The Villainess' Ending Was Death

Isaac, dressed in a dark red suit, entered Fresa’s pharmacy with his well-groomed curly hair shaking and his characteristic arrogant expression. However, unlike his neat clothes and attitude, his face looked much more tired than last time. His already pale complexion became even paler.

‘Are you busy with work these days?’

Fresa was a little worried because the state of her future partner seemed to be in good shape.

Lycaon and Zed were absent today because they had to go to the empire. Of course, Fresa wasn’t worried at all. All preparations had already been completed.

She kept a separate ledger that recorded only sales, and invited Albert, who was the first to see the effect of the ointment. Perhaps thanks to Albert’s hair that had just grown longer, she readily accepted requests that she would otherwise have refused.

He even brought her a portrait he had drawn before using the ointment.

“My life has changed since I started using this ointment.”

Albert brought the top of his head, which was somewhat full, although not completely, closer to Isaac’s eyes.

“Mr. Albert.”

Fresa tried to stop him, saying there was no need to go that far, but Isaac looked more interested and carefully checked the top of Albert’s head.

“If this is the case, your life will inevitably change. Congratulations.”

Isaac congratulated Albert, but perhaps because of his unique tone, it sounded more like he was teasing him.

‘This guild master is also a bit of a strange person.’

In fact, although they had not known each other for long and had not met often, Fresa recognized Isaac’s unique personality just from a brief conversation with him. Isaac was even counting the hairs on Albert’s head.

“This is enough, Mr. Albert.”

Fresa quickly sent Albert away and decided to give Isaac a tour of the inside of the drugstore. Following Fresa’s guidance, Isaac looked inside the pharmacy, the basement, and even the garden, then returned to the first floor and spoke.

“It’s narrower than I thought. I didn’t know you opened a pharmacy in an ordinary mansion. What is the reason?”

“Well. There is a basement, so there is no problem in operating a pharmacy at this level.”

As her business grows, she may need to hire more employees. But the size of the pharmacy was just right now.

A large garden, a basement, and a first floor with a sales counter and medicine cabinet were suitable. Rather, if it was too big, it would only incur additional maintenance costs.

Isaac slowly blinked his green eyes and stared at Fresa.

“Are you planning on moving somewhere else? Or returning to the kingdom. This place is too remote to interact. You can only get there by boat, so transportation is inconvenient.”

“Yes, I like it here. It’s also a good environment for growing medicinal herbs.”

“Instead of looking for a house to live in alone, you wanted a large mansion and were making plans like this. At the time, I thought your decision without even much experience was reckless.”

Isaac muttered softly, picked up a bottle of medicine, and began to look around. Fresa thought that since he had come this far, the deal was already a done deal. Contrary to his unlucky words and actions, it was clear that he was checking things quite meticulously.

‘He must have really come because he must have confirmed the effectiveness of repairing hair ointment.’

It was clear to see that the master of a large guild came to visit in person, like buying a house. Then Isaac stumbled violently and dropped the vial he was holding.

Fresa was startled and helped him up, but the vial shattered with a loud bang.

“Are you okay?”

“Ah…”

Isaac’s face was completely white and bloodless. For some reason, it wasn’t in good condition from the first time she saw it.

“Do you have a chronic illness?”

“No. That…”

Isaac groaned softly and tried to say something, but nothing came out.

“There, there.”

Fresa spread her fingers and tapped Isaac’s cheek. However, the child seemed to be in a deep sleep and could hardly wake up.

“This person is a mess.”

Reese said, circling around Isaac.

“I don’t know what he did, but his life force is being taken away. It looks like he swallowed something strange.”

“Life force? What on earth did you eat…?”

“If you leave him like this, he will die in a violent accident.”

“What should I do?”

“First of all, you have to regurgitate everything above. I need to check what you ate.”

As soon as Fresa heard the answer, she ran to the basement, found the recipe, made an appropriate medicine, and came back. The recipe description said, ‘When you give your precious animal friend nothing and it shows up yapping.’

Even though Isaac wasn’t a precious animal friend, the principle behind making him vomit was probably similar.

“Mr. Cade, Mr. Cade. Please come to your senses.”

Fresa patted Isaac’s cheek, then laid him down and slightly opened her lips. She then gave him a small amount of thick green liquid and turned him on his side to prevent the airway from becoming blocked. After some time, Isaac woke up with a small cough, fell face down, and started retching.

“Wow…!”

After vomiting painfully a few more times, a black lump suddenly popped out of his mouth.

“We have to catch it, Fresa!”

At the same time as Reese’s urgent cry, Fresa turned the glass bottle next to him upside down and trapped the lump. The black mass was as mushy as slime, and as if it had an ego, it kept hitting the glass bottle and trying to get out.

‘What is this?’

Fresa frowned and looked at the unidentified creature trapped in the glass bottle.

“Just now… What happened?”

Isaac looked at Fresa with a puzzled expression. Fresa showed him an unknown creature trapped in a glass bottle.

It may be a bit shameful, but there was no other method as sure as this.

“I just saved your life.”

“What on earth is that…?”

Isaac made a whooshing sound again, grabbed the bucket that Fresa had gently held out, and vomited it all up. Fresa calmly patted his back and waited for this horrible vomiting session to end.

Isaac stopped vomiting only after a while. After waiting long enough for him to calm down, Fresa asked the question he had been curious about.

“Where have you been recently? Or you ate unfamiliar food.”

“…Why are you curious about that?”

“Because you picked up this strange thing.”

“…”

Isaac’s expression, which had regained its color perhaps thanks to spitting out something strange, was gently shaking.

“The World Tree… I went to the roots.”

“I guess it’s not that unusual.”

Reese muttered in a low voice.

The root of the World Tree was a place that bordered the unknown realm where the fairies who protected the World Tree resided.

Humans would not be able to enter the land of fairies…

“I am a half-blood fairy. That is my hometown.”

Isaac seemed to have read Fresa’s question and added an explanation in a calm tone.

“I felt a somewhat familiar energy. Something must be happening to the roots. I need to recover as soon as possible… The world tree…

Reese wandered around in the air, turning gray unlike usual, and soon disappeared underground. It seemed that he became anxious and went to a place with a lot of plants to find peace of mind.

Fresa was also worried about Reese, but she had to finalize the contract with Isaac, so she couldn’t follow along willingly.

‘Resse, you also need some alone time right now.’

By the way, if something really went wrong with the World Tree, it would affect the entire continent, so I was a little worried that something big like this might happen.

‘Is it related to the completion of the original work?’

Usually, no one cared what happened to the world after the end. Because the main characters lived happily ever after, it was enough.

There had to have been a side story, but the place where Fresa was born was a novel that was completed without a side story. If completion meant the end of the world… Did this mean the world could come to an end?

While Fresa was lost in his thoughts, staring into the glass bottle, Isaac asked a question.

“What is that lump?”

“I don’t know either. I think I’ll have to research it. Would you like to take it?”

Since Isaac was the master of a large guild, he would have had his own research department.

Fresa also wanted to reveal the identity of this strange creature, but she was not willing to do so.

‘I don’t know if it will affect Resse.’

If this mass was parasitic on the host and absorbed its life force, it was somewhat dangerous to handle alone. The child closed his mouth as if thinking for a moment, then nodded his head.

“Yes, I will take it. I will let you know the results.”

Without hesitation, Fresa handed the vial to Isaac. The little boy put the bottle in his leather bag with a shocked expression and then looked at Fresa again.

“And let’s write the contract now.”

 

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Translator Note: