It took two more days for the Great Trees to be ready.

  During the wait, I amused myself by training Ryll, and having the Reaver send the occasional swarm of Scarabs to harass the Naga. They had managed to counter most of the explosive drones, but their construction efforts had been slowed to a crawl. Which was good, I really didn't want to see what that tower could do.

  But now, we were also running out of Minerals, an Assimitor and a few of the Probes mining the nearby stone was covering the gap. In fact, with the Assimitor up and running we were getting far more Mineral cubes per volume of stone mined. though we still cked a good source of Vespene on the Pteau other than the Protoss Vessel. Which we had decided not to touch anymore.

  Every day we opened the Portal to transfer over some of the materials that had been harvested back on Earth. It helped, but our needs for advancement were already growing rapidly.

  The Forge consumed a whole slew of material just for the logistics upgrades Martann wanted to bring online. These helped by providing more power from the Pylons and somehow making harvesting more efficient. Soon he would switch to the wartime upgrades that improved the weapons, armor and shielding of the Tempr.

  Jar'thal wanted an Archive and a Council building as soon as possible, so that a High Tempr might be summoned.

  Progress, though slight, had been made towards my understanding of Khai culture. The sheer dedication to their caste and society was admirable. But some part of me couldn't help but think that they often wasted their best and brightest before they had a chance to develop. Further, it was easy to see how the Zerg would use their love of Aiur against them in the future.

  Their nguage was by contrast, becoming easier to grasp, as it wasn't vocal. It was more about being on the right mental wavelength. That's why it had always been easier for the Protoss to speak to humans, then the other way around. Human minds were, retively speaking, simple. Though that didn't expin why I had so many problems understanding them at first, or still struggled with complete fluency now.

  My martial training had, of course, reached no great breakthroughs in just two days. However, my efforts and steady progress were acknowledged by my System. A new skill had appeared on my status screen. Martial Form (Khai).

  Though now I was starting to wonder, how would I level up my Css or Profession? There weren't indicators of accumuted experience points. The skills went up just by using or training them, was that it? The more I acted like a Hunter, or a Salesman the faster I'd level, perhaps? Perhaps it would require a sacrifice?

  At least the System wasn't a snarky or malicious intelligence. I was certainly gd for that. Though it didn't seem willing to communicate outside of updates.

  Martann had finished the Robotics structures just this morning and our first homebrewed Reaver was due to finish construction today. The first new design for the Scarabs was also just about finished.

  Yesterday I'd shown Martann my designs for dealing with the water based Naga in the long term. He was both intrigued and repulsed by the brutality.

  Imagine a Megalodon sized robotic Shark, that created small but fast Squid drones. Much like its nd based counterpart, it would be slow, though no longer as defenseless. The jaws worked and the fins were extremely sharp. The drones would be recipients of the new targeting systems, and would only explode when they reached their target or when they had received catastrophic damage.

  The Sentry robots had also received a new water based redesign, into a Manta Ray inspired war bot. Sharpened fins and the disruptor beams had been doubled up, to repce the shield repair beam.

  Why you might ask, did we get rid of the shield repair beam? Because the shields interfered with precise movement in the water. At least for now. Both types of bots got a little extra armor out of the deal though. More power could be diverted to the gravitic propulsion modules without the shields needing their cut. That also help with movement through the water.

  We were still working on the best way to get them into the water. My idea was to build a jetty style Robotics Facility right on the southern cliff's edge so they just slid on out and into the water. But if it wasn't done properly they'd get smashed on the rocks below.

  Martann was working on it. Though he wanted to wait until we had Warp Prisms to simply pick up the constructs and drop them into the water a couple at a time. Seemed like a slow and ponderous method to me.

  The Protoss do not seem to like any form of rapid change, this was despite their technology making it so fast and easy to adapt. As advanced as they were, they could've been so much further along if they embraced change just a bit more. Yet I was also starting to understand why they held back.

  Notwithstanding their stand-offish and militant ways, they didn't actually want to be the st species standing, all alone in the Void. An interesting conundrum.

  There was also a sense of guilt behind there restraint. They had sughtered almost the whole of a species once, and what was left never really recovered. This other specie had gone from near parity with the Protoss, straight back to the Stone Age. Were they remained. All this happened within a few years if I understood Jar'thal correctly. Many in the Tempr caste had felt the victory had no Honor.

  Honor and Duty matter a great deal to the Protoss. No it was more than that. Without all the other stresses that drove other species, like food or trying to unify their cultures, all they had been left with, were Honor and Duty. They were everything to them. It was hard for me to imagine it, even now that I was closer to them.

  For too long I'd been reduced to a state of survival at all costs. Even when I found the Ritual, that didn't change much at first. I simply couldn't believe it would work. When I gave in and started gathering everything for it, I'd was acting more out of boredom at first. I was tired of crawling through the dark tunnels underground, tired of eating... I was tired of living that way. I thought, 'What did I have to lose?'

