Roots of Life, Ashes of Destruction
Silvia kept placing a large number of beast cores around the divine fragment of space. Each time the barrier broke, one of the cores was destroyed. However, as time passed, the process became slower, as if the ten cores spinning at full speed around the fragment could resist indefinitely.
The woman let out a relieved sigh. The players had proven to be far more reliable than she had imagined. Their progress was even faster than that of the first spirits that had once set foot in this world.
For precaution, she placed another dozen additional cores, reinforcing the defense, though her mind was elsewhere. She needed to know how Lua was doing.
With that thought she stepped out of the warehouse and headed for the door, when a metallic sound stopped her.
Ting…
[The Race Summoning System – RSS requests connection.]
Ting…
[The Race Summoning System – RSS requests connection.]
Ting…
[The Race Summoning System – RSS requests connection.]
Silvia froze, confused for an instant, though she didn't hesitate to accept. She knew that name. After all, she possessed the medallion that occasionally allowed her to communicate with SIA.
[Welcome, new host. Activating the Race Summoning System: Code C-Regs-550.]
[My name is SIA, and I will be your guide.]
"SIA… is that you? What happened to Lua?" Silvia asked urgently.
"Hello, Silvia. It's good to finally speak freely with you, without the medallion's limitations. Lua just used a divine fragment of light to release me. Although it may cause her some harm, I prefer to return to her soon," replied the voice with a serious tone. A brief silence followed before SIA added: "I'll leave you a gift. Sorry, but this will hurt a little."
At once, a new message appeared before Silvia:
[The Race Summoning System requests permission to use a fragment of the world to be uninstalled. Do you accept? Caution: your body may be slightly damaged during extraction.]
Everything happened so quickly Silvia barely had time to react. Even so, she pressed "yes."
A searing pain tore through her body. She collapsed to her knees, spitting a thread of blood as she felt something being ripped out of her. Yet the agony gave way to a long-forgotten sensation: magical energy rushing through her veins once more, like a river overflowing after centuries of drought.
When Lua was born, Silvia had given her the divine fragment of destruction, keeping only the fragment of life inherited from her wife. But from the very beginning, she had been a demigoddess of destruction. The contradiction between both fragments had sealed her power. Now, freed from that burden, everything returned.
Even the dark horns on her head, once broken, began to regenerate. Their tips gleamed with a bluish hue as the magic restored them.
Silvia stared at her own hands, eyes wide open. Her daughter had risked herself for her. Slowly, she stood and opened the door.
The moment she did, an explosion shook the ground before her. The earth rose, and a human body rolled across it, bleeding and exhausted.
"Draven…" Silvia murmured as she recognized him.
He was one of the three demigods who had massacred the spirits, exterminating the last of them.
"Mm…" Draven raised his head, forcing his wounded body to remain standing. His gaze met Silvia's and, with a twisted smile, he said:
"So, you're still alive. Now I understand why these fools keep showing up… Well, if I'm going to die, at least I'll take one of you with me."
A sword of light appeared in his hand.
Silvia looked at him with absolute coldness, a frost that seemed to freeze the air itself. She remembered him. The grudge burned deep inside her.
Without moving more than one hand, she let her magic flow. Runes emerged from her body, hundreds of magic circles that surrounded Draven in an instant. Not even his speed allowed him to react.
"You…?" he muttered in surprise.
Chains of every color and element burst from the circles, binding him completely.
"I never understood why, the moment we arrived, you attacked us without even letting us breathe. You allied with your own enemies just to destroy us," Silvia said in a grave tone. Her face resembled Lua's, and even though she no longer held a divine fragment, the aura she radiated was not inferior. The surrounding magic bent to her will as if it had always belonged to her.
"And why did my student Vin have to die in front of her beloved because of you? …Now I finally know."
Her gaze darkened with fury.
Draven let out a bitter laugh, as if resigned to his fate. Several players were already approaching, ready to join the fight.
"I'm surprised you're still breathing. My emperor stole your divine fragment; you should have died. And now, recovered—what of it? He will become a god and destroy everything. Not even your pathetic goddess could face him. She just fled with her tail between her legs."
Silvia looked at him like he was a fool.
"Do you truly believe that? Then tell me, why didn't your emperor and the demon pursue her? They never told you, did they? Even if they ascend to godhood with foreign fragments, they can never defeat a goddess in her own world, with her own fragments. You wander from planet to planet stealing power, but our world is different. Here there are enough divine fragments to give birth to ten gods at once. How many does your galactic empire have? Five? Six?"
Draven's eyes widened in shock.
"How do you know that?" he muttered.
"Because our world is unique. Its mana, its very consciousness, produces fragments like no other planet. You're nothing but thieves hiding in some corner of the galaxy, scavenging scraps."
At that moment, a mission appeared before the players.
"Even if you ally with the demons again, it's already too late. My daughter is about to become a true goddess… and my wife has returned."
A green light spread across the battlefield. Plants sprouted from the earth, fresh and vibrant, responding to Silvia's presence. She allowed herself a faint smile.
"Two foreign gods will never defeat two goddesses in their own world."
More runes erupted from her hand, circles encircling Draven once more.
