The Gardener of the Withered Flowers (2)

3.

The plastic pot filled with black soil was soaked in sunlight. The lily of the valley was quietly asleep with its roots soaked in it.

As I looked at it for a while, The Wand of Ages spoke.

"Since you have created the sky and the earth, now it's time to create the sea."

"I see."

"Yes, the order of creation is… Wait. What kind of answer is that?"

"You will know when you see it."

The Wand of Ages furrowed its brows, but I started acting without further response.

I first called Estelle.

['The Sky That Gathers Screams' summons its apostle.]

[Your apostle responds to your call.]

[The apostle of 'The Sky That Gathers Screams' manifests.]

A woman who was once called the saint of the weak, and now serves as an advisor in my family, appeared. Her voice spread across the world even before her feet touched the ground.

"Family Head. What did you call me for this time?"

Estelle's voice was excited. It seemed the thrill of a recent battle had not yet subsided.

I raised one hand to calm her down and said.

"Calm down, advisor. I didn't call you to fight."

"Oh, is that so… I was disappointed that I couldn't contribute enough in the last fight…."

"Haven't you become a bit of a warmonger lately…?"

"The role of Chamberlain is like an internet game. It tends to increase the aggression of those around you. I'm just one of those poor victims."

Isn't that an insult to internet games?

While there are mixed opinions on whether internet games increase violence, it's a repeatedly verifiable fact that Estelle increases violence. And while internet games relieve stress, the only thing Estelle can relieve is one's patience….

"It's good to have fighting spirit, but save it. There will always be time for battles, and it's not too late to draw your sword then."

"Yes, Family Head… Um. So, why did you call me?"

Estelle blinked hesitantly. Only now did our surroundings seem to reflect in her violet eyes.

"Well, this place is…?"

"The world I am creating."

I continued.

"This will be where our family will settle."

"I see. So this is our Nazarick."

"What's Nazarick?"

"A place mentioned in an old novel of the world that Venomous Snake recommended to me."

That guy, is he planning to undermine our family from within…?

"I see. So you're going to fortify this place. Very well. Let's appoint a [Gardener] in each garden. The gardeners will possess formidable skills and items, and within the gardens they protect, they hold absolute power that can even surpass the Family Head…."

"First, I need to talk with Liao Fan later. Hmm. Estelle. I didn't call you to discuss such a security system."

"Then?"

"Estelle. You can make it rain, right?"

Devil King of Fall Rain.

The girl who was once called the saint of the weak, now serves as my family's advisor, and who once submerged an entire world under a red flood, blinked her eyes.

"Rain… are you speaking of?"

"Yes."

I recalled Estelle's skill card that Bae Hu-ryeong had once read to me.

+

[Hate Flows Like Rain]

Rank: S-

Effects: You don't look. You can't see. People consider what they can't see as not there. 'Blind fools.' Right. 'Ignorant.'

Then, show them.

Show them how many lives have been lost due to ignorance. As much as blood has been spilled in this world, the sky will pour down red rain.

※However, only the blood you have seen will become rain.

+

"Let it rain over this garden."

I requested.

4.

The sight resembled a prayer.

Estelle closed her eyes. She bowed her head. Her platinum hair flowed down like a waterfall, covering her neck and chest, gathering upon her clasped hands.

Her lips parted.

"Ah."

They closed briefly, then parted again.

"Ah."

Again.

"Ah—"

It was a kind of rumination.

When something unbelievable happened, when she saw something unbelievable, in order to somehow accept it into herself, to digest it, it was like retching several times. Therefore, every time her lips parted, the sound that emerged seemed to flow from deep within her heart, not her vocal cords.

The sight I had seen countless times in her trauma.

"—-, —-, —————······."

And so, the scene I first saw when entering the world of the Aegim Empire unfolded.

Red rain fell in my garden.

"...."

"...."

It was a flood.

The widely spread, fiercely falling rain soon covered the garden. Raindrops clung to each suspended sunset, scattering haphazardly. Strangely, a dark blue rainbow bloomed where the red rain and red fragments met.

I quietly watched the droplets seeping into the plastic pot.

"It's intense."

"Yes."

At the words of The Wand of Ages, I nodded.

"It's like a heavy shower."

"...."

"That rain was also initially perceived as a heavy shower."

I quoted from a book I had read long ago.

"Rain that has fallen countless times. Rain that stops as fiercely as it starts. People thought it was just a rain that could be endured by chatting with neighbors with an umbrella or playing chess inside a house with a roof."

Those were phrases quoted from several books.

If each person were a book, then I had lived the life of a bibliophile. So even if I wasn't quite a librarian, I had many books to quote from.

"But it was not so."

"...."

"It wasn't like that at all."

The Wand of Ages took a breath with a broken wand in its mouth.

An appearance reminiscent of a smoker calming their mind by lighting up their favorite pipe. The actual effect was no different; the wizard spoke in a cold tone.

"It happens everywhere."

"...."

"Underestimating the grudge of the opponent. Not considering that the one you hurt might not be a cat but a tiger. Being negligent and caught off guard, getting your leash bitten or your guts rotting. It's something all empires experience and no strong entity can escape this path… Why are you laughing?"

"Just."

I picked up an empty plastic bottle, cut it in half, and continued speaking.

"Even beings as big as pillars have hardened lives lingering in their hearts."

"Are you saying I'm pretending to be tough?"

