Chapter 1253 — Dark Ripples

A beautiful stream of blue light finally flowed to the feet of the nearest mutated giant. In a silent, soundless burning, that hideous, ferocious giant swiftly became a bright torch, and within a mere dozen seconds was reduced to a scattering of dust.

Firna turned her head for a glance. The dust drifting in the air was mixed with specks of blue radiance, and the luminous dust was reflected in her eyes. She shook her head, her tone tinged with regret: "Truly doesn't hold up to burning."

As she spoke, they had already arrived above the escaping streams of light, standing in midair several meters up as though on solid ground. The primal magic surging up from deep underground had by now begun to flow in continuous sheets; pure flame of light churned in fissures large and small, and bright blue fissures interlaced into a spiderweb pattern. Wherever the light reached, the mutated giants responsible for excavating the ruins ignited one after another, while the treants active nearby retreated nervously. Bolken's gaze was fixed on the elven sisters standing in the air; he knew these two eccentric creatures must have some arrangement, but he could not help asking: "How do you plan to control this? With your magic alone?"

"Strictly speaking, what this requires is knowledge and wisdom," Firna said faintly, raising her left hand, runes already flowing at her fingertips. "Vast energy has the power to sweep away all obstacles, but if you find that 'node' at the right moment and the right position, then give it a very gentle 'push' with a tiny external force..."

"Just as a single pebble raises ripples across an entire pond," Lerna followed close behind, raising her right hand, precisely coordinating with Firna's casting movements, using a clever technique to alter the flow of magic deep within the earth. "Everything will change."

The silent magic seeped into the "Deep Blue Spring" surging upward from underground. The blue fissures across the land all dimmed in an instant, followed by a brief two or three seconds of stillness—then a piercing blue beam of light burst violently from the surface. Accompanied by a magical turbulence that inspired vague dread, the entire ruin area seemed to be subject to some powerful attraction originating from its center, and began collapsing and compressing inward from all sides!

The tenacious boulders and decayed steel gave out tooth-aching creaks under wave after wave of powerful suction, and after a brief resistance split apart and fell into the depths of the blue beam. The treants active on the periphery of the ruin area also retreated in panic, wanting to get as far as possible from this lethal vortex of gravity. Yet amid such a terrifying spectacle, Firna and Lerna still stood expressionlessly in the air, coldly watching every change unfold before them.

That powerful inward-collapsing attraction seemed simply not to exist for them.

The whole process lasted a full ten minutes, and at last this dreadful "collapse" drew to its end. Accompanied by increasingly faint tremors of the earth, a certain "balance" seemed to establish itself at the center of the collapse—the original building ruins had completely vanished, and along with them a large area of ground had become a sunken pit. The blue beam that had shot into the sky gradually contracted and dimmed, and at the place where the beam had risen, a structure resembling a "portal" now floated abruptly at the center of the pit's bottom.

Blue streams of light surged ceaselessly through some space within that portal, waves of pure magical fluctuation constantly escaping from it. It was like a door set into the real world, presenting a spectacular glimpse of the planet's depths.

"Grand Chancellor," Lerna said, walking slowly to the edge of the great pit and smiling down at the now-stabilized "door" at its bottom, "this is the new network entrance you wanted. Please inspect it."

"...You used a natural magical focal point to 'blast' open a gate to the Deep Blue network?" The vines extended from the platform, Bolken's astonished face emerging among those withered, twisted, gnarled tendrils. He stared at the gate, then suddenly reacted. "Wait—opening a gate to the Deep Blue network is actually this simple for you?"

"Yes, it isn't difficult for us," Lerna and Firna said in unison, offhandedly.

Bolken's voice was furious: "...But you had us spend a full half-month in this valley constructing the rune ring and the network node, and nearly exhausted our reserves of magic drawn from the Deep Blue Well!"

"Calm down, Grand Chancellor. Where is that judgment you pride yourself on?" Firna smiled at the angry face presented among the vines. "What we've opened here is merely a temporary gate. It exists only for you to bury the rune stones; it will close in a few hours—but the gate in the valley is permanent. It is the foundation of our enterprise, the control center of all nodes. To pay only half a month's labor for it—don't you think that's still a bargain?"

Bolken stared hard at the elf's face, and only after a few seconds did he speak in a low voice: "When you wear that kind of fake smile, I don't want to believe a single word you say."

Lerna laughed. "Don't be like that, Grand Chancellor. We will tell you how to open these temporary gates—after all, we'll need to open many, many more fissures later, and bury many more rune stones. We two sisters don't have nearly enough energy to personally open every single gate."

"Good. I will carefully verify this 'method' you've brought, and this time I hope you will have no further concealment," Bolken said in a low voice. "Now hurry on to the next step—since this is a temporary gate, we don't have much time to waste. Put the rune stones in."

"As you command—" Lerna and Firna bowed slightly together, deliberately speaking in an exaggerated tone, and only then did Lerna straighten up and look at a treant nearby. "Are there any mutated ones still able to move? Go bring the rune stones over—we're going to 'unload.'"

The treant swayed its crown, and the twisted, horrifying face on its trunk showed a flicker of irritation: "You just burned them all up!"

"...Ah, what a pity," Firna said, seeming genuinely a little surprised, shaking her head. "I thought we had ample reserves, so I tested it out with those expendables..."

"Go catch a few more. As long as they're usable for now," Lerna said immediately, her tone utterly flat. "They're long past being honorable Gondo citizens anyway."

(End of Chapter)