Long Chapter
—-
After Uncle Jed shared his theory, a heavy realization settled over the group. The Divine Sea Temple was not simply chasing power or territory. Their ambitions reached far beyond domination.
They were aiming for annihilation.
Not exactly the extinction of all living things, but sothing disturbingly close to it. What they seed to want was the destruction of Earth itself.
The thought alone weighed down on everyone present, pressing against their chests like an invisible burden.
Leo finally broke the silence. "Boss... what do we do?"
Leo, Victor, Williams and the others had once been nothing more than ordinary n. Soldiers. Enlisted personnel who had lived simple lives before everything changed.
And that ant sothing else too. Sowhere deep inside them still lingered that familiar impulse, the quiet but stubborn urge to be heroes.
Ethan glanced at them before answering in a calm, steady tone. "What do we do? We take it one step at a ti. We haven’t actually fought Temple forces yet."
Which, translated honestly, ant Ethan did not have a clear plan either.
Even Regis, who had reached the Apex State, had been forced to flee before. Without the forr City Lord buying ti for them back then, none of them would even be alive right now.
Sure, Regis had not been able to defeat that purple-robed monster. But the man had not been able to kill him either. The real issue had been numbers. Regis had needed to cover everyone’s retreat, and there had been no way of knowing how many more high-tier fighters the enemy possessed.
If that purple-robed freak had truly locked onto them, if reinforcents had arrived at the wrong mont, then none of them would have escaped.
In the end Regis had simply grabbed everyone he could, followed Xenon’s lead, and fled all the way to the Extre South. They had walked straight into the sealed barrier there, fully aware they would not be able to return.
But what other choice had they had?
At the very least, they had survived.
And through all of it, they had believed one thing with complete certainty. Ethan would eventually co for them.
When that day arrived, they would walk out together.
Hope had never really disappeared.
Ethan looked around at the group and made his decision. "Stick to the plan. We hit the closest point first."
This ti they would not use Shatterstar for transport. Anyone with a ch imdiately suited up, while those without simply prepared to fly on their own.
There was no point hiding their abilities anymore. By now the supernatural world was probably no longer a secret to ordinary humans anyway, and their destination lay deep within uninhabited forest. There were no towns anywhere along the route.
Before leaving, Ethan guided Shatterstar to hover high above the Silverwood territory and activated its automated defense systems.
Earlier he had spoken about abandoning the territory entirely, but that had mostly been an act ant to scare the older council mbers into action. Ethan had never planned to run a charity for cowards.
Dead weight was dead weight.
Fortunately, everyone had stepped up when it mattered. If they had not, Ethan would have personally thrown them out regardless of what he had said before.
Soon the group shot through the sky in streaks of motion.
Half an hour later Ethan was the first to notice sothing unusual. The density of surrounding energy had increased sharply, and when he expanded his senses he imdiately detected human activity hidden deep within the forest ahead.
They accelerated.
Before long a large compound appeared through the trees, followed imdiately by sothing far more striking.
An enormous Energy Sphere floated in the center of the compound.
It stood at least eighty feet tall, suspended in the air without any visible support or structure holding it in place.
Inside the facility Ethan could clearly see personnel wearing the insignia of the Divine Sea Temple.
Then suddenly everything changed.
Chaos erupted within the compound as Temple operatives rushed out from their shelters, their attention instantly locking onto Ethan’s group. A mont later dozens of them launched into the sky.
Ethan blinked in surprise.
"Battle ready," he said, coming to an abrupt halt mid-air. "They detected ."
Which ant they must have possessed so sort of equipnt capable of blocking or identifying psychic scans. Perhaps an alarm system of so kind.
It was the first ti Ethan’s probes had ever been discovered.
"First contact," he continued quickly. "Let’s test their strength. Blackie, City Lord, Uncle Jed, Dragon Child, Hank, and I will hold the line."
Assignnts were made in seconds.
Leo cracked his knuckles. "Got it. Brothers, let’s remind these bastards whose territory this is."
He had not brought a ch with him, sothing Ethan had not even had ti to ask about.
Markham laughed and stepped forward as well. "These punks aren’t anything special. I’ve killed a few already."
The formation shifted imdiately as the rear ranks moved ahead to form the vanguard. Ethan and several of the strongest fighters remained slightly behind.
