I was curious why Earning didn’t have a wallet, but dealing with the countless black dryads aiming their weapons at us came first.

If I couldn’t form a party with her, it was a big penalty since Wolfsbane couldn’t go wild. There was no AoE dealer like Wolfsbane for full-scale attacks.

Even without that, the field was already under Papillion’s control, and no matter how capable a druid Earning was, anxiety surged in my heart due to the disadvantage of having to fight while also accommodating her circumstances.

Just as the dryads were about to clash, a strange roar accompanied a spiked club that heavily split the ground at the center of the standoff.

“Master Mesquite! I’ll take the lead following your example!”

With charred black skin and spiky white hair, and acting like a huge fan of Mesquite, this dryad was a very familiar figure.

Come to think of it, Belladonna’s black barrier started from the hill behind the Alchemy Tower! The dryads of Siedling arrived one after another, keeping the black dryads in check.

I couldn’t help but smile at the sight of that grumpy face, it was so welcoming. When I heard Earning’s words, I worried he might have exhausted his life force, but contrary to my concerns, he looked perfectly fine. For a high-level, that much was nothing, I suppose.

“They’re a tough opponent for you, so fall back.”

Drawing his sword, Siedling pushed me back and kept an eye on Papillion. On any normal day, I would’ve yelled at him not to dismiss me, but in a fight against a person, the appearance of a high-level was a welcome relief.

You can do it! Go for it! Besides, dude has a history of dominating arenas. Maybe surprised that I stayed quiet, Siedling glanced at me and added, checking my reaction.

“You ordered me to protect you from Papillion approaching. I’m just carrying that out.”

“Who’s arguing? Watch me well! If the fight gets dangerous, I’ll chip in too, but there’s something more important than that.”

Ah, right, I never said this.

“Thanks for helping with the graft with Belladonna. To think it unleashed power on par with the Elder’s Rain, which poured out diamonds like crazy. I was moved, it seemed like you put in quite the effort.”

I’d gotten into the habit of constantly complimenting to build rapport with Wolfsbane, and it became second nature. I had to clearly express gratitude for the help! At my words, Siedling stared at me for a long moment, looking quite surprised. What, like he’d never heard thanks or praise before.

“…If you wish, I’ll do so anytime.”

He said in a gruff voice and resumed his guard against Papillion.

“Siedling, after all the kindness I showed you, a troublesome stray in the 16th terrarium, now you turn your back on me like this.”

“Hey! Watch your mouth! Didn’t you pull every trick to keep him from getting into another terrarium?”

Papillion answered my shout with an unpleasant smile. As I recoiled in disgust, Siedling, as if waiting, fully blocked me from view with his large frame.

“You know the Ironbeast too?”

Ah, Earning’s seeing me with Siedling for the first time. And even a famous person like Earning recognizes him. Siedling really is famous. I realize that all over again.

“Is that notoriously rough guild bounty hunter really on your side? If he turns on us, we have no chance.”

She pressed me with a very worried voice. Ah, don’t worry. That guy’s in our guild.

“Here, you can’t even use your specialty of multiple domain proclamations, so how do you plan to face me?”

At Papillion’s gesture, the black flower dryads all raised their weapons and charged this way.

Siedling’s dryads showed the same orderly team play as I’d seen during the boss fight. What was lacking in that team was a healer, so I generously supported them with our beautiful genius healer.

However, Belladonna, who would be a major asset, couldn’t join the battle, perhaps conscious of Earning.

“If you’re here, Siedling won’t be able to bring out all the dryads!”

I tried to move a bit farther away with Earning, but the dryads of the Black Flower lunged at us relentlessly, giving no opening.

Oh man, this is endless. Is it possible for one druid to have this many dryads? It was hard to believe that dozens of dryads were bound to Papillion’s soul alone.

Each strike of the Black Thistle was devastating, like boulders rolling down a mountaintop. Some dryads used large shields like Mesquite, while the attacking ones wielded swords, spears, guns, whips, and wires—it felt like I was looking at an army.

There were even dryads acting as healers, and support-type dryads specialized in buffs to boost our allies’ morale.

No matter how high-level Siedling was, they couldn’t help but be pushed back. It would be better if Belladonna joined the fight too.

“Mesquite, is the blessing of the World Tree’s branch not ready yet?”

