Chapter 338
Chapter 338
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 338
Chapter Title: Can One Who Has Seen the End of the World Plant an Apple Tree? (43)
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Boom!
“Ugh.... Umm....”
An explosion. It was an explosion like hurling the entire city wall into the sea that roused Idrasil. Amid the ear-piercing noise, she spotted an old man drenched in sweat. He was gently catching the Professor as he bounced this way and that while manipulating the water, all the while striving tirelessly to slow Termakian’s momentum. Meanwhile, mutants that had broken away from the battlefield were charging wildly at the ship to stop him.
The sailors were desperately steering the vessel in circles around the moon to evade those mutants, while Notum unleashed spells on the ones they couldn’t shake.
The Professor’s battle with Termakian. Right, I was on the battlefield.
‘....There are no gaps in my memory. But it feels like I even took a nap.’
It felt like she’d dreamed a very long dream. Her mind was clear, as if kissed by a gentle breeze, and the memories before her eyes were vivid even as they scattered like mist.
Memories? Memories of something. There were memories that lingered, hazy yet sharp at the same time.
The World Tree, her encounter with the Mother Tree. Whispers of an unknowable secret. A predetermined future and futures yet unwritten. And what she had to do.
Idrasil sensed something odd from her back—the sensation from the dream—and untied the quiver strapped there.
‘It’s here.’
She hadn’t known what she was searching for, but the instant her eyes fell on it, she knew. The arrows lay neatly arrayed. Among those dead branches tipped with points and fletched with feathers, one pulsed with vibrant life, sprouting tender green leaves. New life had taken root in a lifeless tree.
Notum, who had been conjuring thorn vines with her spells, startled at the sudden surge of vitality and hurried over.
“Grooo. Arrow....? A living arrow. Precious thing. Elf, where’d you find it?”
“I’m not entirely sure myself.... but it’s clear I have to use this.”
Only after reflexively answering Notum’s startled question did Idrasil mull over the meaning of her own words.
She had to use it. That was the choice she’d made. For someone who had ignored the Mother Tree’s will all this time, it was a baffling decision. Yet an unshakable conviction that this would bring hope had taken firm root within her.
Clack.
Idrasil carefully drew out the small branch—point and fletching intact—and held it before her eyes.
What was it for? Like the barrier trees of her homeland, Carnelan—did she just need to plant it in the ground for it to grow and aid the Professor? Or deliver it to him? Or perhaps....
“....Rakshasa. Where is she now?”
“Desert woman’s over there. Caught the snake bitch.”
The spot Notum indicated was where the moon-pulled sea gave way—what could barely be called a coastline.
Rakshasa had conjured a massive white orb with her sorcery and was now fending off mutants swarming from all sides, desperate to free the captive Nigmi trapped inside.
This was no time for calm questions about hatchlings.
Nor for seeking approval on what lay ahead.
“....Please. Let my choice be the right one.”
Her resolve hardened, Idrasil clutched the World Tree branch that had sprouted from the arrow and dashed toward the ship’s deepest cabin below deck.
Clunk!
“Kek!”
“Krik.... Eh, elf girl. Thought enemies had busted in.”
“No time for chit-chat. Tell me if this stirs anything in you.”
Idrasil cut off the royal blood hatchling mid-sentence and shoved the World Tree branch into his arms.
“This.... an arrow? Made from living wood?”
“Rough around the edges, but kinda pretty....”
Aldar and Senika, the hatchling siblings, stared at the branch she’d handed them like it was some fascinating toy.
They were intrigued, but showed no special reaction.
....Boom.
The roar of battle pierced the cabin’s thick walls with crystal clarity. Time was short.
‘....As I thought. The fact it bloomed on this particular arrow must mean something. I may have to drive it straight into those lizards’ hearts myself.’
As the impatient Idrasil reached to reclaim the branch from Aldar’s hands—
Crunch!
“Oh, big brother?”
“This...!”
Crunch crunch!
Before she could stop him, hatchling Aldarshax devoured the World Tree branch in seconds, eyes glazed like he was entranced.
....Gulp.
The moment she noticed his throat bob vividly as he swallowed the masticated mass—
“Grrrk!”
“Oh, big brother! Elf! Blood.... Big brother’s vomiting blood!”
Aldarshax, who had swallowed the branch, spewed blood as if determined to empty every drop from his body.
“Grrrk, kahak!”
Thud. Roll....
He spat out a small, lumpy thing amid the blood.
A green fragment flecked with metal shards.