"Fire at the circles. They will amplify your damage," she ordered the players, before walking calmly toward the entrance of the village.
Draven stared after her with madness in his eyes.
"So what? We have more demigods, more warriors. Your spirits will be destroyed again."
The players unleashed their fury upon the magic circles, and as the attacks were amplified, they fell on Draven like an endless storm. His life bar decreased slowly; even wounded, he remained formidable. Some others struck him with weapons while he couldn't move. Though they didn't deal much damage, his HP bar kept falling bit by bit, especially since he was already severely injured from the earlier battles with the demigods.
"Aaah!" he roared, furious at being harassed like an insect.
But soon he noticed something.
In the distance, explosions erupted and bodies fell, yet the number of spirits did not decrease. On the contrary, new ones appeared and ran joyfully back into the fight. People who had died rose again, over and over, without ever losing their smiles.
"Immortals…" Draven muttered, a gleam of disbelief in his eyes. His life bar was barely at 10% after nearly an hour of siege.
Then he began to laugh hysterically.
"Hahahaha… magnificent. Hey, you." He looked at a nearby player—Peter, Sally's father. "If my emperor ends up like me, tell him this: humans are screwed, idiot."
That was his final taunt.
The players launched a combined attack that merged into a single magic circle. A colossal beam descended, striking Draven directly.
The chains released him. His body collapsed onto the ground, dead.
...
On the main battlefield, the players continued fighting against endless waves of corpses. Although there were only a thousand of them in total, their numbers never diminished: each time they fell, they reappeared with the same determination, charging into battle again as if death did not exist for them.
At a distance, on a much higher level, Lua fought against a demonic demigod. The ground around her was completely shattered, and even the far-off forest burned under the impact of their clashes.
In theory, Lua should have the advantage. She was a level 9 demigoddess, superior to her level 8 opponent. However, her separation from the system and the forced use of the divine fragment had left her with internal injuries that weakened her.
She raised a hand, and a massive shadow emerged before her: a colossal specter wielding a black scythe, the embodiment of death itself, come to claim her soul.
But Lua let her swords fall and spread her arms wide. The ring of destruction upon her sword glowed with a blazing red light, and everything around her began to disintegrate into ashes on the wind. Even space itself seemed to tremble under the pressure.
The specter's scythe descended, but the moment it brushed her, it disintegrated into red dust, and the specter itself vanished.
"Hmph. The divinity of destruction truly is bothersome," the demon muttered with an arrogant smile.
By absorbing the divine fragment of death, he had healed much of the damage Lua had inflicted on him. And now he sensed her weakness. He wanted to finish her before she could recover, for he knew that if she healed, she would become a threat even to his emperor.
Demons were vengeful by nature. If one of them was harmed, they would send entire armies to sate their rancor, no matter the cost.
"You know," the demon said mockingly, "the last time a beast injured one of our demigods, we declared war at the forest's edge. Every damned creature had to gather to stop us. And the same will happen when I return home. This filthy base will be annihilated."
Lua's cold eyes widened slightly. At last, she understood why the beasts had abandoned the entrance and allowed the humans through: it was the demons' vengeance that had driven them to act.
"And the funniest part," the demon continued, "is that back then they didn't even attack us on purpose. It was nothing more than collateral damage from two beasts fighting each other. Imagine what will happen when I tell them about you. I warned you—you should have let me leave."
The young woman did not respond. Her gaze remained as icy as ever.
"Boss, if you keep this up you could get badly hurt," SIA warned in her mind, having returned to her side some time ago.
"I know," Lua answered calmly. "Just a little longer."
The demon scowled at being ignored and raised both hands. The sky darkened under a sinister aura that strengthened the surrounding corpses.
The undead dragon, regenerated, hurled itself against the protective barrier. With a single blow it shattered it, and before it could reform it exhaled a black flame that incinerated dozens of players. A moment later, the barrier reformed again.
"Hahahaha! Each level is a whole new world! This is how power should feel!" shouted the demon, ecstatic as his skeletons surged with renewed strength. Many had risen by ten, even twenty levels, now striking with the same force they had at the beginning of the battle.
The players began dying rapidly once more. Yet instead of being frightened, they were even more thrilled: more deaths meant more experience.
The demon blinked, confused to see them celebrating even amid the slaughter. His brow furrowed when he noticed that, despite the many deaths, their numbers never decreased. They reappeared again and again.
"Mm." He turned his head toward Lua, who stood firm. Yet she was not looking at him, but at his back.
The demon turned calmly, and his eyes flew wide with genuine fear.
From the earth, a gigantic hand made of roots and wood rose up, so silent he had never sensed it. It struck him squarely, smashing him into the ground and carving a crater along its path.
From that hand pulsed a wave of green light, spreading across the battlefield, reaching every player, enveloping the entire village.
[You have received a buff from the Goddess of Life]
The players read the notification with disbelief and joy as new strength surged through their bodies.
Buff of the Goddess of LifeBreath of Life
HP +35% | Regeneration +200 HP/sec Eternal Root
Defense +25% | Resistance to physical and magical damage +20% River of Mana
MP +40% | Regeneration +150 MP/sec Flower of Rebirth
When you die, you revive without losing any EXP for as long as the buff lasts. (Duration: 5 hours)