I found the soul.
"I got it. Lumoof!"
My avatar led the way, since we shared a mind and could see what I saw. My avatar charged up another [soul forge] powered strike and ran to the location. The soul was moving.
My avatar dodged the gigantic leviathan's claws and the flood of demons, while I simultaneously spread out my roots over more and more of its body. To the Leviathan, I was the corruption. I was the blight that destroyed its flesh. I turned its flesh into its own enemy as the flesh fell apart.
"I'm going to move the Cometworld into position." Stella said. "Alka, is the bomb armed?"
"Gimme five, let me just charge everything up!" My master of explosions teleported to the Cometworld with a void archmage to set everything up.
"What? It's not ready yet?" Stella cursed as she paced the room. Though she was not out there in the field, everyone was tense. "Aeon, any chance you can slow down the movement of the soul? Tell me where it is?"
"We're working on it constantly!" Alka countered but he was working hard. My clone on the Cometworld would also be delivered to the Leviathan, though I wondered whether my clone would even survive the explosion.
“Stella, do you think you can yank my tree out of the way at the last minute?”
“What?”
“With the voidlings, do you think you can surround my clone with a ball of void magic just like how you got through the barrier and temporarily move my clone out of harm’s way?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well, only one way to find out. It was a small matter, all things considered. My clone was replaceable.
"Fine, fine, get it ready."
Lumoof dodged the gigantic creature's claws, but the claws were getting faster. More frantic. We were fleas, making the creature itch incredibly. It scratched us, but I got the sense that it had made itself too large, too tough.
The swarm of demons came our way
It was a battle on two fronts. My roots confused the demons,, but it still recognized Lumoof and Edna as a threat. Even though I intercepted their mana flows and made it think everything was fine, it did not rely on its spiritual senses as its only information.
I fought like an invasive virus, and the longer the leviathan assumed I was just an irritating annoying flea, the better it was for me. Just like that time when we fought with Demon King Multipus and confused its warning systems, I replicated this at scale. The leviathan's soul did not stretch to cover all of its body. Not with its full strength.
There was just a light coating of the leviathan's spiritual influence through its massive planetary structure.
The leviathan's many formed limbs scratched. My roots spread out and felt the domain of the Leviathan. Our powers met in its body, my three clones against the Leviathan Reviver.
More
We responded with an echo. More.
The creature flailed, and we felt the demon's prison wobble. The soul seemed confused. There was something else in its flesh. It knew.
The lion had spent its entire life training to fight against men, but it was not prepared for the fungi and parasite that attached itself to its flesh. But living beings had antibodies and defense mechanisms, and unlike them, the Leviathan’s body wobbled.
Holes emerged on the ground all over the place as smaller mini-demon kings appeared. Antibodies. They looked around and searched.
They saw, and we felt the leviathan staring at us. It pressed us with its presence.
[Domain blocked attempted mind control]
“Seems like we attracted some company.”
I heard a voice, distorted by the magic of the demon's prison. It came out like the sickly voice of a corrupted dwarf. "Find the piece that holds the prison."
Edna looked around as she fought, and her spear pierced through one of the defender demon kings. “Wait. Where?”
“I think it meant the soul.”
My roots spread out, and I tried to lock onto the soul, but each time, it moved again. Could I imprison the leviathan's soul within its own body, like how I did with the Crystal King?
The constant conversion of the leviathan's magical energies was also rewarded. [Mana Conversion upgraded.]
I wondered briefly why my clones could grow on such a thing. After all, was it alive? Wasn't it a creature? It made me wonder whether my trees could grow on stone or rock golems.
My roots infested more and more of the creature, and I began to sense the leviathan's soul pushing strongly against my own. But a battle of souls was a battle on my home ground. That wisp was right all along.
The power of the soul was the greatest power in the world. It twisted at one's very existence and broke the very thing that made people whatever they were.
This battle broke out outside of everyone's view as my roots stretched. In a way, I had to focus my soul and my spirit to be more 'here'. More of me was here in this battle with the leviathan as we fought in where our souls touched.
I felt more of its desire for constant consumption, and maybe it felt my desire for balance. For the order of nature and the cycle of growth and destruction.
In the battle of souls, I pushed. My roots took over parts of the creature's flesh, even as more demons spawned above us.
The creature screamed, and it felt stronger than Edna's soul. But it was also not complete. It didn't have lived experience. It stole its power, even if it had all the levels of power. Stolen power that felt brittle. Hollow.
It was something consistent throughout all of the demons.
Even as they reframed and remade themselves with flesh.
They were always not whole. My powers thus pushed and gained ground where it was not strong.
But doing so was a double edged move. The leviathan could not spread itself thin, and so its soul was denser. Thicker.
It was harder for me to push and gain ground. So, I forced it to the point where it was equilibrium. I had managed to only cut off slightly less than half of the leviathan's body from its soul, and that meant the creature's ability to spawn more demons were limited to a smaller area as half of the leviathan's body became sluggish.
