Let's Go Catch the Boss! (Already Dead)

The cards did not simply rain down in straight lines.

Some wheeled through the air like a flock of birds, slicing past the organization members' elbows and ankles as they went.

These were cards that had been enhanced well beyond a mere Straight.

Anyone below executive rank took the hits helplessly and screamed, while only the B-class and stronger fighters frantically swatted the cards aside with their swords or threw up barriers to protect themselves.

But that was not the end of it…

"Queek!" "Beep!" "Pik!" "Kruung!" "Ppyuik!" "Dduibbak!"

Teddy bears came pouring in from somewhere, making every bizarre noise imaginable. Each one clutched a suppression baseball bat as they flooded onto the deck in a stampede.

The organization members stared at the scene with utterly dumbfounded expressions.

"Toy golems? What the hell is this all of a sudd—gah!"

CRACK!

The bat swung without mercy.

The man who'd been gawking blankly at the teddy bears took a blow to the head and toppled backward, while the one who'd tried to react quickly got swarmed by dozens of Party Bears that beat him into paste with their bats.

They didn't discriminate—whether it was the injured crawling on the floor with severed Achilles tendons or cowards trying to flee, the bears chased them down and group-assaulted them to the bitter end.

The members of the Gate of Valhalla who witnessed this were truly horrified and hastily drew their guns.

"What the fuck is that?!"

Yeah. What is it, indeed.

"Shoot! Shoot them all dead!"

"Don't let your guard down! Those aren't just toys!"

They were members of what was supposedly an international mafia organization. No matter how many of the things had charged them, they couldn't just go down this helplessly.

The surviving executives immediately recognized that these were golems of a considerable level.

BANG! BANG! RATATATATA!!

Hundreds of gunshots rang out in an instant.

They began to put up some resistance, grazing or piercing through some of the Party Bears' torsos and limbs.

Of course, putting a few holes in a "doll" wouldn't kill it—but because their bodies were so light, getting hit easily threw off their balance or knocked them backward.

In that brief window, the executives devised a counter-strategy for these never-before-seen golems.

"E-everyone get up here! All of you! Release the 'dogs' too!"

But even so, there were simply too many of them. Wherever they'd come from, there looked to be hundreds at a rough estimate.

On top of that, the flames from elemental magic and the toxic gas smoke obscured their vision, making it hard to track the agile teddy bears' movements with their eyes.

Tweet—

Someone blew a whistle, and several containers clanked open.

From the dark interiors, plant masses shaped like wolves began pouring out.

Their heads looked like flower buds with teeth, their bodies were green stems covered in leaves, and their four legs were replaced by brown roots.

So they came out.

Pecia, who'd been watching the Party Bears with satisfaction, narrowed her brow.

These were the Plant Queen's original main force.

They normally snuck into ships disguised as cargo, then came pouring out the moment the Plant Queen's safety was threatened.

Getting bitten by those flower-bud heads inflicted a Plantification Curse—a curse that usually affected ordinary people with little or no mana.

In other words, anyone of a certain class or higher could avoid the curse.

To the current Party Bears, they were just plant-made mutts.

"What do you want to do? Want me to distract them, or will you take them?"

{Kill them all!}

{Brawl time! Fun!}

{Resistance makes it fun!}

"Figured as much. Then I'll head downstairs for a bit—finish cleaning up while I'm gone. Don't kill any humans."

{Ura!}

{Let's go! Physical therapy!}

The Party Bears were thoroughly hyped up.

She'd deliberately restricted their use of steel needles to prevent fatalities. Now that magical beasts they could freely slaughter had appeared, how could they not be delighted?

Shing! The Party Bears all drew their steel needles at once and charged with ppyuik sounds. They collided head-on with the hundred-odd Plant Wolves rushing at them, and the deck instantly turned into pure chaos.

Flower heads with their necks sliced by steel needles tumbled across the floor, and white cotton fluff from Party Bears cut by plant thorns swirled wildly like spring pollen.

Whoa.

A brawl between C-class magical beasts was quite the spectacle.

The Party Bears were stronger and had better coordination, but it was still enough of a fight to actually call it "combat."

But I'm going to have to heal all of them later.

That was the problem.

Eating magical beast corpses would restore them to some degree, but it wouldn't be enough.

And if she just left them like that, Yena would see them and throw a fit for sure. In the end, she'd have to repair them with Mana Cotton and Mana Cloth again.

Well, it's not like I can leave this to the humans either.

Pecia clicked her tongue at the hassle and headed for the lower decks of the ship.

"You…! That purple-haired brat is the golem controller! Shoot her!"

"Correct."

WHOOSH!

She opened her umbrella straight ahead, and the bullets streaking toward Pecia all slid along the umbrella's slanted surface and bounced right off.

They spun a full circle through the air, then reverse-charged the executives, piercing straight through their arms and legs.

THUDTHUDTHUDTHUD!

"Gyaaaaah!"

"Hwaaaaaah!!"

The executives screamed. Silver baseball bats came crashing down on their heads. Party Bears that hadn't missed the B-class ability users' injuries charged in immediately.

These weren't theme park magical beasts that would just sit and watch a strong opponent get weakened.

