Trees of the Abyss

Trees of the Abyss

Year 215

I am now in possession of two sets of bones from legendary creatures. One, the dragon bones, which I recovered from the moon before I withdrew the clone, and now, the bones of the Zaratan.

Both of which were now safely stored in my [secret hideout], in their own little section. Thanks to the effect of my preservation abilities, they were untouched, almost the same as if they were on the moon, and in the depth of the sea.

Since I wanted to now see what happened to the Zaratan, I figured I might as well check the dragons bones as well.

I moved a large piece of the Zaratans skull from one part of my secret hideout, right to the biolab located within my body. The skull itself was large enough to be a truck, but this broken piece was about the size of a large door.

It pulsed momentarily, as my biolab began its work. Ethereal vines from my soul forge-biolab entered the bones, and I began to see images and little bursts of thoughts. Emotions.

A lake, and then, a sensation of moving. A black sun, then abruptly snapping. Forced off the path! Another lake but then its dried out. How? Then demons, large demons. Champions.

Running. Flee, and conjured water around itself. The champions latch on, and then, the sensation of moving again. Its unstable, demons on its back.

Ocean. A struggle. Pain. Sinking-

The memories ended there, and I realised this zaratan had probably been yanked out of its path across the stars. The demons could do that, or at least, that black sun could.

I feel that black sun is the key to everything, and I proposed the idea of destroying or capturing the black sun to the domainholders. They generally concurred that it may work, if its the only one.

I wanted to speak to Aiva again, ask them whether theyve ever tried assaulting the black sun. If that would work?

I tried a few more zaratan bones, but the memories of its last moments were similar. So, I used the bones of the dragon from the moon that Ive kept for so long.

Its a bad habit. I would keep things, and only check on them when I remember them. Patreeck gives me regular reminders, but I find it hard to focus until it really draws me. Anyway, I focused on the dragons bones now.

Its memories were far more hazy than the zaratan. The images I saw were faded, but I saw-

Flight. Run! Fear!

The sky. The stars, and then a really intense sensation of emptiness. Then the moon. The dragon looked back, and saw a world aflame. A roar, and then, a long period of waiting. Hope. Hoping for others to join it.

No one came. No one was strong enough.

I needed some time to process my thoughts. These were the last moments of these great creatures.

Both bones had power, and as I studied them, I felt I gained a better understanding of their nature. The study of their bones led to additional titan options.

[Titan option unlocked : Dragon Replicant. A creature with the flight, combat and magical prowess of a lesser dragon.]

[Titan option unlocked : Zaratan Replicant. A creature created based on the Zaratans of the void sea. Possessed ability to move between worlds, if there is an existing path. Comes with void mana as default and can use some void magic.]

I have one titan soul left, but I looked at the six heroes allied to me, and realised, I wasnt in a rush. Not if this arrangement worked.

I would get more fragments, sure, I was so close to 100 fragments, but, thats really a consolation prize if I could direct the heros actions.

These dragons, and Zaratans were so powerful, surely they would have achieved a domain? What stopped them from stopping the demons? Or, that was the wrong question. The dragons stopped the demons many times, as seen from the memories in some of the ancient tree, but they were eventually overwhelmed. If so, what can we do to avoid their mistakes?

If two or three demon kings invaded us at the same time, we would fall, just like the dragons. Even today, we dont really know whether thats a rule, or just a convenience of the demons. It is entirely possible that they assigned 1-to-1 worlds just to maximise the number of invaded worlds, but could easily focus on a single world.

We needed to test this. Was there a physical or magical barrier that prevented simultaneous invasions? Its possible that a demon kings presence emitted something that interfered with the astral paths, thus preventing multiple invasions.

Since we now had a demon kings core replica, we also needed to figure out how to confuse their targeting system.

We had seen the astral paths wobble when daemolite was removed from Treehome, and so, weve seen that the creation of stable astral paths required core mana.

Thus, I directed my attention to one of my potential sources of core mana. The core fragment of the anti mana world.

Unlike the shard of the cometworld, the rousing presence from a few years ago was still dormant. It was as if it slept. When I touched it again, this time, the presence was quite similar to the sensation from the cometworld.

The presence was still collecting itself, and its core mana, however few it was, seemed to resist me. Without actually convincing that presence within the core to give me its mana, the core mana was far more bound to its presence.

So, do we want to try it out with this demon within the core?

No. I wasnt sure why, but I felt that using star mana to capture the demon mother in the core would not go well, especially if it interacted with the void mana within the demon mother. Just a normal attack will do. Our goal is to free the core and gain access to the core mana. Not crack the planet in the process.