"Its range of movement is increasingly restricted." The soul was restricted, and if it wanted to manipulate its body, it would have to move its soul and push against my soul.
This still meant its movement was slower. Much slower.
"I don't feel it!" Edna and Lumoof said as they both dodged attacks. The spawns were still numerous.
"I mean, the soul is staying mostly within that particular area." I felt and transmitted details about the soul's location to Stella.
Stella just cursed. "That doesn't pinpoint it, Aeon! It's still half of the entire damned body! It's like telling me I have half a planet to search!"
"Half is good enough. The Comet isn’t a precision weapon. It should crack up the creature’s crust and hide." Alka countered. "The Comet is ready, how quickly can you accelerate it?"
"Wait, really? Well. Really, really quickly." Stella said. "Are you sure you want to fire?"
The domainholders stuck on the gigantic creature asked. "Uh, get us out first? I do not want to be crushed by a gigantic comet."
"The comet is not large enough for that." Stella countered.
“The explosion might be.” Alka said.
“Confident! I like that.” Stella smiled as the voidlings began to somehow drag the Cometworld. She described it like fishes pulling on a sailboat or dogs pulling sleds, though it was hard for me to see it.
It was a fact that the leviathan was in fact, still larger than the comet by at least twenty times. I recalled both Lumoof and Edna, and now everyone was hiding in my clones. Only my three clones fought off the swarm of demonic monsters that came for us.
Stella vanished momentarily, as void magic flooded the Cometworld. She called and powered the voidlings that floated everywhere, and they gave the Cometworld a gigantic push. Some of them looked like they held part of Cometworld's reality barrier and tugged it along like a tugboat.
"Well? Are you not getting off?" Stella looked at Alka as he stood in a rather basic viewing platform on Cometworld. It was made as a tiny window on my clone tree.
"How about you?"
"I am, but only once I get this damn comet within seconds from impact."
"I'm not too different. Someone needs to be here to make sure the bomb all moves in time, and us domainholders that can't permanently die are the best choice."
The two laughed as Stella walked over to a small pantry. Cometworld was always used as a storage facility as well as a research center. I used to store an assortment of divine tools here, but since this was going to be a bomb, they all had to be relocated. "Well, a drink?"
"Nothing alcoholic. Can't mess up during this time, can we?" Alka said as he grabbed a cup of water.
From the edges of the demon's realm, the Cometworld gained speed and looked like a rocket approaching its peak velocity. It flew vast distances and past the intermediate demon realms.
"Alright." Alka said as he adjusted some magical panels. It was a functional control panel. "Bombs are armed, and good to go. Once we are past the Erasian worlds, we should get out."
"Yup. This is exciting." Stella said. They were riding in a bullet that was going to impact the gigantic worm. The void sea was not so thick, and their shared magical vision allowed them to look and notice an increasingly larger Leviathan in the distance.
"Really?" Alka said as we felt the magic within the Cometworld's many chambers fired up. Large arrays of magical crystals supplied power to the arrays and artifacts. The entire Cometworld was pretty much a large particle collider, so on one end was a chamber that held a magically amplified soul fragment, collected from Lausanne, and the other was a shard from Stella.
Based on some complex calculations, the mages had insisted that Lausanne's soul fragment was slightly larger, likely due to her lower level.
"Of course. This is a bomb made with a part of my soul. I can feel it." Stella laughed. "How often do you hear that a part of you is made into a bomb?"
"Not often." Alka squinted. "But this will be the biggest bomb I've ever made."
"Huh. Do you think it'll work with your ability?'
"I don't know. I hope it does. Then we have two shots." Alka said, and we felt the Comet zoom past the Erasian worlds. What was once a distant object in the stars, was now massive and right before our eyes. "Armed. Let's get out!"
Throughout the Cometworld, my clone felt magic swirl and gather.
Both Alka and Stella vanished at the very last moment as the entirety of Cometworld slammed into the reality bubble of the Leviathan, and then right into the leviathan. The gigantic cometworld tore apart.
The leviathan reshaped itself, the gigantic serpent curled into a ball like a snake. This reshaping dragged and moved my clones around, repositioning them. The leviathan’s move pressed against one of my clones.
I felt the crushing force of the creature like the constriction of a boa.
Then, the Cometworld’s bomb ignited.
The two soul fragments collided, and a massive explosion ripped through the outer parts of the coiled up the Leviathan.
It was eerily silent.
Then, turbulent magic shredded through my Cometworld clone, while my other three clones quickly burrowed itself deeper into the Leviathan. I used my roots to pull ourselves downward, one of the few movements I could do as a tree.
[Title : Astronomical Vengeance awarded]
I felt the soul of the Leviathan recoil as it gathered its magic to protect itself. I took the chance to force more but the explosion ripped through the surface of Leviathan and left a massive crater on the gigantic multi-headed worm. The heads were already cut off from the creature's soul thanks to my clones' earlier infiltration, and now, they all just crumbled and turned into dust.
The Cometworld was gone.
