The tower fell before the soldiers at its base could even comprehend what was happening.
Tsukumo did not bring it down with a strike. He merely closed his hand.
Gravity multiplied around the structure, crushing the supports along one side.
The metal groaned, slowly tilted, then crashed onto the neighboring platform, dragging antennas, cannons, and an entire walkway with it in a deafening avalanche of steel.
I ran ahead of the collapse.
Wind coiled around my legs in spirals so dense that my boots barely touched the ground.
I tore through the line of enemy soldiers before the tower's shadow could swallow them.
My sword split the first man's weapon in half, slipped through the second man's guard, and found the third man's throat in one continuous motion.
Only then did I jump.
The massive structure struck the platform behind me, making the entire sector sink beneath my feet.
A wall of debris surged across the floor like a tidal wave, sweeping away soldiers, crushing drones, and ripping light posts from their foundations.
Twisted metal, steam, and blinding sparks filled the air.
I caught an updraft and launched myself over the cloud of dust before it could engulf me.
From above, I searched for Tsukumo.
He stood at the center of the destruction with one arm raised.
The bandages covering his forearm were soaked with fresh blood, and his fingers trembled so badly that he had to clench his fist to hide it.
A Collapse on that scale still exacted a heavy price from his body.
Even so, when three combat drones emerged from behind the fallen tower, Tsukumo merely turned his palm.
The machines were ripped from the air and crushed against the floor like empty cans.
An automated cannon pivoted toward him, but I dove before it could fire.
The Wind Transformation answered my movement. Air compressed along the blade and erupted when I slashed downward.
The invisible crescent tore through the rain, split the cannon's barrel in half, and continued through its housing until the entire gun turret broke apart.
Pain shot through my right arm at the same instant.
The shock nearly forced my fingers open.
Gritting my teeth, I tightened my grip and landed atop the smoking remains of the weapon.
"That makes three surface sectors," Tsukumo said, approaching with heavy steps through the wreckage.
"Four," I corrected.
He looked back.
The path we had carved across the surface of Gron-Tarh was unmistakable.
Fallen towers, sunken platforms, torn-open hangars, and fires spreading beneath the artificial storm.
The prison's red lights still covered miles of metal, but a dark, smoking scar now cut through them.
Our scar.
"Four," Tsukumo conceded, panting.
A colossal armored gate began to open ahead of us.
Its two halves rose with a grinding roar, revealing rows of soldiers carrying heavy shields.
Behind them, three low-profile vehicles aimed their cannons directly at the passage while smaller drones spread into two lines above the infantry.
Tsukumo exhaled through his nose, irritated.
"They just keep coming."
"That was the plan, wasn't it?"
The cannons fired simultaneously.
Tsukumo did not retreat. He stamped one foot against the ground, and the weight of the world changed direction.
All three energy beams curved downward and struck the floor between us.
The explosion tore an entire metal plate loose, which I used as cover for a fraction of a second.
I ran across the slab's angled surface and leaped from its edge.
The soldiers raised their shields, bracing for impact.
Instead of striking them, I drew the air behind my sword and slashed the ground in front of their formation.
The shockwave ripped the soldiers' feet from the platform, breaking apart the shield wall.
Before they could regain their balance, I was already among them.
My blade entered through the opening in one helmet. I ripped it free while turning, severed the joint of a shield, and kicked its owner into the men behind him.
One enemy shot grazed my ribs. Another tore a piece of fabric from my shoulder.
Then Tsukumo arrived like a runaway train.
His fist caved in a soldier's breastplate and launched the body into the nearest vehicle.
With his other hand, he seized the edge of a shield, ripped the enemy from the formation, and used him as a physical barrier against an entire barrage of gunfire.
When he released the corpse, the metal shield looked like a sieve.
A grenade rolled between our boots.
The gravitational field caught it in midair and hurled the explosive over the infantry into the center of the drone formation, where it detonated in a cloud of fire and shrapnel.
