Death March to the Parallel World Rhapsody

This is Satou. Like the old tales of the Snow Woman, men enchanted by dryads are said to have fallen into a happy dream, forever trapped within the trees.

If the dryad we met earlier hadn’t been a young girl, we might have been in serious trouble.

◇

Carrying Mia princess-style, we used invisibility skills to hide and then used earth shrinking to move toward the base of the massive cherry tree.

We reached the cherry tree without being spotted by anyone.

Along the way, fences and barriers had been set up to protect the cherry tree, but they posed no real obstacles.

At the root of the cherry tree sat a fragile-looking girl.

She had pink-blonde hair.

Surely, this must be the cherry spirit who called Mia.

Carelessly, I appeared before the girl without even confirming via AR display.

“Who are you?! Approaching the Sacred Cherry Tree without permission from the ‘Cherry Guardians’!”

The girl, who had been almost fading into the night shadows moments ago, suddenly confronted us with fierce intensity.

Time to respond with a bit of theatrical flair.

“Excuse me. I was called by the cherry tree, so I came.”

“What nonsense are you spouting—”

The girl tried to cut me off, but she was stopped by a cherry-colored beauty emerging from the tree trunk.

Ugh, the cherry tree spirit really did appear...

“Sorry, ‘Cherry Guardian’. You should sleep for a while.”

The beautiful woman touched the girl, instantly putting her to sleep.

The cherry spirit gently caught the girl as she collapsed powerless and laid her down atop the cherry roots.

After tenderly adjusting the girl’s hair, she lifted her face and turned toward us.

A familiar face—

“Oh! Isn’t this the boy! To think you’d come to visit even me, the cherry spirit!”

The AR display confirmed with the label “Dryad.”

However, this dryad was a voluptuous beauty completely unlike the young dryads I knew.

The beautiful dryad reached out to pull me closer, but Mia stopped her.

“Hmph, shameless.”

“Oh? So the young Boruenan child is here too? Jealousy already, even though you’re still young. Such a woman.”

Apparently, Mia had come to see the beautiful dryad.

While Mia continued blocking the dryad from getting close to me, they exchanged words. No matter what excuses Mia gave to persuade her, the dryad’s intentions were always clear.

“Satou.”

“Boy, sorry to trouble you as always, but could I have some magic power?”

—Just as I thought.

Even Van, the vampire, would be jealous.

Well, with such a voluptuous beauty, a kiss or two is no big deal.

The dryad scratched my head affectionately and kissed me.

Mia seemed resigned to providing magic power and didn’t say “Guilty” or anything. Though her cheeks puffed up like balloons, clearly annoyed.

After sucking nearly 2,000 points—the most magic power I’ve ever given—the dryad parted her lips with a suggestive sound.

As soon as her magic replenishment finished, Mia pulled the dryad away from me.

“Yeah, I’m satisfied~. Phew, that helped a lot. The magic flow in the Royal Capital has been strange lately. I was having trouble drawing magic from the source of the city. I’m glad you kids were here to help.”

“Hm.”

I probed about that strange magic flow, but aside from it being a recent occurrence, I learned nothing else. Given the dryad’s skewed sense of time, it’s unclear exactly when things started going awry.

“Boy, this is a gift of thanks for the magic. Ask Lady Aarize how to use it. She should know.”

The dryad said this, handed me a cherry-colored precious pearl, then vanished into the cherry tree trunk.

The AR display identified this as a Cherry Pearl. It seems to be a crystal that collects spirit power. Lately, I’ve been getting quite a lot of rare materials.

◇

After seeing the dryad disappear into the tree, I thought about leaving but decided to wake the sleeping “Cherry Guardian” girl who might catch a cold if left unattended.

Also, if we left, we might be treated as suspicious intruders since she had seen our faces.