger?” Elaine asked, ignoring her brother.

Percy nodded. “It would be hard to forget even without my eidetic memory. Discovering my bloodline and realizing that I could finally pursue my dreams was the most exciting day of my life. I understood why he didn’t want to gamble such a precious resource on me, but it still hurt.”

For a moment, he let the others pull ahead, his eyes lingering on his old home. Archibald had brought the jade tree along during their exodus to the Fungal Spire, and had later placed it back in the inner garden upon returning to the Camelot province.

It was still there, at the exact spot where it had been when Percy had nearly destroyed it all those years back. He and Nesha hadn’t touched it during their renovations, though the far superior sapling that Percy had given his family had turned their “treasure” into little more than a forgotten decoration.

“And look at you now!” His cousin chuckled. “You’ve somehow managed to not only activate your second core but even acquire a third core, on top of giving the Moirais’ Decree to everyone else. You’ve planted multiple better trees, and even brought back our Green-born relative that the Order took in exchange for the original sapling. If that’s not a complete vindication, I don’t know what is!”

Percy blinked. He really hadn’t thought about it in such explicit terms, but his cousin was right. “We’ve really come a long way, haven’t we? And yet here we are, right where it all began.”