"What was that?"
Chris asked, but neither Rudger nor Belaruna had a good answer.
They didn't know either.
At first, they thought that someone was on the roots, a liberator, a warlock, or both. Given the place, it wouldn't have been surprising to find any of them there but it wasn't a person.
'Otherwise, Rudger would have known there were people when he scanned the area with his sound magic. 'Certainly nothing was detected by the sound waves. It was only the roots of the World Tree. Unless someone saw this coming and hid in advance.'
Probably not.
Which meant that the silhouette on that root was not human.
It was watching them warily, but it didn't seem to be moving toward them.
"Fortunately, it doesn't seem to be moving, so we can get a little closer and check it out."
"Isn't that dangerous?"
"It's already dangerous since we're in here anyway."
"Do you think it's more dangerous?"
"We took that into account when we came in."
"Well, that makes it even more so."
There were two bickering but unified opinions or three if Belaruna was counted since she was too curious to say no.
Finally, agreeing to take a look, the three of them slowly approached the root.
As they got closer, the blurry image of the root became clearer and they realized the identity of the silhouette near the root.
"This is……."
Chris trailed off, Rudger narrowed his eyes and Belaruna's mouth dropped open.
What she thought was a person was something that had sprouted from the roots.
Calling it a thing was one way to describe it.
It was a human-looking thing, with arms reaching desperately into the air, and even with the knowledge and experience of the three of them, they couldn't quite put their finger on what to call it.
"It looks pretty bad, like it's trying to pull itself out of the roots."
"I agree. That doesn't sound like the norm at all."
It was a root in the shape of a humanoid reaching for the air with no eyes or mouth.
While the two of them were thinking about it, Belaruna watched it with a nonchalant gaze.
"Is it okay to touch it? It won't move suddenly, will it?"
"Are you scared?"
"What the……! I want to be safe, just in case."
"That's not going to happen anyway, because if that thing was going to move, it would have moved in the first place, or it would have moved now that we've approached."
"Hmm."
"It's your turn from here."
Rudger knew there was nothing he could do now. He'd brought Chris and Belaruna with him because they knew about the World Tree.
Chris was the young master of House Benimore, a venerable magical family with a long history of medicine-making, and Belaruna was an elf who had been cast out of her village, but who knew a thing or two about plants.
Rudger claimed to have some knowledge of medicine, but he fell short in the face of these two. By his own admission, Rudger was inadequate.
"I'll make sure the perimeter is secure."
Chris nodded in agreement and moved toward the root of the World Tree. He pulled out the tools he had brought with him and calmly began taking samples of the tree.
Belaruna stroked the surface of the tree, checking here and there.
Then Chris placed his hand on the World Tree and energized it as Rudger watched in awe.
'So there's magic like that.'
A line of green magic stretched out from the center of Chris's hand, permeating the World Tree. It was an analytical spell used by wizards who specialized in pharmaceuticals.
Rudger had heard of it, but this was the first time he'd seen it in action.
It wasn't something he couldn't learn if he tried, but it wasn't very useful, since it was literally just for analyzing the characteristics of plants.
It was up to you to take those features and information and figure out what to do with them. So even if you learned magic, if you had no knowledge of herbs, it was effectively a pearl necklace around a pig's neck.
When he was done analyzing, Chris took his hand away from the root of the World Tree.
"Did you find anything?"
Chris shook his head, looking a little self-conscious.
"I've gotten a sense of the object's characteristics, but nothing conclusive."
"Is that because it's not a living thing?"
"That would be a reason, but someone has deliberately blocked the information."
Rudger asked in surprise.
"Is it even possible to block information?"
"Surprisingly, this is the first time I've actually seen it happen."
"So it's not a common occurrence?"
"Most living things store information in their bodies, like the brain in a human head. It's the same with plants. It's in their roots, and once it's there, it stays there, even when the cells die."
"I see."
"Especially in a plant as large as the World's Tree, the amount of information it contains is vast and people like me can read that information."
"So it's also possible to block it, then?"
"Yes. Which means there's another expert here besides me."
Rudger had an idea who it was. Probably the biotech warlocks Hans had told him about.
When Rudger laid it out for him, Chris nodded in understanding.
"Indeed. It's not impossible if it's the biotech warlocks created the chimeras, and I'm sure the first chimera they created was mixed with sap from the World Tree."
"Then there's nothing else you can find out?"
"I'm afraid that's as far as I can go with my current abilities. It's a shame."
Chris was honest about his shortcomings.
Being stubborn here didn't mean he could do something. This would be the end of his role as an analyst and he was thinking about going back, unless there was more to do.
"Hey……."
Belaruna, who had just been looking at the World Tree, stood between them like a ghost.
"What is it?"
"I found something."
"……."
"……."
At Belaruna's words, Rudger and Chris looked at each other at the same time then their gazes snapped back to Belaruna.
"What do you mean?"
Chris asked, a hint of anticipation in his voice.
"The roots are dead, but there's still a great deal of life inside. Apparently, the warlocks are pulling it out and using it."
"Is there more to it than that?"
"Yes. There's a human shape sticking out of it, and I don't think it's anything ordinary."
"Not ordinary?"
At Rudger's question, Belaruna nodded, her voice hushed.
"Yes. It's something radically different from the World Tree, and I think that's why it was trying to get out like that, because of the repulsive force."
"But it didn't come out."
"The people who implanted it must have blocked it, but I can see that it's still trying to get out."
The three gazes lingered on the human form that had grown at the end of the root. They didn't know what it was, but the idea that it kept trying to escape was eerie.
"This is no ordinary thing."
