Foreign Land Reclamation By a Vegetable-growing Skeleton

Rarely did anyone touch the Little Sapling other than Ange. Curious about the finger touching it, the sapling gently raised a leaf that touched Anthony’s fingertip.

Anthony felt a cool stream creeping into his body from the point of contact.

He didn’t know what kind of aura it was, but it felt pleasant. However, Anthony didn’t have time to explore this feeling and shot a defiant glare back at Aestolia.

Aestolia nodded, her face conveying a ‘I’ll remember you’ expression, and backed away.

Anthony quickly cradled the Little Sapling in his arms, fearing he might drop it accidentally. His recent show of defiance was largely for the elves’ benefit.

Only after he’d secured the pot in his arms did Anthony declare loudly:

“Firstly, the Tree of Life is not dead. We found the cure to its wilting disease and poured it into the soil. The drug started working, sending it into a slumber.” Saying this, Anthony quickly added, “Give them that branch we cut earlier. Also, do any of you have a Teleportation Scroll?”

Negris quickly tossed the branch they had cut earlier, and said, “You’ve come to the right person for that question. Ange, get the scrolls.”

Ange brought out a large pile of scrolls, one for each person, even Lightning.

But at this moment, Lightning’s mother leaned out, saying sternly, “Lightning, come back! This is no joke. They killed the God of Life. The elves won’t let them off easily. Come back, I can plead with His Majesty on your behalf.”

Lightning rolled his eyes, “I told you, the God of Life didn’t die. Those elves just like to panic and make wild guesses. We wanted to help, but they treated us like criminals. They are too stuck up. The God of Life won’t like them.”

As he spoke, Lightning clamped a scroll between his hooves and bit into it effortlessly. His action conveyed his alignment with Ange’s side. Unless the misunderstanding was clarified, it would mean a complete rift with his mother, turning them into enemies forever.

Everyone began tearing their teleportation scrolls. While waiting for the scrolls to trigger, Anthony continued, “Secondly, we saved the God of Life, and you treat us like this. When the God of Life reawakens, I will ask it to punish you.”

“Thirdly, this is Little Sapling, our partner, not your Tree of Life.”

“Fourthly, the Undead God doesn’t fear battles but dislikes misunderstandings. We will let you off this time. Once you understand the truth of what happened, you can come and apologize to us.”

As Anthony finished speaking, the teleportation scrolls started working one after another. Blasts of white light flared up, one by one engulfing everyone present.

The elves, who had surrounded them tightly, could only watch helplessly as Ange and his associates were teleported away one by one. The last to leave was Anthony, with the Little Sapling in his hand.

The elves looked at each other in bewilderment, at a loss. After a while, Gailard was the first to land on the platform, followed by Kael’danil, who changed back from an eagle to a young woman.

Three elven archers landed too, followed by Aestolia.

Kael’danil was the first to speak, “That Little Sapling truly is a Tree of Life. I sensed the overwhelming vitality in it. It’s full of curiosity about the world and is not a reincarnation of the God of Life but a newly born Tree of Life.”

Kael’danil was extremely excited, “I now know what a newborn Tree of Life looks like. It’s so cute! It waved a leaf at us… did you see it? Did you?”

However, Gailard was troubled by another critical question and didn’t have time to heed the High Priestess. Instead, he turned to Aestolia and asked, “Ais, do you think we can believe their words? Did the God of Life really not die?”

“I believe so. The God of Life isn’t that easy to kill. If they really did it unnoticed and right under our noses, their strength is unfathomable.” Aestolia closed her eyes and calmly responded.

“But, all its leaves have fallen. I’ve never seen the God of Life go bald. It didn’t die even in this state?” Gailard turned to Kael’danil and inquired.

Kael’danil hesitated before answering, “In theory, the tree won’t necessarily die if all its leaves fall off. As temperatures drop in winter, many plants lose their leaves to conserve water during their hibernation period. However, if the Tree of Life will die or not, I honestly don’t know. It often doesn’t respond to my prayers. Now, I don’t know if it doesn’t want to deal with me, or if it’s really hibernating, or dead.”

At this moment, a Chimera Knight flew up and reported, “We’ve found some powder on the ground. It must have been sprinkled not long ago.” He presented a small amount of the powder as he spoke.

Gailard examined a bit of the substance and muttered, “Could they really be treating the Tree of Life? Is this medicinal powder?”

“It could also be poison,” Aestolia pointed out bluntly.

Indeed, it could be medicine, or it could be poison. Who could definitively say they were applying medication, rather than poisonous substance?

Gailard picked up the branch the opponent had thrown. There were really no traces of disease on it.

“Perhaps it was just cut from a healthy part of the Tree of Life. The cut still looks quite fresh,” Aestolia commented.

Indeed, a single branch proved nothing. They, unlike the Tree of Life, had no capacity to discern whether a branch had been freshly cut from their body, healed of a previous affliction, or had been cut some time ago.

“So what do we do now?” As a Queen, Gailard’s capability for decisive judgement was unquestionable, but at this point she too was somewhat at a loss.

“Find them, restrain them, treat them well, and wait for the Tree of Life to wake up. If the Tree of Life can be awakened, you apologize to them; if it can’t be awakened, bury them in the ground as fertilizer,” Aestolia stated calmly.

Kael’danil hesitated slightly, “Is that okay? What if they truly came to heal the Tree of Life?”

“The Tree of Life, should not fall into the hands of others. The Tree of Life, belongs to the elves,” Aestolia interjected curtly, her tone suggesting that this was simply a matter of fact.

This realization struck Gailard: “Yes, the Tree of Life cannot fall into the hands of outsiders. It belongs to the elves. Let’s get moving. Even if they’ve taken refuge in the abyss, we must find them.”

Gailard mounted her Great Unicorn and rode off into the distance, while Aestolia seemed to be buoyed toward the horizon by an invisible hand.

Three elves, each holding a bow, loosed an arrow into the distance. The arrows trailed ropes, and as they shot off, the elves pulled the ropes, leveraging the arrows’ momentum to launch themselves into the sky.

Watching her companions receding into the distance, Kael’danil sighed wistfully, “Is this why Lightning said the Tree of Life doesn’t like elves?”

After speaking, Kael’danil flipped backward, the delicate elf woman transforming into a giant eagle. She soared into the sky in pursuit of Gailard.

Soon, giant arrows began to shoot into the sky and the entire Elf Forest erupted into activity once more.

The elves’ unusual behavior alerted humanity. Top officials from all nations communicated with one another, inquiring if anyone had inside information on the elves’ latest antics.

This was the elves’ second bout of strange behavior in the past two years. They were spoiling for an inter-dimensional war, which made everyone uneasy.

However, it wasn’t long before the human nations received a notification from the elves: “Our target is the abyss nomads of the desert. Please stay calm and do not harbor them; otherwise, we will consider you an enemy.”

No one was willing to antagonize the elves for a group of abyss nomads, especially given the vast scale of elven forces on display. Unless every human nation on the continent were to unite, there was no stopping this warfront.

The Chimera Corps, Pterosaur Corps, Unicorn Corps, Moose Cavalry Corps, Elf Magician Corps, and Magic Tank Unit—the elves had mobilized nearly all their elite forces.

What was more terrifying, however, was that the elves had gathered all their Truth Mages and Arcane Magicians, including Aestolia and over a dozen others.

With this force capable of fighting an inter-dimensional war, Gailard arrived at the Fallen Dragon Lake. Fala nervously handed her a letter. As soon as Gailard saw the first sentence after opening the envelope, she couldn’t help but burst into laughter.