John looked terrified. He was a middle-aged man who used to be a vice principal at a middle school..
"So," John said, adjusting his glasses. "I just... sit here? And make sure the trucks keep moving?"
"That's the job," I said. "You ensure the trade route remains open between Southfield and Adam. You keep the peace and collect the taxes."
John looked at the fortified walls. "And if... if something happens? If something attacks?"
"Then you call me," I said. "And if you mishandle the administration, the shareholders—meaning your neighbors—will vote you out. It’s a democracy, John. Try not to suck at it."
I clapped him on the shoulder but he didn't look reassured.
"Let's go," I told Sal.
We left, leaving John to his anxiety. Eve was secure and integrated.
Now came the hard part.
For the next week, I stared at a blank piece of paper in the greenhouse.
I was trying to design Route Two.
The Green Corridor was fine for trucks. It was a paved road protected by walls. But it was slow and exposed. If I wanted to move an army, or tons of Spirit Stones, or heavy machinery between the capital and the colony, without surveillance, I needed speed and mass transit.
I needed a train.
"Steel," I muttered, crumpling up another sheet of paper and tossing it onto a pile of failures. "I need high grade steel for the wheels and a combustion engine or a high torque electric motor. I need conductive rails."
I rubbed my temples.
I couldn't buy from Seaside anymore. I had cut the cord. That meant I couldn't just order a locomotive from Mister O’s catalog.
I had to build it.
But I wasn't an engineer. I spent ten years in marketing. I knew how to sell a train; not how to build a magnetic levitation system from scratch.
"Argh!" I kicked the table.
Tim the Tomato Plant rustled his leaves in what felt like judgment.
"Quiet, you," I snapped.
I sat there, stewing in my own incompetence. Days turned into a week. The "Race of the City States" was ticking away. New York was probably building fusion reactors. Chicago was likely unifying the Great Lakes.
And I was sitting in a greenhouse, unable to figure out how to make a wheel turn fast enough.
The door to the greenhouse opened.
Aiya walked in wearing yoga pants and a tank top, a towel draped over her shoulder. She had just finished teaching the morning class on the front lawn. She radiated an earthy energy that was frankly annoying given my current mood.
"You look constipated," she said, grabbing a watering can.
"I'm trying to build a train," I grunted. "Trains are complicated. Physics is complicated."
Aiya watered a patch of basil. "Why are you trying to build a train again?"
"Because I need to move things fast underground," I said. "I need a subway but I can't smelt steel and I can't build an engine block."
Aiya paused and looked at me, then at the plants around us.
"Kaz," she said. "You are trying to force the river upstream by trying to be Seaside. You aren't Seaside."
"I know that," I said. "I'm independent."
"You're a gardener," she corrected. "So stop thinking like an engineer and stop trying to build a machine."
She pointed to a tall stalk of corn.
"How does a tree move water from the roots to the leaves, three hundred feet in the air, against gravity?" she asked. "Does it use a pump? Gears?"
I blinked. "No. It uses pressure. Xylem."
"Biology is the ultimate engineer," Aiya said, putting down the watering can. "Stop trying to build a train, Kaz. Grow one."
She patted me on the shoulder and walked out, leaving me alone with the tomatoes.
I sat there for a long time.
"Xylem," I whispered.
I looked at the Sky Piercer Bamboo. It launched projectiles using pressurized gas release.
I looked at the Voltaic Vine. It stored and released energy.
I looked at the Gourd of Holding. A vessel.
I closed my eyes.
The engineer in my head shut up and the gardener woke up.
I didn't need metal or combustion. What I needed was a vascular system.
I spent the next forty eight hours in deep cultivation.
I was drafting. I pulled every plant in my [Catalogue] into my mental workspace, stripping them down to their genetic traits and reassembling them like Legos.
I needed a hull.
Heavenly Gourd of Holding. But inverted. Instead of a pocket dimension, I needed the physical durability of the shell, scaled up to the size of a bus.
I needed propulsion.
Voltaic Vines. Muscle fibers. If I wove them into the hull, they could contract and expand, or better yet, discharge energy against a magnetic surface.
I needed that surface.
Sky Piercer Bamboo. It contained high concentrations of iron in the wood. If I polarized it...
I needed a brain.
Heavenly Mandrake. Usually a sentry, but if I wired it into the Voltaic Vines, it could act as an onboard computer, regulating speed and detecting obstructions.
It was complex and the most difficult [Crafting] I had ever attempted.
I stood in the center of the soil.
"Let's do it," I said.
I placed my hands on the dirt.
I poured 500 Qi into the mix.
It was a massive expenditure—half my total capacity. I felt the drain immediately, a sudden hollowness in my chest, but I held the image in my mind.
Green light flooded the greenhouse.
[Synthesis Complete.]
[Hybrid Plant Created: Eden Guardian Treant (Special Grade) (Transport Variant).]
"Perfect," I whispered.