I continued forward beneath the rain of debris.
I severed the stabilizer on the first vehicle, vaulted over the cannon of the second, and drove my sword straight through its upper hatch.
Wind entered through the opening like an invisible drill, swelling the hull from within until it exploded and hurled armored plates in every direction.
The third vehicle shifted into reverse, attempting to retreat into the safety of the hangar.
Tsukumo spread his fingers.
The tank lost traction beneath its treads and rose half a meter above the floor before being flipped onto its side and hurled into the very gate it had been trying to defend.
The explosion illuminated the depths of the hangar, revealing dozens of new silhouettes charging toward us.
My communicator crackled in my ear.
"Suki. Tsukumo. Respond."
Candice's voice was muffled by deafening gunfire and a constant sound of... leaves being torn apart?
I leaned away from an electrified spear and severed its shaft before the tip could reach my chest.
"We're a little busy," I answered without stopping.
"Then kill while you listen!"
Tsukumo seized two soldiers with his gravitational field and launched them like projectiles into the burning hangar entrance.
"We're listening," he said, his voice strained.
"We've reached the halfway point of Subterranean Sector Two."
Candice was breathing hard.
"And the situation down here is completely fucked."
A shot exploded dangerously close to her communicator.
I heard Havelyn shout something in the background, followed by the brutal sound of metal being torn apart.
"Have you found Rubens?" I asked.
"Not yet. Sector Two is much larger than the maps indicated, and the troops are sealing the routes ahead of us."
"We need you to change positions."
"Where?"
"Go down through the hole you opened."
"Enter Sector One and do down there what you were doing on the surface."
"I want every unit between you and us looking upward."
A soldier attempted to flank me from behind.
I leaned aside, let the enemy blade pass over my shoulder, and drove my sword through his abdomen with a clean counterattack.
"And Yashin?"
Candice took a second to answer.
"He still hasn't shown his face, and that worries the fuck out of me."
The complete absence of relief in her voice made the answer a thousand times worse.
"That's not good," Tsukumo muttered.
"No," Candice agreed.
"Yashin can't simply disappear while Gron-Tarh is under attack."
"Get down there, make some noise, and keep your eyes open."
The transmission cut off abruptly beneath another heavy burst of gunfire.
Ahead of us, the hangar continued spewing troops without end.
I looked at Tsukumo.
"Let's do this our way."
He cast a weary glance at the colossal trail of destruction we had left behind.
I tore my blade from the body sprawled before me with a wet jolt. Dark blood streamed down the metal before I returned it to its sheath in one fluid motion.
Beside me, Tsukumo watched the weapon disappear, his expression weighed down by exhausted suspicion.
"I know that look," he said, his voice nearly drowned out by the rain.
I stared at the vast expanse of metal beneath our feet, smooth and seemingly unbreakable.
"Candice wants noise," I replied flatly.
"Let's give her another entrance."
The fortress did not take long to respond.
The hangar's heavy doors opened with a mechanical boom, disgorging another platoon.
Soldiers in massive armor took the front line and dropped to one knee, planting their shields against the ground, while two rows of riflemen assembled behind them with military precision.
Above, the hum of drones cut through the air. Their metal shells opened, revealing dozens of loaded barrels already aimed at us.
Tsukumo swept his gaze over the enemy formation before returning his attention to the impenetrable floor.
He snorted, expelling a heavy breath through his nose as a faint, fatalistic smile tugged at one corner of his mouth.
"Fine. We'll do it your way. What's the plan?"
I closed my eyes and plunged my awareness into my own body.
I passed through muscle, crossed bone, and sank deeper until I reached what lay dormant beneath my skin.
Strength.
Not the mere exertion of a tensed muscle or the fleeting violence of a physical blow.
It was the raw, absolute concept itself—the primordial force that propelled bodies forward, brought mountains down, and drove worlds into collision.