  Despite the less than pleasant start, I was so happy to be here, now. With a clear enemy that I had the power to fight.

  Heh. I'd even had collected a lot of gold from the Nagas' sacrificed corpses. Though I still found it unfortunate that I couldn't collect all of the items they left behind. I almost didn't believe any of this was real. That I was ying dead somewhere and this was just my st dream.

  I shook myself out of these meandering reflections, I had to see some Trees about some Elves.

  The Tree of Life was not unlike a massive water oak tree, with arms. Tri pointed, deeply emerald green leaves, more graceful branches. Already over 60 feet tall, its broad and kind face had finished growing into the dark brown bark. The vertical ridges in the bark's texture seemed to add more gravitas to its already wise expression.

  "Rummmm, Grummmm. Aaaaaaahhhhhhh."

  I was afraid of that, I didn't speak tree. However, I had a few more tools to navigate this problem now. I reached out with my mind, and it was no where near as difficult to sync with the tree's thoughts, as with the Protoss.

  'Ah, we can speak as members of the same Forest. Good. Small creature, I am Ceritas and I sense much conflict in the air. My new root mate, Borasis is eager to aid in the fighting.' The mind behind these thoughts was deep and clear. Full of vitality. It had vast connections to something far away.

  'What enemy endangers the Forest?' This mind was angry, but it was constrained by a sense of purpose. I turned to the Tree of war, his crimson leaves and smooth white bark reminded me somewhat of a beech tree in fall. Standing 80 feet tall with a harsh scowling and tusked face, Borasis was an intimidating tree with long arms.

  'We are currently engaged with the Naga. They contest with us the ownership of this Isnd.'

  'The fallen ones. The earth speaks of them as foul, and the pure waters do not want to embrace them. The Forest rejects them. The Dream is darkened by their presence. I would tear them and smash them.' Borasis growled in barely contained fury.

  'It is our purpose to aid you Small one. I may summon Wisp to aid you in building. And a small number of Star Children to help with other work. All who rest under my branches shall be refreshed.' Ceritas expined his voice a clear bell.

  'I can summon a limited amount of the Star Children to aid in battle. Fighters and Priests, Hunters and Stalkers. Thought there is one that is different.' Borasis's gravely mindvoice grumbled

  'Ah yes, I have one of those as well.'

  I saw I wasn't going to get to be as hands on with the Tree's production cycles. Which actually suited my just fine. I'd rather be popping skulls myself, than working on the base. But I understood that without the proper logistics, we weren't getting anywhere long term.

  "Well let's start with those, the different ones." After all Martann and Jar'thal were indispensable allies, that were slowly become friends, or at least I hoped they were.

  While waiting for the first summons to arrive, I asked a plethora of questions. I ended up with a pretty good idea of what the two trees could summon and how much.

  Ceritas could summon unlimited Wisps, and other than the aforementioned unique individual, could summon up to five Night Elves with any of the basic professions. So mining or enchanting or alchemy, so on and so forth.

  Borasis could summon up to five Night Elves from the basic csses. Warrior, Hunter, Druid, Rogue, Priest and so on.

  With the few remaining Wisps finally finishing the Hunter's Hall, they could now work on a Crafter's Hall. I had no idea what the utility of Kaldorei crafting might end up meaning to us. Hmm, enchanting seemed a save bet for usefulness and alchemy for healing and short term boosts. Maybe even Engineering or Bcksmithing to improve the Protoss's alloys? Of course, the problem was that without the gathering professions, the others were almost pointless. Or at least slowed way down while I figured out way to get them what they needed for their projects.

  So, A herbalist, a fisher, a miner, a cook and a alchemist. I think that would be a good start. I queued up my choices with Ceritas.

  My thoughts on the Csses were a little more straight forward. We had most of the fighting force we needed in the Protoss. Zealots were very good frontline fighters and had a few extra tricks up there sleeves. Later Dragoons would more than cover any ranged fighting needs we might have. What the Protoss didn't have a lot of, was healing. Repair and Shield management sure, but not a lot of good old fashion biological healing.

  So Shaman, Druids and Priests were a must. Each had their own version of healing abilities.

  I was a Hunter, so I didn't see the need for another just yet. A Rogue would just become another type of scout, which we already had in the Observers. I didn't want to touch the Warlock. The Kaldorei wouldn't become Mages, their distrust of Arcane mage was bone deep. Maybe double up?

  Two Druids and Two Priests, could heal a lot of damage. Let's do that. With a Shaman for fvor. Wait? Why could the Kaldorei become Shaman? I remember that being restricted. More oddities piling up.

  I shrugged there would be time to figure all of that out ter. I queued up my choices with Borasis.

  I sat nearby, pying with Ryll waiting for the new Elves to arrive.

  Matuscarantos