CHAPTER 518: THE WORLD TREE [I]

Many of the pixies are showing their distrust of Elaina despite her intention to help. But Elaina understood why they are like that, and she doesn’t mind it. After all, her main intention is none other than to save the World Tree and make sure the World Tree’s rot does not further cause trouble.

With Raguna and the Elder of the Pixies leading her deeper into the cavern, Elaina soon faced the current situation of the World Tree beneath the soil of the land of the dead.

"Wow, I already expected the damage, but this was still a bit surprising to see in reality," Elaina said as she saw the huge rot currently taking over the World Tree. The whole World Tree was shining, it was like a shining gold tree, showing the soft radiance to the world, creating an air of holiness to the surroundings.

But due to the black rot that is spreading from the root up to the trunk, the radiance is now tarnished and now the World Tree is now on the brink of death.

"This tree...this is still a sapling, right?" Elaina said to the Elder.

"Correct. How did you know?" the Elder was surprised. He didn’t know Elaina would immediately know about their World Tree’s original state.

"I know, since the one who informed me about this matter said that the World Tree that was currently dying is still a sapling, which caused it to suffer from rot and slowly die. Adult World Trees are able to resist the rot and can easily deal with one if they develop one in the process. But since a sapling has just finished growing and is still in the process of growth, this is enough for the rot to persist and cause trouble for the World Tree, which is still focusing on its growth. Without any way to defend from the rot, they would continue to suffer and as a result, the rot persist and spread."

Raguna was surprised to hear this information. "Elder, were the farmer’s words actually true?!"

The Elder nodded. "Indeed. She was very much spot on with her diagnostics. If the World Tree had been an adult, this would not have happened at all, and the disaster of contaminating the whole land above would not have happened at all. But considering that we couldn’t do anything about that is testament that we have left the World Tree to rot and only decided to find help when we are also at risk after the appearance of the worms."

"Are the worms a recent addition to the problems?" Elaina asked.

"Indeed. It wasn’t present back then. It was just a normal thing at first, and the rot progressed quickly. At first, we didn’t do anything as the rot was hardly noticeable, but as years passed, the rot spread, and it continues to degrade the whole World Tree. Many of the pixies believe the World Tree will recover soon enough, and I was included among those who believe in it until the end. Turns out we are very wrong, and we just doomed the world tree in the process."

"When the rot soon reaches the trunk, the Worms appear, burrowing from the soil towards the world tree, eating the rotten bark like how most maggots eat the rotten parts of the deceased animals that are left to rot by their predators. The more the worms eat on the world tree, the faster the rot progresses. This is why we started fighting the worms just to ensure the rot would not spread further. But their arrival just continues to escalate, and soon enough, we are practically being attacked every day, and we are fearing that these monsters will soon devour us and the world tree in the process. That’s when I tasked Raguna to ask for help, and you know the rest."

Elaina sighed. So the pixies thought the World Tree could bounce back easily and got naive, believing that which resulted in the current situation. In short, the pixies were also part of the reasoning why the soil is now corrupted and can’t be used to grow anything at all.

"I will be honest, with the rot progressing this far, I can tell it will be hard for the World Tree to even recover. It might even die as a result. So even if I help out, the World Tree could potentially still die in the process," Elaina said truthfully.

"No way..." Raguna despaired.

"I also feared that might be the case. But based on your words, there is still a chance it can be saved, yes?" the Elder inquired.

Elaina nodded and looked at the World Tree. "Yes. There is still a chance to cure this sapling. But removing the rot is not going to be enough. What we needed is to find the main reason for the beginning of the rot to happen in the first place. Why would a World Tree that is supposed to be immune to regular plant diseases begin to exhibit the condition of rot and causing it to develop further into a problem? It didn’t just start because the world tree is sick; something else caused it."

Right on cue with Elaina’s words, the mysterious anguish cry of someone inside the cave shook the cave.

"Oh no, that entity deep into this place is rampaging once again!" the Elder said as he wanted to go and cover.

"Looks like the main source of the rot has answered our calls."

"What? What do you mean?" Raguna frowned, hearing Elaina.

"According to the one who knows the real truth about world trees have already pinpointed the main reason for the World Tree’s rot beforehand, but now that I have arrived, it seems that the main problem is a different source, but not too far from the original speculated source of the rot," Elaina explained.

"Wait...you mean...?" The Elder was not able to say the word as Elaina cut him off.

"Correct. The one who caused the rot is none other than the one who is screaming and "rampaging" deeper into the caves. I heard from Raguna that no one from your race can enter due to how troublesome and painful just by being there, right?"

"Correct, we lost our power just by being near that place, and we tried our best to look at it, but because of the hurdle, we couldn’t do it, and we have to settle our problem where we remain unsure of what caused this problem in the first place."

Elaina shook her head. "What about before the rot even started? Did none of you even checked there?"

Raguna shook his head. "That place was forbidden for us pixies to even visit. But since we can hear the frightening voice of the beast, we have decided not to check it out. When the rot started, we tried to check what kind of beast was causing things like that, and we soon discovered the problem that we are facing today."

"Not checking the so-called beast is the biggest mistake you lot have made. But perhaps you lot are just afraid, I can understand that. But that cost you a lot with this trouble."

"May we know what causes the problem in the first place? Considering that we still couldn’t access that place no matter what we do..."

"I guess you all have the right to know. During the speculation, it was first revealed that the only one that is capable of doing this kind of rot to the World Tree sapling is something strong enough to become a dangerous curse itself. What I am talking about here is the body of a dead dragon."

"Dragon?!" The Elder was shocked.

"Wait, is that why you asked if there was any dragon in the cave in the first place?" Raguna managed to connect the dots.

"Correct. I was supposed to look for the corpse of a dragon and make sure to dispose of it before it can cause continuous irreversible damage to the World Tree itself. But after the statement of Raguna that reveals that there are no dragon corpse inside the cave, the one who is causing the trouble is still a dragon...but it isn’t a corpse, at least not yet."

"Does that mean the one roaring all this time..."

"Yes. It is a dragon. Since it is still screaming in pain, there is a chance that the same dragon is still alive, suffering, and is spilling his blood on the land, causing the contaminated blood of the dragon to be absorbed by the World Tree. It would have been fine at first, or if the World Tree were an adult tree in the first place, but because it was not in the first place, purification of the blood is not possible, and it will continue to cause the deterioration process. As a result, the World Tree slowly accumulated this foreign substance strong enough to become a curse and is now rotting the World Tree."

Elaina then turned to look at the Elder. "Which is why I will be asking for permission to head over to the location where the growls and roars came from."