Player Who Became A Constellation [EN]: Chapter 221

221. Player Who Became a Constellation

“Do you know a man named Kudan Ragnalan?”

The mercenary pulled out a drawing from his pocket depicting the Nord warrior, Kudan Ragnalan.

The old woman panicked and denied.

“N, no. I don’t know him….”

“Are you sure? I heard you received help from this heinous Nord?”

“Pardon? Ah, that, that’s… not true. That heinous Nord suddenly appeared and tried to… harm my daughter. Yes, then the great Deshar Kingdom army saved us!”

“We’ll need to go inside to confirm.”

“There’s a child inside!”

“What does it matter?”

As the mercenary forcibly tried to open the door, a man stood tall next to him.

The mercenary paused, surprised, and looked to his side.

A man with black and white hair was glaring at him.

Judging by his attire, he was a private in the Deshar Kingdom army.

“W, what?”

Behind the man stood another Deshar Kingdom soldier and a female mercenary.

“Didn’t you say you didn’t know him?”

“…….”

“Do you have a problem with that?”

“No, haha… no problem.”

Whether he was overwhelmed by the man, Loki’s, aura, the mercenary waved his hand and stepped back.

Then, he clicked his tongue and headed elsewhere.

Loki turned his head and looked at the old woman.

The old woman had a nervous expression.

“Do you really not know the man, Kudan Ragnalan?”

He had a feeling that this old woman knew about Kudan.

He mentioned Kudan, and he seemed to be related to that old woman’s granddaughter.

“Oh dear, I really don’t know…. We, we really… don’t know such heinous Nords!”

At the old woman’s words, Cancun, who had transformed into a man with a crow mask, frowned.

“We’ll give you any amount of reward.”

Sharin stepped forward and shook a money pouch.

“I don’t know!”

At that moment, a woman inside the building shouted.

“Grandma, close the door!”

The woman approached.

“I don’t know! I don’t know! So please look somewhere else!”

What a bold young lady.

To speak so confidently without fear.

Her wariness of the Deshar Kingdom army must have reached its peak.

Loki, Cancun, and Sharin looked at each other.

At that moment, Deshar soldiers brought a cart filled with jars into the market street.

“Distribution! Everyone gather around!”

A Deshar soldier shouted.

In response, the houses that had been tightly closed slowly began to open their doors.

The territory residents came out one by one.

“May everyone receive the blessing of the great World Tree!”

The mercenaries opened the lids of the jars.

Then, the market street was filled with a sweet fragrance.

Loki watched the scene.

What was contained in those jars was not ordinary water.

The Deshar mercenaries used bowls to scoop the thick liquid from the jars and distribute it to the territory residents.

The territory residents received it and went back into their homes.

Loki cautiously asked the old woman, who was closing the door.

“What is that?”

“Yes?”

The old woman was flustered.

The soldier who knew best about that was a Deshar soldier.

“You don’t know what that is?”

Loki nodded at the old woman’s question.

“It’s, it’s the World Tree’s sap.”

“Sap?”

“…It’s like a medicine that improves the plague, and it’s also food that extends our lives to some extent.”

“…….”

Loki looked at the old woman and the woman.

Their faces were flushed, and their skin was slightly tinged with purple.

Symptoms of the plague.

But why weren’t this old woman and woman receiving it?

“You don’t seem to be drinking it, what’s the reason?”

The two people closed their mouths at Loki’s question.

Their wariness was so high that it seemed difficult to get any more answers.

Loki sighed and took out two potions from his pocket and handed them over.

The old woman accepted the potions in a daze.

“What is this…?”

“It’s a plague cure.”

“Yes?”

A plague cure, there was no way such a thing existed.

If it did exist, there was only one.

A rare potion from Asgard in the north.

A universal potion that healed any wound or disease.

“I’ll come back later when I have time. If you change your mind, I hope you’ll tell me about Kudan.”

Loki stepped back, and the old woman, who had been watching him, closed the door.

Loki turned his head.