[Cometworld Clone destroyed. You regained one clone slot. Clone slot cooldown : 10 years ]
***
The walls were weakening-
***
The leviathan reshaped itself, as the worm was burnt with a massive crater on one side. It reorganized itself to restore the damage dealt, but the damage from a detonated cometworld was too large.
"It works!" Alka screamed. "But quickly, Lumoof! Go. go. Go, deploy the second bomb, and everything!"
The explosion however, created a massive shockwave that also messed with my three clone's ability to triangulate the creature's soul. I felt Patreeck and the artificial minds scrambling to decode the messed up magical energies and locate the soul once more.
“I can’t find it! We need more time to clear through the chaotic magical aftershock.”
Lumoof and Edna both vanished, and reappeared close to my other clone. The explosion caused by the massive Cometworld sent out a wave of magical energies, but it mostly burnt through the creature's flesh. The bomb was designed to radiate its explosive energies downwards toward the demon, so it didn't create a spherical shockwave.
"We have one bomb, a bunch of scales, Hawa's second bomb, and maybe a few more of Edna's most powerful spears." Lumoof said. "Quickly, tell us where to go!"
The leviathan shook, and we felt the ground beneath us move. The three clones were pulled along as a result, as if we were nailed to tectonic plates and dragged along by the movements of the creature's flesh.
"Trying!" I answered as I felt the confusing magical waves emitted by the leviathan. I felt it search, as if looking for their ancient enemies.
Lumoof and Edna ran across the still massive creature, in search of the demon's soul. "Are there clues?" Edna asked.
Lumoof tried to use his magical senses as the fourth detection array. "Hard to tell with all this noise! It isn’t giving up any major signs."
"The creature reacts to divine weapons." Edna said. "It reacts violently when it finds evidence of its old enemies."
"Ah." We still had Hawa's bomb, and so Lumoof took out the small spherical object. The presence of divine energies on the leviathan's surface was immediate, as two gigantic tentacles with claws emerged and tried to crush us, and the demons swarmed around us.
They began merging, and my clones felt as if they were empowered. A portion of the creature's soul entered these demons, and their power increased manifold.
"Oh." Edna said as she parried a strike by one such empowered demon. The demon struck with incredible force, a strike that she survived only because her [Duty] was still active. "That hurts. You should swing it around and make them chase you. We'll find the demons' soul."
It would be hilarious under other situations, because we ended up playing a game of catch with these Ravenous spawns.
Lumoof felt our shields bend even as monsters swarmed on our position. “I think we’ll need some help.”
We used Hawa's weapon as bait, to trigger a reaction from the Leviathan's soul. But each strike had a portion of the monster's soul, and the attacks somewhat cracked my shields that normally withstood the strikes of hundreds of demon kings.
"Well, how long are we letting them chase us?" Edna said as she parried multiple strikes from these empowered creatures. Their strikes broke through her shields, and even though they landed cleanly on the knight, she was protected by [Duty] and could still stand. "It's unnerving how easily they broke through my shield, and I don't like relying on [Duty] too much!!"
"I'm getting there!" I said as my network of clone trees locked onto the leviathan soul's new location. As it moved, the strength of its spiritual pushback against my own spiritual presence clued in on the soul's relative position.
The soul had a physical core.
Something we could target.
We found it. "There!"
Lumoof raised his hand, and a gigantic spear of wood emerged. Roots reshaped itself and pulled magic, an act that now felt annoyingly familiar. Tens of thousands of trees across the many worlds were sucked dry of their accumulated magic, and we threw it into the ground with all our might.
The soul-forge empowered root strike tore through the flesh of the leviathan and made a deep crevice. The powers of the soul temporarily messed with the leviathan's ability to regenerate the wounds created by the root strike.
"Get in!" Lumoof screamed and Edna followed. The two dived deeper into the creature's body, where we were closer to the demon's soul.
"Well, not the time to hold back!" The knight said as her weapons charged. She sliced, and she thrust her spear into the ground. "How far down?"
"Another one!" Lumoof had to keep the momentum up, as he rushed deeper into the creature's body. They were now located in a tunnel beneath the skin, and this time, we used Hawa's blast. Once more, we felt the presence of Hawa's knightly form, and this caused the leviathan to flail in anger.
"Maybe that's a bad idea?" Edna said.
"We have no choice!" Lumoof said as Hawa's image struck with a harpoon thrust through the small ball. At that depth, the power of the divine rippled through the leviathan's body. From above, it looked like the worm momentarily inflated like a balloon. "I don't have that many soul forge root strikes left!"
But it worked. We were getting closer to the soul.
The entire body of the leviathan continued to reshape itself and pulled the rest of the body closer. It also began to shed parts of itself, and one of the heads melted into nothingness. The once multi-headed leviathan now took the form of a blob with pins, my three clones now spread throughout its body like a persistent wart.
Yet, the strength of the soul was unchanged. The magical binds that held the demon's prison remained.
My domain holders were deep underground. At that depth, the tunnel would collapse once the leviathan's soul reasserted control over its flesh.