‘The sun’s fragment that sealed a dragon’s power with its death. Nul’s final safeguard for a world bereft of its steward. A world twisted before the royal bloodline could go extinct. The seal undone.’
The sight triggered a rush of hazy memories in Idrasil’s mind—flashing up swiftly before dissolving like a mirage.
Moments after the circuit board Aldar had regurgitated crumbled to sand and scattered—
Thump—
“Aldar.... sir?”
“Oh, big brother.... Aldar big brother?”
Thump— Thump—
Color flooded the pallid Aldar’s face. Light seeped from within his skin, as if his chest were ablaze, staining it crimson.
His heart thundered like war drums. With each beat, it shone brighter.
Staggering to his feet, Aldar lurched toward the cabin door, entranced.
Splash. Splash.
The damp, reptilian patter of his footsteps echoed down the corridor below deck.
“Kriruk! E, elf! Wh-what’d you do to big brother....! Snap out of it, big brother!”
Senika wailed tears and clung to him, but his steps toward the outside never faltered.
Thump—
Thump—
Each pulse of his heart flooded him with such ferocious power that his fingers and toes curled inward.
It wasn’t mere strength. It was presence. Authority. The divine right of a being that could stand proudly equal to the world itself.
Clunk—
Creak!
“Elf! Stay put and help out here.... Gurk? Lizard?”
“Th-this! Captain! Get that hatchling back to the cabin! Those mutants on the hull could swarm the deck any second!”
“We’ve got no spare hands ourselves!”
“Wha-what the, where’s it going! Hey!”
Boom—
Kiyaaak! Kaak!
Crunch!
Ahead, water erupted ceaselessly. Disgusting shrieks from mutants clinging to the ship mingled with the crunch of thorn vines pulverizing them.
Aldar staggered across the chaotic deck and slumped against the railing, entwined in thorn vines.
He locked eyes with Idrasil, who had scooped up the toppled Senika, and spoke.
“Elf.... lady.... Take good care.... of Senika....”
“Keuuk! Let.... go! Big brother! What’re you saying, big brother!”
The bewildered half-elf nodded, pinning the thrashing Senika in place. Satisfied, Aldar toppled over the railing like a felled tree.
“Kyaaak!”
“Kraaak, kruwaaak!”
“No, don’t! Big broooother!!!!”
Aldar’s body plummeted into the sand sea teeming with monsters baring razor fangs and talons, vanishing instantly amid their midst.
Screams. And the monsters’ triumphant howls over fresh enemy meat dropped into their grasp.
His fragile flesh shredded pitifully between scythe-like claws, scattering in tatters.
Thump— Thump—
His heart alone. The blood-drenched heart tore free from the mangled body and sank silently into the sand sea.
Thump—
Thump—
.
.
.
.
.
....Thump.
Aldarshax the dragon thought the process akin to life hatching from an egg.
Fwoosh!
『Kruuwaaaaaaaa!!!』
Crunch!
A massive arm burst through the sand, pulverizing the vermin that had rent his old husk.
His birth cry proclaimed his existence to the world in frequencies beyond mortal ears.
Swaaaa—
At last, he emerged from the sand, a form unrivaled among all creatures the gods had dared shape.
His body gleamed with blue scales etched in subtle, rippling patterns. Like the ancestors who once dwelled in this primordial sea, he bore no wings—yet his long, robust frame radiated overwhelming might at a glance. Mighty fangs and flowing whiskers framed eyes aglow with the deep-sea blue of abyssal lights.
Those ink-dark azure eyes surveyed the world unfurled before him.
Pitiful insects clinging ignorantly to his scales shattered against the power coursing over them.
Sailors teetering on the brink of falling from the mast. The captain slumped limp against the helm. Crewmen foaming at the mouth and collapsing.
The elf who had borne the World Tree’s will to him. His blood kin, trembling so violently her tail drummed the deck.
He yearned to offer them warm words, but time was short.
Thump— Thump—
Dragon senses caught the water’s surface detonating. A man impaled on a spear groaned.
And the six-armed fiend shadowing the hurled spear, swinging a halberd at his throat.
Time too scant to close the gap with his newborn form. Aldarshax forwent flight, instead drawing power from his world-pulsing heart and filling his maw.
『Stop.』
Crack!
Word-Command. A savage decree infused with will, hurled at the world’s fabric.
The voice rent the world’s veil and sank to its roots. Mutants, sailors, Termakian’s halberd half-buried in the Professor’s neck—all froze as if by miracle.
A command that pierced the world’s veil to its core. No living thing in this realm could defy a dragon’s Word-Command.
