I had been on a journey to defeat the Demon King when I was murdered by my fiancé, the Hero, and my junior, the Apprentice Saint. To top it all off, I ended up reincarnated as a plant-type monster.
A woman’s torso sprouted from a vivid, scarlet corolla; from the waist down, I was a botanical beast.
Yes, I had become an Alraune.
How on earth did this happen?
I could remember being devoured by a flower monster and pushing my powers as a Saint to their absolute limit, using Super Recovery Magic to regenerate my flesh as fast as it could be digested.
But who would believe that I’d woken up as a monster? I had never heard of such a thing in my life.
Still, I wasn't dead. I was alive. For that alone, I suppose I should be grateful.
At least, that was how I tried to look at it.
Was this a second chance granted by the Goddess, or had the sheer force of my Super Recovery Magic caused me to fuse with the monster that ate me?
Either way, I had to get a handle on the situation.
My upper body remained human. My skin looked the same. The only real changes were my hair—which had grown down to my waist—and its color, which had shifted from a pale gold to a soft, light green.
The real issue lay below the waist.
I was growing out of a massive corolla. From the hips down, I was a flower. The petals were a deep, vibrant red like a rose, beautiful enough to make someone want to display them in a vase, but they were very much a part of my body. It was a bizarre sensation. Beneath the flower were several layers of leaves. Those were also part of me.
I understood the flower-waist part, but my legs were definitely gone. In their place sat a sort of secondary body.
Below the corolla grew a giant, bulbous mass. This bulb featured a wide mouth lined with jagged, thorn-like teeth, reminiscent of a carnivorous plant. This sinister maw looked large enough to swallow a car whole; it was likely an evolved version of the mouth belonging to the monster that had preyed on me. It looked even more malevolent than the brief glimpse I’d caught before being swallowed.
Countless vines snaked out from the sides of the bulb, turning the area around me into a dense thicket of my own making.
Below the bulb, my roots seemed to be firmly planted in the earth. I could actually feel myself absorbing moisture from the soil.
Yep, I was officially a plant.
And a pretty ferocious-looking one at that. That mouth on the bulb was terrifying.
When I tried to exert strength in my lower half, the bulb’s mouth moved in response. I could also move the vines as freely as if they were my own hands. It was a strange feeling, worlds away from the sensation of having only two human arms.
The fact that I possessed a sense of self despite being a plant was also very "monster-like."
If adventurers ever found me, I could see no future for myself other than being hunted.
However, there was one problem I needed to solve immediately.
I was, at this very moment, completely naked!
I could make my peace with the lower body being a flower, but my upper half was bare.
Even if I was a monster now, I was a human first.
Whether as a noble-born lady or as a Saint beloved by the people, being totally naked was simply unacceptable.
Even if I had been reduced to a feral plant monster, as a girl, this was the one thing I couldn't compromise on.
That said, clothes were in short supply in the middle of a forest.
Whatever I had been wearing had clearly been dissolved.
Left with no other choice, I used my vines to try and fashion a bra.
I wound them around my chest and—voila! Finished. That was easy enough.
I had hidden what needed to be hidden, so I decided to be satisfied with that for now.
Wait, what about the lower half?
I didn't know her. I decided to simply erase the concept of "lower-body nudity" from my mind.
Plants don't usually wear clothes. It would look ridiculous if a giant bulb wore a skirt. Therefore, it couldn't be helped. I was a plant; therefore, I wasn't naked.
No lower garments. For the upper body, a wild-looking, handmade vine bra.
I never could have imagined I’d end up dressed like an Amazoness—not as a Saint, and certainly not as the high school girl I had been in my previous life.
It was surprising that I even had memories of a past life. It was just as shocking as being reincarnated as an Alraune.
My name in Japan had been Ayame Komurasaki.
I remembered devouring plant encyclopedias during school breaks to distract myself from being a loner, and at home, I’d been a closet otaku who enjoyed anime and games.
I couldn't remember exactly how I died or why I was reincarnated, though. It seemed that unless something was a hobby or a deep interest of mine, the memories wouldn't surface clearly. Well, it was a past life; I suppose that was only natural.
Right now, my most vivid memories were of being betrayed by my comrades.
I had been born the second daughter of a Duke in the Kingdom of Gardenia. My talent for Light Magic was recognized early on, and I became an Apprentice Saint almost as soon as I could walk. I eventually became a master of Super Recovery Magic—capable of regenerating entire limbs—and was hailed as the greatest Saint of my generation. I had set out to defeat the Demon King alongside my fiancé, the Prince and Hero, and the rest of our party.