Lumoof charged up another root strike, we had probably five left. "Two more to get close, then three for the kill!"
My avatar fired, and the soul forge powered root strikes behaved like railgun projectiles along with a magnetic blast. The soul energies from my root strike paralyzed the flesh and made it possible for us to go deeper.
The creature sensed it, and quickly tried to reshape itself some more as parts of the leviathan regained control over the parts of the paralyzed flesh. The flesh then transformed into a swarm of demons and chased us through the artificial tunnels.
Edna stopped. "They can either cut through their own paralyzed flesh and try to attack us from behind. I'll hold them off?"
"No need. Save it. We get to the soul's core and just hit that."
Edna thought for a moment and realized that was probably the better idea. These things were just distractions.
***
The soul of the leviathan was in a massive liquid chamber that resembled an oversized blood slime, the flesh around us momentarily stunned and unable to regenerate.
"I thought I had a direct hit." Lumoof said, but the leviathan's soul core absorbed the hit with seemingly no damage. But outside, we noticed more of the leviathan's flesh flaking off.
Edna raised her blade and struck the massive jelly that protected the soul core.
Then, the flesh around the main soul melted. We felt the leviathan's soul release a part of itself and created four different creatures, each resembling some type of demon king. Two were humanoids, one had a giant axe made out of hardened flesh and another had two blades as hands.While the other two were monster types. One took the form of a smaller leviathan, while the other took the form of a hound.
"Well, smart to fight us at our scale." Edna said. There was still a small army of 'weaker' flesh demons coming down behind us. "Less for us to hurt."
"We're small but we pack a punch!" Lumoof smiled, but all of them were a distraction. The goal was unchanged.
The soul. We were on an offensive. They needed to stop us and prevent us from hurting the soul. We could hurt the soul, even if we didn't have our most powerful weapons.
Lumoof held up Hawa's weapon. "Let's see how well you absorb divine power."
The weapon ignited a ball of golden flames that rushed towards the leviathan's soul. One of them, the one that looked like a hound, gathered magical energy and fired a powerful demonic fire that met the golden flames. It ignited violently, and the divine flames continued onward.
But the hound king was not deterred. It fired a few more demonic flames, and each collision of the two powers weakened the divine flames.
The two humanoid champions charged and decided to engage Edna in close combat.
Edna said. "Allana's bomb. Use it!"
Lumoof blinked for a second. "Alright! But you gotta cover me. It takes time to set up!"
"Wait, what? Can't Alka just arm it and let it detonate?" Edna shouted as she fought off the two humanoid champions. "Alka!"
"Yes, yes. Setting it up!" Alka said as he already teleported himself right next to the workshop. An army of mages and artificers worked on the smaller bomb that was still quite big. It was still the size of the room. "Leave it to me. Just get in position."
Lumoof looked at the jelly-like fluid that protected the leviathan's soul. "Well, clearly the briefing could have been better!" He rushed ahead, and the wall of demons rushed in.
***
Most of the domain holders operated from the relative safety of the Crucible and Forge of Eras, where we watched the four remaining Erasian worlds drift ever closer to the demon.
They watched anxiously, but they all had a part to play. Both Lumoof and Edna were the strongest of them all, and someone needed to stay back to act as weapons of last resort. Stella was also the emergency extractor, just in case my abilities failed in some way or form.
"Will they be fine?" Lausanne asked as she looked absolutely nervous. There were many places she wanted to be. It was rhetorical. Like Hoyia, she too would only join in the final battle after the bombs were detonated.
There were peripheral worlds under attack by demons even now, especially with the leviathan's multiverse wide empowerment. But we'd left those parts of the battle to the other Valthorns.
If we won here, we could deal with the peripheral attacks later.
***
Lumoof fought off the demons, and felt the soul trying to move again. The flesh itself tried to get in our way, and so he gathered spiritual energies and fired one more Soul Forge powered attack.
We had two left, and the direct hit stopped the Soul from escaping. The monsters came.
Alka triple and quadruple checked the smaller bomb, and looked at Allana. In the workshop, everyone was nervous. "This is the best you got?'
"Yes. Yes. Activate." Both of them were a bundle of nerves as they triggered the mechanism within the bomb. "It's ready to blow in 10."
"I'm getting out, and I hope this bomb works!" Lumoof said as he entered the avatar state once more. "Bomb away!"
***
Lumoof teleported to the nearest clone tree not far away, and we could no longer see what happened within the leviathan's soul chamber. Alka, however, could feel it. The bomb had his mark all over it, and he could feel it first. The clones felt it moments later, as more of the leviathan's flesh melted away.
"It didn't kill it!" Alka cursed. "The damn soul was still surviving!"
***
The creature's hold on the prison weakens! More!
I heard the voice that came from the demon's prison. We all did. It felt clearer and less contaminated.
"Do you think that's Eras?" I asked.
"I think so. I hope so."
***
"Come back and help me!" Edna said, as she stood at the heart of the leviathan's soul, battered by a massive magical vortex. The bomb had created a massive swirl of chaotic magic. "It's not dead yet!"
