Though people may not know it well, the world of plants is far more fierce, desperate, and cruel than the world of animals.
Some tree colonies grow taller and taller as if competing, only to destroy themselves in order to catch even a single ray of sunlight faster. Over such desperately grown trees, kudzu vines crawl up like snakes, smother and kill them. Some trees spray poison around themselves, while certain grasses somehow endure that poison and claim the empty territory.
Plants, which might seem static and peaceful at a glance, wage war every moment to steal even a single fragment more of sunlight.
Such wars occur within a single tree as well. Branches growing below, shaded by the lush leaves growing above, ultimately fail to sprout new buds. Unable to stretch further due to lack of sunlight, they leave behind only bare twigs before disappearing.
The lower branches are culled, the upper ones flourish. Thus the tree grows into the shape we know. The World Tree, too, being a tree, should follow such rules.
But the Tree of Origins is a divine tree before it is a tree. It transcended the logic of ordinary trees.
Countless small branches spread out like a net. There are no leaves. There is no need for them since the sun doesn't even reach here.
Instead, fields lie in place of leaves. At the ends of the branches, seedbeds hang, and some sort of crops are growing there. Upon those branches, people carrying baskets walk step by step, carefully. To harvest the ripening crops from the seedbeds.
Seeing the seedbeds grown on branches of varying heights, it looked just like terraced fields. The problem was that the gaps between the steps were several meters, though. Regardless, a crowd large enough to clearly be called a 'village' was visible.
Having four wings was worth it. Even holding the Regressor, I glided above the ground at a sufficiently reduced speed. The wings that had finished their duty withered and fell off in an instant.
"...You're late."
The Grand Witch, who had been waiting below, greeted us with a sullen face. I carefully set the Regressor down and said.
"For a first time, this is pretty fast, you know? Besides, I wasn't alone."
"...Regardless, you're late."
"It's not like anyone's waiting, so what's late about it."
I was about to brush it off absentmindedly, but I noticed a crowd approaching the landing spot. The people on the branches swarmed toward us like a colony of ants, climbing ladders and sliding down ropes.
It must be fascinating to see someone fly down with wings. But their reaction was far too passionate.
"It's the Witch!"
"Lady Witch!"
The people who approached let out thunderous cheers. At least they had the minimal courtesy not to climb up onto the branch we stood on, but their fervent gazes and shouts made it seem like they were watching some kind of performance.
It feels oddly nice that they welcome me so warmly even though we've just met. I also waved my hand toward them.
"Hello! Thank you so much for your welcome!"
"Who the hell are you? You get out!"
"You're not even a witch!"
That's too much. Should I just awaken as the King of Sin?
'Ugh, there are too many people. I came down in such a hurry that I forgot to change my impression with Agartha's mask.... I should have erased my presence.'
The 'Lady Witch' they were actually welcoming had become haggard from extreme anthropophobia. The Grand Witch fiddled with her face, trying to endure it stoically, but eventually gagged and came behind my back.
Her anthropophobia worsened after meeting the masses. Well, one person is better than dozens. Is this a good opportunity to get closer...?
"You... you handle this..."
The Grand Witch pushed my back and hid behind the Regressor to avoid the approaching people. Whether she did or not, the people began to close in.
"Are you the Witch from above the Leaf Cloud?"
"Ah, yes. That's right."
"We asked the Lady Witch."
"The Lady Witch left that answer to me. The only answer I, as her proxy, can give is this. Fuck off, asshole."
Did I look like an easy target? The resident got excited by my words and lunged at me.
"You're not even a witch!"
"You're not one either!"
Dodging the resident's attack with a slight tilt of my head, I grabbed their entire face and slammed them into the ground. The resident, who hit the tree with the back of their head, trembled without letting out a squeak.
They're neither the Grand Witch nor Nebida, so who does a mere citizen think they are, messing with me? Do they think I bow low to everyone?
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The most intuitive body language is violence. The slightly calmed people murmured as they looked at me. I asked the fallen person.
"Anyway, why are you looking for the Lady Witch?"
"Th... I wanted to request a commission from the Lady Witch..."
"A commission? What kind of commission?"
"Medicine for my hair growing..."
"Wow. She makes medicine for that too? Witches are more amazing than I thought."
Once one person spoke up, others began shouting one after another.
"Our village was attacked by a leopard! We need a lethal poison to kill the leopard!"
"I came to receive a supply of Mine Dandelion. When will the Witches come?"
"My father has mushrooms growing on his body and he's dying! We need medicine!"
"Lately, the crops on the branches don't seem to grow well. Is there something like a nutritional supplement?"
