Chapter 500: A Straight Path
By now, Wang Yu and the dragons under his command were fully within the core of the Ashen Wastes. The convergence of countless wills from the Utopia grew clearer and clearer. They were unmistakably located in the deepest chambers of this underground metropolis, the City of Sin.
He and the dragons had prepared a plan in advance: once they arrived underground, they would advance toward their target in a straight line. Trying to follow the established paths within the subterranean city would mean walking straight into whatever traps the Utopia had prepared in advance.
If they were to just charge forward, though... To beings at their level of strength, any obstacles in their way might as well be wet paper. With a bit of spellwork, they could advance more quickly by cutting through them than taking a winding path.
Several dragons summoned the vast wells of magic from within their bodies and tore open enormous rifts in the air. These fissures, glowing with earthy yellow light, interlinked under the dragons' control and expanded outward, transforming into a circular passage.
Through the rift, one could faintly glimpse another realm—the Land's End, part of the elemental plane, the cradle and tomb of the earth, home to the mightiest of the earth elementals.
This was the power of the elemental covenant: an ancient pact the dragons had forged with the elementals. Each clan's chieftain held a fragment of this pact. When invoked, it compelled elementals within a certain range to answer their call and fight on their behalf.
Most elementals, save for a few planar monarchs who stood as pillars of their realms, were limited in their nature. Their power was narrow, simple, and focused; far less versatile than that of the mortals of the main world. Most of the time, they were of little use to dragons.
But here, within this subterranean domain, those simple, focused abilities represented a devastating force.
Summoned by the covenant, an immense host of ordinary earth elementals, joined by more than fifty legendary earth elemental lords, emerged from the endless golden sands of their plane. They passed through the planar rift and emerged in the material world.
"Open a passage leading to that point."
The command came from the bearer of the covenant, the white dragon chieftain Miselyx. The earth elementals, which took on forms of swirling stone, sand, and soil, obeyed instantly. Without speaking, without hesitation, they surged forward and began reshaping the land itself.
Where their power seeped into the earth, rock and soil alike became an extension of their bodies. They sculpted the terrain like clay, shifting and piling material aside. A single elemental did not work quickly, but in numbers like these, they possessed terrifying efficiency.
And with fifty legendary elemental lords among them, their work bordered on the miraculous.
Their mere presence awakened the earth; vast swathes of terrain liquefied into flowing sand. The entire region became a sea of soil. Through this earthen ocean, the elementals conveyed the dragons forward, carving a straight corridor toward their destination where no path had ever existed.
"We've breached the Utopia's solid barrier," Wang Yu said, leaping down from Aurelian's back. "They'll send their forces to intercept us soon enough. The enemy units stationed in the material realm will be yours to handle."
He continued to protect the dragons from the combustive energy of the Ashen Wastes with the Chariot's power.
"Understood, Lord Wang Yu," Miselyx replied. "Leave the Utopia agents on this side to us. They will not halt our advance."
The other dragons nodded, their confidence unshakable.
"Good. As for the void, until we reach the target, I won't allow a single Utopia operative to get close."
With a nod, Wang Yu stepped into the void rift Avia had torn open. The rift remained ajar, allowing a controlled stream of his Chariot's power to spill outward so that he could continue protecting the dragons.
His foot landed on the firm ground of his own void domain. His gaze fixed on a distant point within that starless expanse.
"They're here."
Avia's voice appeared beside him. She climbed to the peak of his domain and stood shoulder to shoulder with him. Her means of perception surpassed eyesight: she could see far beyond what Wang Yu's eyes could reach.
Countless members of the Utopia were racing toward them from their stronghold, carried by towering spires that glided through the void.
"Heh. We can't have them interfering before we reach the core, can we? I'm heading out."
Wang Yu had spotted the massed spires advancing like a dark tide, too. Clearly, the Utopia had stationed substantial forces beneath the Ashen Wastes.
The sheer scale of their momentum dwarfed Wang Yu and Avia. They were a lone duo taking on an army. Yet in the void, Wang Yu wielded more strength than he ever could in the material realm. Tearing these spires apart would be effortless... but this many at once was beyond what his current state could comfortably handle.
"I'm ready," Avia said. "The Utopia has yet to reveal any force truly equivalent to divine might. Their phantom deities are nothing more than clever deceptions designed to manipulate the mind."