She stood and survived thanks to the protections of the [Duty], but it seemed the Leviathan could take just as much damage and survive.
"Can you lock on to me and teleport to me?" Edna said, as she stabbed the jelly heart of the leviathan repeatedly. "The explosion destroyed the four flesh monsters and everything else, but the heart's still standing. I think it has a way of passing and sharing damage to its other parts, but for now we have a clear shot! Quickly!"
***
"Well, I suppose this means everyone, right?" Lausanne turned to Stella, and Stella activated her magical abilities. A portal opened, and we sent everyone back.
All my domain holders except Hoyia and Stella attacked a wall of jelly that made it feel like we were mining and attacking an ore vein. Out on the surface, I felt the demon's hold on its soul shrink. The leviathan was shrinking even more, and that meant my three clones attached to the surface were also pulled along.
The leviathan kept passing damage to the rest of its body parts, and now, four more of the same flesh fragments appeared, as if regenerated.
But the four had come back with a vengeance and attacked with more power. Edna blocked one of them, and Lumoof held off another, but the other two enraged creatures' claws cut through Roon's body as if he was made with thin paper.
"How? I thought I dodged that!" Roon cursed as he felt the monster's flesh burn through his body.
I recalled Roon, and quickly sent him into one of my healing biochambers. My magical healing abilities and Roon's domain clashed briefly, as I felt the leviathan's corruptive presence lingering.
Edna cursed. "All of you pull back! They are too powerful for everyone except myself and Lumoof!"
"Dammit."
Lumoof decided it was not the time to hold back, and this time, he took out both Neira's scales and Hawa's bomb and unleashed hell on the jellyfish wall that protected the demon leviathan's heart.
We drained both divine objects of their stored magical ability, and we felt more of the leviathan's flesh weaken.
But it did not die.
***
You're not far! I feel the demon's prison fraying!
We heard that voice again.
***
"Uh. Do you have any secret trump cards left?" Edna said as she felt the effects of her [martial paragon] and secret weapons fade.
Lumoof used his final [soul forge] powered root strike, and we still felt the demon's soul remain intact.
"Send me back there." Lausanne said.
"No." Edna said. "The creature is star-mana resistant. Your attacks will just bounce off."
“How do you know? Let me try!” Lausanne countered.
“I think we may just attract a swarm of demons to our location, even more than now. Right now, it looked as if the creature didn’t think of us as a threat, despite all our attacks.” Edna rebuked.
Through Lumoof, I studied the creature's magical energies, and noticed they had many, many layers. Our attacks worked and destroyed the outer physical layers, but there was a very powerful inner layer that prevented our attacks. This layer withstood all our attacks. Then, the four creatures emerged, even though we'd just defeated them moments ago.
***
"Stella, I have an idea."
The leviathan was a creature of combat. It fought wars. It fought battles. It designed itself to win all kinds of battles, and our attempt to be superior in the ways of battle were trying to fight in their home turf.
We'd pushed far, but now we were at the point where winning through combat was futile. I thought back to my earlier success as an infestation, and realized, I needed to be an infestation even more than the demons.
"Do you think it'll work?"
"It is our best shot."
She nodded, and I quickly adjusted the sizes of all my clones on the leviathan.
“Lumoof, are you able to carry my clone trees?!”
“Wait, what?”
“I’ll shrink my trees, just uproot me with my roots and move me over! I’ll resize myself. I think I can survive the move, now that I don’t need earth to live as a tree.”
“Ok.”
Lumoof warped over to the first clone, and my clone shrunk itself to a size as small as possible. As a tree, I could take the form of any plant, and there were small plants, just as there were big plants!
Lumoof pulled my clone out of the Leviathan’s flesh and lifted me over his shoulder. “Well, are you alright?”
“I think so! Go get my other two.”
“Got it!”
Just like that, Lumoof carried three of my clones like logs, and then stabbed me into the ground right next to the spiritual wall of the Leviathan.
Three of my clones popped up right at the wall, and now, it was my battle.
***
The arrival of the three clones sent the defenders scrambling. But I was quite similar to the leviathan in many ways.
I could take a lot of damage.
My roots spread through the jelly-like substances, and I used my roots and vines not to attack, but to turn. To corrupt.
To absorb. I drained magic.
The four powerful defenders attacked my three trees like they were enraged. Frantic. My roots flooded the surface of the jelly wall, and I felt it.
The gradual assimilation of magic.
More
Balance. We are the cycle.
More?
Balance. Cycle. More, and Less.
More???
My roots spread, and the seemingly impenetrable layer weakened. Not to magic, but to spiritual and soul absorption.
"Uh, should we attack?" Edna said, as they stood.
"Yes, hit it from the other side. The more you weaken it, the more I can force my way in." I said, as I used my roots. "Stella, I need more of my clones. Move the clones from the Library and the Crucible as well! Can you drag them to my place?"
“You mean?”
“Can you warp my clones into the void, and then ask the voidlings to pull them towards the heart of the leviathan?”
