Vol 4. Chapter 180: A Girl Changes Drastically as She Grows Up

More than five hundred years ago, when Yumo first awakened in the Great Winter Forest.

The young man couldn't help letting out an angry roar.

"FUCK!!!!"

Under the moonlight, a strange surge of energy suddenly erupted in the eastern part of the Great Winter Forest. Violent waves of scarlet energy dispersed the raging blizzard nearby, causing the earth to tremble incessantly. The entire surrounding space seemed to be on the verge of collapse.

And the culprit behind all this was none other than the ancient temple standing there.

This temple...

Was Yumo's current body.

Having inexplicably been sent to this world by the Goddess and somehow turned into a building, Yumo couldn't help letting out a miserable wail in her heart.

After finally escaping from that damned, empty space, she had now become a building that couldn't even move?!

Wasn't this just being imprisoned somewhere else?!

On her very first day on the Anqieka Continent, Yumo's mood had already plummeted to rock bottom.

But...

She hadn't reached her lowest point yet.

Filled with overwhelming disappointment, frustration, and utter bewilderment, Yumo began using the scarlet power within her to observe her surroundings.

Although this was her first time controlling that power, for some reason, Yumo found herself able to manipulate it with remarkable ease. She quickly learned how to use it to carefully perceive everything around her.

And then...

Yumo discovered what seemed to be an even more serious problem.

That was...

Not only had she transformed into an ancient, dilapidated palace standing all alone in the middle of a forest, but both the inside and outside of her 'new body' were also crawling with all kinds of strange creatures.

Although these creatures came in various shapes and sizes, they almost all shared one characteristic: hideous, ferocious appearances, and bodies radiating violent, bloodthirsty auras.

Their bizarre forms, chilling presence, and terrifying roars were enough to make anyone's SAN value plummet.

Moreover, there were so many of these monsters, densely packed together like a swarm of cockroaches...

It was a nightmare for Yumo's fear of densely clustered things.

Although these fellows would eventually become nothing more than 'little cuties' in Yumo's eyes, back then, when she first encountered these peculiar inhabitants of the Great Winter Forest, the newly arrived 'young man's' sense of aesthetics still largely conformed to human standards.

In her eyes, these monsters had absolutely nothing to do with cuteness.

Their growling and crawling immediately sent chills down Yumo's spine.

She felt as though her entire being had been submerged in a swarm of cockroaches.

If she still had a human body, Yumo probably would have jumped up and fled in a frenzy. But even without a body, after several seconds of stunned disbelief, she couldn't help letting out a heart-wrenching roar in her mind.

"FUCK! WHAT THE HELL ARE ALL THESE THINGS?! GET THE HELL OUT OF MY BODY!!!"

Overwhelmed by terror, Yumo began screaming uncontrollably.

Unfortunately...

As a temple, she couldn't move her body at all, so Yumo could only rage helplessly inside her mind.

However...

Because her emotions had become too intense, Yumo inadvertently stimulated the scarlet power within her.

In an instant, an immense aura surged out from inside the temple like a raging tidal wave, sweeping across the surroundings with an unstoppable, terrifying momentum.

The violent wind pressure caused even the towering ancient trees nearby to gradually tremble.

The groups of terrifying monsters also seemed to reveal expressions of 'fear' under the impact of this energy wave, raising their heads and looking around in confusion.

Yumo noticed this scene, and a 'brilliant' idea immediately appeared in her mind.

It was true that she couldn't move.

But she could unleash storms of energy like this, couldn't she?!

Wouldn't using these storms of energy to drive the monsters away solve everything?!

Having thought of this, Yumo immediately put her idea into action.

She didn't want to spend another second with these monsters.

Even though her current temple body couldn't actually feel anything, merely imagining these disgusting, bloodthirsty monsters gathering in groups and settling down inside her body made Yumo feel as though she had thorns digging into her back.

She felt uncomfortable all over, and uncontrollable disgust welled up from the depths of her heart.

Under Yumo's conscious control, wave after wave of scarlet storms began erupting continuously, relentlessly 'expelling' the surrounding monsters...

...

The wind pressure generated by the eruptions of scarlet energy was indeed terrifying.

After Yumo's relentless efforts, the world that had previously been engulfed in a raging blizzard suddenly became a place of clear skies stretching for thousands of miles...

However...

Those monsters did not flee in terror from the surging, overwhelming aura as Yumo had expected.

Instead, they seemed to become even more excited?

The monsters that had originally been merely growling suddenly began raising their heads and howling toward the sky...

And the number of monsters occupying the inside and outside of the temple had successfully decreased from around a hundred to more than a thousand...

Because after Yumo unleashed that aura, not only did the monsters refuse to leave, but more and more of them came roaring out of the forest and squeezed directly into the temple.

