"…do I have one?"

"Get within 60 feet of me and I can check?"

Arete moves closer to the box until she is within range.

Arete appears soulless and not-alive, similar to the bean sprout. "I'm not seeing any soul or any other usage of positive energy, you look just as not-alive as your bean sprouts do," Griffie says. "In theory the barriers between us could be blocking my detection-ability, but that seems unlikely to me."

"I see."

Griffie looks contemplative, then concerned.

"Actually, we need to talk more before I do active tests on the beansprouts, I just thought of a big concern. Leonarda, you said that our deities who hurt people sound like someone took the flaws that people sometimes reach, and turned them into actual people, who are the very worst traits made manifest. That's actually a very good summary of the process by which they draw power and create their realms and servants and whatnot? And the helpful ones are the moral opposite of that. We technically don't know the exact origin of the deities that existed prior to the big war, history broke, but it would be unsurprising to me if that was involved in their origins as well. Basically, people produce quintessence of things like love, hate, blacksmithing, the desire to defend each other, lots of stuff. This process depends on positive energy. Technically, animals and plants participate some too. I want a better model of this before I touch positive energy to one of your plants, or at least we should think about it more."

Leonarda takes a deep breath "So… you may be able to create deities, and that might be an outcome of this experiment?"

"It'd be an extremely slow process, and the feedback loops of 'a little bit of goodness-quintessence is used for goodness, which produces more goodness-quintessence' might converge, not diverge."

"Is there some way you can test?"

"Or predict the sort of deity that would result."

"Well, really testing with a bean sprout shouldn't do much. Even if I cause it to have a tiny proto-soul like a bean sprout in my world would, it would still be a mere bean sprout. It shouldn't produce much quintessence of any kind and what little it does produce would dissipate. I'm producing a lot more quintessence than a bean sprout would and don't know how to stop. The quintessence should be linked to the actions I've been taking since I arrived, most of which you've observed. The actions you didn't observe were not that interesting? I tried to call Axis, and failed. I did work on the 'Life Bubble' spell. I drew the stars. I tried different spells for figuring stuff out about this place, but they didn't work. I tried to call the Upper Planes, uh, that's where the helpful deities live, and that didn't work. I used a spell to make a calming noise. And then when I saw your sphere-constructs I waved around my light and yelled for help. But really, one person doesn't produce a lot of quintessence."

"…does this process continue after the destruction of things other than the soul?"

"Yes."

"So… there is nothing we can currently do except hope that this process does not cause any harm to us, as we have no method at all of stopping it, including killing you."

"I've been doing harmless things, so even if it somehow does produce significant enough quantities to affect you, it shouldn't cause you harm? I actually have a sample of concentrated Upper Planes quintessence. It's mixed with water, so it'd probably destabilize outside my bubble. I can't make more of it but I can definitely spare some drops for analysis. I am avoiding the term 'goodness quintessence' on the basis that you are concerned about propaganda campaigns but the substance could reasonably be called that, it's derived from stuff like acting-with-the-goal-of-defending-others and whatnot."

"That is… promising, it sounds like at least. My primary focus was on the implications for the experiment. Beginning the process… would be concerning, but… adding a beansprout to the process… seems… it certainly sounds harmless to me, yet somehow I find myself concerned that to you, beansprouts are horrible monsters that enjoy tearing people's teeth out."

"Beansprouts are not horrible monsters that enjoy tearing people's teeth out. I agree that adding a beansprout to the process doesn't sound concerning. If it were concerning, it would be because of ways in which your world's beansprouts are worse than mine in significant ways?"

"…I don't think so? What would… that look like?"

"Uh. Are beansprouts the sort of plant that poison the soil around them, killing competitors but also significantly hurting themselves? Stuff like that."

"…I will see about getting you the most friendly and cooperative plant we have onboard. This make take a bit."

"It really shouldn't matter much, but that sounds like a reasonable precaution from your standpoint and I am happy to wait."

"My legacy will not be that I brought fiends into our world by being too hasty about beansprouts."

"I got a slower introduction to this mess than you're getting. I wish it weren't so overwhelming for you."

"Appreciated. I'll return soon."

"Alright. Can you have someone send me those causes-of-death statistics and city-destruction statistics and reports?"