My heart beat once, heavy as a war drum, and the metal sank beneath my boots.
On the second beat, the power overflowed.
Pulsing lines of incandescent red and glacial blue ignited across my hands.
They climbed my arms in thick, winding bands, curled around my shoulders, and disappeared beneath my clothing.
I felt the same pattern spread across my chest, back, and legs, compressing every fiber of my being.
The red burned like the heart of a forge. The blue froze like the vacuum of space.
Caught between those two extremes, my muscles condensed until they felt nearly impenetrable.
White steam began hissing from my collar and sleeves.
My hair rose and floated within the gravity distorted by the colossal pressure leaking from my body.
Falling raindrops evaporated with a hiss before they could even touch my skin.
I pushed the transformation deeper.
The luminous lines thickened.
My body did not grow larger, but it gained an absurd density, anchoring me to the ground with overwhelming force.
The plate beneath my feet groaned and bent several centimeters, spreading a web of tiny cracks around me.
Tsukumo needed no explanation. He recognized the technique immediately.
"It's been a long time since I saw that," he said, his eyes fixed on the energy radiating from me.
"Tsukumo, use your gravity on me."
Without hesitation, he turned his attention toward the floor and extended his free hand.
I clenched my right fist, feeling the power buzz viciously beneath my skin.
I channeled the entirety of the transformation into that single limb.
The lines covering the rest of my body dimmed as their power was drained away, while those along my arm ignited with nearly blinding intensity.
The muscles there compacted until they looked carved from granite, and every beat of my heart sent a dull vibration through the metal beneath our feet.
My blood surged with such pressure that my veins threatened to split from within, and the bones of my fist groaned in protest before the strike had even begun.
"If I mistime the activation, I'll rip your arm from your body."
"Then don't miss!" I roared as the strength overflowed.
He raised his right hand and curled his fingers toward my arm without touching it.
Gravity vanished from the limb instantly.
My arm, now holding an astronomical density, suddenly became weightless, allowing me to lift it over my head with ease.
Tsukumo lowered his center of gravity and planted his feet.
Dark blood streamed from his nostrils and mixed with the rain, while the restraining bandages around his arms began to snap dangerously beneath the strain.
"When?" he growled through clenched teeth, holding all that energy in check.
I bent my legs and prepared my body.
The floor sank another centimeter.
"When I start bringing it down."
The soldiers opened fire at once, turning the air into a storm of lethal beams.
My shoulder rotated, my elbow broke through inertia, and my fist began its deadly descent.
"Now!" I roared.
Tsukumo snapped his hand downward and violently closed his fingers.
All the gravity he had nullified returned in a fraction of a second.
Multiplied.
The gravitational field did not affect my chest or legs. It closed like an invisible shackle exclusively around my right arm.
My shoulder joint was wrenched downward with absurd violence, as though the weight of an entire mountain range had suddenly been chained to my fist.
A dry, agonizing crack erupted inside my elbow.
My knees nearly buckled beneath the crushing pressure.
"More!"
Tsukumo snarled a curse, his face twisted by pain and concentration, and doubled the gravity.
The colossal weight tore through my muscles, tendons, and bones.
The skin of my forearm could not withstand the expansion. It split into dozens of small fissures between the luminous lines, and the blood that emerged vaporized the instant it touched the generated heat.
The raw power of my transformation drove everything downward.
Tsukumo's insane gravity dragged it in the same direction.
All that impossible mass reached terrifying speed as it collapsed toward a single point of impact.
I clenched my fist so tightly that my nails tore into my palm.
"TITAN!"
My fist struck Gron-Tarh.
For one endless fraction of a second, there was only silence.
No explosion.
The impenetrable metal simply sank beneath my knuckles, yielding like clay.
Then the force drove downward.
A circular shockwave tore across the surface like a furious earthquake, throwing steel plates, machinery, and dozens of soldiers into the air.