If Yumo had barely been able to tolerate the situation before, she had now reached the absolute limit of her patience.

Covered in 'cockroaches,' Yumo was on the verge of a complete breakdown.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!!!!!!!!! WHAT THE HEEEEEEEEELL?! YOU DAMN THINGS! GET THE HELL AWAAAAAAAAAY!!!"

Yumo screamed frantically in her mind, practically losing her sanity.

And then, at that very moment...

The earth suddenly trembled.

Countless blood-red thorns burst out of the forest in an instant, violently attacking the swarms of black monsters gathered near the temple...

As blood splattered everywhere...

Under Yumo's stunned and terrified gaze, the blood-red thorns danced wildly across the sky, mercilessly tearing those terrifying, repulsive monsters into pieces amid waves of shrill screams.

The gruesome, blood-soaked scene left Yumo completely dumbfounded, frozen in place.

By the time she finally recovered from her shock, all the black monsters both inside and outside her body had already been reduced to corpses.

Although getting rid of the 'cockroaches' was certainly something worth celebrating, witnessing such brutal and bloody scenes for the first time still made Yumo feel intensely uncomfortable.

Feeling deeply unsettled, Yumo slowly shifted her attention toward the dark and gloomy forest nearby.

That was precisely the direction from which the blood-red thorns had emerged.

"What... What is that thing now...?"

Is it the same kind of creature as those monsters?

But...

If they're the same kind, why would it kill all the others?!

Could it be...

Another monster that's even more terrifying?

The unknown filled Yumo with unease.

And so, under Yumo's anxious gaze, an enormous flower bud, as vivid as fresh blood and surrounded by blood-red thorns, slowly emerged from the forest.

Every towering tree blocking its path was reduced to disgusting lumps of white liquid.

After reaching the front of the temple, the flower bud slowly began to bloom under Yumo's frightened gaze...

It was a beautiful yet sinister Netherworld Flower, brimming with the aura of death.

The Netherworld Flower was incomparably enormous. Each of its petals gave the impression of being large enough to blot out the sky.

In terms of size, even Yumo's new architectural body was slightly inferior to it.

Moreover...

What surprised Yumo the most was that the center of the Netherworld Flower contained a bizarre humanoid figure.

A humanoid... monster... whose entire body was made of plants, with cold, dark-blue eyes...

...

...

...

As memories played through Yumo's mind like a slideshow, the humanoid monster from her memories gradually overlapped with the beautiful figure standing before her.

"Youlan..."

Looking at her eldest daughter, whom she hadn't seen in so long, Yumo spoke softly with complicated feelings.

A trace of astonishment involuntarily appeared in her azure-blue eyes.

She was shocked not only by Youlan's sudden appearance but also by the changes in her.

Although Youlan had stopped displaying the terrifying appearance she had possessed during their first meeting after learning to assume a human form in the Great Winter Forest, she had always kept her eyes hidden behind her bangs.

She was taciturn and constantly maintained an unsettling, gloomy atmosphere.

Yet the honey-haired woman standing before Yumo now was practically a completely different person from the figure in her memories.

Standing ahead of her...

The honey-haired woman who had walked through a sea of blood wore a white magical robe as light as gauze, making her appear as though she were enveloped in mist and smoke.

She looked to be approximately twenty-three or twenty-four years old.

Apart from her beautiful, slightly wavy, long honey-colored hair, she possessed an exquisitely beautiful face of extraordinary elegance.

Her dark-blue eyes shone like brilliant, alluring gemstones, full of life and vigor. Although her smile carried a distinct chill, it was nevertheless extraordinarily captivating.

Her figure was slender and well-proportioned, practically perfect.

The only flaw in her beauty was the complete lack of color in her skin, making her appear unusually pale.

Even so, paired with her blood-red formal gown adorned with tiny sparkling rhinestones, her pallor gave her a haunting, almost sickly beauty.

Although Yumo's feelings toward Youlan were extremely complicated, seeing her eldest daughter again after several hundred years involuntarily reminded her of a saying from her previous life on Blue Star.

—"A girl changes drastically as she grows up."—

However...

Just as Miss Yumo was still astonished by Youlan's transformation, the golden-haired beauty before her suddenly pushed off the ground with her delicate feet, instantly transforming into a blood-red afterimage.

Accompanied by countless crimson petals scattering through the air, Youlan flashed directly in front of Yumo.

Then, with her slender, delicate hands adorned with red ribbons, she slowly cupped Yumo's little face.

Afterward...

Under Yumo's bewildered gaze...

Youlan gently pressed a kiss directly onto Yumo's cheek...

...

...

"So this is what Mother tastes like?... So sweet..."

Yumo: ?!!