Ch.101Report on the Downfall of Kindness (11)

Through Henry’s knowledge, Roberta was able to perfect her own magic. A spell that transfers human vices and sins to trees, leaving only goodness, positivity, and happiness in the body.

Would even the wise, stubborn, and worldly fall for it, not just the foolish, uneducated thieves and country farmers…

Henry was a valuable resource in that regard. Thanks to his strong will and noble heart, Roberta could do whatever she wanted.

No matter what Roberta did to him, Henry endured. Like a training dummy that could withstand any blow because of its sturdiness.

But now Henry was useless. Because he had been completely persuaded. The fallen great tree had declined beyond salvation. That’s why playing with Henry was no longer much fun.

‘Should I wait a bit longer? Or is it okay to leave now…’

Maria, who descended before the hesitating Roberta, was like a divine blessing. If she could persuade Maria, she could advance into a wider world.

But the process of persuasion is not easy. Roberta’s teachings require freedom from existing prejudices. One must abandon doubt and distrust and open one’s heart completely. And to open one’s heart, one must go through even more processes of negation, negation, and negation.

That’s why Maria’s resistance now is Roberta’s joy.

Plant sin in the tree, and leave only happiness in the flesh. The sins bound to the tree will naturally be purified within the great cycle of nature.

The process of persuasion is never easy. Before that, one must go through countless processes of negation, negation, and negation. Through numerous experiences, Roberta knew this.

To open the mind, one must first tire the body. When the body’s boundaries loosen, the doors of the mind also become slack.

Even beasts give up when approached after their strength is completely drained. How much more so for mere humans…

“Where are you…?”

Roberta’s hands explored her body. Her neck. Her shoulders. One moved to her left side, the other to the underside of her left breast.

If she pushed just a little higher, Roberta could be more satisfied.

‘Yes. It’s just for a moment… what’s the harm…’

Roberta drove the villagers. So that the pleasant tingling would move toward her more intimate places. The creeping, thrilling sensation slowly rose to her two breasts.

“Ahah…!”

Roberta, clutching her breasts, let out a cry. The villagers would spin around following her touch. At the tips of her breasts, she felt the strange energy of outsiders.

The more they resisted, the more stimulation Roberta felt. The more they feared, the more her heart fluttered. The faster their breathing became, the faster Roberta sank into passion.

“Yes. Fill… fill it…! Us… me!”

Pleasure struck her spine and rushed upward from below. With her back arched, Roberta was too immersed in pleasure to do anything. For someone who had been starved for so long, this satisfaction was incomparable joy.

The joy of driving luscious prey where she wanted it. The coming wave of immense pleasure. Heart pounding, mouth dry, legs crossed, she prepared for the coming pleasure.

The hunter who lost her composure didn’t realize she had missed a signal because of it.

* * * * *

Maria climbed the log cabin wall. It wasn’t difficult with plenty of places for hands and feet.

She’d like to catch her breath, but there was no time for that. Half the villagers were chasing after Maria.

“Come on!”

Fortunately, there were many things to throw on this roof. Tiles. Stones. Maria threw them randomly at the villagers.

Even with crushed feet, broken shoulders, or blood flowing from their foreheads, the villagers just stared up at Maria with blank smiles. They even waved their hands as if asking her to come down and join them.

The house was already surrounded. Ten people. Twenty people… more people gathered. The clumped people began climbing over each other. Like ants gathering and trampling each other, these people would crawl up to the roof.

As people stuck to the wall with a “wooo” sound, Maria snapped her fingers. Glorious light stuck to everyone’s eyes.

An intensely bright light without heat. The villagers flailed their arms in confusion. Just as eyes are temporarily blinded when going from darkness to light, the villagers temporarily lost their sight.

Then Maria kicked the roof with a thud. After lightly jumping down over the villagers, she ran to the next building.

“Come on! I’m here, try to catch me!”

As if taunting them.

From a distance, a completely different scene could be seen. Lily strolled through the village as if taking a walk. But whenever someone rushed toward her with arms outstretched, she unfailingly extended her staff.

She would stab the solar plexus to break their posture, then strike upward at the jaw to knock them unconscious. If once wasn’t enough, she would deliver two or three quick strikes.

Unlike Maria and Kain, Lily wasn’t skilled at climbing walls.

Of course, she had passed all the training and tests that Security Bureau agents must complete, and with a sturdy rope she could climb even castle walls, but being able to confidently demonstrate in a real situation was a different story.

So she chose what she could do well. Standing firmly on the ground with both feet, then toppling everything that approached.

It was like testing how much strength a knight trained to the extreme could exert against humans without a shred of reason or judgment.

Another one falls with a happy smile.

“Huff… huff…”

But Lily was quite exhausted. And the villagers didn’t decrease in number. No matter how much damage they took, they ignored the pain and kept coming.

Lily knew that these people, though not all, had committed serious crimes in the Empire. That they had not been forgiven, their sentences had not been reduced, but merely suspended.

But that doesn’t mean they can be treated carelessly. Even if they are criminals, Lily has neither the authority nor the right to punish them.

“I don’t want to hurt you. But if you approach, I have no choice but to knock you down. I’m not trying to punish you, but to protect myself and those dear to me. So please, come to your senses.”

Though these words were completely meaningless to the people who drooled and grinned stupidly, Lily steeled her resolve. She could see the flashing light from the other side of the village.

