Year 116

The demon king arrived. The heroes were ready. A battle was fought in the southern continent, far away. It was the battle of legends. The heroes fought valiantly, and after days of constant fighting, they won a hard fought battle.

The battlefield was ripped, the ground itself twisted by the magics.

[Demon King Nergal was slain]

Or so the news goes.

But on the very day the demon king died, the heroes teleported to me.

“Aeon.” Gerrard was frantic, he ran. “All of us have been cursed by the demon king’s disease.”

Gerrard looked extremely pale, and though he ran, I could see his spirit flickering, not a good sign by any measure. Mirei was awake, too, but she was flickering as well. Harris lost an arm and a leg, and he had a massive gash across his body, the armor that protected him half-charred and burnt. Mirei too, lost both her legs, and two massive lightning elementals carried their master. In Harris’s case, one of his summons supported him like a crutch.

Gerrard was the only one with his limbs intact, but he looked like big chunks of his skin was covered in... pus. They all used their heroic magic to hold themselves together.

“A damned plague demon.” Gerrard said. “And we don’t have a healer!”

“And...”

“You’re a great healer.” Harris said, coughing.

I paused, and inwardly I took a deep breath. “Fine. But my medical services will cost you.” At that very moment, memories of exorbitant medical insurance bills flashed before my very eyes, but then, I am the hospital. I could probably earn a lot of valuable supplies from this endeavour.

That was how I had 3 heroes in healing pods in my body. All of them suffered, and somehow, even though they lost their limbs on that very same day, the demon’s plague-touch meant it couldn’t be regenerated.

In normal cases where the cut occurred just recently, the soul hasn’t forgotten it’s limbs, so it’s possible to regenerate a limb. But this demon king somehow inserted something into the soul that stopped that. I had to quickly intervene so that the limbs of their souls don’t disintegrate. I also had to quickly use all the healing I have to gradually extract the demonic energy out.

But this was a plague-focused demon king, and its power here is not to be trifled with. It’s almost like the demon king, who received the bombardment of hexbombs, learned to use the disease-like power of hex.

Adaptive demons.

That’s such a scary, scary thought.

The three heroes rested in their pods for days, as I tried to lessen the effect of the wounds. Gerrard, comparatively, had it easier than the rest. It was significantly easier to just cut-off the ‘sick’ part and then just regenerate it.

“Couldn’t you cut off for us too?” Harris and Mirei both asked.

“In both your cases, the Demon King’s damage is in the soul. Cutting it won’t fix it. The corruption must be purged from the soul, then only the limbs will regenerate.”

“Shit.”

Gerrard, relieved to be the first to be discharged after a week in the pod, didn’t leave yet. He stayed in the [secret hideout], and watched his two fellow earthlings.

“We would’ve died if not for Harris’s beacon. There was no way we could get anywhere with a good-enough healer in time.”

“Tough fight, eh?” I entertained him. Harris and Mirei, since the damage is a soul-level damage, had to go to sleep. I reckon they need something like my [Domain : Roots of Life] to actually fight back the demon king’s corruption. I had to use my soul forge to prevent decay of the soul’s blueprint for their limbs.

“Yeah. It wasn’t very physically tough to kill but it’s use of gases, poisons and those gooey stuff meant we were all constantly taking damage. All our armors were destroyed.” Gerrard showed off his specially made anti-demon weapon, it’s half-rotten, as if somebody poured a fuckton of acid on it.

“At least it didn’t detonate.”

Gerrard nodded. “That, too. I for one am relieved this demon king didn’t have a death bomb-ability, just a death-plague ability.”

“Plague.”

“Yeah. This game is rigged.” Gerrard took a deep breath. “Will they die?”

“As it is, no. They won’t die. But they won’t heal, either. I can keep them on suspended animation, or probably prevent further deterioration, but unless I find a way to overpower the demon king’s corruption, it won’t actually heal.”

I wondered how those demonic cultists removed the [demon king’s flames] from my trunk so many years back. But then, that’s just a ‘physical’ everburning fire, not a soul-level damage.

He breathed a sigh of relief. “That’s... that’s great. At least they live. When will they wake up?”

“I’ve put them to sleep for the next few days. I’ll inject them with food via my vines. You can get a drink if you’d like.”

He opened a magical holding bag, withdrew a really old-looking wine, and some cups. “Yeah.” He sat there quietly and drank the wine for some time, and once he was done, he left for Freshka, and found accommodation in Freshka’s many inns.

Harris still needed constant medical care, as the demonic corruption and sickness was still in his soul. But physically, other than the lost limbs, he was fine. He still had only one leg and one hand, and I had Jura come in, and teach both Mirei and Harris how to use their familiars to create a wooden leg.

“I lost my hand until Aeon healed it for me, but still, it’s a useful ability to have. You need to first let your familiars take up the armor form, and...”

“Got it.” They both said, and were able to replicate it. To them, magic was easy, and the system aided them, and so they quickly understood what Jura wanted to do.

“Wow.” Jura was impressed. It took him some time to learn how to do it. “Heroes really are a different breed.”

But, even with the tree familiars acting like artificial legs and hands, the two couldn’t leave very far. In Mirei’s case, the demon king’s attack, one of it penetrated near her chest, so there’s a swirling demonic corruption very close to the center of her soul, and it took a lot of my energy to just suppress it.

This was quite different from what I expected. The Demon King’s very own attacks possessed high-tier soul-damaging abilities meant it could potentially hurt me directly, even if I had extremely high anti-demon defenses, though, like the demonic curse, it may be possible to suppress with [Roots of Life].