“Alright! The distribution is over. Let’s go.”

The Deshar soldiers emptied everything in the jars and began to move.

“W, wait a minute!”

“We didn’t receive any!”

As people gathered, the Deshar soldiers pushed them away with spears.

“If you want more, join our army!”

It seemed they were conscripting soldiers from the occupied territory.

The Deshar mercenaries headed towards the World Tree.

“Let’s follow them too.”

“Yes?”

Cancun and Sharin were taken aback.

The place they were going was the center of the Kaprik territory, where the World Tree was located.

It was the central heart of the Deshar Kingdom army.

As it was expected to be the most heavily guarded place, there was a possibility of being discovered if they were inspected, no matter how well they were disguised.

“It would be good to check how much manpower is here.”

Rather than moving recklessly, it would be better to check the enemy’s strength.

***

“They’re gone.”

The old woman looked outside through the peephole.

The old woman sighed in relief as Loki and his party moved away. And she turned around.

Her granddaughter was staring blankly at the two potions.

“What are you doing? Throw away that jinxed thing! Who knows what kind of medicine it is-.”

At that moment, the woman opened the potion lid and drank it.

“Hey!”

She closed her eyes tightly and drank, then widened her eyes.

The fever disappeared. The pain she felt in her body gradually decreased, and her skin color began to regain its color.

The old woman had a surprised expression at the sight.

“G, Grandma.”

“H, how did that happen? That…!”

“Those people from before….”

The woman said, looking at the old woman.

“They might be people from Asgard.”

***

Loki and Sharin arrived near the World Tree.

The security around the World Tree was surprisingly lax.

No, it was almost non-existent.

“Hahahaha!”

Was it because they could see the light after a long time, even at night?

Or was it because of the hallucinatory symptoms emanating from the pollen scattered by the giant World Tree?

The Deshar Kingdom army, which had settled around the World Tree, was engrossed in a banquet.

They opened the food storage and danced around the firewood.

Perhaps because they enjoyed quite intense entertainment, there were old people skewered on targets here and there, and men and women who seemed to have been beaten to death with whips were scattered around.

Loki clicked his tongue as he looked at them, drooping like dolls that had run out of life.

‘…I think it’s been a few days since this Kaprik territory was captured?’

Have they not stopped the victory celebration since then?

“…This pollen, it seems to have the same effect as madness mushrooms.”

Loki nodded at Sharin’s words.

They must have become lax due to the hallucinatory symptoms.

But no matter how much it was a kingdom army made up of conscripts and mercenary groups with no cohesion. It was too much.

Loki looked up at the tree, which stretched high into the sky, threatening to pierce even the clouds.

Angels were flapping their wings and flying there.

As they did, they plucked the fruits hanging from the tree and dropped them from the sky.

“Oh! The angels are giving us blessed fruits!”

The soldiers cheered as they received the fruits in baskets.

There were gaps between the trees, and from there, a sweet-smelling, pure white, thick sap flowed down like a waterfall, creating a stream that flowed around the World Tree.

The Deshar soldiers dipped oak mugs into such a river, took them out, drank, and burst into laughter.

“Kudan was defeated by these guys?”

They had no discipline, no fighting spirit, no will to fight, and no sense of tension.

To capture this Kaprik territory, where the Ronia and Asgard armies were stationed, with such a disorganized army….

‘…Kudan, his pride must have been severely dented.’

It was when Loki was looking around the surroundings.

“Hey! What are you standing there blankly for!?”

One of the Deshar soldiers sat in front of the campfire in the barracks and gestured towards Loki and Sharin.

“Don’t just stand there blankly, come here and pour some wine. Rookies!”

As Loki and his party were only spacing out unlike the others, they seemed to have thought of them as rookies.

Indeed, with the capture of the Kaprik territory and the creation of supply routes, newly conscripted or hired mercenaries were gathering.

As time passed, the size of the Deshar Kingdom army was growing considerably.

Loki, Cancun, and Sharin approached the one who had called them.

A swaggering middle-aged man gulped down the green liquid in an oak mug.