As Rudger thought that, Chris asked, unable to contain his curiosity.
"More than that, how did Lady Belaruna know about it?"
'Lady Belaruna? Now he's adding that modifier to her name.'
"……Well, that's because I'm an elf, and elves can communicate with the World Tree and instinctively feel the genetic information of plants."
"Even with the information blocked?"
"Well, normal humans can't do that, but as an elf, I can."
Belaruna nodded in agreement.
She didn't sound like she really meant it, more like she was proud of herself for coming up with a convincing excuse on the fly.
At that, Chris stroked his own chin as if it were odd.
"Hmm. From what I've heard, it's not easy to read the information on the World Tree, even for an elf."
"What? Who told you that crap…….?"
"I heard it from Mr. Vierano. Do you happen to know Mr. Vierano Dentis?"
"……!"
Belaruna's reaction to the name was fierce.
It was a name that any elf would recognize. In fact, it was a name that was impossible for an elf to not know.
The Dentis family had long been one of the most powerful elven families.
Rudger sensed something was wrong there.
'Wait a minute. Even an elf wasn't allowed to read the information in the World Tree, and even then it was a bit of an overreaction.'
Even as he tried to deny it, Rudger's mouth spontaneously formed the words to express his doubts.
"No way. Have you been secretly……?"
"……!"
Belaruna stared at Rudger with wide eyes. She kept her mouth shut, but her body language said it all.
"Are you serious?
Belaruna Petana, an eccentric elf who was cast out of the elf village.
At first, Rudger thought she was wandering the streets because she was discriminated against by the elves' tight-knit society and intolerance of the strange. But it turns out there's more to the story.
Belaruna had violated a taboo that was not allowed, and for that reason, she was banished from the village.
The taboo of making contact with the World Tree.
Moreover, the contact with the World Tree would not take place in a small village, but in a large elven territory centered on the World Tree.
"Contact with the World Tree……. Oh, my God, that's it."
Chris nodded in agreement because he too heard stories.
"The elves have a hierarchy even within their own society, with strict rules that no one from a powerful family is allowed to touch the World Tree unless they are the caretakers of the central root."
Human scholars have concluded that the World Tree is merely an ancient species of plant that existed long ago. But the elves still revere it, calling it a sacred tree.
Naturally, they were extremely sensitive to the idea of unauthorized persons tampering with it.
They would have understood if Belaruna told them that she was actually from a powerful family and was hiding her identity.
'Judging by their cold sweaty reactions, I don't think it's anything like that. A common elf, unauthorized, tampered with the World Tree.'
She's more courageous than I thought or did the elves had mercy on her and chased her away?
"How many times did you touch the World Tree?"
Rudger asked, and Belaruna answered in a small, crawling voice.
"Twice……."
"Not once, twice?"
"Three times……."
"Four times……."
"Was it four times……?"
Rudger rolled his eyes and even Chris, who would consider Belaruna beautiful even if she was chewing on a bug, was baffled by this.
At this point, he wondered how she was still alive.
"Oh, it's okay, it was only one time!"
"……."
"……."
So, to summarize, Belaruna was not kicked out of the elf village for her bizarre tendencies.
She didn't even technically qualify, because she had contacted the World Tree and read its information.
In Earth terms, a common soldier had barged into a highly classified intelligence room in the highest command and read its contents.
Rudger glared at Belaruna intensely with an unspoken pressure as if to ask her why she hadn't told him before.
Belaruna didn't dare to meet his gaze, her shoulders hunching and her head slipping away.
Instead, it was Chris who reacted to Rudger's behavior.
"Why are you glaring at her? Lady Belaruna may have done wrong in elven society, but this is the human society, and you have no right to criticize her behavior."
'That's because it's none of your business.'
With Belaruna in tow, there was no telling when other elves might show up looking for the traitorous elf.
The Black Dawn Society was enough of a headache already, but adding elves to the mix would be quite a hassle.
'Hopefully it's just a one-time thing, and she just got kicked out.'
Given her behavior, it was clear that there was something else she wasn't saying.
Perhaps it was Chris's support that gave her the courage to speak up again.
"You're right, and besides, I'm fully remorseful, but the most important thing is the present not the past."
"As far as the……contact goes, that's one thing, but what do you make of that thing in there that's trying to get out?"
Rudger pointed to the human form protruding from the root.
When Rudger offered to let it go, Belaruna replied, a little excitedly.
"I'm not sure, but it's definitely not ordinary, because even though the World Tree is dead, its life force is incredible, and these tracks show that it's trying to get out of it instead of being buried in it."
"Do you think it's going to move?"
"It's just a trace, a trace of the power inside trying to get out. It's not going to move."
"Then……."
"It's just a repulsive force, the real thing is still sleeping in the roots of the World Tree, and the Liberation Army and the Warlocks are trying to deal with it."
Rudger's eyes narrowed at the words repulsive force.
"Come to think of it, I've been thinking about something."
"What do you mean?"
"They say there was a power like that before, and it was similar……No, almost identical."
"You know what that power is?"
"Yes."
Belaruna nodded with a heavy face.
"That's, uh, demonic power."
Rudger and Chris gulped at Belaruna's words.
Demons, a name that existed only in mythology and was now only a legend.
It was only when Rudger had calmly collected his thoughts that he spoke.
"How do you know that? That's not something you'd learn from contacting the World Tree."
"……."
Belaruna's mouth fell open at that question and Rudger's eyes narrowed.
"……Did you secretly see that, too?"
Belaruna's cold sweat increased as Rudger groaned to himself.
He called her a World Tree expert, but she was a chronic trespasser.