Chương 27: The Wish Tree Seed

"Oh, them—they must have seen Senior Lowe pass you his inheritance, and now they're fighting tooth and nail to snatch up a peerless young genius like you!" Beside him, Lillian laughed softly.

"Everyone knows the Mystic Spirit Gate is full of once-in-a-thousand-years talents, so how could they let go easily? Don't you think?"

"They're this ferocious?" Ryan marveled inwardly, watching the mentors bicker themselves red in the face.

"This is only the start. Once word spreads, even more mentors will rush over to fight for your remaining class slots." Lillian smiled.

"You're definitely today's hot pick!"

"No good—I need to slip away, fast!" His gaze sank. If these mentors really tangled him up, it would be a mess. He had his own plans; he couldn't let this derail them.

"You're so strange. Anyone else, showered with offers from a crowd of mentors, would be over the moon. Only you treat it like the plague." Lillian looked at him, puzzled by his attitude.

"Let me put it this way—I'm a non-combat class, so I can only take life-classes. No matter how fierce these people get, I'm willing but unable." Ryan shrugged helplessly.

"Oh, I see… I know of something that could spare you this trouble," Lillian said slowly, blinking her big eyes.

"You're serious?" Ryan's excitement flared, and his hands seized her shoulders before he knew it.

"…Of course I'm serious." Startled by his reaction, Lillian flushed faintly and said in a small voice, "Only, getting it will be very, very hard."

"Hard's no problem—so long as there's a way!" His face lit up. The truth was, the moment he'd received Lowe's inheritance, his class situation had begun to nag at him. As things stood, the single Mystic Spirit Disciple class could cover nearly all the life-classes he'd want—he need only find enough Mystic Spirit Gate seniors of Fane's and Lowe's caliber willing to pass him their inheritances, and he'd have life-skills aplenty. Which left his five remaining job slots utterly useless.

That had been gnawing at him from the start. But Lillian's words rekindled his hope and showed him a turning point.

"Help me, would you?" Ryan fixed her with earnest eyes, a thread of urgency in his voice.

"…All right." Pinned by his gaze, Lillian blushed and, after a long pause, lowered her head and agreed.

"Wonderful!" Overjoyed, Ryan scooped her up and spun her around several times, his excitement beyond containing.

"Sorry… I got carried away just now." He let go, rubbing his nose sheepishly. This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source.

"It's… it's fine." Her voice was thin as a mosquito's whine, her little face flushed pink.

"Let me get you out of here first." With that, Lillian's small hand caught his arm; she murmured an incantation, and the scene around them shifted. The next instant, the two of them had vanished from the Class-Change Plaza.

"Damn, where'd the kid go?"

"You're asking me? Who am I supposed to ask?!"

"Argh—I'm losing it! A genius like that, vanished right in front of me!"

"What're you on about? Who isn't losing it right now?" … The crowd of mentors, faces full of defeat, scattered like startled birds. Meanwhile, on the Heaven's Descent forums, a thread titled Dragon Blood City's Class-Change Mentors in a Mad Scramble Over One Player shot to the top, sparking wide discussion.

"Anyone know who this guy is?"

"Not sure. Probably a player from one of Dragon Blood City's starter villages."

"If that's the case, then nine times in ten this is Big Gunn! Isn't his Sunward Town right under Dragon Blood City's jurisdiction?"

"The one above me has a point! It's got to be Big Gunn! Wow—that's my idol!"

"Pfft, your idol? Big Gunn is everyone's idol!"

"I don't think it's Big Gunn, because—""I don't care what you think—I care what I think, and what you think doesn't count! Got it?" The forums blazed, while the man at the center of it all was already in Lillian's boudoir within the Dragon Blood City Lord's Manor. A faint floral scent reached him, and Ryan breathed it in deep, half-intoxicated. Glancing at the silent, blushing Lillian before him, his astonishment swelled.

Truly—if he weren't certain the girl before him was Lillian, he'd never have believed the decisive Dragon Blood War Goddess of his last life could wear so bashful a look. What kind of experiences could change a person's temperament so drastically?

"Have you heard of the Wish Tree Seed?"

"The Wish Tree?" Ryan paused. The term had surfaced in his last life's memory, but how to use it—or where it was—he had no idea at all.

"The Wish Tree is a legendary sacred relic of the Heaven Mystic Empire. They say it can grant a person three wishes; once the wishes are made, the tree withers and condenses at last into a single seed." Lillian said, "Legend holds the seed can grow into a new Wish Tree, but in all these years no one has managed to cultivate it—no one has even gotten it to sprout."

"You mean… you want me to cultivate the seed?"

"Yes. The odds are vanishingly small, but for you, it should be your only way." Ryan fell silent. His class setting had been fixed by the Heavenly Dao System from the very start, so in theory no item in the game could alter it. Surveying the whole arc of Heaven's Descent across his five years of last-life experience, he'd never seen any item capable of changing an initial setting.

The Wish Tree Lillian spoke of was clearly the exception—an item that granted wishes, something even the well-traveled Ryan had never laid eyes on. Maybe it really is worth a shot. In all honesty, gaining five combat classes was deeply tempting. For Ryan—who would one day face the apocalypse born of the game world and reality merging—it was a golden opportunity. Five combat classes fused into one would mean far more than a simple stacking of jobs.

And his memory held guides for many powerful hidden classes; if he could gather them all into himself, then even when the cataclysm came, he'd handle it with ease. So no matter the odds of success, this was a rare chance—because if it worked, his strength would undergo an earth-shaking leap.

"Tell me—what do we have to do to get the Wish Tree's seed?" His gaze sharpened, full of fighting spirit. Nothing to lose, everything to gain if it worked; the choice was obvious.