So Lily fought more fiercely. To draw as many people as possible toward herself. To reduce the burden on Maria and Kain.

* * * * *

Roberta could no longer hold back. Looking up at the ceiling with ecstatic eyes, she writhed on the wet floor. The stimulation to her body was beyond imagination. Too overwhelmed to speak, she could only open and close her mouth repeatedly.

Maria was indeed the best. More stubborn, intense, and at times even biting back than anyone she had hunted before. From Roberta’s perspective, it was like rubbing around the critical spots she wanted to be touched.

Though she said she wanted them to be caught, there was a contradictory desire for this moment to last longer.

Even this? Even this? Roberta kept sending people. By now, Maria would be unable to escape.

The sweet sensation felt on the opposite side of her body, though slightly less than Maria, was not insignificant. If one side was familiar anticipation, the other was an unfamiliar spice. While she had expected Maria’s resistance, the resistance of the tall woman who came with her was unexpected.

‘Yes… keep… going!’

Roberta was happy. This is the thrill of the hunt. To push precariously, but never let go. Once trapped within the encirclement, it doesn’t matter how you drive them afterward.

Her forehead tingled pleasantly. Her spine felt electrified as if lightning were trapped there. Roberta twisted her body on the floor.

Then more roots, more rootlets from her body burrowed into the mansion floor. Like a seed beginning to sprout, Roberta continued her movements of joy.

‘More… more…!’

* * * * *

Maria’s body staggered. Her foot caught on a tree root. This was absurd. A tree root in the middle of the village path.

Tree roots were sprouting from all the roads. Like snares, one could easily trip over them while walking carelessly.

Maria leaped forward. She slid across the road and regained her balance. Then she was horrified.

“This is insane.”

Tree roots sprouting from the ground had wrapped around the villagers’ bodies. No, it would be more accurate to say they had attached themselves.

The tree roots had become part of the people. Some had grown a second lower body like centaurs. Some had two more upper bodies, and some had three heads fighting over one body.

As if trees had been grafted onto human bodies.

Maria ran along the road.

Roots and vines grew along her path. They wrapped around houses, licked pillars, lifted roofs, and the ground kept trying to shed its skin.

Underneath were red, flesh-like, meat-like trees writhing obscenely.

From the other side of the road, Lily came running. Instead of her broken staff, she held a woodcutting axe. A sword wouldn’t be very useful against things that were neither human nor tree.

The villagers, forming a large circle, gathered from the far end. They tightened. They swirled around.

Circle around the tree, spin around, open a pouch full of herbs, achoo, achoo, everyone has fallen down!

She stomps her foot. Tree roots surge from the ground like waves. They wrap around, crush, split, and absorb anything in their way with their rootlets.

Circle around the tree, spin around, open a pouch full of herbs, achoo, achoo, everyone has fallen down!

The human-trees hold branches in their hands and spin around. They gather around Maria and Lily, spinning and converging faster than summer rain seeping into cracked, dry ground.

Roberta’s hand movements become more intense.

The people who have become trees laugh until they tear.

Circle around the tree, spin around, open a pouch full of herbs, achoo, achoo, everyone has fallen down!

The roots seeking blood thicker than water thirst for the women, grabbing and tearing the ground’s skin.

Lily and Maria stand back to back.

The trees stop. Silence falls. Roberta catches her breath.

The time has come. Only one movement remains. She can’t hold back anymore. One last time. Her fingers, already turned into branches, to that place she so desired. That place she had teased, circled around, waited for, and made wait.

That place.

That place.

She touches. She grasps.

Passion steals Roberta’s heart.

Unable even to say “thief,” Roberta merely opens her mouth. She widens her pupils. She arches her back trying to hold onto her heart being pulled away. She opens her mouth that has become a flower.

Thus she becomes a tree that blooms flowers. Instead of fluid, honey flows from the naked tree.

The petals spread. The honey overflows. The honey flowing along the roots is, however, too little to go around to all the villagers. It’s merely a drop of water that makes the thirsty even thirstier.

“More…”

The trees cry out. Some can be seen biting, sucking, and rubbing against each other. But how can trees feed on trees? It’s meaningless.

“More… more! More! More! More!”

The villagers shake their branches and shout.

“More! More! More! More! More! More!”

No. No. No. No. Roberta delays. She holds back. Holds back. Holds back. Not until she can’t endure.

Until the craving that can’t be endured ignores even the final command.

The human-trees with rolled-back eyes fly at Lily and Maria to suck even the last drop.

Roberta flings open her flower petals.

On the mansion’s roof now stands a tree shaped like a naked human, a tree dripping honey from every curve, a tree with a red flower blooming instead of a face, emitting pollen instead of pleasure, climax, and obscene language.

Enough to make passing beasts’ heads spin. Enough to make them mindlessly kiss the flower, rub their bodies against it, thrust their hips, and then eat their own wings.

Enough to blow away the last judgment of the human-trees who smell the obscene scent of pollen.

And so the trees became that way. Now only desire remained in them.

Grab. Tear. Eat. Suck.

Humans.

The human-trees fly toward Maria and Lily. Tree roots cutting through the ground skin, for the living human, for another’s essence and sweat and blood and flesh not their own.

To grab tear eat suck to grab tear eat suck to grab tear eat suck

“Now!”

Lily thrusts her Imperial sword into the ground. Maria shoots a pillar of light high into the sky.

The next moment, the trees’ heads exploded.