Chapter 153
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Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 153
Chapter Title: Lie
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High Elf Rene attempted to commune with the forest surrounding her dungeon—a natural fortress unlike any other—after stepping outside its bounds.
Her senses expanded endlessly in response. The grasses and trees blooming throughout the woods became her eyes and ears, relaying all sorts of information to her.
-...As expected... around here... those elf-eared freaks...
A stranger's voice—a demonkin—drifted through the foliage. These outsiders had been showing up in droves lately.
Rene let out an irritated sigh as she sensed the presence of demonkin combing through the area like they owned the place, all sharing the same goal. She extended her hand toward a nearby tree.
-Shurik!!
The branch twisted like a living thing, bending and hardening into a bow frame. Rene plucked a few strands of her own hair and strung them across it.
She fashioned an arrow the same way, then closed her eyes, focusing solely on the sensations from the vegetation. With that, she loosed the arrow straight toward the blue sky.
-Shiiiiiik!!!
"Don't make so much noise. Elves have sensitive ears..."
"Hmph. Even if they do, aren't they just one of the weaklings from the south? That pathetic—Gurk."
-Thuk!!
The demonkin who had been trampling through the woods in search of elves died instantly, his skull pierced through before he even realized what hit him.
Rene dispatched the second one—panicking and trying to flee—with archery skills that transcended mastery itself, a divinely inspired curved shot. She scoffed as she recalled the dead demonkin's pitiful last words.
The notion that southern demonkin had grown weak stemmed from the collapse of the southern demon realm and various dungeons, a label slapped onto the surviving weaklings and the new dungeons that rose in their place.
Rene's dungeon, however, had existed even before the demon realm's fall and had evaded large-scale subjugation efforts. It was an exception to that judgment.
"Am I... getting close to my peak again?"
Rene clenched and unclenched her fist casually, gauging her strength after effortlessly slaying the two demonkin.
Back when her dungeon had only a single sacred tree, she had yielded it to her daughter and sustained herself on the energy flowing from the dungeon core to make up for the deficit.
But now, thanks to the Dryad Lady's blessing, she had acquired a new sacred tree. No longer needing to expend the core's power to fill her lacks, she was gradually regaining the strength she had displayed long ago, before her daughter was even born.
'That's why... I can't forgive scum like them.'
Rene smiled as she thought of the adorable Dryad Lady, but her expression soon turned icy once more.
The great Dryad had bestowed her blessing, ensuring she and her daughter would never part, and had even saved her life. She couldn't allow such worthless thugs—who neither recognized that value nor comprehended even a speck of her greatness—to get anywhere near her.
Of course, the Dryad Lady had that unfathomable guardian by her side...
'Another one's here.'
As Rene, resolved to eliminate every demonkin hunting the Dryad, prepared to sever her communion with the forest, she sensed yet another new presence entering the woods.
She sighed deeply but first tried to gauge the intruder's movements. It might just be some lost wanderer—not worth attacking blindly...
-Ohsok!!!!
'What?!'
Rene shuddered as the plants relayed their sensations through the communion. The trees, the grass, the entire forest—they were all screaming.
Grasses wilted involuntarily at the sense of an overwhelming, unstoppable giant. Leaves rained down from the trees in droves.
These spirit trees, nurtured by elven hands for over a century—nearing two hundred years—had naturally absorbed vitality, transcending ordinary plants and gaining faint egos of their own. Now, they were steeped in terror.
-Kwadududuk!!!
"Th-the barrier...!!"
The barrier formed by the guardian trees that Rene had personally cultivated and planted was shattering outright. The ward that had repelled invaders for two centuries... was crumbling just from that existence passing through.
"...Lady..."
Rene, lost in confusion, snapped back to her senses upon hearing the intruder's voice through the vegetation.
A chilling voice, like muffled sobbing. Deep despair and sorrow. And thick madness. Trembling, Rene gripped her bow tightly with shaking hands.
'What is that woman? Is she one of the demonkin searching for the Dryad Lady?'
A demonkin she had never seen before. Yet, somehow familiar. Right as a sense of déjà vu hit her, the mysterious woman sobbed out someone's name again.
"Lady Erzsebet...!"
"....!!"
A familiar name. The moment she heard it, Rene realized why the woman felt so eerily familiar.
'The one by the Master's side...!'
The Dryad's master—and potentially the new demon realm of the south, given her dungeon—the Dungeon Master.
She recalled that the white-haired woman by that Master's side was named 'Erzsebet.' Rene hesitated.
'She's a bit... different. Who is she? Why would anyone radiating that kind of aura be searching for the Master's woman...'