I wasnt sure scorched planet even worked as a defense policy. Destroyed worlds did not form a wall that prevented travel. If it did, it may be worthwhile to look into destroying uninhabited planets to form interstellar barriers.

***

As part of the preparations for the invasion, we significantly increased the number of trees on Branchhold and soon made connections to more magical ley lines. I spread my trees, discreetly where I could, and ramped up my total mana output.

Back on Treehome, we did the same, I added more trees, and extended my trees further out to the various islands closer to the Central Continent.

Thanks to the skills earned before this, I was able to tunnel to some of the islands, and this meant I now had some influence over the seas around the Central Continent. My minds suggested creating artificial islands, a point which I eventually came to agree to. The Valthorns quietly arranged for druids, earth mages and builders to commence the construction of these artificial islands.

This was an incredibly lengthy process, as lifting sand and rock into a stable structure was actually quite difficult, and we honestly had to look for locations where the deep-sea monsters didnt appear too much.

Publicly, these artificial islands were to serve as my military ports, of course, with all that excuse of reducing piracy and facilitating trade. Its just a cover for my real intention to spread my roots across the ocean, and expand my total mana output.

My expansion on Mountainworld went relatively easier. Mountainworld as a whole only had one single ocean thats rather deep, fed by hundreds and thousands of rivers. That meant there were very little physical barriers to my expanding trees, and it was possible to go around any large habited areas.

The cold peaks of the Mountainworld didnt do much to stop roots that could tunnel through mountains, though in the process, I discovered that Mountainworld has very interesting subterranean life and culture. There are entire parts of the world that resembled parts of the Eastern Continent, where cities and entire nations lived within mountains, and within many mountains, there were massive caverns that contained things from an older era.

Many of these were in territories far from Branchhold, so Id probably need to cook up a plausible excuse to send my Valthorns to investigate, or probably just have them fake it as adventurers.

Yeah. Thatll be something to do. I could have an initiative to set up Branchhold-sponsored adventurers, and send them in that direction. But I could indirectly stir up a gold-rush if that leak came from me, since these guys would suspect I know something.

Anyway, as a result of my expansion on both my homeworld and Mountainworld, my total mana output increased by approximately half, and my total mana storage by that same amount. This was a massive increase, though most of that increase came from greenfield expansion on the Mountainworld.

This wasnt enough, obviously, but then again, the demon mother might be weaker.

Time to set it in motion, whatever the consequences may be.

***

Weve been working on this plan for years. Stella said at the edge of my clone tree on the parasite world. She set up multiple observation posts, and a few more of her students, other void mages, joined her. They would monitor the stars for any signs that something was wrong, or reinforcements were on their way.

Lumoof, my domainholders and the heroes stood at the edge of the pit. Lumoof made a repeat of the mission statement. Down there is the demon mother. Our goal is to capture it, or defeat it, and free the core of the parasiteworld. The reason to capture this is simple. We want to test whether it is possible to recapture a world from the demons, and gain access to core mana.

If its possible to free the world, it may mean we can have a new population base, and more future heroes to rely on. With core mana, Stella and the void mages can start to establish stable astral paths through the void forest, and mount a counter invasion.

The heroes gulped at the term, counter invasion. Getting core mana was the equivalent of having the fuel needed to make the journey. The counterinvasion was a deep-strike, meant to target the real command center of the demons.

Any questions? Lumoof asked out of habit. It was just a procedure, they have discussed the issue at length over the years.

Everyone shook their heads. The pit had been heavily reinforced over the past year. I have four seeds. One on Branchhold, One on the Cometworld, One here in the Parasiteworld, and one more in store, still serving its cooldown.

Theres four more years to go. They thought of waiting, but then, I didnt feel like we needed to.

We had made extensive preparations, and they all had a variety of weapons, the ice blades of Aria, the death-staff of Lillies, Stellas void-weapons and their own hero items.

Check equipment? Everyone took a minute to recheck their list, and nodded.

Lumoof nodded, and entered avatar mode. Vines branched out, and around him, the vines turned into a massive walking vine-creature. He looked at the pit, and thought of the many times he made a journey into the core.

The pit itself was already filled with vines, and my beetles already patrolled the entire pit. The only area weve yet to claim was the large cavern around the core.

Lumoof made a prayer, and the heroes nodded.

Time to claim the parasites core, and free this planet.

Spaizzer

I'd like to shoutout Ghost of the Truthseeker. If you like defiance of the fall, or other similar fictions, GotT is supposedly similar. (Yes I /series/543086/ghost-of-the-truthseeker/