Harris, feeling a bit better, though his limbs still burn in pain, sent a message to his subordinates and minions back home. I wondered if they are happy, or sad that their King lived. Perhaps, the kingdom will hold itself together for a bit more. Or, it may just mean the conflict that happens when all the kids are older will be more deadly and ferocious.

“We both can’t leave this place.” Harris said, he sat in the lounge area in the [secret hideout]. Even with my healing, I’m only able to suppress it so that they can still afford some degree of freedom, but left unattended, it would flare up within a week.

“We could teleport there and back...” Mirei said.

“I can’t run my kingdom like this.” Harris complained, and he had a lot of concerns. “I would have to delegate my role.”

Mirei just laughed at her friend. “Good! Finally you have to bite the bullet and cut the damned cake. Hand over power, and ensure that they don’t fight each other before you die is the best thing you can do as a father, Harris. This medical issue is the best thing that have ever happened to your kingdom.”

“...” Harris seemed reluctant to face the problem. It reminded me of myself, and damn, that hurt. I too hesitate far too much when faced with problems. “Aeon, any chance you can uh... remotely heal me from my capital?”

“Uh... no.” Truth was, there really wasn’t. The kind of mana and energy needed to suppress the demon king’s curse on their bodies was something I have only here, and it needed the presence of my main body’s energies.

Mirei was cheerful, even though her condition was the worst of the three, because of the curse close to her soul spring. She took some time to enjoy herself in Freshka, and went for long walks. As a hero, her powers meant she could still move around very quickly.

“Won’t you miss your prettyboys?” Harris laughed.

Mirei just shrugged. “That was my hobby a few decades ago, I moved on now. How often do we talk about it anyway?” To be fair, even though she’s now in her mid 40s, she still looked really fit and youthful, due to the influence of heroic magic. Heroes, I reckon, if they survive, would probably like till 200s, just like the humans that practice magic.

“Then what do you spend time on?”

“Like what most typical ladies do, good food, tea time, good cakes and cookies, and fashion!” Mirei laughed. “All I have to do now is move my entire operation here.”

“Oh.”

“You can’t move a kingdom!” Mirei ribbed him. “So, let it go, Harris. It’s better to let your many children have their thrones now, at least you can watch and advise them.” After days of discussion, eventually Harris succumbed to Mirei’s idea.

Anyway, now that I am their healer, and essentially their lives on my hands, I’ve started to demand for more things as compensation for my healing services. Like gems. A lot of them.

So, this finally allowed me to repair my [Grand Mind Tree].

With that, I felt a return of more statistics and numbers to my mind, and it checked my thoughts for the presence of external influences.

So, my Rottedlands expansion continued, and we claimed more areas. So, after a good amount of area was reclaimed, I opened up segments 11 to 15 for new refugees and migrants. There were some areas I’ve set aside as ‘hybrid-tree’ parks, where these are the hybrid plants that I’ve gained control over.

I reckon some of these new refugees will be surprised by it, but I decided to let it be.

“You guys seriously didn’t find anything that was the source of the corruption?” I asked Harris about the crystal that they destroyed a few years back.

Harris probably was quite surprised that only now I spoke about it, since, well, we had that discussion many years ago. “Uh... no. We were honestly just looking for our fellow heroes. After we destroyed the crystals and got the notification, we just... stopped?”

“Is there a source of all these corruption?” I wondered to myself. It may be possible, if my understanding of the hybrid botany improves, to trace it’s energy source through the roots of these hybrid demon plants. It must come from somewhere.

But it’s something I fear to do.

If it is the abyss I’m looking into, it may well look into me as well. Would I end up like Zeratul, accidentally revealing the location of the homeworld to the demons? I immediately set the Grand Mind Tree to act as an antivirus and firewall, to block out any attempted intrusions into my mind. Alexis had already revealed plenty to the demons, when she was trapped in the fire-demon mode, or so did Simone and Victor.

-

“I’m home!” Lausanne returned after... years of travelling. She gave Laufen a hug. It was pretty much the first thing she did.

“You’ve been away for very long.” Laufen looked at her growing daughter. “How was it?”

They had lunch together. “Oh. I’ve been to all the continents! I fought lots of monsters and creatures.”

“That’s good. Did you find anything, or... anyone?”

Lausanne nodded shyly. “Yes. Erm... that’s part of why I came back, mom.”

“Oh?”

“I... uh... joined an adventurer team when I was in the continents. And erm... I travelled with them for a few years.”

“And?” Laufen had the look of an expecting mom, like, come on, drop the bomb already.

“I’m thinking of getting married to him. My captain.”

“Ah.” Laufen nodded knowingly. “So, is he here? Did he come?”

“...yes. He’s like... in the inn. I wanted to just uh... tell you about him first, before you meet him.”

“Don’t be silly. I was expecting this to happen! No young elven girl goes travelling around the world for almost 7 to 8 years and does not find someone to fall in love with.” Laufen smiled and gave her daughter a knowing look. “So uh. You’re here to invite me to the wedding, I suppose?”

“...yeah.” Lausanne said shyly.

In my mind, well, that escalated quickly. She’s just a kid. Then a teen. And now she’s getting married. I... if I was human I’d probably need to take some time off and accept this. Like... wow. Time sure moves quickly, and it’s even more pronounced when I see all these other people moving on with their lives.

I feel... lonely. At that moment, I could feel a sense of warmth and belonging from all my fellow trees, like they were trying to comfort me.

[Grand MInd Tree has intercepted attempted Influence from trees. The following message was deleted: We are one, we trees are all one.]

Yeah. A tree’s forever alone. All these other trees in the forest, but I am still just me.