Chapter 259 - What will you do now? (Patreon)

One of the reasons the First One teleported so far is to put a distance between me and the anchor I left on him. Probably in hopes of cutting off my connection and getting rid of the black mana orb. Or there is something else, and the reason for him going there is different.

Staying over the ancient array, I hear a soft ding of the notification and open the system. Going through the options, I notice that a side quest was added.

Side quest: Save Virelia from annihilation

Reward: 1000 shards

I turn to Myrra, "What is up there? Did the matriarch leave any info on that?"

The debris, or whatever it is, is something we were curious about and tried to get information on, yet were unable to find anything at all. Just a bunch of disjointed rumors.

The tall, white-haired lynthari releases more heat, pushing against the chilly air up here on what feels like an impossibly high mountain. I notice that the longer we are here, the worse the cold gets. Still, this place is weirdly beautiful. Devoid of any life, clear white snow, and the sound of roaring wind, with snowflakes floating wildly around. The only sign of life is an array that is still partially charged from when the First One used it hours ago, and it slowly loses all the mana that charged it.

"Remains of the war between lynthari and humans. The base of the lynthari Absolute was there, orbiting around the planet, allowing him to move anywhere he wanted. But feral one, even the matriarch thought all the ways to get there were gone. This," she points at the array, "shouldn't exist anymore."

I send my senses towards the array and examine it more.

The side quest and its timing most likely mean that the First One is trying to destroy Virelia. Either because of his programming or he just wants to finish what he started and hurt Myrra and me for hunting him down.

Myrra says something behind me, but I filter it out and examine my body. My mana is mostly back, I even have some in reserve. I have over three thousand shards to buy something in case I need it.

The floor quest isn't finished, so that means the First One is still alive, meaning he survived the transport and wherever he is, it is livable as he wouldn't be able to stay alive in a dangerous place in his weakened state.

I step into the array and look at Myrra.

She laughs shortly and without hesitation also steps into the circle. There is no need for more words, and she only smiles, her posture confident.

An armor made of aurora glass is created around the epic armor she is wearing. A beautiful, almost work of art like with thousands of surfaces that are of different colors and partially reflect the light.

[Regalia] also activates, a blue armor surrounding me and my head as well, with a helmet without any visors as I make it as airtight as I can. The armor strengthens and I prepare [Infusion].

Then, I send my mana to the array, immediately appreciating the different kinds of circuits that are expertly inscribed into the circle. They are simple, elegant, not very efficient, but easy to work with.

I reactivate the remaining mana that charged it and push in more of mine, much more, feeling a massive drain on it. One after another, the parts of the array light up, my mana flowing through them, reactivating it.

Lost in my work, I want to send more mana, but then I realize that we are already somewhere else. The transportation was extremely smooth and I barely noticed it.

A quiet hum welcomes me and a myriad of inscriptions all around. Most of them hundreds of years deactivated and some of them were reactivated just hours ago. The room is relatively small and circular. There are no windows, just walls made out of gray stone that I have seen so often lately. An indestructible stone that some tunnels were made of and that a few buildings in Virelia used.

I observe Myrra's movement as she gestures to me to wait and the helmet around her disappears.

With fascination, I watch as she breathes in a few times and even flickers her tongue, tasting the air. She continues to do so for one minute.

“It seems fine,” she says.

My helmet disappears, but I keep armor around my body, just in case.

The air I breathe in feels weird, somewhat chemical or artificial. Fake, maybe even? As if it went through dozens of filters or the room where the windows weren't open for a long time.

“This way,” I tell her and start walking towards where I sense my anchor.

The First One is not far away.

Side by side, we walk through the dimly lit hallway, architecture much different from anything we've seen so far. Simple, functional. Even the lights are just lines on the walls without any twists or decorations, just a straight line releasing a dim orange light.

We continue carefully, watching every step, examining every hallway, ready for anything. While hunting the First One, we learned about all sorts of traps and got used to constant danger and watching our steps.

But there is nothing.

No traps, barely any mana can be felt around, and it's eerily quiet except for a constant hum somewhere in the distance. It starts to feel like we are once again down under the ground until we reach the window.

At first, we hesitate, seeing a panel of glass, our senses shooting there, looking for weaknesses, for traps. I detect the First One too and he is still a few minutes off. So I take a few last steps towards the window, Myrra carefully following behind me.

Then, we stand there for a long minute, staring outside.

I don't think I was ever so lost for words. So lost for thought. The view in front of me makes it hard to do anything else but just stare. My worries, my problems, my need for revenge, all of them become so distant. So unimportant.

So small.

Behind the window that is as big as a small car, a planet is surrounded by pitch-black darkness with a few stars glowing dimly so far off.

The planet is so far below us and no matter how giant it is, it looks so small right now.

