Chapter 423: Bloodline Part 3
The pressure outside the ruined base kept rising.
Chunks of metal and stone floated in the air as the moon shook beneath the grip of massive roots. Everything they built was gone.
Even the magic circles prepared in advance had failed to respond — overwhelmed in an instant by the sheer scale of the enemy’s power.
A giant wooden face looked down at them, burning green eyes calm and ancient.
Arken’s breathing grew uneven.
Years of work. All of it destroyed in seconds. Their only chance to bring their father back — shattered.
The frustration finally broke loose inside him.
"DIE!"
Hundreds of magic circles burst into existence around him. Layer after layer of glowing runes filled the space at his back, spinning in opposing directions — some wide enough to swallow entire buildings, others tight against his arms like coiled springs.
The air around him warped under the surge of energy.
The others moved at once.
Magic circles erupted across the battlefield, spreading through the broken fortress and the void above the lunar surface.
Flames roared. Gravity bent. Spatial blades sheared through the dark. Lightning constructs cracked and flashed. Ancient symbols formed that no human mind should have been able to hold.
Everyone released their strongest attacks without hesitation.
Those carrying dragon blood stepped forward together.
Dark scales rippled across their skin. Their eyes sharpened first — cold, predatory. Horns pushed through flesh and bone. Heat poured off their bodies in waves.
The blood fully awakened. No caution. No restraint.
Because every one of them already knew the truth.
The enemy was far beyond them.
Ashley’s breath turned to burning mist as power gathered around his claws.
Others of the same bloodline fell into step behind him. The pressure of their transformation cracked the debris at their feet.
And still —
The Vedant Queen did not move.
Her massive face simply watched them. Calm. Unshaken.
The roots tightened around the moon.
Then her voice spread across space like something older than sound.
"You carry his blood."
The green glow in her eyes deepened.
"Good."
A root the size of a mountain shifted behind her, slow and deliberate, like the arm of a god preparing to end something small.
"Then your deaths will reach him too."
It dropped.
Space cracked under its weight before it even made contact.
"Scatter!" Arken roared. His magic surged upward, slowing the root — buying seconds, nothing more.
The battlefield dissolved into motion.
Hundreds of spells fired at once. Compressed energy beams, pillars of flame, gravity wells, spatial blades — all of it slammed into the descending root.
For a moment, the dark side of the moon blazed like a second sun. A shockwave tore through the ruined fortress and sent debris spinning across the lunar surface.
For one brief moment, the root stopped.
Then it pushed through.
Chunks of wooden armor broke away, revealing glowing green veins beneath — but the wounds sealed almost instantly, flesh knitting back together as if the damage had never occurred.
Ashley’s eyes went wide.
"You’ve got to be kidding me."
The root came down.
Everyone scattered a heartbeat before impact. A wide section of lunar rock folded inward like crumpled paper, then exploded upward in a column of debris.
Arken reappeared above the field through teleportation.
This time, there were thousands of circles behind him. They overlapped and stacked into a vast structure of interlocking runes, a framework spread across space itself.
His expression was stone.
"Endless Stream."
They fired together.
A storm of concentrated magic crashed across the Queen’s face. Light devoured space. Explosions covered her wooden features and the roots coiling around her body. The moon shook harder.
The others charged into it.
Ashley’s body blurred before he collided with one of the great roots, claws tearing through thick bark while purple dragonfire poured from his throat.
Ashmay struck from the opposite side, driving both arms down in a wide crescent of energy sharp enough to split mountains — it carved through several roots at once.
The others pushed with everything they had. Gravity crushed. Spatial tears split. Focused beams aimed for the burning green eyes.
For the first time since appearing, the Vedant Queen moved her head — slightly, barely.
A reaction. They had forced a reaction.
But her expression did not change.
She still watched them the same way: the way something ancient and vast watches things that do not yet understand what they are.
When her voice came again, it was not angry. It was not even dismissive.
It was simply true.
"Pathetic. I have lived for millions of years. You seedlings have no conception of how vast the distance between us truly is."
The roots suddenly shifted.
Thousands of smaller roots burst outward from the larger ones.
They moved like serpents.
Too fast.
"Behind you!" Ashley shouted.
One of the children turned too late.
A root wrapped around his arm.
Then another coiled around his waist.
The moment contact happened, the bark changed.
It softened.
Opened.
The root swallowed him whole.
"WHAT?!"
His scream echoed briefly before vanishing.
The root sealed shut again.
A faint silhouette remained visible beneath the wooden surface.
Alive.
Trapped.
Everyone froze for a split second.
The Vedant Queen’s green eyes glowed brighter.
"Killing you all is a mercy," she said.
"You will remain inside my forest until the one I seek arrives."
Arken’s expression darkened.
"Don’t let those things touch you!"
More roots surged forward.
The battlefield became chaos.
Ashley ripped apart several incoming roots with his claws before spinning through the air. Dragon fire erupted from his mouth again, burning dozens of smaller roots into ash.
But even the ash began growing.
Tiny branches extended from the remains and regenerated into new roots.
"They keep multiplying!" Ashmay shouted.
A giant wooden hand suddenly formed behind her.
It closed around her body before she could fully dodge.
The pressure cracked the air around her
Ashmay roared and released a massive burst of dragon energy point-blank, and for a second she wrestled control with the Verdant Queen — because she too was a fairy who controlled nature.
The hand exploded apart.
But roots immediately rushed from every direction.
They wrapped around her legs.
Her arms.
Her chest.
"GET OFF ME!"
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