Chapter 380: The Gardener of the Withered Flowers (2)

Chapter 380: The Gardener of the Withered Flowers (2)

3.

The plastic pot filled with black soil was soaked in sunlight. The lily of the valley was quietly asleep with its roots soaked in it.

As I looked at it for a while, The Wand of Ages spoke.

"Since you have created the sky and the earth, now it's time to create the sea."

"I see."

"Yes, the order of creation is... Wait. What kind of answer is that?"

"You will know when you see it."

The Wand of Ages furrowed its brows, but I started acting without further response.

I first called Estelle.

['The Sky That Gathers Screams' summons its apostle.]

[Your apostle responds to your call.]

[The apostle of 'The Sky That Gathers Screams' manifests.]

A woman who was once called the saint of the weak, and now serves as an advisor in my family, appeared. Her voice spread across the world even before her feet touched the ground.

"Family Head. What did you call me for this time?"

Estelle's voice was excited. It seemed the thrill of a recent battle had not yet subsided.

I raised one hand to calm her down and said.

"Calm down, advisor. I didn't call you to fight."

"Oh, is that so... I was disappointed that I couldn't contribute enough in the last fight...."

"Haven't you become a bit of a warmonger lately...?"

"The role of Chamberlain is like an internet game. It tends to increase the aggression of those around you. I'm just one of those poor victims."

Isn't that an insult to internet games?

While there are mixed opinions on whether internet games increase violence, it's a repeatedly verifiable fact that Estelle increases violence. And while internet games relieve stress, the only thing Estelle can relieve is one's patience....

"It's good to have fighting spirit, but save it. There will always be time for battles, and it's not too late to draw your sword then."

"Yes, Family Head... Um. So, why did you call me?"

Estelle blinked hesitantly. Only now did our surroundings seem to reflect in her violet eyes.

"Well, this place is...?"

"The world I am creating."

I continued.

"This will be where our family will settle."

"I see. So this is our Nazarick."

"What's Nazarick?"

"A place mentioned in an old novel of the world that Venomous Snake recommended to me."

That guy, is he planning to undermine our family from within...?

"I see. So you're going to fortify this place. Very well. Let's appoint a [Gardener] in each garden. The gardeners will possess formidable skills and items, and within the gardens they protect, they hold absolute power that can even surpass the Family Head...."

"First, I need to talk with Liao Fan later. Hmm. Estelle. I didn't call you to discuss such a security system."

"Then?"

"Estelle. You can make it rain, right?"

Devil King of Fall Rain.

Thegirl who was once called the saint of the weak, now serves as my family's advisor, and who once submerged an entire world under a red flood, blinked her eyes.

"Rain... are you speaking of?"

"Yes."

I recalled Estelle's skill card that Bae Hu-ryeong had once read to me.

+

[Hate Flows Like Rain]

Rank: S-

Effects: You don't look. You can't see. People consider what they can't see as not there. 'Blind fools.' Right. 'Ignorant.'

Then, show them.

Show them how many lives have been lost due to ignorance. As much as blood has been spilled in this world, the sky will pour down red rain.

※However, only the blood you have seen will become rain.

+

"Let it rain over this garden."

I requested.

4.

The sight resembled a prayer.

Estelle closed her eyes. She bowed her head. Her platinum hair flowed down like a waterfall, covering her neck and chest, gathering upon her clasped hands.

Her lips parted.

"Ah."

They closed briefly, then parted again.

"Ah."

Again.

"Ah—"

It was a kind of rumination.

And it gave.

I bent over and scooped up seawater into a newly made plastic pot... with my hands spread out.

"Hundred Flowers Reincarnation."

[Activating skill.]

Inside the pot, which rippled like water drawn from a well, a small lotus blossomed.

Like curtains in an old ruined mansion that no one had walked through, the frayed lotus had no weight. The heavy and light raindrops alternately struck, creating waves on which the tattered petals silently entrusted themselves.

"This flower..."

The Wand of Ages quickly recognized who the lotus was.

I nodded and pointed to the pot containing the lily of the valley.

"If this world needs a sky and earth, it's solely because that child needs it."

"Likewise, if this world needs a sea, it's because this child needs it."

I then placed the pot on the water surface, now risen to my ankles. It was the first boat to float on the sea of this world.

The pot, like the lotus it contained, seemed weightless, entrusting itself to the movement of the waves. It rose as high as the wave hills allowed before sliding down smoothly, repeating the process.

It seemed dangerously close to capsizing, yet it gradually found a steady rhythm and began its own navigation.

It drifted somewhere and eventually disappeared from sight.

5.

[A sea has been created in your world.]

[Floor 83 is cleared!]

Thus, I continued to cultivate my sanctuary.

"Hundred Flowers Reincarnation."

[Activating skill.]

"Hundred Flowers Reincarnation."

[Activating skill.]

First, I bloomed the flowers. I transplanted them one by one into the pots I had prepared.

Then, I summoned my vassals and gave them tasks.

"Ugor. Daddy. Are you asking me to punch the ground?"

"That's exactly it."

"I'll do it if you ask, but... what's the point?"

"This flower likes high places."

I spoke while holding a tattered aster. My family's warrior leader stared for a while at the flower blooming in a pot made of dirt packed in white plastic, then snorted loudly.

"Got it. Daddy's job is always such complicated stuff. Ugor, step back."

"Thanks."

"Hmph!"

Uburka swung his fist. Bang...!! The previously flat ground and the undulating sea above it exploded vertically.

When the towering water column had once more doused this world in rainwater and then subsided, the floor of my sanctuary was no longer flat.

[A mountain range has appeared in your world.]

[Floor 84 is cleared!]

That was how it went.

[Spring has come to your world.]

For a flower that enjoyed spring breezes and another that had collapsed from eternal winter, I brought spring.

[Summer has come to your world.]

For a flower that felt boiling heat as home and another that wished to visit the sea with its family even just once during summer, I created summer.

[Autumn has come to your world.]

For a certain flower.

[Winter has come to your world.]

Simply for a certain flower.

[Congratulations! Seasons have been created in your world!]

[Floor 85 is cleared!]

[In your world....]

Only for the needs of each individual flower, I filled my world.

"Bloom."

I made flowers bloom.

"Rest sweetly, comfortably, and earnestly amidst the things you've longed for."

I planted flowers.

"As long as you want, for as long as you wish."

Perhaps forever.

But.

"When that time comes someday."

When the day arrives that the withered petals heal.

When the holes in the leaves fill themselves, and strength returns to the once-broken stems.

When the moment comes that they want to bloom brightly again, entirely of their own volition.

"Only then will you leave the pot."

That's how I tended to my garden.