136
136 ― Near Seoul
The wounds healed instantly. Broken bones were restored and torn flesh mended in the blink of an eye. Injuries that would have killed an ordinary person from shock alone were cured in a single moment.
However, the light did not heal. The light that had wrapped around her body, not permitting even a trace of shadow, did not return. It scattered and spread chaotically, spraying indiscriminately everywhere.
[ Aaaaaaaaaaah! ]
As the light disappeared and shadows fell, Praysiar writhed in agony. Like a vampire exposed to the sun. Except this one feared and suffered from shadows instead.
"Now!"
The Hunters didn't miss this timing. Neither did Jin-woo. Amid waves of flames and lightning, Jin-woo's sword sliced through Praysiar's body.
That wound would soon heal as well. However, it didn't seem like there was any impact at all. Praysiar had no moment to rest, dodging shadows, dodging Jin-woo's sword, and dodging the Hunters' attacks.
Stress mounted. An emotion similar to hysteria, different from anger. Irritation surged, and light swept away everything around her.
[ Why...... Why in a place like this! ]
Until just moments ago, she had been in her garden. The beautiful garden she had created, solely for herself. A sparkling place with no filthy shadows, filled only with light.
Unforgivable. Both Kang Jin-woo, who had dragged her down, and the Hunters, who were making their move thinking this was their chance. Her light covered the surroundings. Sweeping up Jin-woo and all the Hunters, inviting them into her domain. The next moment, all of them were invited to Praysiar's garden.
"Wh, where is this......"
"What the......"
It was a beautiful place. A place with no filth whatsoever. A place where unnecessary thoughts weren't needed, and one could live simply by following orders.
Gradually, everyone's consciousness grew hazy. Their focus blurred, their bodies lost balance and staggered before collapsing. Thud. Thud. Hunters are falling one by one. But even when they fell, it didn't hurt. The soft earth and grass cushioned them.
Soon, light wrapped around them, forming oval-shaped eggs. Several Hunters struggled to resist, but it was useless. The light, the power of the seed Praysiar possessed, took their consciousness and made them enter the eggs obediently.
'I should have done this from the start!'
She had unnecessarily performed a pointless ritual. She should have just stuffed all the conspicuous ones with the seed's power from the beginning.
Though she didn't know much about Earth, she well understood that the Hunters gathered here were the strong ones of this planet. If she eliminated just these guys, the rest wouldn't be difficult.
Those who entered the eggs would be molded into new souls after a long time. Into bodies suitable for this garden. Some might become trees, others might become flowers. They could be reborn as insects like bees or butterflies. Their souls would find their own suitable afterlife.
And so everyone would become new beings and cultivate the garden for eternity. This garden she loved, this garden for her sake.
"Is that the power of the seed you possess?"
[ ......! ]
At the voice that suddenly rang out, Praysiar flinched and turned around. There stood that man who was an eyesore. Kang Jin-woo was standing there.
[ How......! Kuk, is it Jeraxon's Seed? ]
"......"
There was nothing to answer. Jeraxon's Seed possessed power that wasn't bound by anything. Even Praysiar's seed couldn't constrain it. Therefore, Jin-woo, who possessed Jeraxon's Seed, wasn't bound by her either.
"Kneading souls to change them as you wish...... A power that forcibly reincarnates, how frightening."
To be able to shape the next life as desired—wasn't that an amazing power?
At this moment, Jin-woo was thinking about something else. The twelve seeds possessed by the Lords were things his past life had possessed. That meant this power Praysiar possessed was also his past life's power.
Perhaps with this power, he himself had reincarnated as the being called 'Kang Jin-woo'? An ordinary person with no special characteristics on the planet called Earth. But someone who knew how to make some effort, who struggled somehow to regain his past life's memories.
Perhaps even the fact that he was facing Praysiar's seed at this very moment was all something he had arranged. Such a thought occurred to him.
[ ......Your tone doesn't sound scared at all? ]
Jin-woo's tone was so calm that he didn't seem frightened at all. Praysiar bristled at this.
However, bristling aside, what should she do from now on? Cold sweat ran down the back of Praysiar's neck. It was good that she had dragged him into her domain, but this wasn't a space for combat. It was merely a place where she had created her ideal garden.
Now that the seed's power didn't work, how should she fight Kang Jin-woo? She wasn't as confident in combat as Jeraxon. Jeraxon was one who ranked in the upper tiers in combat power, even among the twelve Lords. He was someone who enjoyed invading himself and had absorbed the vitality of the planets he invaded to make it his own power, so naturally.
But she wasn't like that. Of course, being a Divine Spirit, she would be immensely stronger than mediocre beings, but Kang Jin-woo wasn't such a being. The man who had slain that Jeraxon. Moreover, he wasn't alone—the Soul Tree called the World Tree was guarding his side.
A 2-to-1 situation. Could she win?
"It's a beautiful place."
Because she was in the midst of anguish, she couldn't make the first move. Meanwhile, Jin-woo looked around Praysiar's garden.
