FREE USE in Primitive World

Suddenly hearing a strange cry, Sol looked up. A flock of small, iridescent birds with long, ribbon-like tails were darting between the branches above them. Their feathers were translucent, shifting from violet to emerald as they caught the light of the lumen-moss. They didn’t seem afraid; they seemed curious, chirping in a frantic, rhythmic pattern that synchronized with the thrumming of the trees.

“Star-wings,” Kira noted. “It’s strange seeing them here, they usually only come out for the High Priests. You’ve got them all riled up.”

They passed a grove of giant, bell-shaped flowers that stood as tall as Sol’s waist. As they walked by, the flowers pulsed with a soft amber light and exhaled a cloud of shimmering pollen that tasted like honey on Sol’s tongue.

A small animal, looking like a cross between a red panda and a lemur, scampered across a high branch. Its fur was tipped with glowing white frost, and it paused to stare at Sol with large, intelligent gold eyes before letting out a playful whistle and disappearing into a hollow in the bark.

“This is a far cry from what the forest I was imagining.” Sol said, glancing back toward the ridge.

“This area is ’cleaned’,” Kira explained, her pace steady. “Our warriors patrol these woods every sunrise. They hunt down any stray Marauders that try to slip through, and the Shaman-Circle maintains the ward-stones. That’s why the air feels calm here. Otherwise, every little thing would have tried to eat you by now.”

Sol’s gaze drifted forward just as a group of large, white deer or deer-like creatures with antlers that looked like flowering cherry branches crossed the path ahead of them. Seeing them they didn’t bolt. They simply paused, acknowledged the duo with a slow blink, and continued their leisurely stroll into the glowing brush.

All in all, it was breathtaking. It was a paradise designed by a god with an unlimited budget. The colors shimmered, the silence was serene, and for a moment, Sol almost believed in the illusion of peace.

…

Yet beneath that beauty, his mind couldn’t stop thinking about the Bear-warrior, Korg. He couldn’t stop thinking about the double-jaws and the necrotizing poison.

This paradise is built on a pile of corpses, Sol thought, his crimson eyes glowing a bit brighter.

He looked at his hands. He thought about the “Memory Palace” in his head. He saw the blueprints for a water-filtration system. He saw the design for a repeating crossbow. Blueprints of various weapons. Knowledge from another world, another life. Tools that could change everything.

But as the designs shimmered in his thoughts, doubt gnawed at him. If I brought those things here… would I be helping this garden thrive? Or would I become the blight Kira warned about?

No one knew the right answer. But Sol did know one thing: he couldn’t simply scatter his knowledge across this land without first weighing its impact.

Because he already knew the answer from his past life. He had seen forests stripped bare for progress, rivers poisoned in the name of convenience, skies choked with smoke that no prayer could cleanse. Technology had always promised salvation, but more often it had carved scars into the earth that never healed.

He looked around at the jungle, it was alive in ways his old world had forgotten. Its canopy glowing with strange power, its roots humming with unseen life. To introduce steel, fire, and industry into this place might not be a gift… it might be a desecration.

And more importantly, he would not allow this world to become like the one he had left behind… pollution choking rivers, plastic lodged in human flesh, even the air itself poisoned with invisible toxins.

To hell with advancement, he thought bitterly. If the cost is the destruction of this beauty, then it’s better to let those technologies rot inside my mind.

The truth was, this world already had its own foundation. Magic-like power coursed through its veins, shaping beasts, forests, and even the phantoms that walked beside warriors. They did not need to lean on steel and smoke the way his old world had. Here, survival and progress could be written in mana, not machinery.

Sol’s crimson eyes narrowed as he exhaled, the jungle’s breath mingling with his own. For now, restraint was wisdom. He would watch, he would learn, and only when the balance was clear would he decide whether to plant seeds of knowledge… or keep them buried in the vault of his Memory Palace.

…