Then, he suddenly grabbed Sharin’s arm, pulled her in, and put his arm around her shoulder.

“Oh! Rookie, you have a unique skin color. What country are you from?”

“…Haha, a faraway country in the south.”

As Loki and Cancun tried to step forward, Sharin raised her hand and smiled awkwardly.

It meant not to stop her.

Rather, she pointed to the man next to her and said with her lips.

-‘Information, I’ll get it.’

Loki and Cancun sat side by side next to Sharin.

Then, another mercenary sat between Loki and Cancun.

It was a female mercenary.

“Are you guys companions? Haha! Nice to meet you! But are you a small three-person mercenary group? You’re small in scale? My name is Sasha. That womanizing captain over there is Renic.”

Loki and Cancun said to the female mercenary who introduced herself as Sasha.

“Hans.”

“Jin.”

It was a pseudonym.

“What’s the lady’s name?”

The man named Renic looked at Sharin with a sticky gaze.

Sharin twitched her lips and avoided his gaze, as if she found his gaze burdensome.

“It’s Reina.”

This was also a pseudonym.

But Renic burst into laughter as if he liked the name.

“The name is as beautiful as the appearance!”

“Um, is it always like this?”

Renic was about to drink the green liquid in the oak mug when he looked at Sharin.

“What?”

“Is it always this festive here?”

“Haha! Of course. We’re always playing like this. War? What’s that? Who wins by wielding weapons with difficulty these days?”

“Then?”

“We don’t need to fight. All we do is chores.”

“Chores?”

“That….”

Renic pointed to the giant tree, the World Tree.

“Protecting that tree is our mission.”

“Then does that mean we can stay here?”

Renic shook his head at Sharin’s question.

“No, it moves.”

“So what kind of work-.”

“No, not us, that tree.”

“Yes?”

Renic chuckled as if he found Sharin’s reaction amusing.

“Surprisingly, that giant tree moves.”

“……!”

“The tree roots pierce the ground and move the body. Each time, the terrain is distorted, and the surrounding area is devastated. And….”

Renic shuddered as if he had remembered something.

“And?”

At Sharin’s urging, Renic subtly revealed a terrified look.

“…It dries up all the surrounding life.”

“…….”

“Not only trees and grass, but also forests and meadows, and even rivers all dry up, and all the insects, animals, and all living things that lived nearby wither and die as if their vitality has been sucked out.”

As if taking all that life as nourishment, the World Tree was moving.

Was it because of the hallucinatory symptoms of the pollen?

His mouth was very light.

At Renic’s words, Sharin realized that the tree was not just a tree that spread the plague.

“What is that tree?”

“Well, we don’t know either.”

Renic naturally handed the oak mug to Sharin.

“More than that, here! Drink it! This sweet honey is the sap that only comes from the World Tree. Originally, it’s said to be a very precious honey wine that only the constellations drink.”

“I don’t really drink….”

“Hey, are you refusing? It’s delicious.”

“No, that….”

As Renic stared intently, Sharin accepted the oak mug and drank.

“It’s sweet….”

It was sweet. But at the same time, her head became hazy.

She kept drinking without realizing it.

“Right? It’s the blessing given by the constellation of the earth, Gaian. So enjoy it. You guys drink too!”

Renic gestured as if telling Loki and Cancun to drink too.

Sasha distributed the sap wine to them.

“Besides, you have to rest to hit it off with the goddess at night.”

“Hit it off with the goddess at night?”

It was when Cancun and Sharin were tilting their heads.

Cheers erupted from here and there.

Loki and Sharin turned their heads.

At that moment, they saw an existence walking around, spreading a light green aura in all directions.

A woman guarded by angels flying in the sky.

It was a beautiful woman with light green hair and a fluttering dress.

Everyone looked at her with a blissful expression.

Even a sweet fragrance flowed out, and everyone was completely captivated by her.

The goddess of the earth, Gaian.

Also called the goddess of healing and life, and also the goddess who spread the plague.