Chapter 147.
Conquering the 11th Floor (3)
Once the spell was successfully cast, a strange phenomenon occurred.
Her field of vision shot upward, changing into a perspective that looked diagonally down at the ground.
It was disorienting, but not surprising.
It was exactly the same quarter-view perspective she had seen countless times in the game.
Looking down from above, Camellia noticed something strange.
Thin lines, almost like strings, were hanging from the heads of the puppeteered clones.
‘What is this? I never saw anything like that in the game.’
Thinking they looked just like the strings attached to puppet dolls, Camellia followed the strings with her gaze.
To her surprise, both the starting point and the endpoint of the strings were her own hands.
‘Ah…… So that’s why Puppeteering is literally called puppet manipulation.’
Finding it extremely fascinating, Camellia pulled on the strings of consciousness.
At once, the skeleton soldiers she had turned into puppets all turned around.
They ended up in a formation that looked as though they were guarding the party while surrounding them.
[What did you do to my clones…… Aaargh!]
Acheronia screamed in shock.
The puppeteered clones under Camellia’s control had begun attacking the skeleton soldiers that had not yet been dominated.
Although they were called clones, every vine was connected to Acheronia.
For them to fight one another was essentially no different from self-harm.
[Stop! Stop it! How dare you, my clones, my branches……!]
Acheronia desperately tried to take back control of the puppeteered clones, but it was useless.
Perhaps realizing there was no other choice, the dryad violently shook her flower vines and severed the roots connecting her to the clones.
The clones that had been moving the skeletons according to Camellia’s will rapidly withered and turned to ash in an instant.
The skeletons released from the withered stems also crumbled into dust.
Having lost thirty percent of her clones in the blink of an eye, Acheronia seemed enraged and shouted fiercely.
[How dare you make me cut off my own stems?! I won’t forgive you!]
Acheronia rustled her withered flower vines and moved the remaining clones.
The skeleton soldiers charged forward, raising claws made from vines.
—Stop them. It will only take a moment.
—Y-yes!
After giving the party her orders through mental resonance, Camellia cast another spell.
‘Spell Enhancement. Puppeteering.’
While Nashu swung her axe and reduced the number of skeleton soldiers, Camellia seized control of the dryad’s clones in exactly the same manner as before.
Perhaps because she had already experienced it once, Acheronia didn’t hesitate.
Just as before, she immediately tried to cut off the clones.
But Camellia’s command came first.
“Acheronia, stop. Do not sever the clones.”
[Urgh, ugh……! Don’t be ridiculous!]
Surprisingly, Acheronia succeeded in resisting the domination.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t a very good choice.
Mina, who had been waiting for the dryad to let her guard down, sprang into action at once and scattered explosive potions.
“You keep bringing out something worse every time I somehow endure it, and then something even worse after that…… Why do you keep picking on me?!”
【You don’t like me, do you, Lord!?】
Because the Crystal-Clear Mind shared through mental resonance had dispelled all her fear, only anger remained within Mina.
Grinding her teeth, she used her spells and skills.
Switching to Potion Explosion.
Immediately activating Potion Regeneration.
Then switching again.
The seamless chain triggered a terrifying series of explosions.
Despite being quite some distance away, the thunderous roar and heat intense enough to make their skin sting engulfed the party.
If Nethanel hadn’t quickly raised a protective barrier, Nashu, who was standing at the very front, would have had her skin practically roasted.
Naturally, Acheronia, who took the full force of the attack head-on, couldn’t remain unharmed.
[Aaaaaaargh……!]
Nearly half of the flower vines serving as her head were blown away by the explosion, while the other vines wrapped around the skeletons caught fire and began blazing fiercely.
Even while letting out horrific screams, Acheronia desperately tried to sever the connections to the puppeteered clones.
“Do nothing, Acheronia.”
Camellia had no intention of allowing her one last desperate struggle.
She finally succeeded in dominating Acheronia and pinned her in place.
[Kyaaaah, aaargh! Why?! Why only me……! I’ll curse you, Godslayer! I’ll curse you whether I’m dead or alive!]
Acheronia had become a screaming torch, continuously spewing curses.
But Camellia didn’t even blink.
She moved the puppeteered clones and pushed the remaining clones into the flames.
The clones left behind to protect Acheronia desperately resisted.
