A few moments prior

Outer Bunker Area.

"What's going on? Can you hear anything?"

"No, it's soundproof."

Aoife answered while massaging her right cheek. It was still hurting, and just thinking about Kiera who had slapped her just a few moments prior, she glared at her.

"What?"

".You know what you did."

"What did I do...?"

"Hah."

Aoife took a deep and heavy breath to calm herself down. She was really having a hard time. The more she looked at Kiera, the more her hand twitched.

'I'm better than this.'

That's right, she couldn't stoop down to her level.

Rumble! Rumble!

"Uh?!"

A distant rumbling disrupted Aoife's thoughts. She could feel it through the vibration of the floor. Turning her head, her expression changed.

It wasn't just hers.

Everyone in the outer area wore expressions of shock as they stared into the distance. A grotesque figure emerged, breaking through the walls that crumbled under its enormous hand.

The surroundings turned quiet for a brief moment as the very air was sucked out of the room.

And then,

"What the hell is that!!"

"Ahhhh!!"

Panic started to spread within the crowd.

Despite many of the people present being powerful people, the pressure that the creature in the distance elicited feelings of despair.

"Calm down! Everyone calm down!"

Thankfully, the post-leaders were present to calm the situation down.

"Remain calm."

At the lead was Penelope. Her voice, which was crisp and pleasant to the ears, gently traveled through the air.

There was a strange calming effect in her voice, calming many of those who were panicking.

It even worked for Aoife who had been relatively calm from the very start.

'I've experienced too many shocks lately.'

This hadn't been the first time she had been put in a terrible situation.

In hindsight, she was starting to get used to such situations.

Not sure if this was a good thing or not.

Thump!

The bunker trembled subtly. When Aoife turned to look at the windows, her breath caught at her throat.

.The monster had entered the station and was headed straight for their location.

"Please remain calm. There's nothing to worry about. You are safe here. Remember, there are several of us here that can deal with the creature. In fact, we already have several post-leaders outside ready to deal with it. There's no reason to panic."

Penelope's words brought silence to the room.

It was a tense silence that felt extremely stifling.

Thump!

Especially with the thumping sound that was coming out.

Thump!

Strangely

Thump!

Each step,

Thump!

Seemed to resonate with the sound of their heartbeats.

Thump! Thump!

***

Thump! Thump!

The ground shook, the thumping growing progressively closer by the second.

..I felt the hair at the back of my head stand at the thought, and yet, I couldn't tear away my eyes from those two red eyes that were staring back at me.

They were intense, and it felt as though my head would fly off if I were to look away.

My legs buckled slightly.

But I didn't show it. I remained calm while trying to think of a way to solve the situation.

'I need to get my hands on the page, but how am I going to do that...?'

In fact, did he even have the page with him? What if he had hidden the page elsewhere? How was I going to get that information from him?

..Fighting him one on one was simply impossible.

He was far stronger than me.

Not only that but with the monster drawing nearer, I knew that it was also impossible for me to rely on the post-leaders to take him out.

".Shit."

Shit indeed.

My situation was terrible, and I could hardly see a way for me to get to the page.

The best I could do at the moment was not die.

As all sorts of ideas ran through my mind, I stopped at a certain one.

'What if I use the first leaf?'

Would that even work?

I thought about it for a few seconds before shaking my head.

The effects would be minimal for someone of his strength.

If they could affect someone of his level, Leon would've undoubtedly gone insane by now.

'My guess is that my current limit with the first leaf is people with mental fortitute of around 5 or just a little below.'

So around Tier 4-5.

Well, mentality-wise.

I didn't think that the red-eyes man before me had a mental resilience that was below his tier, which appeared to be 6.

Then what?

What exactly could I do?

Thump!

Another step echoed, and the surroundings shook. I pursed my lips and looked around me.

It was close.

Extremely close.

The entire time, Karl didn't move. I wasn't sure why, but Lennon and the other post-leaders were questioning him.

"Karl? What's going on?"

".Are you the one behind this?"

From the way they were speaking, they seemed both surprised and shocked.

"....."

But despite their questions, Karl didn't answer. Instead, the eaters around us started to twitch.

The thumping was clearly affecting their perception of the surroundings, and yet, they still remained where they were.

Clearly, whatever noise that creature was making, wasn't making them move.

.....Judging from how the creature looked like a taller, more gruesome version of them, I could more or less guess why.

'It's commanding them.'

"Hey!"

All of a sudden, I felt something tug at my shoulder and I was pulled back. Before I knew it, Lennon's face was right before my very eyes.

"Do you have any idea of what's going on?"