Even after Pecia disappeared down the stairs, the horrific screams continued to ring out for quite some time.

I knew it would be like this.

A cold smile rose to Pecia's lips.

The Plant Queen's response was exactly as she'd predicted, without the slightest deviation.

The ship's interior was like a maze full of traps.

Thorn vines shot out from the walls like bullets ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠to attack, and tiny winged seeds tried to infiltrate nostrils and ear canals.

The floor would suddenly give way while walking, and what seemed like a wall would collapse like jelly and spew toxic gas.

"No ordinary cargo ship would be this freewheeling."

Parts of the structure had been replaced with plants.

Now that her identity had been exposed, escape would only get harder, so she'd prepared for a full-scale battle instead.

In other words, the Plant Queen had no intention of getting out alive.

"I should've handled this a bit more quietly."

If she'd left people to die according to the original history, the Plant Queen would have come and gotten captured without knowing a thing.

Making a ruckus and getting discovered had nearly made things a bit more annoying.

The traps the Queen had set up personally would be too much for most hunters. If an A-class got hit with a proper Plantification Curse, it would be a real headache.

"What do you think, Psychology Hagweed?"

{……}

Pecia asked, spinning a card around her fingertip.

The Plant Queen, Psychology Hagweed, was right in front of her.

In her basic form, multiple stems were woven together into the shape of a human woman. Her arms and legs stretched out in a Y-shape, spreading throughout the ship—apparently connected to the bizarre structures Pecia had passed through.

Simply put, she was integrated with the ship itself.

The Plant Queen, who had been staring at Pecia expressionlessly, opened her mouth.

{Queen of the Amusement Park, Pecia von Chiffonside.}

"Yeah."

{You are the Demon God's seventh daughter. The reason you remain here before your powers have blossomed is… pffah!}

The Plant Queen took a slap from Pecia and drooled thick green liquid from her mouth.

Five trump cards vanished into smoke from Pecia's hand.

"That was a Back Straight slap. Next is a Mountain. And it's only going to keep going up from here."

{Wh… what?}

"Skip the fancy talk and speak simply. Stop putting on airs for no reason."

What actually mattered wasn't Pecia's own identity or the world's settings.

It was the item the Plant Queen was holding.

Pecia jabbed a finger at the Plant Queen like she was pointing an accusation.

"Don't even think about fooling my eyes with that long-winded speech. Hand over the Psycho Berserker you're holding right now."

{…!}

The Plant Queen replied in a chilly tone.

{Even for Royalty, you cross the line. Not content with arbitrarily breaking the summoning rules, you would seize my treasure as well. You will die here.}

Suddenly the surroundings began to vibrate heavily, and powerful mana waves started surging from all directions.

Mana that could make even an S-class flinch condensed in various places, and from each center, plant stems jutted out long like gun barrels.

But that was all.

From the barrels aimed at Pecia, there was no reaction whatsoever.

{…?}

Thinking the magic circle's response was strangely delayed, the Plant Queen looked around—and found trump cards embedded throughout the Queen's chamber.

Every single one was positioned to exquisitely twist and sever the Plant Queen's mana circuits.

{…!}

Pecia let out a sigh.

"If you were going to abandon personal combat power for a form like that, you should've expected this too. As expected, you're boring relative to how much of a hassle you are."

If they'd simply clashed with raw power, the fight would have dragged on.

After all, the Queen was S-class and Pecia was B-class.

But the Queen hadn't anticipated Pecia's invasion, nor the existence of her Legendary mental skill. So she'd fortified the ship itself to maximize her forces in the shortest time possible, and as a result, her main body had weakened.

Pecia raised both palms.

"How is your response always so consistent?"

{Pe… Pecia von Chiffonside…!}

"You need a beating, right? With a Double Mountain."

BOOM—!! CRASH!!!

A few days later.

Veteran hunters from the Hunter Administration were stationed throughout Incheon Port to wipe out the Gate of Valhalla and the Plant Queen.

I was participating as a collaborator under the Incheon Branch, with the role of releasing the mental domination on the brainwashed hunters.

Perhaps due to reliability concerns, I wasn't given as big a role as I might have expected.

The Director of the Central Hunter Administration continued his speech.

"The moment the Plant Queen comes under attack, the infected will launch a disruption! You must maintain formation and not pursue too deeply. If you prioritize glory and endanger civilian safety, you will be held strictly accountable. Is that clear!"

"Yes, sir!"

"Next, the extermination team. The target is a plant-type S-class. Casualties are inevitable, but respond in a ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠way that minimizes loss of life as much as possible."

"Understood!"

"From this moment, we stake the honor of the great Hunter Administration…"

This is way too dramatic.

Right now, that ship was so neutralized that you could send in cleaning staff and they'd finish the job.

Feeling like things had somehow gotten a bit too big, I turned to Kang Jiye with a nervous heart.

"Um, I have something to say…"

Kang Jiye, checking my expression, responded on automatic reflex.

"Hm? Why, don't tell me you caused ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠an accident in the middle of all this?"

"…"

An accident.

An accident, huh.

Strictly speaking, it wasn't, right? I didn't kill anyone ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠or anything.

"Of course not. I'm not a child."