He understood that constantly shielding the others would only hold them back. If they wanted to grow stronger, they needed to face real danger themselves.
The distance between the two sides shrank rapidly as the enemy figures beca clearer.
Then Ethan’s senses suddenly flickered.
His eyes narrowed. Without warning he veered away from the formation and shot off in another direction.
"City Lord, they’re yours."
Before anyone could respond he had already accelerated, covering nearly a mile in seconds.
Uncle Jed clicked his tongue. "Now where’s he running off to? Ditching us again?"
Regis remained calm as he watched Ethan disappear into the distance. "He must have found sothing. Let him go. This fight isn’t even worth his attention anyway."
Dragon Child’s body began to glow faintly green as she focused on the approaching enemies. "Stay alert. They have high-tier fighters among them too. Be ready to move."
---
What Ethan had sensed was a familiar presence.
The white robed woman he had encountered half a year ago in Harmony City, back when he had gone there to pick up Sandra.
He had only caught the faintest glimpse of her at the edge of his perception, but it had been enough.
The sight imdiately stirred mories of Sandra.
That day she had not left with him. She had never made it to the villa at all. Surveillance footage later showed that she had been inside the building with that sa woman.
Afterward Sandra had sohow escaped alongside Victor’s group and fled to the Extre South.
But when Ethan finally arrived there himself, the woman was nowhere to be found.
There had been no way for him to review a full year and a half of security recordings, so he had no idea when she had disappeared. He had not bothered asking further questions either.
There was also the matter of Sandra’s paralyzed father, who had likewise vanished without a trace.
And now, suddenly, the woman had appeared here.
Ethan’s curiosity sharpened.
He rembered their first eting clearly. At that ti the woman had radiated an unmistakable aura of pure, righteous energy, the sort of presence that simply could not be faked.
Now, however, the energy surrounding her felt different.
Polluted and chaotic. The exact opposite of righteous.
Ethan pushed forward at greater speed, finally slowing only when he ca within half a mile of her position. Matching her pace carefully, he began trailing her from behind.
The woman moved through the forest in a strange pattern. She wove between the trees, circling and zigzagging as if deliberately avoiding sothing.
’What is she doing?’ Ethan wondered as he continued observing. ’That’s the fifteenth loop already.’
His senses followed her clearly, revealing that every turn she made was intentional. Each circular route was slightly different from the last.
Nearly an hour passed like this before she finally chose a direction and moved decisively.
Her speed exploded.
"Holy hell..."
Her energy signature surged at the sa ti.
’So she had been holding back all along.’
Ethan accelerated as well, though that sudden burst had already placed several miles between them. Fortunately she was still running along the ground while he traveled through the air, which allowed him to gradually close the distance.
Half an hour later the woman finally slowed.
She arrived at the bank of a massive river, paused briefly, and glanced behind her as if checking for pursuers.
Then she dove straight into the water.
Ethan imdiately understood the purpose of her earlier movents. Those repeated loops through the forest had been designed to flush out anyone tracking her. If soone had followed carelessly, they would almost certainly have exposed themselves during those maneuvers.
’Where is she going?’
His senses followed her downward through the water. She was not teleporting, simply diving deeper and deeper.
The river itself turned out to be far deeper than its surface suggested.
Stranger still, once she descended past roughly a hundred feet, Ethan’s scan abruptly stopped.
It could not penetrate any further.
All that remained were vague, indistinct impressions.
He did not dare force his way through the barrier, since doing so might imdiately reveal his presence. Even while tracking the woman he had kept his senses as light and subtle as possible.
After the incident at the Temple compound, Ethan now understood that soone out there possessed the ability to detect soul energy and perhaps even counter it.
Otherwise Soul-Wielders would practically be gods.
The woman continued descending until she crossed the hundred-foot mark and disappeared entirely within the scan-proof zone.
Ethan hesitated only briefly before diving in after her.
"Travel Form... Seal."
With a sharp rush of motion he entered the water.
The transformation occurred instantly. His body streamlined as he cut through the river like a torpedo, moving far faster than the woman.
The depths were pitch black, making it impossible for ordinary eyes to see anything at all, but Ethan was far from ordinary.
In Seal Form he could breathe underwater without difficulty, and his vision functioned perfectly even in complete darkness. A thin translucent film covered his pupils, giving them a faint blue shimr.