We had defeated the Demon King’s executives and were just one step away from the dark lord himself when my allies turned on me. I didn't know why. All I knew was that my life had ended in that moment.
I was only seventeen.
My training as a Saint had been grueling, and I’d truly believed I would be free once the Demon King was dead.
I had been proud of the fact that I was going to marry the Hero and become a princess.
If we’d had children, a boy might have become the next King. A girl might have followed in my footsteps as a Saint.
By bringing my bloodline into the royal family, I could have honored my parents and my clan.
I could have spent the rest of my days in a peaceful world without monsters.
Every bit of that future had been stolen from me.
To be honest, I couldn't forgive my junior or my former fiancé, and a part of me wanted revenge—but more than that, my spirit was just broken. I was in tatters.
I had been betrayed, murdered, and then turned into a monster.
If I ever ran into those two in this state, I didn't even want to imagine what would happen. I would be too humiliated. I was still a Duke’s daughter, after all. I couldn't show my parents this form, and if the Hero and that girl saw me and laughed, I didn't think I could maintain my sanity.
Besides, they’d probably just "subjugate" me all over again.
I had never heard of an Alraune being a particularly powerful monster, so I likely wouldn't win a fight anyway. In the end, monster or not, I was a plant. Just a flower.
And besides all that, even if I wanted revenge, I was rooted to the spot. I couldn't move. I couldn't even go find the people I hated, so it was all moot.
I decided to put those thoughts on the back burner.
Just thinking about them made me furious!
I needed to calm down.
The current "me" was a mix: a former Japanese high school girl, a formerly human Saint, and a current Alraune plant monster.
It was only natural that my head was a mess.
Having the memories of two lives in a brand-new body meant this was effectively my "third round."
In the end, my personality settled into a blend of the three—the noble Saint, the otaku high schooler, and the botanical instincts of the monster—divided by three. I figured time would handle the rest.
Moping wasn't going to get me anywhere.
The human "me" was gone. This was my second life. Or, counting the previous one, my third?
Since I was a plant, was it a "flower-life"?
Whatever. It didn't matter.
I stopped sweating the details and faced reality. There might even be a way to become human again. If I stayed alive and didn't give up, surely something good would happen.
"All right, I’m going to give it my all!"
"Heave-ho, let’s go!"
Wait.
I noticed that my chest felt wet. When did that happen?
Actually, a liquid was trickling from my chest, running down my stomach and onto my petals. What was this?
Looking closely, a sweet-smelling nectar was slowly oozing from my chest.
To be specific, it seemed to be overflowing from my nipples...
"Wh-What?! This is a little much!"
As both a former high school girl and a Saint, this was traumatizing. I wasn't even at that age yet, and I’d never had any "experiences," so this was just cruel.
I wanted to cry. I could feel the tears welling up—because I was still a girl, after all. Even if I was a flower. Wait, huh?
These weren't tears; they were nectar.
Nectar was dripping from my eyes.
It seemed to come from other places, too. As an experiment, I tried to focus my consciousness, and—there!
I’d thought I was drooling, but that was nectar as well. Score!
I decided that, from now on, I would only let the nectar come out of my mouth. It seemed I could control the flow. I had mixed feelings about "drooling," but it was a lot better than the alternatives. Good job, me!
Since it came from my own body, I couldn't tell what it tasted like, but the scent was incredibly sweet. It was sticky to the touch, like honey. It was actually quite surprising that I had a sense of smell as a plant.
I was killing time by poking at the nectar with my fingers when I suddenly felt eyes on me.
I scanned the area and saw a bear emerge from the shadows of the trees ahead.
It was massive. And with a horn growing from its head like a unicorn, it clearly wasn't a normal bear. It was a monster.
I’d heard of this creature—a terrifying beast that would hunt a human through the forest until they stopped moving.
Not only was it persistent, it was strong enough to be called the Lord of the Forest.
I could feel its bloodlust.
This bear was looking for a fight. It was a little scary.
But even if I wanted to run, I couldn't. I was a flower.
Wait, hold on. Aren't plants at a massive disadvantage here?
In the natural world, the standard move when facing a superior foe is to run, but that wasn't an option for me.
This was an impossible game.
This was totally unfair.
"S-Someone, help me!"
Of course, my mental scream reached no one. How tragic.
And so, I found myself facing my first life-or-death struggle as an Alraune.