I checked my phone and dialed Sal.
"Meet me at Eden Oil Up," I said. "We're going digging."
Sal was waiting for me at the gas station, sitting at one of the outdoor tables with a coffee and a croissant.
"Subway?" Sal asked as I sat down. "You want me to dig a tunnel to Adam? Boss, that's fifty miles of dirt. Even with my crew, that’s six months of digging."
"You don't dig," I said. "I dig. You reinforce."
Sal raised an eyebrow. "You gonna grab a shovel?"
"I have something better."
We drove to the western edge of Southfield, to a large empty lot.
"Stand back," I said.
I walked to the center of the lot, closed my eyes and activated [Dominion].
I felt the earth beneath me. The clay, the rock, the roots.
I reached out toward Adam, fifty miles west.
"Open."
I commanded the soil to compress, to move aside, and create a hole.
A hole opened up in front of us, ten feet wide in a perfect circle.
If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
I pushed forward and walked into the tunnel, and the tunnel created itself ahead of me. I lined the walls with the roots of the Heavenly Bamboo, weaving them instantly into a structure harder than concrete.
Sal followed behind, his jaw hanging open. He tapped the walls. "It's... it's organic. It’s a root system."
"It's the track," I said.
We moved fast as my [Root Sense] guided me around aquifers and rock formations.
It took us a couple of hours to reach Adam.
When we broke through into the basement of the Adam Governor's Mansion, Mayah nearly dropped her coffee.
"Sir?" she gasped, looking at the hole in her cellar wall.
"Express line," I said, wiping dirt from my hands. "Get a crew to build a platform here. We’re installing the station."
We drove back to Southfield—well, Sal drove a truck back topside, I took the tunnel to reinforce it—and met at the station entrance.
"Bring it out," Sal said, vibrating with excitement.
I reached into my Gourd of Holding, where I had stored the seed of my creation.
I planted it in the center of the bamboo track.
"Grow."
A massive and elongated shape formed. It looked like a bullet train made of jade. The hull was smooth and segmented like a bamboo stalk. Streaks of glowing blue electric energy pulsed along the sides.
The front was rounded, with a viewport made of transparent amber.
It hovered slightly off the track, suspended by the magnetic repulsion of the Sky Piercer roots.
"It's beautiful," Sal whispered. "It looks like a giant cucumber."
"It's a Guardian Treant," I corrected. "Horizontal Variant."
I mentally noted the military application. If I flipped the axis, gave it legs, and mounted Jade-grade weaponry... I could create a biological tank for 500 Qi.
"Let's ride," I said.
The doors opened—the sound of air escaping a pod.
The interior was warm and the walls were lined with moss. Bioluminescent bulbs cast a golden light. The air was cool, conditioned by the Glacial Gourds integrated into the ceiling.
Sal sat in one of the seats that grew from the floor and bounced on it. "Comfy."
I walked to the front. There was no steering wheel, only a Mandrake root interface.
I placed my hand on it.
[Link Established.]
"Hold on," I said.
I thought: Adam.
We launched.
We blurred through the tunnel as the bioluminescent lights on the walls turned into a single streak of gold.
I checked the time.
We hit the Adam station and the train decelerated smoothly, coming to a halt at the platform Mayah had cleared.
I looked at my watch.
"Thirty minutes," I said.
Sal stumbled out, looking dizzy. "That was... fast."
"Sixteen hours on foot," I said, stepping onto the platform. "Thirty minutes by vine."
I looked at the tunnel stretching back into the darkness.
"We just shrank the world, Sal."
Two days later, I stood at the podium in Eden City Hall.
The room was packed with the 70 Delegates who were there, along with every journalist who could get a pass.
Grace sat to my right, looking smug. She knew what was coming.
"My fellow Edenites," I began.
I projected a holographic map of Michigan behind me.
"For the last year and a half, we have thought of ourselves as a city state and of Detroit as the prize."
I zoomed out.
"We were wrong."
I pointed to the vast, red expanse of the state.
"Seaside creates luxury, White Hill creates fear, and The Cove creates drugs. But who is creating care?"
I looked at the camera.
"Who is taking care of the family freezing in a shack in Lansing? Who is feeding the survivors in Grand Rapids? Who is bringing clean water to Flint?"
Silence.
"We are," I said.
"Today, I am officially announcing the Eden Expansion."
I swept my hand across the map, turning the red territory green.
"We are annexing Michigan."
"We will bring civilization and democracy to every corner of this state. If you live under the Eden flag, you do not freeze. You do not starve. And you do not get eaten."
"We are not fighting for the penthouse," I declared. "We are taking the building."
I looked at the delegates.
"All those in favor of entering the Race of the City States?"
The hands went up. Every single one of them.
"Vote: 70 Yea. 0 Nay."
I banged the gavel.
"Let's get to work."
I walked out of City Hall into the roar of the crowd.
The news was already circulating and the headlines were flashing on the screens in the square.