Yet.
“Don’t care what wormhole you slithered from....”
Crack, craaack!
“But my guest.... you’re leaving him behind!”
Boom!
A dragon’s Word-Command stemmed from a presence rivaling a continent’s collective destiny. Every soul here could scar world history indelibly.
Their fates too intertwined, too vast—the newborn dragon’s decree could only bind them momentarily.
“Cough, cough! Kruuuh.... Th-thanks.... No idea where you’re from, dragon....”
『Saladin. You don’t recognize me?』
“Cough, uh.... wh....? Wide circle, sure, but not dragon buddies.... Eastern dragon vibe? Azure Dragon? Korea, maybe? Fellow Asian?”
『Incomprehensible babble.』
“Ah, sorry. This bastard’s game yaps about the outside world like it’s every meal now.”
The Professor, focused on mending his wounds, sized up his draconic rescuer.
No clue. Everyone I know’s slogging through the shit with me—no pristine dragons like this.
『It’s me. Aldarshax. The hatchling siblings under Rakshasa’s protection.』
“That scarf lizard? Grruk?”
『Insult no dragon. Invites calamity.』
The Professor shook his head, forgetting his lolling scarf, as Aldarshax—having barely saved him from Termakian’s halberd poised to cleave the ship—ripped away the entire hull side with the spear-pierced man in his grip.
“Uh.... How’d you pull off a full metamorphosis like that?”
『Long tale, but suffice it: the world’s so warped it demands an ancient dragon’s might. I’ve only just absorbed the knowledge—still disoriented myself.』
Aldarshax glanced between the regenerating Professor cradled in his talons and the facing Termakian.
The foe rolled his shoulders; his unnatural swings normalized swiftly. Word-Command akin to magic, after all—from [Stop], he’d broken free on his own power, proving it futile. No repeat would bind him.
『....A dragon forged from kin’s rotten carcasses and a dead god’s specter. And yet it wields might to defy the world’s will. The ‘trial’ bestowed upon this world has long surpassed all bounds.』
Aldarshax addressed the Professor as Termakian hefted his weapon anew.
『Saladin. Head this way to the moon.』
“Nah, we grab him together and—ah, right.”
The Professor ditched his initial divide-and-conquer notion.
Valkatus, who’d passed dragon power to Termakian, had retreated into the moon. Leave that variable-spawning bastard time, and who knew what schemes? If I were plotting from such a brink, Plan B? Nah—full alphabet, then numeric variants to 32-ga-na-da-ra, all lined up.
‘How long since he broke free of that gold dragon’s corpse? Borrowed body or not, he took a beating. Recovery time, next plot....’
Damn. Options overflowed. The moon’s sea-surging swell made his gut twist with urgency.
“Uh.... Cover me then! Back in a flash!”
『Make haste. The world’s strayed too far already. Further delay, and endings irreversible loom.』
Gurgle!
The Professor nodded; his form plunged ghostlike into the water. Silence blanketed the moon’s sea, which had roiled like an erupting volcano.
Splash. Splash.
Footsteps rippled across the now-still surface.
『Indeed.... Even a pretender, you suit the thief of dragon power. Freed from Word-Command so swiftly—and mobile to boot.』
“Then. Feels like I could soar right now. What a da~mn perfect day. Slaughter ant humans to my heart’s content, suck in power till my roots throb, thrash that ‘father’ Valkatus crooned about—not enough? Now a dragon. Hell, my birthday?”
Termakian whirled his still-awkward arm, flashed a vicious grin, and leveled his weapon’s tip at the dragon.
“Baby dragon. Dice it fine—meat for sis as a gift, heart as mom’s health tonic. Ideal!”
『Steal dragon power, yet claim no right to such hubris.』
Crack—
Aldarshax’s chest heaved; a radiant orb rose to his jaws. His heart, crystallized by absorbed draconic essence. The Dragon Heart.
The heart’s emergence summoned thunderheads over the desert sky.
『Crave sight of your dam charred black by bolts? Come take it!』
Flash!
Rumble!
Desert firmament. Backdropped by lightning-veined thunderheads, the dragon’s sinuous form ascended.
The six-armed beastman clenched his weapon grips to splintering—
Boom!
Draconic thunderbolt met beastkin fury.
The battlefield the Professor had vacated thundered once more.
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Gurgle—
And so. The ragged man forsook the mythic clash behind.
“Open the damn door.... You shit!”
At last, before the sunken moon. He reached for the stage fated as the tale’s finale.
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