“I’m not so sure!" Stella vanished and encased my massive clones in a cocoon of void magic. “I have never tried this before, but I suppose there’s always a first time.”
The trees that hid in the Library and the Crucible vanished, but even as a void portal emerged right next to the leviathan’s heart, a powerful force began to push back. The turbulent void currents rippled through one of the void portals.
One of my clones got stuck within the boundaries of reality and the void.
[One clone is caught between the void - reality wall. Clone destroyed. This clone slot will be available in 10 years.]
“Shit.”
But the other one got through.
The demons' defenders still tried to attack me. But my powers pushed through.
My roots now flooded half of the leviathan's soul, and on the surface, it seemed as if the leviathan no longer moved.
It was violent. Powerful. In a straight fight I could not win, I could only absorb the blows it dealt. In a battle of strength, it would be a stalemate or my eventual loss as it wore me out on endurance.
But I was a tree.
A spirit tree, and I did not fight wars like everyone else.
Like nature, I spread.
My roots got into everything, everywhere.
My roots pressed and pushed against the soul, and here, though we could not get through the demon's defenses via magic or physical attacks, on a spiritual level, I could sense damage.
Its soul did not push back as strongly as it did before.
I spread.
My roots got deeper into the creature's soul.
I felt something try to block me. A wall. A domain. But just like the Crystal King, I could crack it. My roots crawled onto the walls, seemingly impervious walls, and they pushed.
Tiny cracks emerged.
Then deeper.
And then the cracks shattered the defenses.
[ Your soul energies has successfully penetrated the Leviathan's domain defenses ]
It was then, I saw. The leviathan's soul was massive. It was only at this point that I realized I was staring at an entire metropolis of dark springs, a creature clearly amalgamated from many other and lesser beings.
Floating at the heart of it all, was an old familiar sight.
A blob.
The black blob that powered all the demon kings. It was a presence within the leviathan's soul all this while!
The leviathan was a stitched creature, its soul fused from many others, all dark. Spiritual lines crisscrossed the leviathan's soul, and I looked. I saw blackened stone all over the place, placed irregularly. They were of many different colors and shapes as if they were foreign. Stolen in some way.
The beast consumed.
My roots spread, and I felt the creature's voice.
MORE
"Enough." I said.
The word rippled through the creature's soul. But this massive soul was still too powerful for me to kill. As my roots moved through the metropolis of the leviathan's soul, I sensed its intense desire to live. It manifested itself in a single black geyser at the heart of the leviathan's soul city.
That geyser shot up, and fueled the blob within the leviathan's soul. The massive black blob. To kill someone through the soul is to destroy their soul spring. But here, I knew this geyser was beyond me.
Still, I tried. I pushed my roots towards the geyser, and felt the fires burn through my spiritual roots and vines.
LIVE
Live. I couldn’t crush another domain holder’s soul. Not this way. Even as my roots tried, the geyser that fueled the black blob was too much for me to destroy.
But I could change things here. My roots spread deeper, and for a moment, the world around us froze. A domain holder with weakened skills could be less of a threat to everyone.
That was a net benefit.
Even if I could weaken a few key skills, that would do.
[Your spiritual roots have been petrified.] I knew then that the spiritual presence of the Leviathan was still too damned strong. I felt so close, and yet, the creature’s presence overwhelmed me.
It resisted.
“It is still too strong! We need to weaken it somehow!”
Even with my clones and all my spiritual might, the creature’s soul had to be weakened!
“Throw everything we have at it!”
“Everything?” Edna stood at the edge of the demon’s massive soul. Its heart was the size of mountains, and even my few clones were only a fraction of its size. I felt myself like a gnawing worm, nibbling away at a gigantic log. “What else didn’t we use?”
Lausanne screamed. “ME!”
The heroes joined in. “Us, too!”
“I suppose we have no choice. We cannot avoid using star mana forever.”
Lumoof stood and called on all of our domain holders. All of us came together, and this time, even those from far away and not really part of our Order. The White Statue, Zhaanpu came too as we all threw our fists at the creature.
Lausanne’s star mana charged up and slammed into the creature’s powerful soul. Roon’s projectiles and Johann’s dragon attacked the soul, while armies of demons swarmed. Stella and Hoyia appeared too, and they attacked with their powers. As we predicted, star mana did not work that well, the flesh was resistant.
“I’m not exactly sure this is working!”
Our attacks, combined, should have leveled multiple demon kings.
Yet the leviathan’s soul only wobbled. We felt a ripple.
My roots that penetrated into the creature’s soul shook momentarily as if the petrification was suspended for a split second.
“We need more!” The domain holders cursed.
Back on one of my clones, the heroes gathered and raised their point. Colette led the argument. “You need us there. You cannot keep us away from this fight forever. We were brought to this world against our will, and now we are at the moment we can finally bring this whole scheme to its end. Let us play a part.”
I felt their desire.
“Very well.” I answered, and Lumoof understood what to do. “Get all the heroes here!”