The energy she exuded was far too ominous to dismiss as mere resemblance. Up close, blood tears streamed from her eyes, and the plants touching those tears writhed in agony.
And just as Rene froze under that unnatural pressure, yet another newcomer appeared, unfatigued.
"This is where the elf-eared freaks were last spotted fifty years ago... Hm? Hey. You there, woman."
A rough tone, a western accent. And the attitude of dismissing other demonkin on sight, simply for being southern.
This demonkin checked every box proving he was from the west. He barged into the forest without manners, trampling grasses and snapping branches, only to encounter the blood-weeping woman.
"You. Local demonkin around here? Perfect. Lead the way."
Calmly, as if obedience were only natural when he commanded. The demonkin ordered the white-haired woman.
She turned her head and looked at him.
"Lady Erzsebet... Do you know where she is?"
"What?"
Erzsebet again. Asking where she was.
He had clearly ordered her to guide him, but now questions were coming from her instead. The presumed western demonkin spat on the ground and approached her closely.
"Ears clogged? I said guide me, not spout bullshit—"
"You don't know... Lady Erzsebet?"
"Erzsebet my ass, I don't know who that mongrel even—"
Already pissed from marching in boldly to hunt elves only to get lost in this maze of a forest reminiscent of the western great woods, the demonkin snarled harshly at the blood-tear-weeping woman... Bathory.
-Seogeok!!!
"Huh? What sound was th—H-Hraaaagh!!!"
"How... dare you...!!!!!!!!"
Erzsebet. The demonkin who spat out 'mongrel' after uttering her name heard a faint slicing sound—then felt his right arm suddenly missing. He looked down.
His right arm had been severed cleanly, as if it had never been there. Strangely, not a single drop of blood seeped from the stump.
"With that filthy mouth... you dare speak her name?"
"Gaaah! What the hell, you crazy bitch...! You asked me first—!"
-Kwaduk!!!
"....!!!"
Rene, watching through her forest communion, froze solid. His speech was crude, but his aura marked him as a fairly strong demonkin.
That confidence let him roam alone and belittle anyone he met on sight.
Yet this woman handled him like twisting a child's wrist—in an instant. And...
'I couldn't even see it properly...!'
During communion, Rene's senses transcended limits. Every blade of grass and tree became her eyes and ears, granting perception beyond mortal bounds. Even so, she hadn't caught when this woman severed that demonkin's arm.
That horrifying sight and wariness toward the stranger instinctively made Rene grip her bow tight, radiating hostility toward her.
-Heok!!
"...!!!"
The female demonkin whipped her head around, sensing Rene's brief burst of aura.
'She's onto me...!!'
In that split second, countless thoughts flashed through Rene's mind as she weighed her best option. She pulled out the crystal orb she always carried and activated it.
The one linking her to the Master she served.
And no sooner had she done so...
-Kwang!!!
The woman had sprouted wings of blood on her back and torn through the forest barrier, appearing before Rene in a flash.
"Lady Erzsebet... Do you know her?"
Bathory had followed a vague pull south but couldn't pinpoint the direction.
If Lady Erzsebet was in the south, Bathory—who had received and slowly absorbed her blood over ages, even returning most of it—should have sensed her location without fail.
Yet some strange intuition told her: Lady Erzsebet was here somewhere. So Bathory's method was brute force—grabbing every demonkin she met and asking.
Crude as it was, she was desperate. Compared to centuries of waiting, interrogating passersby was nothing.
"........."
The crystal activated, but there was no time to wait for the Master's reply. Rene hid it behind her back and stalled, using the simple message function for emergencies if no response came.
"I don't know who you're talking about. This is elven territory, intruder. I'll overlook the damage to the forest, so leave..."
"Liar."
"....!!"
Rene had no intention of handing over info on the Master—or rather, the woman by his side—to some unidentified being. She lied with the calmest face she could muster, but Bathory detected it from the subtle shifts in her bloodstream.
"Your heart pumped a bit more blood... You're tense, heartbeat racing... A lie..."
She dropped the speech patterns from her days mimicking her lady. No more rudeness now that her lady had returned.
Instead, Bathory squeezed out the blood power still lingering in her body.
The remnants she could no longer return to Erzse, fully absorbed after ages.
-Chwaaaak!!
"Where... is she?"
"........"
Rene had sent the message. Through her forest communion, she swiftly ordered her elven subordinates to evacuate, then sneered.
"Who knows. Didn't I just say I don't know?"
"........."
The blood-tear-weeping woman's face hardened coldly. Moments later, Rene nocked an arrow as a massive wave of blood crashed toward her.