Myrra's planet, the Waning Realm as the system called it, is half covered in snow and wild mountains that stretch on a big part of the surface, a wild beautiful white color. The bottom half of the planet is made of rocky ground and green continents with a few seas with clear blue color. Clouds lazily float there over all of it.

It's beautiful. A view I didn’t think I would ever see in my life.

I want to see things like this. I want to see them more often. I want to reach that level where even things like this will become normal. And I will get there.

But there is something I need to do first.

I step away from the window, back to the hallway, and continue to walk towards where my anchor is.

Barely able to take her eyes off the view, Myrra follows me.

***

We pass through the room with a glass floor that makes it terrifying to walk through. Nothing changes and this place seems as solid as before, yet there is this irrational worry that just our steps would break it as if it's normal glass.

Then there is a room with another window, this one turned to the opposite side. A view of infinite darkness behind with lonely stars shining by.

We detect one of the traps the First One left behind too, trying to tear a hole in the wall and throw us into space.

I don’t think it would be able to damage it, yet I still disrupt it and notice a few thin threads of mana all over the place that I take care of.

At some points, the place we are in starts shaking and the hum intensifies as if we started moving.

So that’s how it is.

The First One plans to use this place, a reminder of an era passed long by, and crash it against Virelia, most likely hoping to kill us in the process.

I create a domain around myself and try to place an anchor behind the walls, out in space. And I fail; my senses can’t pierce the walls in a similar way the outside void can’t get inside. We are trapped here and the shakes intensify and passing by the window I can see we are moving, passing through other debris, also remains of what used to be a much grander build. Some other debris crashes against us, making us shake even more, yet the damage is none or minimal.

I check the anchor I left on top of the snowy mountain with the array and it's too far. I can send my mana there, yet teleporting seems to be impossible, the amount of mana I have is not enough.

So we continue. We destroy the traps, we pass through the rooms, ignoring the wonders that surround us, and we reach the center of all of it.

There the First One stands. A black carapace that seems to absorb the light itself and a dagger stabbed into his back close to his head, constantly absorbing most of his mana.

The ant steps away from the pillar, barely any mana inside his body as he relies on the strength of his physical stats. He takes a few more steps, moving even further back, and just stands there, our figures reflecting hundreds of times in his compound black eyes.

Myrra hisses, about to charge him, but I put my hand on her, “Check the pillar first.”

She tries to get away from me, but I strengthen my body and pull her back, “That fucker did something. Check. The. Pillar. First. There are no traps on it and I probably won’t be able to activate it as it's for lynthari only,” I repeat.

Myrra curses but does so while I take a few steps, keeping myself between the black ant and the white-haired lynthari.

Just looking at the creature makes my blood boil, but I push all those thoughts to the back of my mind, and even through [Focus] some of them surface.

As if in answer to that the First One clacks his mandibles a few times, a soft snapping sound echoing through the room.

“We are falling,” Myrra says.

“Can you tell where?” I ask.

After a minute Myrra confirms what I was thinking, “There is a trajectory calculated… it’s right on Virelia…” her voice breaks in the end.

Mana radiates from her but she quickly takes it under control and sends it into the pillar, the shakes weakening and through kinetic energy, I feel our movement slowing. Myrra is using her mana to power the base and keep us in orbit.

The First One clacks his mandibles.

“Not enough, I don’t have enough mana!” she pushes more and more of it, weakening herself near our enemy. Hoping to redirect the base.

The feeling of the ant looking right into my eyes flows through me and there is even a question I can read or feel from him.

What will you do now?

The ant took us here in hopes of cutting the connection to the tether. When it didn't work, he threw the base against Virelia, and now there he is, waiting for us to use our mana to stop the base, to weaken ourselves. To stay trapped here with him.

He wants us to waste mana, not even for a moment giving up on his attempts to kill us. And seeing the way he looks at us, we will need to use most of our mana to stop the base from falling on Virela, Im sure he calculated that. Using some of it to fight him would make stoping the base impossible.

"Cheeky little fucker, aren't you?" Not taking my eyes off him, I take a few steps back and put my hand on the pillar.

Without any hesitation, I release my mana and push it inside. I start infusing all of it, the mana from my body and reservoir as well.

“Myrra, I bet this base has some detection, so find the place with a huge amount of ants.”

This single ant is smart. I do not believe we got all of the Colony. No, he most likely saved some and hid them to rebuild the Colony after killing us.

I continue, “And then when you find such a place with plenty of ants, crash us against it.”

The First One freezes, his mandibles stop moving, a sheer surprise to be felt even from his monstrous body.

I place an anchor near the pillar and start sending my mana to it, and even with my gradually decreasing reserves, I step into his way.

"What will you do now?" I say to the monster.

The ant's body moves, and he rushes to stop us.

***

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