Colette, Prabu, Khefri, and all the rest appeared as Lumoof functioned as a conduit for their movement to the leviathan’s presence. The heroes appeared, and their powers charged up. Star mana, however, was like the fire in the darkness. It attracted their ancient enemies, and the heroes glowed.
Demons came.
“Oh dear.” Khefri cursed, and yet, a moment later, she steeled herself.
“Tens of thousands of my fellow teenagers were brought to this world because of this damned creature!” Colette declared, and a part of me twisted. But I felt she said it mainly to hype up the rest of the heroes. “All of us here came, one way or another, because we were brought to rescue this world from the demon kings brought forth by this foul pretentious god!”
Her magic gathered.
“But not more! I am willing to die today, so that thousands more may never suffer our fate. So that thousands more will never miss their old families and old homes, and be separated from those who loved us! Let us end it all!”
And somehow, the rest of the heroes cheered. I felt their passion, even if I feared that bringing them right to the demon’s doorstep was a mistake.
My spiritual roots and vines heard voices, and the presence of the leviathan. My spiritual roots tried my best to understand what was happening within the monster, even if they were petrified and locked in place.
I heard the Leviathan’s voice echo.
SUMMONED PUPPETS! DIE!
Demons everywhere came, as the entirety of the leviathan reshaped itself to fight the heroes. The flesh of the leviathan melted away as they transformed into hundreds and thousands of mini-demon king like creatures, and they charged. Every single variation of some past demon king could be recreated from the leviathan’s flesh, and somehow, they knew the exact archetype to counter the heroes.
“Shit.” Edna cursed. “The creature has been learning how to better fight the heroes after all!”
“They want us?” Colette raised her magical staff. “Come! I am not the hero that the gods summoned any more! No matter what, let us lead these creatures away from the rest of you. Do not help us!”
I felt a few of the domain holders curse, but they knew in their hearts they would not disrespect their devotion to the cause. To say they shouldn’t sacrifice themselves at this time was to insult what they’d worked for.
In a way, the heroes were massive like bright lights, and all the lesser demons were drawn to them like moths. So much so that they ignored even Edna’s powerful stabs. A fact that the heroes themselves did not miss.
“Come! Today is a fine day to die!” Khefri said with a rare burst of bravado. She was usually never like this, but perhaps, she too had grown tired of life as a hero.
Thousands of demons charged at the heroes, and what occurred next was a flash. Magic and power exchanged, and the demons died by the hundreds. I felt the heroes died too as they traded blows with the demons. In minutes, the heroes slaughtered many, but ten demon kings were still too many for a single hero.
In the end, the last two standing were the most high leveled of them.
Both Prabu and Colette joined their staff together, and then, I felt their souls sacrificed for the cause.
“[Heroic Nova].” Their souls, their bodies, and their mana all melted away.
A powerful vortex of star mana and divine energies, somehow charged with the powers of the soul, ripped through the flesh that was supposedly resistant to star mana. Even with the leviathan’s incredibly powerful presence, it still ripped through enough of the leviathan’s flesh and annihilated the swarm of demon king replicas that attacked them.
An area that could have been a metropolis and its surrounding economic region was turned into dust, and not a single bit of the hero's flesh remained.
“Shit.” Edna cursed.
“They died a good death.” Lumoof said as Lumoof too, felt the change in our souls. “I have their souls in Aeon’s [Soul Realm], but the battle exhausted them and they are now asleep.”
“Let them rest.” Edna said, as she battered away at the leviathan.
[You’ve received 9 heroic fragments. You now have more than 100 heroic fragments.]
[100 Heroic Fragments have merged and transformed into the Heroic Light Obelisk ]
[From now on, all heroic summons in any world close to your clones and nodes will be redirected to your clones, instead of being dropped randomly into their targeted worlds. All heroic summons will also be blessed with [Hero Starting Town], which allows you to grant protective blessings that overwrite heroic restrictions, teleport them, and also respawn any heroes who are below Level 100. You also gain the skill [Hero Restriction Management], the ability to lift and remove certain heroic restrictions placed on higher level heroes ]
[The Heroic Light Obelisk also grants a burst in all basic stats and the ability to freely convert all regular mana to star mana and vice versa at an advantageous exchange rate ]
It was a good skill, and one that would be useful in a world that needed heroes. But my battle was not yet over.
***
I felt my spiritual roots within the leviathan’s soul strengthen as the demon’s hold on them weakened. It was twofold. The explosion from the heroes did weaken the creature somewhat.
“Do we have anything more?” Edna asked, as we attacked the massive metaphorical mountain that represented the soul of the leviathan. The heroes’ bomb was like a dynamite that blew up a small section of a mountain.
I felt my own power replenish as the [Heroic Light Obelisk] gave me entire body strength. I felt like I could wield both star mana and my massive natural mana easily, and I forced myself to move.
I felt the leviathan’s soul resist, but now, it felt more balanced.
“More!”
MORE! The leviathan’s soul screamed back at me. WE WILL LIVE. WE WILL BECOME ALL.