It was a place like a beautifully crafted work of art. The objects or beings arranged everywhere had an obsessive sense of order. A place where everything fit together perfectly without a single rough edge.
[ ...... ]
Praise all of a sudden—what was going on? Praysiar remained on guard while observing Jin-woo. Even so, it wasn't a bad feeling.
She didn't know Jin-woo's past life, but she had heard about it. According to what she heard from Rondar, he was a gardener, farmer, and carpenter who cultivated an incredibly beautiful garden. She heard there were countless words that described him from that era.
The reason she made the garden her domain, her ideal, was partly influenced by that. She wanted to become such a being. She was curious about the being who made that impudent Rondar show such a longing expression.
So she was surprised. By that statement of Jin-woo's. By the fact that her heart was moved enough to be surprised by those words.
However, at the next words, all color drained from her face.
"A beautiful...... Model."
[ What......? ]
She asked back. She couldn't understand what he had said. She understood the words, the sentence, and the meaning contained in those words, but her mind refused to accept it.
"I can't possibly think of it as something alive. Everyone is just your appendages; the only thing living and breathing here is you."
Jin-woo was just saying what he felt. In this pathologically controlled place, he couldn't feel the vitality of life. The nobility that comes from disorder, the kind that sometimes surprises even the gardener—there was none of that at all.
In the past, when Jeraxon escaped from the cage, even so, he loved it. That was part of the nature and life he desired.
But if a single bee escaped from this garden, Praysiar wouldn't let it go. She would somehow find it and punish it, and fill the empty spot anew.
This place was well-crafted enough to be beautiful, but precisely because of that, he couldn't feel any collision of life at all.
[ You......! ]
Praysiar became enraged. Blood rushed to her head, and her vision turned red. In that field of vision, Kang Jin-woo had already stopped talking and was walking toward her step by step.
When she blinked once, Kang Jin-woo's figure was gone. He had already passed by Praysiar and—
Puk.
Had plunged his sword into her chest.
The black flame rising from the center of her chest, the small seed hidden within the flame. Pierced by Jin-woo's sword, it lost its form. It crumbled limply and scattered, then separated from Praysiar's body and melted into Jin-woo's sword.
The garden disappeared. The light that had wrapped the Hunters like eggs also disappeared. When they came to their senses, they had returned to the original location.
Having lost her soul and even her seed, Praysiar's body fell to the ground. Her turquoise hair scattered, taking the shape of lotus petals.
Kurung―
The World Tree's roots that grew from the ground swallowed that body. Having lost everything, Praysiar was merely dragged away with unfocused eyes.
Pulled down from the Divine Spirit Realm, she was soon pulled down from Earth as well and became nourishment for the World Tree. With her soul stolen by Jin-woo.
***
It was quite noisy afterward, but there were no headache-inducing incidents. Following Ireland, countless people flocked to Jin-woo, who had slain even Praysiar, but he brushed them all off appropriately.
Outstanding S-ranks like Lin Shenlin and Zhang Lüye had died, but most other S-ranks were safe. The time they were captured by Praysiar was extremely short, so no aftereffects remained. Though they still had to be hospitalized for now.
"But what about the recovery of the Black Land?"
After the situation was wrapped up, people's attention turned to the White Land.
Though the world didn't know the details about Praysiar's identity, they still knew that she was the one who had caused the White Land.
According to people's eyewitness accounts, that corpse was swallowed down by tree roots and disappeared underground. As those accounts spread, people brought heavy equipment to search for the tree that had disappeared underground.
But no matter how much they dug around the area, it couldn't be found. Neither Praysiar's corpse nor the tree roots that had swallowed it were discovered anywhere.
"Jin-woo. A message came from Mayor Ma Du-sik."
Around that time, Jin-woo was spending his days quite busily. There were many Hunters visiting, and many agents from other countries coming to court him. People who introduced themselves as broadcasting station staff or journalists endlessly visited Jin-woo, making things bothersome.
Though he was brushing them off appropriately, there were too many of them, so there was no end. Coming to visit the hospitalized Shartia, partly to escape from that, what he heard was this. An urgent message had come from Ma Du-sik.
"Why not by phone......"
"It's very urgent, and also a message that came secretly."
The fact that it came to Shartia meant he should receive it together with her. After confirming there were no people around, Jin-woo and Shartia received Ma Du-sik's message.
―You've done something big. The rumors are all over here, too. Hunter Kang Jin-woo.
First, they exchanged greetings for a moment. It was about Jin-woo's accomplishments and Shartia's physical condition.
After getting past the usual greetings, Ma Du-sik showed a certain place through the video call. It was a place very familiar to Jin-woo.
"Isn't that my house?"
―That's right. Please look over there.
What Ma Du-sik showed was Jin-woo's house seen from the outside. A place with a small garden and grass, and trees that Shartia had planted. But there was a tree there that he hadn't seen before.
Even through the screen, Jin-woo could intuitively know. That was.......
―Actually, White Land was discovered near Seoul. It was spread out, centered around some tree roots. When we looked into where those roots extended from.......
Jin-woo's house. They extended from that garden. Ma Du-sik spoke in a lowered voice.