The people shook their hands holding scrap metal or alchemical coins. Not intuitively understanding the situation, I looked toward the Grand Witch.
"...The Tree of Origins grows all sorts of ingredients, but it lacks minerals and metals.... So we receive those and make medicine in return..."
"Ah. Bartering, right? Makes sense, mining minerals would be difficult for witches."
Receiving commissions and taking minerals as payment, right? They've accumulated for a long time, so there's quite a lot. These commissions aren't something I can resolve.
But if I say it's impossible right now, I don't know how this crowd might turn violent. The desperate tend to become radical.
"Now, there's no point in making a fuss here since I won't even remember it all. Instead, please organize your commissions and give them to me. Then I'll deliver them up above."
"Deliver them? To which Witch?"
"The Witch will choose that. Each Witch has their own field of expertise. Isn't it more convenient to gather them all at once rather than comparing each one?"
I don't know whether the witch will accept this many commissions or not. Nor am I particularly interested. But these people would be satisfied and wait just by having it written on paper.
"Hold on, hold on. Don't write on my body though. Is there a village chief or tribal chief here? A person or group that can represent you."
"Village... chief?"
"We're not a single tribe, so we don't have that."
"Something that could be called a representative... there's one."
People's gazes headed in one direction. Among the countless branches extending from the Tree of Origins, the tree with the most human hands upon it. A branch where golden ears of rice hung instead of leaves.
"The Rice Paddy Branch."
The residents of the World Tree's shade live on tree branches. No matter how the Tree of Origins is a World Tree and its branches are large enough to live on, a branch is still a branch. On a branch that slopes upward, there is no concept of flat ground. The stairs people created by wedging boards were the only brief flatness they could enjoy.
"A village full of stairs. The quality of life must be the worst."
As I grumbled while walking up the stairs, the Regressor said as if suddenly recalling something.
"At times like this, you're surprisingly interested in how people live."
"Huh?"
"No matter where you go, you seem to observe the lives of the people living there. Is it because of that? King of Humans?"
"I've never consciously done that."
Do you think I observe humans because I want to? I just happen to notice them as I go around, what can I do about it.
"Really?"
The Regressor brushed it off nonchalantly and looked around.
"Anyway, where's that witch from earlier? Where did she suddenly go?"
"Wasn't she next to Mr. Shey?"
"I don't know. She hid behind me and then disappeared at some point."
'Even for me, I usually don't miss signs. Did my senses dull because I'm injured?'
No, I didn't miss her. She's right behind us.
She's following us with her presence hidden by Agartha's Mask. She hid in the crowd, yet no one pays her any attention. With her witch hat removed and quietly following along, the people walked with her without even realizing she was there.
'...No one recognizes me. This is rather comfortable. Agartha's Mask... it's comfortable.'
There are three aspects to Agartha's Mask. Truth (眞), Goodness (善), and Beauty (美).
Truth (眞) reverses perception.
Normally, when looking at someone's face, you can roughly guess their sex or age, but Agartha's Mask determines 'what I appear to be.' Even with a face like the Regressor's, one could be perceived as a man if they had this mask.
Goodness (善) determines impression.
No matter how large someone is, few people feel threatened by the face of a smiling dog. However, they show fear toward a leopard or wolf of similar size. Agartha's second mask intervenes in the wariness people feel from a face.
Beauty (美) reveals beauty.
Charm, presence, the charisma that pulls in gazes, and the seduction that tempts reason. It reveals and conceals the radiant presence that seems to shine from one's face.
Right now, the Grand Witch was wearing all three masks simultaneously to avoid attention. Lowering her presence as much as possible, drawing no one's gaze. Slipping among the people with the impression of an ordinary girl.
'This is my ancestor's mask... no, Agartha's very face itself. A king's authority that works even on beasts, not just humans.'
The ability to recognize faces isn't exclusive to humans, after all. The effect would be much weaker, though.
It was because the Grand Witch used it so trivially that it seemed so, but Agartha, who was one of the Five Lords, unified the jungle with that power. Sometimes with beauty, sometimes with awe, sometimes with the power of civilization, she subjugated the uncivilized barbarians and brought them under her order. She even tamed the beasts, the greatest threat of the jungle.
A power so potent that it could be considered an upgrade compared to the Grandiomor royal family's ability, which at best only influenced human sociability. It's ironic that the very ability of Grandiomor, the supposed downgrade, survived longer.
'...I searched through this jungle for hundreds of years, but to think she'd come on her own two feet. I never thought it would be in the Elephant Graveyard... because going there means death. The Saint must have seen through even the Elephant Graveyard.'
