The Demon Lord's Bride (BL)
Chapter 523: Forest of Punishment

Chapter 523: Forest of Punishment

Running away from me?!

[Running away from us?!]

"Like I’ll let you!"

The angry roar came with a surge of thick vines and roots. As if each of them had their mind on their own, they chased the retreating Spectre with a vengeance. Each time the Spectre’s shadow broke them, more would take their place, while the broken one regenerated.

It became apparent to the Spectre that the attack would happen endlessly unless they could destroy the source of power; yes--that human druid who somehow controlled the forest.

The Spectre had been coating themselves with their mana as protection against the hard leave projectiles, as well as moving their shadow to destroy the chasing vines and roots. But their energy was not boundless; just to escape from the forest, they might need to use every ounce of energy.

In that case, they shouldn’t try to escape.

Growling deeply in disdain, the Spectre made a sharp 180-degree turn, crashing themselves against the incoming roots. The condensed shadow energy created sharp propellers around their body that shredded the chasing forest. Using the wriggling roots and vines that were trying to regenerate, the Spectre ran back while charging their magic.

Tsk--they should have done it from the start instead of escaping. Should have just kept attacking the shed.

As if reading the Spectre’s mind, Valen shouted in anger. It wasn’t something comprehensible but sounded like a forest in the middle of a storm. It was the rumbling of a giant, and right after, the forest did feel like it was in a storm.

Or rather, the Forest turned into a storm.

The first thing Valen did when he felt the Spectre’s mana was summoning pillars of vines around the shed, creating a tight barrier to protect his little flower. With glowing eyes and a scowling face, he raised his arm and had the roots coming toward the Spectre from all directions. Boulders and dirt walls sprouted from the ground around the Spectre, determined to catch them this time instead of poking them to death.

Perhaps, the forest had realized the Spectre’s body was not the normal flesh and bone. The Spectre hissed and threw the mana it had accumulated before using the rest of their mana to form a barrier that also actively attacked the entrapping roots.

The Spectre thought they could distract the human-druid for a bit before using the chance to escape, but the Spectre did not know this;

At that moment, Valen was the whole forest.

He could see the destructive shadow and slapped it away with a sway of the trees, sending the energy up to shred the veil of darkness even more.

And he could see how the Spectre left the barrier in the middle of the entrapment while slipping away in their smoke form.

"Where are you going?"

The Forest asked sinisterly, whispering through the rustling leaves. Even the voice felt alive, carried by the wind to chase the retreating Spectre. Hissing in a sense of humiliation at getting chased away by their own prey, the Spectre did not have time to react when a large tree bent and smacked them with the force of a trudging bull.

"Gahh!" the Spectre, who had left their barrier as a feint, had to receive the assault fully; the shadow forming their limbs swayed, and their cores rattled by the impact.

But the Spectre didn’t even have the time to collect themselves, because another tree hit them from the back, toward another tree ready to swing and hit them like a ball. The Spectre didn’t have proper organs, but they felt like their inside was crushed. They had no real flesh and muscle, but they felt battered and bruised in the worst way possible. They were being thrown from tree to tree every second, and there were a lot of trees in the forest. Each came alive. Each came with a vengeance.

In the midst of that, pebbles and sharp leaves flew around and stabbed the swaying shadow, scattering and chipping on the expanded mana. The Spectre condensed the shadow, forgoing the limbs to create a thick cocoon around their mask and their cores.

Oh? Valen raised his brow coldly and moved his hand. The trees kept hitting the shadow cocoon, passing it from one to another, rattling the struggling core inside. Gradually, the Spectre was delivered to the Prince;

To the Heart of the Forest.

Right at the clearing in front of the shed, vines upon vines rushed to envelop the cocoon, trapping the Spectre like a cage; like a jail. Layers upon unbreakable layers provided not even a gap for a sliver of smoke to slither out.

"I don’t know who you are," the voice of Valen and the forest came even from the binding vines. "But you can make acquaintance with my Iron Maiden."

The fair hand, which was coiled in vines and flowers, clenched.

CRUNCH!

Thousands of thorns sprouted from the forest cocoon, piercing the Spectre with no mercy.

Now...

Where are the rest of you?

* * *

Crazy!

Ocla ran and ran through the forest, using every bit of his power to dodge the persistent leaves and branches that seemed like they had their own minds. He could only dodge because of his physical agility, but if he failed to concentrate even a second, fresh wounds would appear on his body.

And he had already failed for at least a dozen times. At least, his vital organs were still intact. If he could just leave the forest...

Ocla spat a curse.

Like any nightmare, he could usually overpower someone once he played on their fear, but fuck--how could he cast fear on the whole forest? He had tried to inflict fear on the human-druid, but he got a fury beyond measure instead.

Crazy!

What kind of monster...

Ra Natha, that bastard! How could he take a natural disaster as a spouse?! What kind of crazy shit was he smoking?!

Just as he cursed the owner of the place he invaded, a voice came through the wind and the rustling leaves, whispering in his ear as he ran past a thick bush.

Found you

"The fu--"

That one whisper was startling him enough that Ocla could not dodge a sprouting root and fell hard on the ground, right onto a bed of thorns.

"Aaaagh!"

Ocla screamed as he fell face-first into thousands of thorns. It was the same kind of scream the guards the Spectre killed earlier had. He hissed and grunted, and screamed again as he crawled out of the bed of thorns. But he only managed to drag his head out when a loud shriek came from the sky.

[You can’t go! Jade won’t let you go!]

A rainbow elemental bird flapped its wings, and a whirlwind crashed into Ocla. "Aargh!" his scream echoed through the forest incessantly as the whirlwind rolled the bed of thorns around him, bundling him in a traitorous blanket. A chain of water jets sprayed the whole blanket of thorns, stimulating them. The thorns grew immediately and stabbed the struggling demon, who was reduced to a sorry excuse of a gasping mess.

As if it wasn’t enough, the elemental bird landed on his head--the only part that didn’t get tangled in the blanket of thorns--and started to kick his head. The ruthless bird plucked his hair with no mercy, dug into his cheeks with talons that ignored the mana barrier, and sent mana into the blanket of thorns to wrap him even tighter.

[How dare you! How dare you harm Jade’s sibling! How dare you make Papa cry!] the bird shrieked and plucked his hair at the same time, kicking and scratching his face while at it.

"Aaaargh! Stop it! Stop it!"

Ocla screamed and cried, wetting himself in blood and tears. But the elemental bird did not stop, and a voice answered his cry. Not from the forest, but from a person. A demon.

"Did you stop when the guards asked for it?"

A pair of shoes stopped in front of his face, and Ocla tried his best to look up through his bloodied eyes. A wrong move. His body started to seize in an assault of fear, forcing the thorns to dig deeper into his skin.

"R...Ra Ne...Nejza..." he spoke in a choked breath before his consciousness gave away.

"That’s enough Jade, we can’t make him die...yet," Ra Nezja took the frantic bird away, caressing the shrieking child softly. "You can do it again later, after we pried his mind open."

It was difficult, but the promise of revenge calmed the bird a little bit. The exhausted bird, who had sent most of its mana to its Papa, turned into a small bundle of rainbow again, weeping.

[Aunty! Aunty! Papa is...Papa is...]

Ra Nezja could not read mind like her nephew, but she could easily feel the fear enveloping the little bird.

"It’s alright," she whispered soothingly, before staring into the swaying and rumbling forest that had just finished its judgment and punishment. The first round anyway. Hugging the weeping little bird, she took out her whips and circled its end on the broker’s neck, dragging him out of the forest. "Someone is already on his way to your Papa."

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