Chapter 2319 A Subtle Knife

--- Kat ---

Kat was back under water, or rather, she was back AS the water. Giving Lily a full 360 degree view of the orb and her shadows should be giving her the best chance to cut it without issue. That is... if they could work out how to properly share the memory. Lily couldn’t just watch it directly. Whatever trick rewired Kat’s mind to let her deal with the odd sensory input in a dome did not apply to Lily. It made her rather nauseas to look at. On the other hand, just going into the memory let her look around it from a standard viewpoint, even if the dome meant it was limited coverage.

The real issue was the fact that the memory didn’t change or shift. It was a memory, so of course it was fixed in place... but in this case that was an issue. Not only did Lily need to move her shadows into position but there was also the slight currents of the water to worry about.

The pair spent a bunch of time trying to work out some way to blend the two ideas but after five minutes of failed attempt and a small bit of vomit Kat simply reformed and let her eyes do the work. Lily could look through them far more directly with no real issues. Especially if Lily had her own eyes closed, but that wasn’t strictly necessary.

Lily had her shadowy claws spread out around the orb and Kat circled it a bit so that Lily could get a full idea of what it looked like from all angles. The shadows twitched and shifted slightly to get to better angles, then... strike. Failure. Kat could already see the orb bleeding out.

Onto the next one. This time, Lily made her shadow into more of a curved knife. Appoline had drawn it in sand from the little island up top after all. A bit of back and forth with Appoline to fully confirm the shape and attempt number two was up. This time was cleaner, and it almost looked perfect... but that bit of green on the bottom on the side Kat wasn’t looking at remained. Another failure.

[Ok this is kinda messed up.]

*Yeah how do you think I feel? I’d be convinced that it was impossible to harvest these things if I couldn’t also see how I messed the process up. I gave up after... seven attempts I think? How many do you want.*

[At least a few more.]

Three attempts later, and Lily was more determined then other. The knife of shadows had solidified in an odd way such that it almost looked like steel at this point. The shadows were heavily compacted and perfectly formed into shape. It hadn’t wavered at all and Lily was ready for the cut. She’d had Kat circle the entire thing once, and then waited. Seconds past, but Kat could tell this was intentional. Lily wasn’t just nervous... she was waiting for something.

Though Kat had no idea what that thing was. Minutes ticked by, and then, in a flash Kat barely caught the knife arced right through the plant. Kat swiped the orb and accepted the snapping of the plant. A few moments later and she was outside it again and could look at the orb properly...

And it actually seemed fine? Kat didn’t believe it as she slowly turned it around. There was no marks. No cuts. It looked like a perfectly formed orb. Which was kinda of weird actually. How did it connect to the plant then? Regardless *WE GOT ONE! FINALLY!*

[Now we just have to do it again. How many did Appoline want again?]

*I do not care at this point. Let’s just see how many we can get.*

[Alright but it’s not going to be fast. If you were wondering why I was waiting for so long, it was to ensure the current was pushing in the correct direction. I’m not good enough to perfectly line the knife up regardless of everything else. Instead, I have to find a good enough angle and then wait for the current to move it close to perfect.]

*Ah... but Appoline did say these were worth it. So we can take it slow, and get as many as possible. What Appoline doesn’t use, we can try to sell. Lachlann was around, and the rest of his village is hopefully alive somewhere else after all.*

[Alright sounds like a plan.] And thus, they got started. It took somewhere between five and ten minutes per orb... and sadly, not every attempt was successful. Even with patience and a new drive to try and grab as many as possible it was still very, very hard to do. In the end, they kept up the attempts for over an hour, with the limiting factor being Lily’s mana. Maintaining the blade wasn’t particularly draining, but keeping it extended out that far and for so long meant the costs did add up over time.

When the pair returned, it was to Appoline messing around with her equipment. Though in this case, it seemed like she was cleaning it all thoroughly instead of making more potions. "Did you manage to get any?" asked Appoline. "It’s fine if you didn’t, no pressure."

Kat flicked her hand and suddenly, four orbs appeared between her fingers. "We got quite a few. Actually, we have six total. If you can’t use them we thought they might sell for a good amount."

"Oh they certainly will. If you want you can keep half. I don’t plan to use them immediately, but they’ll be great for a number of potions I might need. They’re quite potent ingredients after all..." Appoline was grinning and rubbing her hand together. Clearly quite pleased with the haul, and uncaring that it took them over an hour just to get those few. Kat felt a bit bad about that part, and the fact they didn’t even have a fifty percent success rate with collecting them.

So many failed just because of a slight nick or the tiniest bit of green. Kat was far angrier about it then Lily had ended up being. It was just... it was almost like the plant was taunting her! Then again, for Kat there had been a lot more failures, and Lily might have simply been enjoying the attention. It was a weird couple activity, but a couple activity nonetheless.

"Alright, with this done where do we want to go? There’s the portal over the way, or one of the ones back in the previous area, and the mushrooms of course..." Kat listed. Appoline shrugged once again to the question. Kat didn’t really expect much else at this point and made the decision to go for the other portal here.

This was immediately retracted when the portal spat them out somewhere underwater. The portal itself seemed to keep the liquid at bay, but they were... under a lake or something? You’d need to swim for a good while to leave the water and that was not in the plans. So back they went, and, oh look, mushrooms. Appoline downed a potion to help with the altitude and they set off.

It was... peaceful almost. The mushrooms and their vines were exceptionally white, and the smaller ones on the ground were the same colour. It felt a bit weird stepping on them, as if she was doing something wrong but there was just so many around that you didn’t really have a choice. The mushrooms also bounced back fairly well... if it was Appoline anyway. Kat’s weight was perhaps a bit much for them, or at least took longer to recover from.

There was a distinct lack of monsters here, or at least, nothing seemed to be attacking them. Which was odd. Kat expected there to be something, but the mushrooms apparently weren’t scary, and the monsters didn’t seem to exist. *Why is that do you think? This is a pretty big plot of land...*

[Honestly? I’d guess that it’s someone’s mushroom farm that hasn’t been tended to in years. Like, if they were breading giant safe to eat mushrooms same as like, an apple orchard. With no predators they could just... grow.]

*Where did the nutrients come from then?*

[I don’t know the sun? They’re giant mushrooms so I wouldn’t think... whatever mushrooms normally eat would be enough. Though... yeah the fact that there’s no diversity at all is strange. Hmmm...]

The pair continued to glance around, alert for... anything else. A mushroom elemental, a monster of some kind. Sentient mushrooms, or even just something obviously extra magical that could explain the growth. Though, Kat did note that Lily’s orchard guess might be correct. The bigger mushrooms were in mostly neat rows... but it wasn’t perfect. There were also just clumps of them sometimes, and it was hard to tell how much of this was just the mushrooms using what space they had as best they could, and what was some sort of guiding hand behind it all.