He immediately started to question me.

"The two of you have been talking strangely. I'd appreciate it if you'd tell me exactly what is going on here."

"Ah."

I opened my mouth but felt unsure of how to respond.

Would he believe me if I told him that all of this was an illusion?

That we were all victims of some demonic tree that was slowly sapping away our life force...?

Perhaps, or perhaps not. Convincing him would end up wasting too much time. So after a little thought, I decided to answer differently as I pointed at Karl.

"He He has something important. With it, we'll be able to stop all of this."

"We'll be able to stop eeverything?"

"Yes."

I nodded.

"Everything."

I looked around me.

From the Crimson Shade to the rapidly drawing monster.

".Everything that you see is artificial. None of it was natural. He's the one behind it."

All eyes turned towards Karl who smiled all of a sudden.

It was a creepy smile.

A smile that made my entire body grow tense.

"You're very creative with the way you speak."

For the first time in a while, he spoke. His was different from the last time, sounding deeper and more ancient.

"For someone of your age to be able to have such high mental resilience. It's truly praiseworthy. The tree has been paying a lot of attention to you because of that. Otherwise, everything would've flowed much more smoothly, and I"

He stopped then.

I was curious about what he had been planning on saying, but what he had said was already plentiful for me to understand a few important things about the situation.

'High mental resilience'

'Paying a lot of attention to you'

Could it be that the tree had a harder time targeting those with high mental resilience? If that was the case, it explained a few things.

Like the screaming people.

..When thinking about it, none of those who had been affected were high-ranking people. However, with each passing moment within the illusion, they'd slowly be targeted.

The tree It was slowly eroding a person's mind.

'Right, it makes sense...'

I had noticed this on a few occasions. From the time when I felt absolutely no remorse when killing, to the unnatural fear and emotions that I felt on certain occasions.

There were plenty of times that I felt fear, but there were a few that just felt unnatural to me.

This explained it all...

'Wait, but what about Leon?'

As far as I knew, his mental score was rather high. Why would he

"Ah."

.And then I realized.

'It's my fault.'

I wanted to facepalm there and then.

All of a sudden, I started regretting a few of the words that I previously said about him.

In the end, the reason why Leon had been affected so early was because his mental fortitude had been severely weakened due to my emotive magic.

'.It's not like he doesn't have plot armor, it's just that I'm the one who killed that plot armor.'

If that was even a thing.

"...."

I felt the sudden urge to scratch the side of my nose.

'Wasn't intentional'

Not like I could've predicted any of this to happen.

On a good note, he probably wasn't dead. Yet? My best guess was that the tree's first action was to erode a person's mental resilience before sapping away at their life force. It was highly likely that everyone was still alive.

From the people that had died in the Crimson Shade, to the people that I had killed.

'Well, at least that's a good thing.'

It was going to save me from a lot of headaches.

BANG

Startling out of my thoughts was the sound of metal clashing against mental. Raising my head in haste, I saw a huge axe come into contact with multiple tree vines that had emerged from the ground.

Standing behind them was a calm and collected Karl.

"You..."

Lowering his axe, Lennon stared at Karl.

".....This is the first time that I've seen you use such power. You, don't tell me everything that he said was true. You're the one behind all of this."

Rather than answering, Karl smiled.

That was silent confirmation, and Lennon's gaze turned fierce.

He was just about to engage again when,

BANG

A shadow cast over the area above us, smacking against the barrier that was protecting us.

Cra Crack! Crack...!

Immediately, cracks appeared all over before the shield started to shatter.

"Pftt!"

Lennon and a few others threw up blood as they took several steps back.

On the other hand, I fell on my back.

"Ukh."

Before I even had the chance to move, a shadow cast over the area I was in, and two red eyes looked down on me from above. The monsters around also stopped moving, and I felt the entire world stare at me.

"Give up."

Karl's voice reached my ears.

".....You'll never get the page."

He seemed sure of it.

"It's not with me. Even if you kill me, you'll never know where it is or what is written in it. Your best course of action is to give up."

"....."

Squench. Squench.

Roots emerged from the ground beneath, slowly wrapping over my ankles and my chest. I lay paralyzed, unable to move with the exception of my hands which I slowly raised before lowering again.

In the process, I managed to grab onto his ankle.

"...."

With his head lowered, he looked at me.

"What are you doing...?"

He asked, his expression appearing relatively calm.

I looked up at him and met his gaze.

So what if you didn't have the page with you?

So what if you were stronger than me?

In the end, I didn't need the page to be with me for me to see it.

All I needed to do was,

"See your world."