The Witch's Anatomical Notes

Chapter 85

The Girl and the Mountain of Flesh (Please vote for this story!)

Talia stroked the worn gray dress on her body — this was the only dress she had owned back when she was a farm girl, refashioned from the gown her mother had worn at her wedding.

"But where is Olivia?" she murmured.

Lucy did not answer, only turned her gaze to the now-calm surface of the water.

Talia followed her line of sight and saw an unbelievable scene in the water.

Their reflections gradually disappeared, replaced by a castle shrouded in gunsmoke.

"One, two, three… jump!" Lucy suddenly seized Talia’s wrist and leapt into the river.

This time, the river fractured beneath their feet like a fragile canvas.

The world spun wildly. The familiar village twisted and faded like a bleached oil painting.

When their feet touched solid ground again, the tip of a coldly gleaming spear hovered barely half an inch from the tip of Lucy’s nose — the spear-bearing guard stared wide-eyed, clearly frightened out of his wits by these two “soldiers fallen from the sky.”

"Uh, good afternoon?"

Lucy pushed the spear aside with her fingers and said to the astonished guard, "May I ask if Princess Olivia’s afternoon tea has started?"

The guard’s expression shifted from shock to a savage grimace. "They are the princess’s accomplices!"

He shouted in a harsh voice, "Loose arrows! Kill them!"

Dozens of feathered arrows tore through the air.

Yet before they could touch the two of them, they were all deflected by an invisible Basic Ring of Resistance.

Immediately after, a fan-shaped mental shockwave swept across, and the entire squad of guards collapsed in unison like a field of wheat.

"Where is this place?" Talia asked in confusion.

The black spires of the Gothic castle pierced the blood-red sky. Raging flames spread among the buildings, dyeing everything with an apocalyptic hue.

"Beckett Castle, Olivia’s father’s residence. She must be dreaming about how she ‘failed’ to seize the throne," Lucy said, snapping her fingers. "We might as well change into something more fitting for the scene."

In an instant, their outfits transformed completely.

Talia found herself wrapped in a revealing leather ranger’s outfit. Large swathes of skin along her waist and thighs were exposed, accentuating the graceful curves of her figure.

Lucy, meanwhile, wore a striking suit of armor, a vivid red cloak billowing behind her.

"You call this a ranger’s outfit?" Talia tugged at the tight neckline. There was so little fabric that her cheeks flushed crimson.

Lucy blinked. "It’s a classic setting. The less you wear, the higher the defense."

…

At the top of the tower, Olivia knelt in a pool of blood.

The last of her personal guards lay dead at her feet. The warmth of the lover in her arms was fading away.

She lifted her head to look at the high platform. Her bloodstained ceremonial gown spread around her like withering petals.

"Father…" her voice was hoarse. "Are you truly going to execute me over that woman’s slander and the worthless prince?"

The face of Grand Duke Phoenix remained hidden in the shadows. At his side, the duchess let out a shrill laugh like a night owl.

"From the moment you were tested to have a wizard’s talent, you were no longer part of the Beckett family!" She clutched the grand duke’s sleeve. "Darling, give the order to execute this witch!"

The grand duke’s sword slowly slid from its scabbard.

In the instant the cold blade glinted, two figures dropped from the sky.

"Sorry to interrupt your little family gathering, but Livy, your dream is just too melodramatic."

"Lucy!" Olivia exclaimed in surprise. "Then the one in my arms is…"

She looked down and saw that the one lying in her arms was actually a silver-haired doll that bore some resemblance to Lucy.

The duchess’s face turned the color of pig liver. "Guards! Guards!"

"Don’t bother shouting. They’re all outside taking their beauty naps." Lucy reached out and pulled Olivia to her feet. "Do you remember who you are now?"

The confusion in Olivia’s eyes dissipated like mist, returning to clarity.

"Was this caused by the divine power of the Lord of Nightmares?"

"That’s right. Time to get up, Your Highness the Princess."

After a final bit of teasing, Lucy slowly let her smile fade. "The farce is over. Time to wake up!"

With her loud call—

The entire castle began to quake violently.

The grand duke, the duchess, the soldiers — all dissolved into nothingness amid the tremors. Everything vanished into an enormous vortex.

Yet when the dust settled, the three of them had not returned to the original chamber woven from tangled roots.

Instead, they stood within a nightmare realm.

A wasteland of flesh writhed beneath their feet. Golden veins pulsed beneath the skin, and at times, thick pus spurted up from underground.

