With the help of Emeraldine, Root, and Ash, and well, Jonathan for more purifying stuff, alongside my near endlessly regenerating Mana, we got to work.
First of all, we helped Ash manipulate his Mana, and to "feel" the soul within him. He slowly began to imbue this soul's powers into the contaminated soil, purifying it easily.
With Emeraldine and Jonathan's aid, the soil was purified rapidly as long as I gave them Mana, and after just a single hour, the entire contaminated area was completely purified.
The dead trees remained dead though, they were completely soulless, the souls were probably sucked away by the evil god fragment, so there wasn't anything we could do about those.
I dedicated to cut down the trees with everyone else, and take them out of the soil completely, as I stored them inside my Inventory so they wouldn't bother anybody, they ended being named "Death Miasmic Wood" and were a pretty good-looking material, so I kept it. Might come in handy in the future.
After that, Root helped by setting up the "pillar" for the new forest, using his own roots and creating mini spirit tree clones of himself, which Emeraldine using her Yggdrasil magic, helped to grow and multiply even more.
She was already able to create lesser Yggdrasil wood with her Yggdrasil Spirit Magic anyways, so this time we made sure the entire forest was made out of spirit trees!
Doing that with everyone else's help took roughly almost the entire day, we took a break to eat and continued until the night came.
The rest of the villagers eventually joined us, as they glanced the forest grow and develop. Grass and flowers grew around, and the trees, despite being newborn, reached almost the same size as the ones from before the incident.
However, even with all of this, we still needed the forest's core. Root had offered himself to become the forest's core. After all, his entire body had grown tremendously big.
And we agreed, because the soul of the lesser Yggdrasil inside of Ash didn't seem to want to leave him, Root absorbed Ash's powers, which he imbued into him, alongside Emeraldine's spirit magic, and my Mana.
And a huge "clone" of Root, connected to the roots beneath the ground that connected to our city, emerged, growing as tall as the older tree.
"I'll make sure to take care of this place too, gyuh! Leave it to me- Ah, now it feels like I have two minds gyuh? How weird gyuh… Well, whatever!" Root said carefreely.
"Well, even if his connection with his main body is cut, the one from here won't die, there'll be… two Roots I guess?" I wondered. "Though this one will be much weaker. Nonetheless, he'll protect the place if its ever attacked again."
"That's a relief…" August sighed.
"I feel like I've made a strange bond… The crystal in my chest… It feels like it is imbuing its strength in there." Said Ash in surprise.
"Most likely." Emeraldine nodded. "The Ancient Spirit Tree's Soul wants to remain with you, but at the same time, it created a special Spirit Bond with the Root here, to imbue more and more of his former strength into him. Looks like you've become his successor, Root."
"Gyuh? Thank you, Ancient Spirit Tree!" Said Root politely.
"What… will happen to me now? Where should I go?" Ash wondered. "Mom's dead… Should I go back to Goldsand?"
"Well…" August wondered. "If you want to, you could stay here. How about it?"
"B-But… after everything I've done?" Ash asked. "Doesn't everyone in the village hate me?"
"We heard what happened from August and Emeraldine."
"And after seeing you help them regrow the forest into this state, we can't really blame you anymore."
"You've redeemed yourself quite well, boy."
"Stay with us and keep proving us that you're a good kid."
All the villagers seemed to agree. Nobody seemed to mind that he could stay there. I didn't wanted to bring him back to Goldsand, it looked to be a dangerous place. It is better if he stayed here, in the safety we've created.
"E-Everyone…" Ash continued crying. "I'm sorry… and thanks… I'll keep working hard… to redeem myself, even if a little bit… every day."
"Hahaha, okay, no need to cry any more tears, kid." August laughed. "How about we have a communal dinner with the rest of the village? Some hunters ended hunting a big giant wild boar, so there's a lot of meat!"
"Oh, the hunters already went to hunt?!" Emeraldine was surprised.
"Of course, once they felt revitalized they said they wanted meat, and went out of their way to catch the first thing they could find in the outer forest that wasn't affected by the miasma, hahaha!" August laughed. "We elves are a resilient and hard-working bunch!"
"That much is clear." I laughed. "Anyways, let's get going then. Root, wanna join?"
One of Root's many clones turned into his small, adorable egg-shaped spirit embodiment form, and floated at our side.
"Meat! Meat! I like meat gyuh!" Root started singing.
"A tree that likes meat?" Wondered August. "Our new Tree Guardian is sure a peculiar one, hahaha!" The rest of the villagers laughed along.
We spent the rest of the night celebrating, eating, and laughing. We let bygones be bygones, and we looked forward to a brighter future together.
And once the next morning came, we departed, above Lucifer's large back, saying our goodbyes.
"Thank you for your hospitality and everything else!" I said, waving my hands. "We'll come back once we're done with what we want to do!"
"Goodbye uncle! Please take care of Ash! And yourself too, obviously!" Emeraldine said.
"We'll do! Don't worry!" August said. "Safe travels, everyone! I'll be praying to the Yggdrasil Tree for you to find Maria's missing brother!"
"Thank you so much!" I smiled.
Without further ado, we left. We arrived when everything was dark, desolated, and contaminated. But once we left, everything was bright, green, and lively.
And I hope it stays like that forever…