But they were no match for the puppets Camellia controlled with such precision.
Half of the remaining clones were engulfed in flames in an instant.
‘It’s over.’
Camellia threw all the remaining puppeteered clones into the flames as well.
Watching the scene, an intense feeling of disgust filled Mina’s consciousness.
【……No, no. Don’t think like this. The Lord might be reading my thoughts.】
She immediately suppressed the thought, startled.
Camellia lightly clicked her tongue inwardly.
‘If she knew I could read everything, both her Affection and Loyalty would drop through the floor.’
And it wasn’t just Mina.
The emotions Camellia sensed from Nashu and Nethanel were also far from positive.
Truly, this was the ultimate one-hit wonder of mental magic.
Its effectiveness in battle was overwhelming, but its ability to destroy one’s reputation within the party was equally overwhelming.
Still, it wasn’t as though she could simply stop using it.
Suppressing her increasingly complicated feelings, Camellia looked up at the completely incapacitated Acheronia.
“Will you renew the contract, Acheronia?”
[You want to renew the contract? After burning me like this, you’re talking about a contract?]
“If you do not wish to, you may choose annihilation instead. Unlike the other sinners, you were imprisoned here because you begged to live.”
Acheronia growled even as she burned.
[Why should I die? What exactly did I do wrong……?! I just wanted to make flowers bloom!]
“You turned two elven cities and thirty human villages into gardens.”
[You did the same! Those wretched animals cut and tore apart my sisters just to decorate their filthy mud dens!]
Acheronia spat the words out.
You were cruel too. You were evil too!
You stole our fruit and carelessly abandoned our seeds to rot.
You stole our water and cut our stems and leaves apart just to obtain sweeter fruit!
You processed us, ate us, tortured us again and again just to make yourselves look beautiful!
[Why am I the only one who’s evil?! You’re evil too! You’re horrible monsters! You did all those things, so why can’t I do them?!]
Nethanel muttered incredulously,
“What kind of nonsense is that…….”
The other party members also looked uncomfortable, apparently thinking she was raving like a madwoman.
Unlike them, Camellia, a modern person, understood what Acheronia was angry about.
From a plant’s perspective, there probably was no creature more horrifying than humans.
It wasn’t strange for her to think there was nothing wrong with taking revenge on the enemies of her friends and companions in exactly the same manner.
‘Though Acheronia isn’t really the kind of villain with a tragic backstory.’
The dryad insisted that she had turned elves into fertilizer because she needed them, but that was only half an excuse.
It was closer to a massacre she had committed simply because she enjoyed it.
And it didn’t stop there.
She had used living elves as planting beds because she wanted to offer the most beautiful flower garden to a god, until she was caught by the First One and sealed here.
That was also why Acheronia’s sealing battle was so desolate, unlike the relatively peaceful spaces given to the evils on the lower floors.
‘Because giving her a flower garden wouldn’t count as punishment.’
Camellia felt sorry that the punishment had been so severe that Acheronia had eventually gone mad.
But she couldn’t release a man-eating plant simply because she pitied it.
“You considered the lives of animals so worthless, yet your own life is apparently so precious that you cannot throw it away even now.”
[Shut up, shut up! You think I’m going to let you kill me?! Absolutely not!]
“Then you will have to remain alone again.”
Acheronia flinched.
[N-no…… Please, I don’t have any stems left now. If I’m left alone, I won’t be able to bear the loneliness.]
“Then repent. If you repent, a true garden—not a false one—will come to you.”
[I didn’t do anything wrong, so how can you tell me to repent?! Please……!]
Instead of answering, Camellia activated Domination.
Then she coldly declared,
“Sleep, Acheronia.”
The horribly burned dryad collapsed limply.
Leaving her behind, Camellia continued forward.
The party followed her as well.
Before long, they arrived at the red magic circle located in the center of the garden.
‘Whew. Good.’
Without saying a word, Camellia placed her hand on the magic circle.
A dazzling light enveloped her.
Unlike on the lower floors, no vision appeared.
When she opened her eyes again, the only thing that greeted Camellia was the system window.
[The seal of the 11th floor is being restored.]
For the first time in a long while, she had successfully conquered a floor of the Tower without passing out or nearly dying.
‘I’m seriously going to cry.’
Camellia rose to her feet and announced to the party,
“……Let’s go back.”
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