Sincerely, Vanessa [EN]: Chapter 98

To the Teacher, From Vanessa 98

The child was too young to properly identify them and didn’t know what to do.

“My mom is sick. So, um, don’t come in. She said it’s contagious.”

“Don’t worry. We’ll take care of that.”

Riete didn’t think much of it. She simply figured it would be problematic if the young child was left alone. She needed to quickly check inside the house and search the forest again.

So, she was puzzled when Andalus subtly frowned.

“What’s wrong?”

“There’s a foul odor.”

A strange smell wafted through the slightly opened door. It smelled like something rotting, a scent quite familiar to those in special forces.

Riete, now aware of the smell, drew her dagger.

“I need to go in.”

The boy turned to run inside, but Dalois caught him in an instant.

“Let go! Let me go!”

Riete strode across the small, unkempt front yard, while the child thrashed, biting Dalois’s arm.

Dalois, unaffected by the bite thanks to his thick uniform, casually lifted the child onto his shoulder.

“It’s okay. We’re not bad people.”

“Mom! Mom!”

The child struggled, but it was no use. There was still no sign of anyone inside the house.

Riete, gripping her short sword, and Andalus, wearing leather gloves, forcefully kicked open the rusted door. Vanessa watched from behind, wary of any potential attacks.

A terrible stench poured out through the wide-open door.

“Goddamn it.”

Riete cursed under her breath. The house they entered cautiously was a mess.

Not just disorganized—it was far worse.

“It’s all blood.”

The surroundings were filled with bird feathers, small animal carcasses, and bloodstains. Vanessa, enduring the nauseating smell, brought light inside to fully illuminate the scene.

The small living room must have been quaint and beautiful in the past. The floral fabric covering the sofa was decorated with lace at the edges, and the old but wide-backed purple armchair looked comfortable.

However, now it was covered in dust and blood.

“Mom, you can’t go in. Um, um, Mom is….”

The child, foreseeing what was inside, began to sob.

There were two doors next to the small living room. The most terrible smell was coming from the one on the left.

“Shall we open it?”

“Wait a moment.”

Riete put her dagger back into its sheath and replaced it with her long sword. Andalus and Vanessa were already prepared to attack.

Seeing them ready, Riete kicked open the white door.

“Ugh, yuck.”

Dalois couldn’t hold back his gagging. The stench was overwhelming.

“Lieutenant Stahner, take the child outside.”

“That’s my mom! Leave her alone!”

Riete, at the child’s scream-like cry, burst into anger.

“She might have been your mom before. She would have been your mom worrying about you until the very end! But you’re desecrating the dead like this!”

The body of the deceased was surrounded by bloodstains and rotting animal carcasses.

Beneath it was a magic circle that someone had clearly drawn haphazardly; it was a ridiculous prank. The fairy dust needed to draw the magic circle would be washed away by the blood.

The strangest thing was the huge root wrapped around it. It had a structure that stretched out in all directions with many rootlets, entwining the animal carcasses.

Andalus carefully observed the surface of the root and then left the house.

“She’s going to come back to life. She’s going to come back to life!”

“Who told you that?”

Vanessa made eye contact with the child. The child, held on Dalois’s shoulder, had a higher vantage point than Vanessa.

Staring into the child’s eyes, which were filled with tears, Noah began to sob.

Even with snot running down his face, Noah couldn’t hold back his sadness. He deliberately kept the room dark. Even in his young mind, he didn’t want to face it directly.

But under the light these people brought, his mom looked too sick.

“Noah, tell me quickly. Who made you do this?”

“Mom, can’t she come back to life?”

*Sis, you used strange powers earlier. Maybe she can live like that.* Noah’s lips trembled.

Vanessa slowly wiped the boy’s tear-stained face.

“She’s gone to another place.”

“That tree, it said it would save her…”

“There’s no such thing. Even the Great Mage Bam Bandalu can’t bring the dead back to life.”

Noah looked at his mom lying down again. Or rather, the body that *used* to be his mother.

She wore a white bonnet over her braided hair and sang lullabies to the boy who had nightmares. They used to cook together. Even after his father passed away, the boy grew up without knowing sadness thanks to his mother.

But her warm hands had turned cold, and her red cheeks had cooled and turned pale. Her soft body had stiffened and dried up.

Still, she was the boy’s mom.

“Mom…”

Dalois suddenly spoke up.

“We’ll punish those who desecrated your mom. And your mother will rest peacefully in this beautiful forest.”

Noah knew too. At first, he firmly believed without wavering and caught birds and small animals, pouring their blood on his mother’s cold body.

Then the tree grew little by little. Hope arose.

But from some point on, his mother’s body began to dry up, and tears fell whenever a foul stench wafted.

*My mom always smelled so good. When Mom hugged me, it was the happiest place in the world.*

Still, holding onto the hope he had scraped together, he ran into the forest. When he caught a small bird, the tree grew again.

