The rules for the Whole Rose Garden were quite simple. One wasn't allowed to fight inside. One couldn't destroy or take away any of the plants. And they could only take so many at once. To limit the amount of flowers one could take, they were forced to leave after they had gathered a decent chunk of lower.
Momo read the rule with a bit of a confused look. "How will they reinforce the rules?" she asked.
"There is a formation around the whole garden that keeps continuous surveillance on everyone inside and knows what they are doing. Once you stay inside for too long or take too many flowers, they will send people to get you to leave."
"What if we have to leave?" Momo asked, worried.
"Then we leave," Alex said. "They won't ban you. They will just ask you to co back after a month."
"Oh, that's not bad," Momo said.
"No, it's not bad. It's actually quite a great system in my opinion," Alex said. "It stops soone from taking away all the important ingredients and forces you to manage your ti properly. Speaking of which, let's make proper use of ours."
"Ah, yes," Momo said and began following Alex.
They entered the garden and were imdiately t with a variety of rose flowers, growing sowhere in a bunch, sowhere alone. So bushes lay in a bunch, while so stood alone. So bushes were tall, so sort, almost all with branches that had thorns in them.
There was no order to where they grew. They were allowed to grow anywhere they wanted without any human intervention, and there was a sort of beauty to that.
Order in the disorder.
"Wow!" Momo said, moving closer to one of the very first flowers she saw. Alex grabbed her by the shoulders. "Rember now, so of them are poisonous, and so will lure you on purpose too. You have to keep your wits about it when walking through this place."
"Huh?" Momo seed confused at having been pulled back. Only a second later did she realize what she was about to do just now and gasped. "Was I going to die?" Alex laughed. "No, the Leopard-cloud Rose —the orange one with a few black petals— propagates by luring unsuspecting creatures to rip it off the stem. You take the flower and start walking, and a few hours later when the flower loses all potency, you finally realize what you had been doing this entire ti, at which point you drop the flower soplace else, allowing it to propagate."
"There is nothing harmful about what it does, except for the fact that it lulls you for hours, which could be dangerous in a place like this."
"Wow, and it's placed right at the front," Momo said.
"Likely soone took it from inside and snapped out of it only when they were coming back toward the gate and dropped it here. You will see this rose in a ton of places inside. Just… cover your senses with your spiritual sense and you'll be fine."
Momo was a little confused about what to do exactly, but she did as she was told and was surprised to find that she was suddenly feeling a lot better about, well, everything. There were so many things trying to influence her that she hadn't even realized.
"Wow, are you doing the sa, master?" Momo asked.
"No, the Leopard-Cloud Rose is only a Saint-rank flower. Anyone who has ford their Nascent Soul would be too strong for it to affect, and I am already an Immortal."
"I see," Momo said. "Then I am only the weak one."
"Yes, that's why we are here to protect you," Alex said, pushing her along. "Let's continue."
Roses were not the only flower in the Whole Rose Garden, but they were the majority. They were available in every color, every size, and with almost every scent.
They didn't grow neatly in a row, but there was a path through them, which Alex and the rest took. They went through the flowers, looking for the ones they needed.
Along the way, Alex began explaining each and every flower to Momo, who took it all in expertly. He taught her the nas of the flowers, what they did, and how they could be recognized when not on the plant. He taught her how to procure them from the plant for the special ones that didn't want to be plucked away.
He told her all the properties each one of the flowers had, and whenever he ca by a repeat flower, he had her repeat everything she had learned about it all.
Momo was great at rembering information, but now she had to co up with what she knew at a mont's notice. Unlike Alex's Alchemy God's Knowledge —which allowed him to spontaneously know everything about plants thanks to the inheritance— Momo had to go through it the normal way, learning all the nas and properties the hard way.
Rembering was easy, but recalling it from such a vast array of information she rembered was not. She got better at it as ti passed, however, and very soon, she would be amazing at it.
Even though it took ti for now, she repeated every word Alex had taught her, and that made him happy.
They plucked a few flowers along the way. So by Alex, so by Momo, so by Pearl, and so by Whisker.
Because the formation counted people individually and instead of a group, it was better to split the task of taking away the roses so as to not cause it to alert them.
The garden was large enough that it would take them days to go through it all normally. Just 4 hours after arriving here, the place was already in the shadows.
"Hmm?" Momo looked up. "It should only be afternoon. It's already so dark."
Alex pointed to the 5 mountains that were closest to them. "The Hand of the God casts a shadow onto the land just after afternoon. So half of the day in this garden is spent in the shadows," he explained.
"Really? Don't plants need sunlight to thrive?" Momo asked.
"Not all plants," Alex explained. "Most plants can survive on Qi too, but they need to be of a higher rank. That is why you only see Saint rank and Immortal rank flowers in here. My Master said there were a few Divine rank flowers in here too, but I am not sure if those are still here or not."
"Divine rank…" Momo said with wide eyes. That was nothing but a concept to her, and even then she understood how big it was.
"There's no point in looking forward to such a flower though. Even if we do find it sowhere hiding in here, we won't be able to—"
Alex paused, looking in a direction. "To?"
"To get it," Alex finished as a wide smile ford on his face. "Finally, there it is."
"What is it?" Momo asked, looking in the sa direction as him. She saw an ordinary plant like every other in this region. "The plant of the flower I was looking for," Alex said. "The Seven-Colored Angel Rose."
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