Within monts he reached the depth where his senses had previously been blocked.
Stretching out a hand, he touched the barrier gently. His finger passed straight through.
’Huh. Just a water barrier?’
He pushed forward. The next instant he erged into completely dry space.
It reminded him of Whale Fall City, where the surrounding water had been sealed away entirely.
Ethan slowly surveyed the area.
Bones were scattered across the ground in every direction. Most belonged to fish, but there were plenty of human remains as well.
’What the hell is this place?’
The dry zone stretched roughly a mile across, flat and open with almost nowhere to hide. Unfortunately his senses still refused to function here.
That ability was beginning to frustrate him more and more. So many locations seed capable of blocking it entirely.
People constantly praised Soul-Wielders as if they were unstoppable, but right now it felt useless.
Relying only on his eyes, Ethan carefully searched the surroundings.
Nothing.
Yet the woman could not have simply vanished. He moved forward cautiously before suddenly stopping.
’There.’
The ground was coated in black mud, and at first he had nearly overlooked the dark opening ahead. From a distance it blended perfectly with the surrounding terrain.
Approaching the edge, Ethan looked down into the pit, his expression tightened.
Another hole.
mories of the bottomless pit in the Extre South imdiately surfaced. He had fallen for three straight days back then, convinced he might eventually erge on the other side of the planet.
Before they had left that place, the old Qilin had offered a cryptic explanation. According to the creature, that cavern was humanity’s true ancestral land, the very place where the first human had been born.
Then everything had changed in an instant. One mont they had been deep underground, and the next they were back on the surface.
Descending had taken three days, ascending had taken less than one.
Ethan even wondered if the old Qilin could have reversed that process whenever it wanted. The thought still made him feel slightly cheated.
This new pit was different. Instead of a narrow shaft, it was a massive abyss occupying most of the dry zone. Wooden staircases spiraled along the inner walls, descending layer after layer into darkness.
After considering it briefly, Ethan jumped down.
He landed on one of the ancient wooden platforms and crouched to examine the structure.
The wood was old and decaying, clearly not sothing built recently. The design reminded him of the old mine shafts he had seen in docuntaries, where wooden scaffolding supported tunnels that spiraled deep underground.
Below him the stairway continued downward into shadow.
’Well, I’m already here. Might as well see where this leads.’
And what exactly was that woman doing down here with all this secrecy?
Moving to the edge of the staircase, Ethan extended a hand and felt a faint pulling force rising from below.
’Anti-flight.’
He had expected as much.
Flying here would be extrely dangerous. That downward force would slam him straight into the bottom if he lost control.
Without soul sense, flight, or high-speed movent, he would have to rely entirely on the stairs.
Not that he was worried about the woman herself. The only concern was that she might have so way to alert whoever she was eting. If that person escaped, Ethan might lose the chance to uncover whatever was happening here.
Her sudden appearance felt wrong in too many ways. The timing, the location, everything about it.
Step by step he descended.
The space gradually narrowed as he went deeper, giving the impression of an inverted pagoda forced downward into the earth.
Soon he saw sothing that confird the suspicion.
An upside-down Buddha statue was embedded in the wall, its head pointing toward the depths below. The carving clearly belonged to a decorative shrine figure, the kind normally found adorning Buddhist pagodas.
So this was not simply an underground structure. It was an entire pagoda buried upside-down beneath the river.
An inverted pagoda, sealed underwater by so strange barrier.
’What the hell kind of place is this?’
The situation was becoming stranger with every step. Still, if a nun was involved, there was a good chance the structure and her presence were connected sohow.
Twenty minutes later the staircase finally ended.
He reached a landing where the path opened into a wide gap.
If the pagoda were standing upright, this would likely have been the floor above. Instead Ethan had effectively climbed down through the building’s lowest and widest level, and moving deeper now ant entering progressively narrower floors.
He stepped forward into the next chamber.
This level was far better preserved. The ceiling, which was technically the pagoda’s original floor, remained solid and intact.
Then a faint sound echoed through the chamber.
Click. Click. Click.
chanical chanisms shifting sowhere in the darkness. Ethan’s head snapped toward the noise.
’The pagoda’s traps are still active?’
And then, in the distance, he saw her. The woman.
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