But still, Mom was in that dirty pool of blood.

*’Noah, you always have to wash your hands, feet, and behind your ears clean.’*

*’I don’t want to wash behind my ears.’*

*’Oh my, Mom cleans the living room so shiny every day. Our Noah is getting all the dust on him!’*

“M, Mom…”

Riete hurriedly cleared away the animal carcasses. She left the magic circle just in case and washed away the blood with water.

She tried to cut down the huge root that was trying to devour the body, but it wouldn’t cut properly.

“Th, those people… they said they were servants of God…. So they could save her….”

The crying child stammered. Riete hit her forehead.

“They said Mom could live. That the tree would sa, save her… if we gave it blood….”

Vanessa wiped the cheeks that had become wet again. The boy’s unusually dry cheeks were rough because they lacked fat.

“Lieutenant Stahner, it would be good to take Noah to the village.”

Riete’s voice was firm. But the child, getting down from her body, rushed to his mom. He squeezed and massaged her already dry and rotting hands. Tears fell again.

“Mom, I’m sorry…. I was wrong. U, Mom hates dirty things….”

“Let’s go, Noah.”

“Mom…”

Vanessa looked at the child’s eyes, which were blackened by death, and lowered her head.

The moment of realizing something is always painful. But there is nothing more frightening than a young child acknowledging himself, left alone.

A phantom was reflected behind Noah. His younger self, squatting in the orphanage’s front yard, drawing a house with a twig.

The act he repeated in the hope that his parents might be alive ended sometime. Instead, he wrung laundry with cold, numb hands to appear useful.

So, those who used the child’s unformed mind and small hope as bait were terrible.

Dalois couldn’t wait any longer and picked up the child. Leaving the child being carried away behind, Riete and Vanessa began to analyze the tree roots.

“Burning it would be the fastest. These stems won’t come out.”

“First, I’ll just take out the mother’s body.”

“I want to be considerate, but damn it, bad thoughts are coming to mind.”

Vanessa also had the same ominous feeling. Still, she had to at least try.

Vanessa and Riete struggled to pull out the legs entangled in the roots.

The stench made it feel like they couldn’t breathe. The stiff body wouldn’t come out easily, and the stems were tightly wrapped around it.

“Damn it, damn it, damn it.”

Riete breathed heavily, and Vanessa opened the window and called for the wind. The wind that swept through the interior briefly brought in fresh air, but it didn’t last long.

“Damn priests, damn bastards, telling such lies to a young child?”

“But there’s no evidence. That the priests did it.”

“That’s right, they’ll just say the child is sick or something. Politics is too difficult. If we just arrest them and make them confess! Can’t we do that! Then they’ll make a fuss about torturing them, ah, we can’t do that!”

Riete gasped and finally stood up.

“It’s impossible to cut out the roots without leaving a trace on the body. They’re too entangled. Damn it, I want him to be able to say his last goodbyes.”

“We need to see the main body of the tree first. Let’s go to Major Andalus.”

Riete and Vanessa quickly left the house. The two discovered the tree roots that had broken through the back of the house and began to walk towards the connected side.

A figure flickered in the distance. Andalus was standing under a white tree. Vanessa and Riete quickened their pace and ran.

“It’s a really beautiful forest.”

“I know, right. Major! Major Andalus!”

Major Andalus, lost in thought, quickly turned his head.

“Don’t come any closer.”

Major Andalus, seeing them, spoke sharply. His face, reflecting the white light of the snow on the ground, looked very pale.

“What is it?”

“…All the trees here are demons.”

Riete suddenly raised her head. The pure white tree trunks were dense, and the branches that grew randomly and tangled covered the sky. Vanessa guided the light and scanned the nearby trees.

Nothing unusual was visible. However, they had an unusually smooth sheen and unique square-shaped leaves.

“‘Branches of Dotram’ [a type of demonic tree]. I’ve seen it briefly a long time ago. It was only knee-high, but this is….”

A size that covers the sky. Riete bit her lip.

“What seems to be the range?”

“I can’t know exactly. I can’t tell where the demons start and end.”

“Is it still growing?”

“I don’t know. All I know is one thing. These demons move at night.”

They catch and eat animals that move at night. At that, Vanessa felt a chill all over her body.

If it’s ‘Branches of Dotram,’ she had heard of it even superficially. It was one of the few plant-type demons discovered so far, so it was sometimes used as an example.

The only reason she hadn’t recognized it was because it was usually found in a small state.

When they are small, they are not very threatening to people. They hinder movement with shallow roots covering the ground and kill creatures by entangling them with stems and dropping them, but they could not lift and drop a person with a size that only comes up to the knee.

But these had already grown like huge trees.

And in a huge forest, it is impossible to know how many demons are hiding.

Without knowing when they will try to attack them, or when they will awaken.