Nox had never liked the sun. She had kept to the shadows for centuries, drawing on the darkness to fuel her power and expand her Soul Core. She had felt exposed in the sunlight, like a fish out of water. Not only because her powers were heavily restricted and weakened under the intense light Qi, but also because people had sought her out. She may have put that 30,000 Yinxi Coins bounty to the back of her mind, but it had still hung over her head like death itself for many years.
The Celestial Warden may have an iron fist over the region as the figurehead of the Eternal Pursuit Pavilion, meaning most knew the bounty placed on her by the Lunarshade family was a joke, but upstarts clueless of the internal politics still tried their luck. Not to mention the other enemies she had made over the centuries would love to shove a sword through her chest.
It was weird to think out of that long list of enemies, the one that ended up succeeding was Stella from an upstart pill sect and a demonic tree.
But none of that mattered anymore. For all intents and purposes, Nox Duskwalker, the famed and despised Merchant from the Tainted Cloud Sect and a Jade Sentinel of the Pavilion, died two days ago. She had watched on as her body and soul were torn up and fed to a demonic tree. What remained was a fleeting part of her, a fragment of her soul that had been twisted by a curse into something inhuman.
A tree.
The sun she had been so afraid of in the past now warmed her leaves that rustled in a peaceful breeze. She now rose to a height of around twenty meters, letting her lord over the other scarlet-leaved trees and having a clear view of the sprawling city of mortals she had been entrusted to defend. Ashfallen City.
"This is nice," Nox muttered in the confines of her mind. She had no mouth to speak, so talking to herself and watching the world pass by was all she could do.
She also spent much time coming to terms with her new existence.
Becoming a tree aside, she wasn't quite herself. A lot of things were... missing. She only realized the full extent of how much she had lost when she and all the other demonic trees slept under these nine vertical moons in a dreamscape. Under their lunar energy, her cultivation slowly recovered, and so did her memories and emotions as her soul healed from being ripped in half.
It was a strange experience being drip-fed fragments of her memories alongside small surges in emotions as she judged them without the full context.
Many things she had done in the past seemed so stupid and selfish in hindsight until she gained more context the next night, but by then, she had already changed her view and deemed it a poor decision, so the context carried less weight. It was almost like watching her life in reverse. She saw the consequences of her actions first and then the inciting incidents that caused them all with the damped emotions she now had as a tree.
It sufficed to say her life had been a joke—or at least that's the conclusion she had reached in two short days. It had been nothing but one wrong decision after another in the endless pursuit of power. In fact, it was almost torture at this point, having to regain her memories so slowly. She would rather remain blissfully ignorant of her past grievances if she could.
Talking of power, she still had some, even as a tree. Yet it was far below what she had at her peak as a human. Since she now only had half a soul, her presence had diminished to what she had wielded before her ascension. Furthermore, her fragmented soul, which had been fine for a human, was now stretched to fit the form of a still-growing trunk.
"Luckily, my connection to heaven has remained strong, so I can still use the techniques I learned as a human," Nox said as she flexed her meager amount of stored shadow Qi, making shadows dance on her branches. "But now the question is how can I expand my power? I can't learn techniques like before, as I don't have arms. Even my breathing cultivation technique doesn't work anymore, so all I can do is sit here and hope I absorb some Qi."
It didn't help that the demonic tree that cursed her into this new existence ensured she paid her debts.
Strange ghostly roots that ran throughout the mountain had merged with her own roots during her first night—turning her from a lone tree into a part of a vast, interconnected forest that felt very much alive. Emotions ebbed and flowed through the roots of the many trees, and trying to comprehend them all drove Nox to insanity. Qi was pulled from her into the network against her will, but in return, she received water and nutrients that kept her alive.
Despite her relative strength compared to the demonic trees around her, she had no interest in trying to fight back at having her Qi taken. Spreading her spiritual sense and following the flow of Qi had drawn her focus to the demonic tree atop Red Vine Peak. It was a beacon of blinding and concentrated power worshiped by the other trees through the network as nothing short of a god.
Yet she wanted power, but not for the same reason as in the past.