The Grand Witch fell into deeper thought, recalling the Regressor's words.
'Huh, but... if she got the mask from the Elephant Graveyard, how did she get there?'
"We're here! This is the Rice Paddy Branch. If you go that way... Huh? But where's the Lady Witch?"
Only then did the people look around, searching for the Grand Witch. Despite her being right in their midst, the people couldn't recognize her.
'Ah... thank goodness for the mask...'
People passing by her, who was inwardly relieved, discovered the Regressor. The Regressor with the mask on might have been a pretty man, but now, having lost the mask and grown their hair out a bit, there was no way they looked like a man regardless. Pointing at the Regressor, the people said.
"Hey, this person looks like a witch too!"
"Idiot. She doesn't have a witch's hat."
"But her outfit is really strange, right? Both of her arms are bound. How strong must she be that she has to seal her own hands? She must be a great witch!"
Hearing the passing remarks, the Regressor looked at me with an annoyed expression.
"...You explain."
"Aish, you're both such difficult people. Why do you find talking to people so hard?"
This world is wrong. Both the Regressor and the Grand Witch, their abilities are too outstanding compared to their sociability. I need to tone it down.
"Don't worry. The Lady Witch is currently watching over you with sorcery."
"Really? She didn't run away?"
"Why would the Lady Witch run away in fear? She's someone who can turn all of you into frogs if she sets her mind to it."
"Still..."
"They're getting a bit cocky. Lady Witch! Turn just one of them into a frog as an example!"
"Gasp! No, no! I'm sorry!"
These people treat witches so casually. Well, even if they're witches, in a jungle where all sorts of sorcery and mysteries run rampant, they aren't mysterious beings.
'Duckweed? Heh... It might not be bad if all humans turned into frogs...'
"I said I'm sorry! Please forgive us generously!"
'Tsk...'
She was actually about to do it. I can't even make jokes properly to someone who has the ability to turn them into reality.
The people seemed a bit suspicious, not quite believing my words, but there was nothing they could do about it. The people surrounding us headed toward a pavilion-like building standing in the middle of the Rice Paddy Branch.
On a branch with no ground to build a foundation, one had to pile pillars and lay boards on top to level it. Because of that, all the buildings were pavilions. Especially at the points where branches split, large pavilions were built wherever two branches could serve as supports.
Between the massive tree branches so large that one's sense of distance faded, the pavilions adorned with cascading vines and thick leaves were as beautiful as a scene from a painting. Of course, as with all artworks, actually walking through the landscape was exhausting to the point of death.
Everyone panted as they climbed up the branch, catching their breath in front of the largest pavilion. A brief silence flowed. No one gathered here thought of going to the pavilion, hesitating.
Then someone spoke to me first.
"Excuse me, proxy of the Lady Witch."
"Yes?"
"I'm sorry, but could you go in first?"
"Huh? This is my first time here, and I don't have any acquaintances with the people inside, either?"
"You came from above the Leaf Cloud. Those bastards are strong and fierce, but they're still respectful to people from above the Leaf Cloud."
Leaf Cloud? I looked up toward the top of the Tree of Origins, and the lushly grown green leaves covered the sky like a dark cloud. The people below the tree must call that area the Leaf Cloud.
So they call people from the Spirit Lord's layer that. Well, for people like Nebida or the Grand Witch, they must seem truly special, like they descended from the clouds.
"And... we're also a bit scared of those who came from beyond the grassland. They're from the same place as Lord Muhu."
And the people in this pavilion were also 'special' people from the perspective of the Nine Nations' people. I asked again.
"Huh? The people here are those who came from beyond the grassland?"
Thinking it was a good time to spill, the people chimed in.
"Ah, yes. That's right. Outsiders came into the Rice Paddy Village's pavilion."
"They're small but ridiculously strong."
"They act like they're the village chiefs! Even though they didn't even come from above the Leaf Cloud!"
They must have had a lot pent up. Seeing that they still couldn't bring themselves to step forward, they must be quite frightened.
If you don't want to, there's nothing I can do. I can open the door myself. Let's see.
"They always claim to be the lords of all creation. Always acting so high and mighty!"
...Hmm?
I paused in front of the pavilion. Lords of all creation, somehow a familiar term.
Feeling a strange sense of alienation, I opened the door.
"Arf- I'm sorry, but the owner of this place is currently out-."
From inside came a voice that sounded like a beast flirting. A dog beastman in a pitch-black suit was sitting on a desk, welcoming me.