Just who was this guy, really?
I’d wager he was stronger than even an S-Class adventurer from the Kingdom of Gardenia. To be honest, I found it hard to believe that a human this powerful existed in the southern part of the continent without my knowledge. I could sense a level of power from him that belonged to the realm of legends—the kind possessed only by Heroes and Saints.
The only humans strong enough to be called heroes in these parts were my former fiancé, Great Sage Otfried, and the Golden Tiger Prince, who was rumored to be the strongest man in the Glanz Empire. A few years had passed since my death as Saint Iris, but I never imagined such a powerhouse would have emerged in the interim.
His ability to manipulate lightning was also a mystery. I wondered how he was doing it, because in this world, lightning magic simply did not exist.
There were ten types of magic in this world. Of those, humans could only use the four primary elements: fire, water, wind, and earth. As an exception, human women granted power by the Goddess could also wield Light Magic.
The others were race-specific: Dark Magic for the Demon Race, Black Magic for witches, and White Magic for elves. Then there was Spirit Magic, used by spirits and high-level fairies. Even if I excluded the final magic that appeared only in legends and was reserved for the Goddess, lightning magic was nowhere to be found.
So, how was this playboy manipulating electricity and floating in mid-air? It was a complete enigma.
"You're pretty good too, Alraune-girl," Kyle said, holding up his right hand. "But now it’s my turn."
A massive spear of lightning manifested in his palm. He launched it, and the bolt flew at the speed of light, striking my bulb directly. It was likely powerful enough to char a human to a crisp.
However...
"That won't work on me," I said.
While the lightning had singed me and caused my bulb to crack slightly, it didn't qualify as real damage. I could regenerate from something like that instantly. Besides, the electrical current simply channeled through my roots and dispersed into the earth.
"My Donnerlanze didn't work?" Kyle blinked, sounding genuinely puzzled. "Just what is your body made of? Are you really a plant?"
"How rude. No matter how you look at me, I'm a beautiful flower, aren't I?"
Just look at these crimson petals! An or-flower blooming this beautifully was a plant no matter how one looked at it.
"I’m surprised you’re this strong," he admitted. "It’s been a while since I’ve felt this excited... I guess I'll have to get a little serious."
Kyle pointed his palm toward the ground. The earth swelled, and countless black arrows sprouted from the soil. Those were likely made of iron sand. He was generating an electromagnetic field to manipulate the mineral deposits within the dirt.
"Lindschlag!"
The air vibrated as the arrows of iron sand were launched at high velocity. The sight was exactly like the railguns I had seen in manga during my previous life. The electrical trails left by the projectiles shone like beams of light.
The railgun arrows burst the moment they struck my body.
"Oops, did I get a little too serious!?" Kyle’s voice sounded panicked.
The destructive power reminded me of the Beast King’s Roar used by Marticoras, one of the Four Heavenly Kings. Compared to that roar, however, the attack speed of this railgun was on a completely different level. Dodging it would have been impossible—not that it mattered to me, since I was a plant and couldn't move anyway.
Wait... the Demon King’s Army?
Destructive power reminiscent of the Four Heavenly Kings, flight capabilities like a witch, and a power over lightning that didn't belong to any of the Ten Great Magics... While the possibility remained that he was an extraordinary human like the Hero or the Great Sage, another thought occurred to me.
What if he wasn't human at all, just like me?
If that were the case, this strength would make sense. I decided to test him.
"No matter what you do, it's useless," I told him.
I forced my body into super-regeneration, sprouting rapidly. As long as my roots remained intact, I could regenerate indefinitely.
"Whoa, she’s growing right out of the ground! Are you some kind of monster!?"
Calling me a monster was quite rude. As if a monster with the appearance of a Saint could possibly exist.
"Unfortunately, physical attacks have no effect on me."
To kill me, he would have to destroy every last root. My root system was connected not just throughout this forest, but past the neighboring town all the way to the Freiheit Great Plains. Even if he blew away this entire section of the forest, I would regenerate as many times as necessary. Now that I had overcome normal fire and the Witch Queen's salt damage, the only thing that could probably kill me was the Flame Dragon Lord's black flames.
"W-Wow! Regeneration on par with Hydra... no, even better!"
"Have you fought Hydra before?" I asked.
"A little bit, a while back. He was stubbornly persistent in a way that made no sense, but you're an even more nonsensical existence, Alraune-girl."
Mr. Playboy, was the Hydra you fought by any chance the Hydra I know? If it was the plant-loving Mr. Hydra who spent his days watering the botanical garden, I knew him quite well.
"You certainly went on a rampage," I said, looking at the devastation. "You've made a total mess of my forest."
Behind me, the trees had been pulverized. The railgun had carved a straight path of destruction through the woods. Since all of these trees were essentially part of my body, I decided it was time to pay him back.
"Next, it's my turn!"
I had several ways to neutralize him, but many would result in wide-scale indiscriminate damage that might catch Yasmin and the others. This was a spar, so I aimed for capture while being careful not to kill him.