The sky, sheathed in membranes of meat, was covered in countless rolling eyeballs. The moment the three appeared, all the eyes turned to fix on them.

And in the center of this flesh-formed wasteland, a “hill” of rotting meat convulsed violently.

"Kill me… I beg you…"

Branny’s distorted face flickered in and out of view across the surface of the towering mountain of flesh, more than ten meters high. New wounds kept splitting open on the swollen masses, pouring torrents of golden blood.

Talia fought the urge to vomit. "She… who is she?"

"I don’t know." Lucy paused, then called out cautiously, "Branny?"

The pleading expression on the meat mountain’s face became even clearer.

"She’s still conscious?!"

“She must have activated an incomplete ritual array, awakening the residual will of the Lord of Nightmares in the golden index finger, and she herself has been completely corrupted by divine power…”

Lucy stared at the crying-faced patterns emerging on the surface of the flesh mountain.

Though she did not know exactly what trouble the strike team that split off had encountered, she could more or less guess the situation.

“What do we do now?” Olivia turned her face away, refusing to look at the horrifying sight.

“If I’m not mistaken, that golden index finger should be inside this mountain of flesh.” Lucy spoke in a low voice. “If we don’t extract it, we can’t escape this dreamscape of the Lord of Nightmares.”

As she finished speaking, Lucy silently called out to the system in her mind.

An intensely bright blue marker quickly converged on a certain spot within the flesh mountain.

Evidently, that was where the golden index finger of the Lord of Nightmares lay.

“I’ve found the index finger’s location.”

“But how are we supposed to extract that thing right in front of this mountain?”

Though the flesh mountain hadn’t shown any hostility yet, it surely wouldn’t just sit there like some neighbor girl and let them do as they pleased.

“Livy!” Lucy suddenly grabbed Olivia’s wrist. “Remember that time in the Principality of Kolo?”

The golden flesh mountain’s monstrous form reflected in Olivia’s pupils. Her black hair clung to her pale cheeks, damp with sweat. “I can’t do it… That time was an accident…”

“You said it only triggers when I’m in danger.”

Lucy suddenly flashed a cunning smile, producing the No. 3 scalpel of the Midnight Dissector and gripping it in her hand. A pair of radiant wings abruptly unfurled behind her.

In the next instant, Lucy shot toward the flesh mountain like an arrow loosed from a bow.

Sensing hostility, the mountain began to erupt with countless golden tendrils.

The seething tendrils came lashing from all directions.

The luminous wings on Lucy’s back gave a shudder, and her figure reappeared in another spot.

“Madwoman!” Talia’s right arm transformed into a massive vine, trying to shield Lucy.

But in just two exchanges, it was shredded by the golden tendrils sprouting from the flesh mountain.

Meanwhile, Olivia could only bite her silver-white teeth, as if trying to recall that feeling from two months ago.

“Almost there!”

“Almost there!”

Lucy continuously invoked Phase Wing Leap in High Elvish.

Yet as she closed the distance, the density of the tendrils grew, and the space she could maneuver shrank rapidly.

At that moment, the tendrils blocking her path suddenly withdrew.

Branny’s remaining human upper body struggled to extend its arms out of the flesh mountain. “Hurry… while I can still control…”

Before she could finish, three sharp tendrils abruptly erupted from her throat, shooting straight at Lucy’s chest.

In that split second, the silver-haired girl activated Phase Wing Leap again. As the afterimage was pierced by bone spines, her real body appeared directly above the flesh mountain.

But now, within the leap’s range, there was no more foothold left.

Still, Lucy showed no trace of fear. She merely looked toward the black-haired girl in the distance, her lips moving silently.

“Now!”

The phantom clock in Olivia’s eyes abruptly solidified.

Her slender fingers grasped the intangible second hand. Her nails split and bled from the force, but she wrenched it backward by three ticks.

“Ka—”

The world seemed to have a rewind button pressed.

The sharp tendrils that had lunged at Lucy retreated bizarrely into the flesh mountain, but Lucy’s figure remained fixed in the position after the Phase Wing Leap.

“Got you.”

The instant time resumed its flow, Lucy unleashed Phase Wing Leap again. Her scalpel stabbed precisely into the system’s marked spot.

The No. 3 scalpel of the Midnight Dissector, gifted to her by Mentor Fernando, pierced into the flesh mountain like a red-hot steel rod.

When Lucy gripped the hard object inside, Branny’s wailing and the flesh mountain’s convulsions reached their peak together.

“Come… out!”