"Are you not?"

"…My work must have been pretty messed up."

The wizard, who had served as a judge in the underworld for an incalculable amount of time, once again put the wand to his mouth and then removed it.

The rain falling now had a temperature different from the blood flowing in my body; it was so cold it felt like it could freeze, and thus the wizard's disgust manifested as white steam rising from his mouth.

"Yes. But whether I have any intentions or not, it's the right thing to say. The reason why the Aegim Empire fell is because they were complacent, mistaking themselves for the strong."

"Yes."

I nodded and then shook my head.

"No."

The autumn rain pouring from the clouds covering the entire sky naturally soaked the entire land, accumulated. It didn't take long for the rising level of the rainwater to seep inside my shoes.

The weight of each raindrop varied, and as the overflowing water from the plastic pot naturally created differences in strength. Initially flat, the ground began to rise smoothly until the differences in the force hitting the surface caused it to start undulating.

It was the sea of this world.

"Additionally, because you forgot two facts."

Standing with my feet dipped in the sea made of tears, I said,

"Someone is crying."

Then, I continued,

"Someone is crying for someone else."

I spoke to The Wand of Ages.

"Just as the Tower Master does."

The Wand of Ages hesitated.

Heat gathered in the broken wand. True to his nature as a great wizard, he quickly grasped the essence of my words.

"Are you saying that what the Tower Master does is a common occurrence everywhere?"

"Isn't that why you were drawn to the Tower Master?"

"Yes."

Even in a world ruled by some merciless being, a world of despair, there will still be someone crying, someone crying for someone else.

"It's something that must not be forgotten."

The Aegim Empire was founded by Lefanta Aegim aka Constellation Killer. The founder of the empire had always been crying with his sword for others in a garbage dump where no one was ever invited.

Someone was crying. Someone was crying for someone else.

The fall of the Aegim Empire was simply because they forgot to maintain that.

"—————······."

In the pot blooming with the empire's founder, tears of the Devil King who destroyed the empire overflowed.

The overflowing autumn rain left dark red marks on the translucent sides of the pot as it mixed with the sea. Despite being newly formed, the sea did its duty as a sea. It silently accepted everything overflowing in the world.

And it gave.

I bent over and scooped up seawater into a newly made plastic pot… with my hands spread out.

"Hundred Flowers Reincarnation."

[Activating skill.]

Inside the pot, which rippled like water drawn from a well, a small lotus blossomed.

Like curtains in an old ruined mansion that no one had walked through, the frayed lotus had no weight. The heavy and light raindrops alternately struck, creating waves on which the tattered petals silently entrusted themselves.

"This flower…"

The Wand of Ages quickly recognized who the lotus was.

I nodded and pointed to the pot containing the lily of the valley.

"If this world needs a sky and earth, it's solely because that child needs it."

"Likewise, if this world needs a sea, it's because this child needs it."

I then placed the pot on the water surface, now risen to my ankles. It was the first boat to float on the sea of this world.

The pot, like the lotus it contained, seemed weightless, entrusting itself to the movement of the waves. It rose as high as the wave hills allowed before sliding down smoothly, repeating the process.

It seemed dangerously close to capsizing, yet it gradually found a steady rhythm and began its own navigation.

It drifted somewhere and eventually disappeared from sight.

5.

[A sea has been created in your world.]

[Floor 83 is cleared!]

Thus, I continued to cultivate my sanctuary.

"Hundred Flowers Reincarnation."

[Activating skill.]

"Hundred Flowers Reincarnation."

[Activating skill.]

First, I bloomed the flowers. I transplanted them one by one into the pots I had prepared.

Then, I summoned my vassals and gave them tasks.

"Ugor. Daddy. Are you asking me to punch the ground?"

"That's exactly it."

"I'll do it if you ask, but… what's the point?"

"This flower likes high places."

I spoke while holding a tattered aster. My family's warrior leader stared for a while at the flower blooming in a pot made of dirt packed in white plastic, then snorted loudly.

"Got it. Daddy's job is always such complicated stuff. Ugor, step back."

"Thanks."

"Hmph!"

Uburka swung his fist. Bang...!! The previously flat ground and the undulating sea above it exploded vertically.

When the towering water column had once more doused this world in rainwater and then subsided, the floor of my sanctuary was no longer flat.

[A mountain range has appeared in your world.]

[Floor 84 is cleared!]

That was how it went.

[Spring has come to your world.]

For a flower that enjoyed spring breezes and another that had collapsed from eternal winter, I brought spring.

[Summer has come to your world.]

For a flower that felt boiling heat as home and another that wished to visit the sea with its family even just once during summer, I created summer.

[Autumn has come to your world.]

For a certain flower.

[Winter has come to your world.]

Simply for a certain flower.

[Congratulations! Seasons have been created in your world!]

[Floor 85 is cleared!]

[In your world....]

Only for the needs of each individual flower, I filled my world.

"Bloom."

I made flowers bloom.

"Rest sweetly, comfortably, and earnestly amidst the things you've longed for."

I planted flowers.

"As long as you want, for as long as you wish."

Perhaps forever.

But.

"When that time comes someday."

When the day arrives that the withered petals heal.

When the holes in the leaves fill themselves, and strength returns to the once-broken stems.

When the moment comes that they want to bloom brightly again, entirely of their own volition.

"Only then will you leave the pot."

That's how I tended to my garden.