She knelt slightly and placed a small black sapling at her feet. Raising her hands toward the oncoming host, she summoned the power of the Lady of the Night. Behind them, a colossal black tree erupted into being, its branches streaked with starlight, its roots lost in endless shadow. The Tree of the Night's divine radiance flowed through Avia's body.
With that titanic silhouette behind them, the disparity between two mortals and the entire Utopia army vanished. It was now two mortals, along with a goddess, against an army.
"Let's go."
Wang Yu bumped his fist lightly against hers, crouched low, and launched forward like a thunderbolt, straight toward the advancing wall of spires.
Avia swept her arm forward. The Tree of the Night answered her call. Its colossal boughs extended across the void, wild and unrestrained, forming a road beneath Wang Yu's feet, one that stretched toward the heart of the enemy.
He was far faster in the void than in the material realm. Wang Yu closed the distance between him and the army in the span of a heartbeat, bringing the vast, onrushing Utopia host into his striking range. He stamped down, launched himself skyward, and plunged straight into the innumerable enemy ranks.
Given the immensity of the void, Wang Yu's lone figure looked minute. The Utopia forces seemed wholly fixated on the colossal tree rising behind the two intruders; they did not register him until he was dangerously near.
Pitch-black beams lanced out from the forest of spires, streaking toward the rampaging Wang Yu. The beams twisted mid-flight, coiling like serpents as they locked onto their quarry and chased him with unnerving precision.
"Out of my way."
Muttering under his breath, Wang Yu swung a fist wrapped in the Chariot's power. He slammed it again and again into the densely packed ribbons of destructive void energy swirling toward him, knocking each beam off course.
Then, relying on reaction speed alone, he snatched one sweeping beam out of the air, taking advantage of the Chariot's ability to control everything it touched. Gripping it as though it were a horizontal bar, he heaved upward with terrifying force. His feet landed in quick succession on other pursuing beams, using each streak of death as a foothold with an almost absurd fluidity as he ran straight toward the Utopian spires.
Several massive violet spheres, warping and folding in on themselves, materialized between the tightly packed spires. They surged toward Wang Yu, who now hung mid-air with no more beams beneath his feet. The void energy contained in the orbs dwarfed even that of the beams.
Wang Yu crashed directly into them. Contact triggered a violent detonation of void energy, its effect no different from an explosion in the material realm: pure destruction compressed into a tiny space.
The swirling purple turbulence dissipated quickly. But Wang Yu did not emerge unscathed. In fact, he had vanished completely. The spires that had been tracking him abruptly lost their target. Could he have—
As the Utopian spires tried to home in on him, one tower's exterior wall suddenly buckled and burst inward under tremendous force. A gaping wound opened, exposing inner structures and startled members of the Utopia. Without anyone sensing him approach, Wang Yu had reappeared on the spire's outer surface, his fingers gouging into the stone as he tore loose a slab of its wall.
"So that's it. The true structure you're guarding lies within the void itself. No wonder the spires in the material realm were solid throughout."
Clinging to the tower's side, Wang Yu regarded the exposed Utopia members with cold indifference. They were still in shock, but not for long.
He drove both arms deep into the tower's interior. The Chariot's power spread outward, anchoring his grip so the structure would not crumble. Then Wang Yu heaved. He lifted the entire spire,swinging it like a colossal hammer into the neighboring one.
The two spires collided in a thunderous impact. Their hardened outer shells crumpled under the impossible force; the Utopian members within were flung out from the wreckage, stripped of the protective power that had once shielded them.
"Heh. The same fate awaits you as well."
Those who lost their protection twisted and disintegrated under the void's corrosive influence, dissolving instantly into mindless voidspawn.
The next moment, a massive sphere of void energy began coalescing overhead. The spires had recognized Wang Yu's threat and were gathering overwhelming force to annihilate him.
A pitch-black blade dropped from above, unseen by any Utopian member. It pierced straight into the forming void mass, its descent unimpeded. With a slight twist, the sword split the sphere cleanly in two, sending torrents of uncontrolled void energy roaring outward.
From afar, Avia raised her hands, hurling a blast of the Lady of the Night's power from the heavens.
Two people and one goddess stood before the Utopian army—and even seemed to be winning.
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