Mesquite was focusing on protecting me rather than jumping into the front lines with Siedling’s dryads. With attacks closing in from all sides, there was no room to spare attention elsewhere. She shook her head and answered that it wasn’t ready yet.

At this point, my chest felt so tight I could die. Oh, Great World Tree’s branch! You said you’d kill me, didn’t you! I’ve come all this way—can’t you just trigger the hidden quest already?

Of course, since it’s part of the world’s god, the World Tree, it would be even weirder if the blessing vanished so easily.

But our side couldn’t gain the upper hand and kept being pushed back, and the leader of Inferno had already arrived at the Terrarium with wide-open eyes, so time was tight. Now, the uneasy feeling of having to kill the World Tree’s branch had vanished, and I was in a position to desperately pray that it would get eliminated quickly.

Suddenly, amid the chaotic battlefield, I sensed a strange shift in the air. The dryads of the Black Flower, who had been attacking us like madmen, faltered, and even Papillion, who had been leisurely wearing a creepy smile while enjoying his advantage, visibly stiffened his expression.

The heat that had been suppressed by the Elder’s Life Rain began to boil uncontrollably. An intense heat, incomparable to the midsummer warmth I had felt when I visited before, started to encroach, as if the hill we were standing on was slowly sinking into lava.

A dry, stifling heat pressed down on my whole body, making it hard to breathe.

“Holy shit… What the hell is this…”

It was beyond believable that this was just the power of a single black branch radiating heat.

“Damn… It seems the patience has run out.”

Papillion covered his eyes and muttered gloomily.

“Ah… no…”

Earning was seen stepping back hesitantly with a trembling voice. With a dazed expression as if she had seen a ghost, she stared at the direction where immense heat was emanating. Her mesmerized actions were so unsettling that even I instinctively stepped back.

I felt the black tree branches stabbing my back. There was no more room to retreat.

“I still haven’t found all my flowers… I can’t die like this….”

“Something enormous is coming.”

Siedling spoke with even more caution than when facing Papillion. At his attitude, the dryads stopped fighting and formed a defensive formation, surrounding Siedling.

What the hell, what is it? Why is the atmosphere like this? No way… Is the head of that boss-level Inferno finally coming here? Crap, isn’t this a huge deal? Creacion’s promise to look out for me would all go up in smoke if we run into the boss here.

“That’s why you should have kept the incident to a manageable scale, you. In the end, our master, whose patience has worn thin, is coming to personally execute. Ah, then I’m in danger too.”

Papillion sighed and looked at me. Not like he was taunting either.

As the heat intensified, I even reached the despairing conclusion that this was beyond human capabilities to handle.

I could understand that Earning’s description of it as a walking flames was not an exaggeration at all, just from the aura it radiated without even seeing its form.

It was a crisis of life and death. And then.

“Now!”

An unfamiliar voice shouted at me. Now what? Before I could assess the situation, something hot wrapped around my wrist. The blazing heat tormented my wrist to the point where I almost screamed. It was only because my thick sleeve and robe covered it that it didn’t scorch my bare skin.

What grabbed me was a black tree branch that writhed like a vine. Its target was my phone held in my bound hand.

“Jae!”

Mesquite, startled by my scream, pulled me away instantly. But the black tree branch, not giving in, desperately yanked at my wrist.

“How dare you…!”

Finally, Mesquite raised her hand as if to tear it apart, even though she knew it was a branch of the World Tree.

“Mesquite, wait!”

What stopped her was noticing the end of the branch squirming and changing shape. That flat, rectangular shape was unmistakably a USB cable.

The branch that had turned into a USB shape urgently plugged its tip into my phone’s charging port, like a traveler in the desert finding an oasis.

Crazy, couldn’t it have warned me nicely first….

“Ugh.”

Suddenly, a wave of nausea hit me like severe motion sickness. My vision went black along with the feeling of my mind collapsing.

It felt as if a massive boulder had filled my entire body. An immense pressure I had never experienced before weighed down on me. A colossal energy surged to its limit inside me, making my whole body feel like it was about to burst.

I heard the voices of the Dryads shouting my name as they tried to hold my collapsing body together. Inside my nose, a burning sensation, then a pop, like a soap bubble bursting, sounded. Soon, a hot liquid trickled down my philtrum.

I had always had a healthy body that never even got a nosebleed, even when I stayed up all night for days on end…

This energy was on a completely different level from what I felt in the orchard of the 28th terrarium.