The Queen of Scrolls never admits defeat

This time, Sylph did not refuse.

She took the card and walked to the mutated, activated Black Death Tree, first materializing a finger and placing it in the planting pot.

As soon as the finger was lowered, the black half of the branch eagerly pulled the finger into the soil beneath it.

Then, with a burst of excitement, it sprang up a centimeter.

The black branches are now slightly taller than the green ones.

"No wonder he hasn't grown taller no matter how I try to raise him! Turns out he needs a corpse!" Sylph exclaimed in realization.

Seeing that the green branches were still stubbornly reaching for the creaking oil lamp, Sylph manifested a little bit of her soul essence and placed it in the planting pot.

This time, it was the green branches' turn to be happy.

Unlike the black branches, which buried their soul essence in the soil, they extended a section of green root directly from the soil and inserted it into the essence cluster.

Like slurping up a drink, it instantly drained the essence from the group.

The green branches quickly grew taller.

Sylph finally "heard" the mutated black tree express a clear meaning for the first time.

"More more!"

"More more!"

……

It's like how eating the Soul Essence makes you smarter.

Suddenly we were able to communicate.

Sylph began feeding a section of corpse and a clump of soul essence.

The mutated and activated black dead tree begins to grow rapidly, with its branches becoming thicker, taller, and longer, sprouting new branches, and its root system gradually extending.

However, no matter how long it grew, the tree showed no sign of growing leaves and remained bare.

Half green and half black, growing together, yet clearly distinct.

It wasn't until it grew to the point where the small planting pot could barely hold it that the revitalized black dead tree finally looked like it was bursting at the seams.

Black branches hung the corpses on the trees, while green branches strung together the essence of the soul to preserve it.

After the green branches grew, the mutated and revitalized Black Dead Tree became easier to communicate with.

When Sylph asked, she learned that this was because it had reached its current limit and wanted to consume her alien magic power again.

The mutated, activated Black Death Tree is no longer suitable for carrying around on a flying carpet.

After asking about the growing space it needed to fully mature, Sylph replaced the mutated, revitalized black dead tree with a larger planting pot in one go.

After nurturing them with exotic magic and inquiring about their abilities, Sylph raised her head with a strange expression.

"So? What's so special about this mutated, activated Black Death Tree?" Moran asked curiously.

“They say that when they grow up, they will produce two kinds of very useful dolls,” Sylph said.

"A doll?" Vasita asked, puzzled. "What doll?"

Sylph shook her head: "They're probably about the size of our palm, and look a bit like humans. They don't know exactly what they're used for."

Even though they are a bit smarter than before, they are still just saplings that have only recently grown. They haven't experienced enough things yet, and their ability to express themselves is still quite problematic.

“But they should know once they grow up,” Sylph said. “With enough humanoid corpses and soul essence, and a little more nurturing with exotic magic, it will grow and bear fruit very quickly.”

Moran and the others were curious, but they had no better option than to wait. After finishing breakfast, they would usually pack up their tents and prepare to continue their journey.

However, none of them moved today.

Vasita was preoccupied with the unfinished head of her servant, Lilith was thinking about the unfinished corpse of her servant that had just been disemboweled and hadn't been coated with preservative oil, and Sylph was thinking about the mutated, activated Black Death Tree that she had just found a direction for cultivating.

Even Moran was still concerned about the soul fire that hadn't been fully nurtured.

The group exchanged glances, each understanding the other's meaning.

“How about we stay here a while longer, until our Death Servant is ready and Sylph’s revitalized Black Death Tree has grown up before we leave?” Moran said.

"I think it's a good idea!" ×3
"We'll probably be staying here for a long time, and it's too much of a burden for you and Lilith to stay on the flying carpet the whole time. Let's head straight to the depths of the Black Forest and set up a camp!"

Vasida suggested, "We can use the instructions my mother gave us to have her undead servants guard our camp, so we won't have to worry about other undead creatures disturbing us."

This was indeed more convenient than staying on the flying carpet, and the group immediately agreed.

Vasita pulls out a map: "Most of my mother's dead servants are gathered in this location!"

“I’ve got it,” Moran said. “Let’s go!”

Today it's her turn to control the flying carpet to carry everyone.

After the group packed up their things and put away the tent, Moran controlled the flying carpet and headed at full speed toward the location marked on the map.

Without stopping along the way, they arrived at Ms. Ginia's largest cemetery for dead servants by evening.

This is where the undead servants rest. The free-roaming undead servants gather here to set off in groups to find corpse materials, fight other undead creatures, and then bring their spoils back here.

Ms. Ginia probably prefers zombies.

There are only three skeleton squads here: one is logging, one is making coffins, and one is planting trees.

The rest are all zombies.

Each of the dead servants was bound with a red cloth strip dyed with the petals of a large face flower that would never fade.

Moran disabled the flying carpet's invisibility, and the flying carpet became visible above the cemetery.

To attract the zombies' attention, she deliberately lowered the flying carpet and canceled the fake death spell on the group.

The presence of a living person immediately made the zombies lying in the graveyard open their eyes, lift their coffins, and gather around.

Once they had gathered enough, Moran and the others exchanged glances and called out Ms. Ginia's name in the witch's language.

The zombies, who had been baring their teeth and claws, immediately fell silent upon hearing the name, tilting their heads in confusion as they looked at the flying carpet.

“Go about your own business! Don’t let outsiders near the cemetery!” Vasita said in the witch’s tongue.

The zombies immediately staggered away, some returning to the cemetery, others patrolling the area around it.

“Okay! Let’s set up camp near the carpentry shed and the mortuary materials warehouse! Mom said the security there is the best,” Vasita said.

The flying carpet flew over.

This time, not a single zombie bothered them.

Since the burrowing mushrooms couldn't adapt to the soil of the Black Forest, they simply found an open space near the carpenter's hut, set up their tents, and created a campsite.

Then Sylph and Vasita carved the array stones and buried them underground around the camp, setting up a protective magic array.

With the zombie servants as the first layer of insurance, the protective magic circle as the second layer, and Lilith's vampire vines protecting them, there's no chance of anything going wrong.

The only drawback is the dense concentration of death energy here, affecting even the inside of the tent, making it unsuitable for placing planting pots of other types of plants. (End of Chapter)