Looking at the goat the Windchime Grass, as I was currently calling it in my head, had killed, I could only wonder just how that had worked. The deer I had examined just minutes earlier had been in perfect condition as it fled, only covered in the seeds spread by the grass, carrying them down the mountain so they could germinate elsewhere, but the goat was undoubtedly dead. Very dead, so dead, in fact, that it had somehow managed to spread a fair amount of its blood, alongside a few shreds I thought used to be parts of the goat’s innards, but with the way they had been shredded and spread out, I just couldn’t tell.
Landing next to Luna, I raised an eyebrow in question, curious what my daughter might have observed from the events.
“Well, I wouldn’t get too close to the grass,” she suggested, her face remaining perfectly straight and serious as she spoke, “It might have something to do with the roots it spread, I think I can feel them beneath the soil where the goat started to dig, but as it turns out, the grass not only has a mechanism to lure things close so they can be covered in seed,” at that she giggled for a moment, a small blush on my face that managed to cause a budding headache somewhere deep in my brain, “But also one to defend itself if the thing they lured too close doesn’t want to leave once it’s been seeded.”
“What did that mechanism look like? I think I can see its effect.” I nodded toward the shredded animal, curious about what had caused wounds like that.
“Different kind of noise; I think the grass can work together as a colony to cause some sort of resonance effect,” she shrugged again, making it obvious it wasn’t an easily understood effect. Some effects were like that, especially if you didn’t have the right senses or weren’t focused on what they were sensing at that moment. In that case, you might not be able to observe more than a brief flash of radiance as a bit of Astral Power escaped a spell and turned into something visible to the naked eye before fading but I doubted many would be able to do more than guess what element the spell had used, based on the colour of the escaping radiance, though even that was somewhat vague as many spells combined elements, causing a fair bit of variation in the Astral Power involved.
“Let’s see if I can provoke things a little,” I grinned, quickly waving my hand and conjuring up a simple figure made from Ice, barely humanoid and lacking any kind of sophisticated features, but it was enough. I didn’t need anything fancy, I merely needed a sacrificial body we could use to trigger the response, though it would be interesting to see if the figure did.
Taking control of it and partially shifting my sight into the scrying construct I quickly created in the figure’s head, I used my Ice Magic to move the statue down the hill and closer to the Windchime Grass, trying to trigger its defences. Or even the lure mechanism would work, though I quickly realised that the figure didn’t work.
Obviously, the grass wasn’t using sight to sense the world around it. Given that the figure was many things, but quiet wasn’t one of them, I didn’t think they were using sound or something like the displacement of air or moving air currents. If the grass did, the statue should have triggered a reaction.
My next try was to add a bit of my Blood, infused with Astral Power, to the statue, giving it a faint life signature, strong enough to be perceivable to Luna, and even I could get the vaguest glimpse of its signature using my Soul Sight, despite it being already separate from me. Still, just that glimpse served as a powerful reminder of just how dangerous it could be to have any of my Blood leave my immediate control and for a moment, I began to worry about Lia, who had fed on my blood for months. Who knew how that connection might work as a link to myself? It was a somewhat scary idea, though one I couldn’t do anything about right now.
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Just as the figure, now with some blood as enhancement, moved into the area around the grass, the earlier chiming started back up and, for a moment, I was tempted to call it a success and move on, only to realise that the chiming wasn’t for the figurine but to lure in a fox that had been drawn in by the smell of blood from the dismembered goat.
Given that this might be even better than triggering the mechanism myself, I mentally settled in, keeping the controlled Ice Figure motionless so I wouldn’t spook the fox and waited. Only to be disappointed shortly after it seemed that the defensive mechanism didn’t kick in if the target wasn’t performing some specific action. Like digging for roots, which is why I used the figurine to disturb the earth somewhat close to the plants and that, finally, was enough to make them react.
And react, they did with a vengeance. In moments, the chiming sound changed from the one drawing in their targets, like the fox, and exploded with a cacophony of noise, strong enough to give me a small headache despite the vast difference. It also made Silva howl in response, clearly registering her dislike of this particular type of noise. But compared to the effect of the noise, which was nothing but noise, with no additional magic carried by the sound whatsoever on the fox and my figurine, the effect it had on us was negligible. Nothing, really.
On the other hand, my figurine, despite its construction from somewhat sturdy Ice, only lasted for a second or two before it shattered. Sure, I was fairly cognisant that objects conjured from ice were generally fairly brittle, but this was a little more than I had expected. Similarly, the fox suffered greatly, to the point that the initial moment of noise was enough to incapacitate it as it stumbled around for a few moments as if drunk or concussed, which I considered more likely, but it didn’t last long. Longer than my figurine, yes, but then it started to bleed from every orifice of its body until it started to expel bits of its shredded organs from both ends. Moments later, it succumbed to the damage caused by the strange noise, and I felt that it was a bit of a mercy.
“This time, it was a lot louder,” Luna told me after I used a bit of Blood Magic to get rid of the light damage our ears were suffering from.
“Maybe because there was an additional disturbance, the one I caused with my figurine and the digging fox,” I suggested, getting a shrug and a nod in response as Luna admitted it was possible.
“I also think they are only as powerful and dangerous as they are here because of their number,” I continued, quite intrigued by the sheer power displayed here. With the entire valley of Windchime Grass working together, or rather, resonating in harmony, they could cause some serious damage. But I doubted this would be a long-term effect, the grass closer to the middle wouldn’t be able to receive the nourishment the grass on the outskirts was absorbing, meaning it would soon wither and die.
Just to make sure they hadn’t managed to combine their root systems or something like that, I checked with my Soul Sight and could discern different organisms, though they were fairly similar. No, this was a temporary curiosity caused by the experiment Luna and I had performed here, not something that would spread and retain its current dominant power.
Still, this grass had an interesting effect, something to keep in mind for later, though I doubted I’d settle anywhere where it would be able to thrive.
“Do you want to check if this stuff has its own name or if it has accepted the Windchime Grass designation?” Luna asked, and after a moment of consideration, I decided to shake my head. Sure, I was fairly confident that the grass wouldn’t react to a cautious, especially an aerial, approach, but I wasn’t about to risk it, not for something this meaningless. Maybe we could cultivate a few additional stems in the coming days and check those, but this grass wasn’t something I wanted to mess with. At least not if it had grown in these absurd numbers, making me wonder if Luna and I had been a little too successful.
“We should continue,” I told her, already turning away from the valley filled with deadly grass and the bones of two animals, “I have a feeling this will be quite the sight for a bit but it won’t last. Not something we need to be concerned about long term and in the short term, it’s trivial to simply move away.”
With that, Luna and I continued on our path, travelling further north while Silva followed a little after us once she had placed a marking and, possibly, demonstrated what she thought about this noisy, annoying grass.
