Valterra watched his mice lie down before turning to his notifications. He had dismissed them to check on his dungeon and he was glad he had. He caught the tail end of the fight with the monster and witnessed his guardian’s victory. He hadn’t quite known what he was doing when he reforged his mouse guardian’s sword and created his cloak but he thought the items had turned out great.
Amazing in fact. Now he had another way to upgrade his creatures or protect his core. There was also the matter of the new Schema he had gotten but he dismissed the notification. He would get to it later. It was time to see what the system had in store for him.
Valterra looked at the notifications, stunned. So he was like the High Council now? And they had adopted him? Valterra felt a flood of warmth overtake him at the idea. It touched a part of him that he didn’t know was empty and filled him with a desire to achieve more than he already had. From his memories, he had a hazy idea of what adoption was. It was a long drawn-out process by which a child became the responsibility of another who entered into the process willingly.
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That individual or pair of individuals chose to take care of, nurture, and see to the growth of the child. That the High Council had chosen to adopt him spoke to his soul and reassured him that everything would be alright and that they would watch over him. He felt…comforted. Even as that feeling spread inside him he felt the pinging of yet more notifications and he honed in on them eagerly.
Wow. Valterra hadn’t known that he would be able to choose the evolutions of his creatures. Now that he thought back, the only other combat evolution had been when his Mouse Guard had evolved, and that had been back when he wasn’t yet fully sentient. Filled with childish joy he eagerly looked through the options.
The first that stood out was the fact that his Mouse Guard was no longer the only mouse that could become one. That was big news since he was also evolving which would allow the Core to see what was coming down the road. He almost dismissed the evolution options for his smaller mice to go and check but held himself back to look at the other options.
The other two evolutions looked like they were the next stage of a natural House Mouse’s evolution without the interference of a divine entity. ‘Thanks, Ile’fen.’ Valterra thought, trying to express his gratitude for the Schema of his guardian even though he figured the High Spirit wouldn’t be listening.
It surprised him therefore to feel the briefest divine touch as Ile’fen responded with a feeling of pride. Whether the pride was for him or the Schema, Valterra didn’t know but he was comforted that the High Council was watching over him. Even if it was only to watch him play.
He turned back to the Schemas to try and see where they might be used in a dungeon. The Feral Mouse had it right in the description. He doubted that his title would work on it, seeing as it had already been used by dungeons in the past.
The Mouse Hoarder, though, seemed interesting in the way that it stole things and then sat and defended the hoard. He figured it would be hard to trust such a creature with the defense of the Dungeon for another Core though, especially when you could choose a hoard of ravenous giant mice instead.
He was optimistic he would be the only dungeon to willingly choose it but the fact that it wasn’t listed as Unique made him suspect one had chosen it at some point. There was also the chance that it was a natural evolution of a house mouse rather than simply a wild variety of mice that went feral.
Regardless he could already see a use for the creatures. Who knew what treasures lay to be uncovered in the archmage’s cabin? And of course, Valterra could create little trinkets for his mice to find. It could be fun! Yes, he would have to see about that evolution later.
For now, though, he turned away from them. He knew the desire of his little mice and how they looked up to their older kin. They wanted to follow in his paw steps and become Mouse Guards and he would grant their request. All except one.
Another unique Schema meant that it was the first of its kind and only available to his dungeon in particular. He knew the mouse that unlocked the Schema. The little guy was the first of the mice to be born and had become attached to the older mouse. It was he who took care of the needle many times, cleaning it with moss. It seems his devotion had paid off and the Core looked forward to seeing the results.
That line of thinking interested the Core because it could mean that there was some way to influence evolution. He would have to think about it more later. Valterra selected the evolution and then confirmed the rest for Mouse Guards. He then turned to the next notification of evolution and his metaphorical eyes went wide.