It would be just like falconry. As a former noble lady, I was expected to appreciate such things. Though I had never participated in my past life, I would now demonstrate the skills that had once captured the Golden Birdman of the Four Heavenly Kings.
"Plants are not monsters, but they are terrifying when angered."
I sprouted a multitude of flora from the ground: sticky sundews, Venus flytraps with gaping maws, parasitic dodders, and strangling gajumaru trees. My plants targeted Kyle as he scrambled to escape into the sky, hunting him like hawks.
"Whoa! What the heck is this!?"
Assailed by an innumerable flurry of botanical limbs, the playboy retreated higher into the air. I didn't intend to let him go.
"Herrschaft Pflanze."
I draped the forest in a dome of greenery. This created a barrier between the fight and my friends, ensuring they wouldn't be collateral damage. As a bonus, I used transpiration to envelop the interior of the dome in a thick mist.
"Rain... no, mist!? If there's no place to run, I'll just break through!"
Kyle hurled a spear of lightning. The bolts tore through the plant limbs, but his efforts were counterproductive.
"W-What!? The plants are suddenly growing like crazy!"
He had been generating lightning repeatedly, hadn't he? It was said that plants grew significantly when exposed to electrical discharge. There were three elements essential for plant growth: potassium, phosphorus, and nitrogen. Nitrogen was abundant in the atmosphere, making up about 80% of the air, but it usually didn't affect plants in its gaseous form.
However, lightning changed that. When electricity discharged, the nitrogen in the air combined with oxygen to create nitrogen oxides that could dissolve in water. When this fell to the ground, it became a potent fertilizer. There was a reason people said years with lots of lightning resulted in bountiful harvests.
Even the Japanese word for lightning, inazuma, literally translated to "rice-wife," stemming from the folklore that lightning was the partner that allowed rice to flourish.
"Thank you for the lightning feast," I whispered.
Normally, moisture was absorbed through the roots, but I had selectively bred my body to intake water through my branches and leaves. I used transpiration to create mist, then re-absorbed that moisture along with the nitrogen-rich fertilizer to fuel my vines.
Coupled with the spirit power I used to manipulate nature, I absorbed the nutrients with incredible efficiency. My vines grew thicker and faster than his lightning spears could destroy them. I intended to dominate the entire space.
"Kh... even if I can't destroy them, you'll never catch me while I'm moving this fast!"
He was right; catching him while he moved at such high speeds was difficult. However, I didn't need to be fast if I simply surrounded him with a dense, inescapable mesh. Kyle tried to defend himself by creating a shield of iron sand, showing impressive persistence.
But I had another trick up my sleeve.
"What... my body... won't... move...?"
His limbs began to twitch and convulse. Seizing the opening, my plant nets ensnared him. I pinned his limbs with gajumaru branches and restrained him further by piercing his skin with parasitic dodder roots.
"J-Just... what did you do to me...?"
"Oh, my. I have no idea what you're talking about."
I had infused the mist with a neurotoxin. I had formulated it specifically to paralyze rather than kill, and I planned to give him the antidote once we were done. Having inhaled the toxins, the playboy was finally rendered unable to fight. This was a secret technique, so I had no intention of explaining the science to him.
My true "killing" move would have been to make the toxin lethal and instant, but that would be going too far. Humans and animals had it rough, needing to breathe with lungs and all. I really wished everyone could just perform photosynthesis.
"Don't tell me this mist is poison!? I guess even if I was a bit stiff from just waking up, I can't believe I'd be taken down like this... looks like this is the end of the line for me."
Kyle raised the white flag. The match was mine.
"In this form, I guess this is my limit. I give up~"
I lowered him to the ground and released the restraints. To be honest, I hadn't expected him to be so formidable.
"As I thought, strong women are scary. I lost again," he said, scratching his head.
I still didn't know exactly who this man was, but I had a theory. Even if lightning magic didn't exist, creatures that generated electricity did—like electric eels. It stood to reason that similar monsters or demons existed in this world.
"Please, drink this. It will heal your wounds."
I secreted nectar and used a vine to help him drink.
"Whoa, delicious! This nectar is so sweet it feels like my tongue is going to melt. I’ve never tasted anything this good."
Earlier, he had said "In this form, this is my limit." That implied he was hiding his true self. His ultimate trump card was likely reverting to his original shape to reclaim his full power. I knew of one other person who could shift between a demon and a human form: a giant dragon.
"So this is the rumored Saint Nectar," Kyle muttered. "No wonder my big brother is hooked on it."
That confirmed it. His "big brother" liked my nectar.
Mr. Playboy, do you by any chance have an older sister, too? And does your brother breathe fire while your sister manipulates ice?
As their sibling, he generated lightning. I was almost certain now; Kyle's true identity was a giant lightning dragon. And his brother—the one who loved my nectar and could transform into a human—was undoubtedly the Flame Dragon Lord.