Insanity.
The reality bubble around us began to crumble and shrink as I felt the leviathan gather its energies. The physical form of the soul began to warp, even as those parts with my physical roots and tendrils were unable to.
From a gigantic part of the leviathan’s soul, a creature reshaped itself and stood before us.
[The Ravenous Avatar]
It took the form of one of the most basic forms of the demons. A simple horned demon with claws, but every bit of the creature rippled with the energies of a creature that was many steps into their domain.
It came for us, and the creature’s claw met with Lumoof’s shield.
Five more of these horned demons appeared, and instead of fighting us, they charged towards my four clone trees embedded on the leviathan’s soul surface.
They grabbed hold of the trunk of my clones and tried to pull me out.
“Oh no.” They wanted to cut off my spiritual roots that penetrated the leviathan’s soul.
“We need to get through and weaken the soul, quickly!”
Edna’s breathing was ragged. She used all her strength. Even with the passive blessings of the [Pantheon], all of our attacks barely made a dent. The soul of the leviathan remained too powerful. Too tough. If I couldn’t move the stones within the leviathan’s soul, I couldn’t mess with the skills and abilities that gave this creature power.
“There is something.” Alka said, as he looked at Stella and Lausanne. The two of them looked at Alka.
They looked at each other, and then at Alka. “How?”
“I’ll be the conduit. I can replicate any bomb, remember? I can blend it using your souls as fuel.”
Three domain holders walked towards the wall of the leviathan’s soul, holding hands. Alka stood in the middle.
“[Like a bomb].”
I felt Stella and Lausanne’s form melt, and they both gave their entire lives to Alka. Alka too, gave himself to the bomb.
[Alka has died. His soul has returned to your main body and will now begin resurrection. Resurrection will take 22 years]
[Stella has died. Her soul has returned to your main body and will now begin resurrection. Resurrection will take 28years]
[Lausanne has died. Her soul has returned to your main body and will now begin resurrection. Resurrection will take 20 years]
The world turned white.
The shattered reality bubble burst.
Three domain holders created a massive explosion that rippled and destroyed most of the leviathan’s outer flesh, and the soul of the leviathan drained.
Even then, the explosion did not kill it, merely severely weakened it. The effects were immediate, as I felt the restraints on my spiritual roots within the Leviathan’s soul vanish entirely.
I began to pick up the various scattered corrupted stones of the leviathan's soul. The entire world shook. The leviathan began to shrink massively.
[Effects of the Ravenous Reborn's curse has been cancelled]
I hacked away at the Leviathan’s various skills, the corrupt stones of the creature. All the power, everything. I felt a powerful magical link in one of the leviathan’s spiritual stones, connected to the demon’s prison.
I gathered all my strength, and attacked that stone.
[Skill acquired : Root Access Strike ]
The stone shattered.
[ You’ve destroyed the Ravenous Reborn’s domain tier skill : Prison Control]
The demon's prison suddenly changed color. It was no longer black, but instead, transformed into a golden spherical machine.
[The Demon's Prison has been restored. It has transformed back to an Erasian Divine Chamber]
The black sun shrunk and vanished just that instant as a golden creature emerged. A golden man with a golden toolbox loomed over the entire Erasian worlds as the golems knelt to their god.
"Old beast, you are too dangerous for the world. The prison that you've made for me, shall now be for you."
A whirlpool of magic pulled the leviathan into the prison.
“He must die.”
“Yes. In time. But both you and I are not strong enough to kill him. For now, he shall live his days within this prison, and trouble the world no more."
"Really?" I said, but as I looked at the exhaustion in all my warriors and how little energy I had left, I realized that perhaps, this was the only option.
I recalled my clones and my warriors. The golden prison shut as hammers emerged to seal it.
But the Ravenous struggled violently. The creature flailed and resisted the Forge god’s weakened powers. Its faith powers were frail, and could not fully contain the creature.
Eras then spoke. “Help me, the one of the trees. Be the warden and the jailor. Be the vines that bind the prison in ways I cannot.”
I felt a strange irony, just like the Crystal King, that I now would jail another domain holder.
“Very well.” My four clone trees swirled, and somehow, I felt a connection form between my clones and the Erasian Cell.
[Erasian Cell transformed into the Aeonic-Erasian Chamber]
[Ravenous Reborn has been sealed within the Aeonic-Erasian Chamber]
[You’ve gained 28 levels. You are now Level 327]
[Divine Title Granted : Aeon, The Demonic Binding Tree]
[Divine Title Granted : Aeon, The Starspanning Tree]
"It is better to seal it, than to kill it. The Ravenous can never truly die. It will always find itself resurrected elsewhere. Better here, where we can watch over it." The golden man said. “And when the time comes, it will be for all of us to sentence it to death.”
All over the multiverse and the peripheral worlds, the rifts that connected them collapsed. Without the black sun, there was no magic to power the rift gates. With the Ravenous cut off, the mind that held it all together crumbled.
The long age of demonic invasions finally came to an end.
This war was finally over.