That godly existence had entrusted her to watch over this city of mortals. Since Nox lacked purpose and very much wished to turn over a new leaf from her past, this seemed like a suitable goal. It was not like she had much choice, and it was hard to look down on mortals as lesser beings when they had legs... and could walk around freely.
"Shadow tree spirit, are you here?" A distorted voice brought Nox out of her thoughts. She heard the outside world as if someone was shouting through a wall if she didn't spread her spiritual senses. Once she did, the world sounded almost as good as when she had been human with ears. Looking around, she noticed a father and mother with their daughter walking up stone steps to where Nox grew on a raised ledge.
"Don't shout like that, Jasmine. You might anger the spirit." The mother scolded the girl who was skipping beside her.
Nox thought these three were particularly amusing. "So they are back again today?" Rather than drive them away with her presence that could easily squash a mortal, Nox welcomed anyone who would come and stop for a chat. Not that she could really reply. These two happened to live nearby, and the father had been among the first to notice her existence when returning from a shopping trip in Darklight City.
The other mortals mostly stayed away, never leaving their basic stone homes. But this Jasmine girl was a curious one and was probably more fearless because she was from the only family on this mountain apart from the Redclaws to have the talent for Qi.
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"I never thought I would enjoy the company of mortals, though I suppose these three aren't mortals. They are just so weak they might as well be." Nox would have slaughtered these three for even looking in her direction in the past, but now she enticed them closer by leaking some Qi into the area. "If only I could do more than sit here in silence."
She had tried to use her Qi to communicate but thus far had little results.
"Look, Jasmine, I think it's recognizing our presence," the father said while ruffling his daughter's hair, "Can you see those shadows dancing along the branches? Those don't match the morning sunlight, so it must be the spirit's presence."
Nox tried to wrestle her shadows into words or something else, but her control over her Qi in this new form was fickle at best.
"Wow..." Jasmine muttered as she gazed up.
"There has to be something I can do," Nox muttered to herself. She didn't want to summon shadow fiends or use Night Beast Summoning because it would terrify these weak cultivators, and if she lost control of them, they could even die. "I need a body of some kind, a humanoid one to not scare them."
Nox thought for a while as the family wandered around, marveling at how tall she had grown in such a short time. Eventually, they sat down under her canopy crosslegged and began trying to cultivate from the instructions of a parchment. From a glance, it appeared to be the most basic breathing technique that those without an affinity used to cycle untamed Qi through their system.
It was a painful and inefficient technique used mainly by those outside the noble families with more specialized techniques for their affinities, such as rogue cultivators.
While they got to cultivating their abysmal techniques and gulping down pills, Nox continued thinking of a way to gain a body of some kind that was more humanoid.
"I know there are myths of tree spirits having a dryad form. Couldn't I make a shadow dryad?" Nox had a sudden realization, "My family's secret technique for making a second soul from our shadow, which I used to reach Nascent Soul Realm the first time. Couldn't I use that?"
Nox mentally activated the Shadow Soul technique and was relieved when the heavens understood her will. An intense pain followed as a tiny fragment of her soul was broken off and transported through her roots and into her vast shadow.
"Just as painful as the last few times," Nox hissed. It wasn't so bad if she kept reminding herself that tonight, she would have her soul healed under the nine moons. As the pain subsided a little, the feeling of control over her shadow heightened as if it were another limb.
Everything was going according to plan, except for the slight issue that her shadow was very much tree-shaped rather than humanoid. As the sun rose through the sky, her shadow was the area under her canopy. It hardly even looked like a tree and more of a hole-filled circle as streaks of sunlight snuck through her black-leaved canopy.
"Carving out a humanoid from this shouldn't be too hard," Nox muttered as she used her Qi to mold the shadows. Since her shadow was now part of her own soul, it was far easier to control than the surrounding shadow Qi since she didn't have arms or a voice to direct the heavens on carrying out her will.
"It definitely also helps that I lived as a human for centuries. Even though my soul has been altered by the curse to fit this new form, I still remember what it was like to be human."