FROM COWARDS TO CONQUERORS.
EDEN DECLARES WAR ON MICHIGAN.
THE RISE OF THE GARDENER.
I felt... settled. I wasn't reacting. I wasn't running from a warlord or hiding like a cockroach. I was dictating the pace of the game.
I was now seen as the most well rounded leader on the board. I had the food, the money, the infrastructure, and now, the transportation.
I was the first major Detroit faction to officially announce their entry into the Race of the City States.
This time I was ahead of the others.
My phone buzzed in my pocket.
I pulled it out, expecting a congratulatory text from Aiya or a budget update from Grace.
It was an unknown number.
[Message: Friday 8 PM. Riverwalk.]
I looked up.
Perched on top of a streetlight, watching me was an owl.
Its eyes were glowing red.
It stared at me for a long second, hooted once and took flight, heading south toward the river.
I watched it disappear into the night sky.
"The Cove," I whispered, my grip tightening on the phone.
Misty had finally made her move.
Name: Eden
Rank (Local): Major
Rank (Global): Minor
Capital: Eden City Hall, Southfield
Demonym: Edenite
Government: Corporate Democracy
Area: 68.01 km2
Population: 70,000
GDP: 6.2 billion
GDP per Capita: 88,571
Detailed
- Government
- President - Kaz Kaaz
- CEO - Grace Beckenfein
- Chief of Staff of the Army - Bells Ruper
- General of Second Division - Joakim
- Chief of Medicine at Southfield General - Siegfried
- Governor of Adam - Mayah
- Governor of Eve - John
Territories
- Southfield: Eden’s capital. Supplies labor and workforce.
Colonies
- Adam: Supplies stones and Wilds items.
- Eve: Houses 24/7 Mart
Diplomacy
- Seaside: None
- White Hill: Unlimited Heavenly Tomatoes for 6 months (3 months left)
- The Cove: None
- Government: None
Military
- First Division
- General - Bells Ruper
- Soldiers - 0
- Second Division
- General - Joakim
- Soldiers - 50
Objectives
- Race of the City States: Annex Michigan (Franchise Model)
Name: Kaz Kaaz
Age: 37
Birthday: April 30th, 1988
Path: Heavenly Gardener’s Path
Cultivation Realm: Sprout (Stage 2)
Qi Capacity: 1000 / 1000
Domain Stats:
- Soil: Verdant Jade Loam (Grade 2)
- Ambient Qi Generation: 96.4 Qi/Hour (via Heavenly Moss Verdant Jade Loam Grade 2)
Skills
- Gathering: Extract Qi/Materials from plants.
- Nurturing: Infuse Qi to accelerate growth/mutate plants.
- Swordsmanship: Proficiency with Spirit Bamboo Sword.
- Dominion: Mental control, teleportation, and acceleration of plants within the Domain.
- Alchemy: Refine plant matter into consumables/artifacts.
- Awaken Plant Spirit: Grant sentience to a plant (Cost: 25 Qi).
- Seed Identification: Analyze mundane seeds to reveal hidden magical potential.
- Root Sense: A Qi sense. The user can feel Qi, water, structures, and energy signatures through the earth. Range increases with cultivation level.
Dao
- Growth: Photosynthetic Regeneration. The user’s body heals at an accelerated rate. Severed limbs can be regrown as long as the heart remains intact.
Active Plants
- Tim (Awakened Heavenly Tomato): Sentient. Produces fruits that permanently boost Constitution and heal.
- Heavenly Bamboo: Indestructible wall. Active Defense: Thorn Reflex.
- Heavenly Moss: Bioluminescent (Gold). Generates 96.4 Qi/hr.
- Heavenly Mandrake: Sentry. Psychic scream.
- Explosive Heavenly Squash: Explosive impact grenade.
- Heavenly Tuber: High calorie sustenance.
- Heavenly Cucumber: Quenches thirst for 24 hours.
- Heavenly Potato: Wards off hunger.
- Heavenly Filter: Purifies contaminated water.
- Heavenly Whispervine: Dampens sound and energetic signatures.
- Heavenly Gourd of Holding: Grows a gourd containing an extra-dimensional space.
- Razorgrass: Becomes monomolecular knives on command. Can grapple and shred.
- Sky Piercer Bamboo: Surface-to-air missile battery. Launches hardened bamboo tips at high velocity.
- Grounding Vine: Absorbs/drains electricity (anti-tech).
- Voltaic Vine (Special Grade): Generates electricity
- Bioluminescent Bulb (Special Grade): Generates light
- Glacial Gourd (Special Grade): Generates cold air
- Eden Guardian Treant (Special Grade) (Transport Variant): Organic bullet train.
Inventory/Equipment
- Verdant Jade Loam Bamboo Sword (Grade 2)
- Verdant Jade Loam Bamboo Armor (Grade 2)
- 100,000,000,000 Spirit Stones