It took until midday for Nox to wrestle her new Shadow Soul into submission and create something vaguely humanoid. It had everything a woman could need to put the mortals at ease. A striking figure with all the necessary limbs and a head with long flowing hair. The only problem was that it was nothing but shadows, so any finer detail than that would have to come with time and effort.
Nox sighed as she made her creation rise from the shadows and hide behind her trunk out of sight from the weak cultivators, "If I had a lot more shadow Qi, I could condense it down into a more liquid form or even remake it out of dark flames."
Sadly, it was the best she could do for now. Retreating from the confines of her mind, she inserted her consciousness into her Shadow Soul. It had a ghostly feel compared to her rooted-in-place body. She flexed her shadowy arms and fingers and had to admit it felt freeing to have limbs again.
Peeking past her trunk to see what the cultivators were up to, she froze as she locked eyes with Jasmine, who was taking a break from the brutal breathing technique. Her face was red, she was out of breath, and her hair was glued to her forehead.
"Ah! The spirit woke up!" Jasmine shouted as she pointed at Nox.
The mother was the first to respond, awakening from meditation and grabbing Jasmine by the hand. "Julian, wake up," She kicked him in the side, making the man blink in confusion, "We need to run."
"What the—" Julian stumbled to his feet and stood before his wife and daughter with his hands raised with whisps of untamed Qi enveloping his fists.
Nox didn't know whether to laugh or cry at this situation and then realized she could do neither. "I picked the least frightening form I could manage, yet they still backed away in fear. Are mortals really this skittish?"
Even with the Qi enveloping Julian's fist, it was hard to call him a cultivator.
With her hands raised to show she was not a threat, Nox floated around her trunk. What followed was an awkward standoff. Nox showed no signs of attacking while Julian stood there panting and burning his Qi to keep his feeble attack going.
Eventually, his arms dropped, and he kneeled over, gasping for air.
"Julian!" "Dad!" The mother and daughter went to help the man who had collapsed from surpassing his limits by... standing there. Learning one's limits was one of the first things a cultivator learned. Just how had this man gotten to that age without knowing the basics?
"He's going to pass out if he isn't given some Qi," Nox floated closer, much to the mother's horror.
"Don't come any closer, spirit!" The woman shouted as she stood and tried to stop the shadow from approaching, but Nox simply phased through her body like a mist. Arriving before the man, who was thankfully still within her shade and not out in the sun, Nox placed her ghostly hand on his back and began transferring some untamed Qi.
The daughter, wielding Qi like a maniac, charged at her, "Leave my Dad alone! Don't eat him!"
"Who said anything about eating? I'm trying to save him," Nox mentally sighed. Maybe she wasn't cut out to be a good person, and these mortals wore her patience thin.
The whole thing had turned into a mess. All Nox wanted was to guide them in cultivation and perhaps chat through hand signs. Instead, her reward for her efforts was one collapsed man on the verge of passing out that she was trying to save and two screaming people trying to slap her away as if she were an annoying swarm of flies.
"Just be patient," Nox convinced herself, "Once the father recovers, they will forgive me."
Her efforts paid off as Julian visibly recovered and managed to get his breathing under control. She was about to float away when she felt the tremendous presence that spread throughout the mountain focus on her.
"Nox, I am about to send Stella and Diana to meet you, so be nice—what in the hell is going on here."
A voice that sounded like a thousand people speaking at once thundered in her mind and made her Shadow Soul tremble. It was barely formed, so it was not designed to handle such pressure.
"This is a misunderstanding," Nox said as she floated back toward her tree. "I was trying to help them..."
To be fair, she could see why the godlike tree would misunderstand. The scene didn't exactly paint a good picture.
A portal ripped open behind the mortals, and two people stepped through. One was likely the demoness that had impaled and rammed her into the ground, while the other was Stella... with an axe.
Stella took one look at the mortals before her presence came crashing down, "Nox, you bitch, do you have any idea how much effort I spent to save these three!" Stella teleported at her with the axe wreathed in spatial flames.
All Nox could do was raise her hands and pray her new life as a tree wasn't about to end.