The atmosphere was violently expelled in every direction, sweeping the rain sideways and shattering the armored windows of the watchtowers.
But the true fury of the strike did not spread outward.
It was directed below.
The first layer of armor folded and tore like paper.
The second was obliterated by an invisible column of kinetic force that shattered support beams, pipes, and steel cables as thick as tree trunks.
The third layer—the final structural defense—held for less than a second before exploding into fragments.
The impact continued burrowing through the fortress like the fist of an enraged god.
Every annihilated structure was driven into the next in a catastrophic domino effect.
Walkways collapsed in cascading waves. Freight elevators plunged from their rails in free fall, and internal containment walls were ripped clean from their foundations.
Forty meters beneath us, the ceiling of Sector One burst apart.
A colossal avalanche of plates, twisted beams, and machinery crashed mercilessly onto the troops assembled on the subterranean level.
Entire platforms were crushed like empty cans. Control towers vanished beneath the wreckage, and a deafening shockwave swept through the sector, hurling soldiers away from their positions.
The surface beneath our feet, once impassable, lost all support.
A monumental crater opened around my fist.
Physics collected its price immediately.
The recoil raced up my arm with the force of a derailed train.
The bones in my wrist cracked ominously.
The suppressed energy traveled through my elbow and detonated inside my shoulder like an internal grenade.
My vision vanished in a white flash of absolute pain.
The thick taste of blood flooded my mouth, and the lines of the transformation began flickering erratically across my skin, completely out of control.
Before my legs could give way and send me plunging into the abyss, Tsukumo seized the collar of my coat.
With one desperate pull, he tore me away from the central plate at the exact moment it fell into the darkness of the hole we had opened.
We rolled heavily across the deformed edge that still held, safe by mere millimeters.
For several long seconds, I remained there, kneeling among the twisted metal and breathing in ragged gasps as I cradled my limp right arm against my body.
I tried moving my fingers. They responded, but with agonizing slowness.
My shoulder radiated unbearable heat, and every beat of my heart made the bones and tendons grind against one another inside my forearm.
The transformation finally faded.
The crushing weight abandoned my body all at once, leaving behind only clouds of steam and sweat, the stench of scorched blood, and pain so deep it seemed rooted in my marrow.
Tsukumo rose unsteadily beside me.
His left hand, which had held the gravity of the world only a second earlier, trembled violently, mirroring mine.
"Do you... still have an arm?" he asked between ragged breaths, spitting a thread of blood onto the metal floor.
"For now," I muttered, forcing myself to raise my head.
Where an immaculate courtyard had once stretched before us, there was now an abyss dozens of meters wide.
Black smoke and dense flames rose from Sector One, warming the rain against our faces.
Peering over the jagged edges of torn metal, I could see the entrails of Gron-Tarh: suspended walkways split in half, crushed containment blocks, burning hangars, and thousands of red emergency lights igniting across every level like the eyes of an awakened beast.
The prison reacted to the invasion like a wounded organism.
The wail of the sirens changed, becoming sharper and more urgent.
Enormous armored gates began sliding open around the new crater.
Battalions that had been rushing to contain our previous assault skidded to a halt and abruptly changed direction.
Swarms of combat drones emerged from the smoke below, while heavy internal antiaircraft batteries rotated their lethal barrels toward the wound we had opened.
We had just given the fortress a second point of invasion.
In response, it would send hell itself to stop us.
Tsukumo stepped closer to the edge, his eyes shining with reflected fire and chaos.
A crooked, exhausted smile crossed his face.
I rose, gritting my teeth against the throbbing pain throughout my body and holding my useless arm firmly against my side.
"Let's go."
The first suppressive volleys came screaming up through the hole.
Tsukumo did not even blink. He jumped into the abyss before the shots could reach us.
I took two quick steps, planted my boot on the edge of the twisted steel, and launched myself after him.
Together, we fell through the shattered heart of our new crater, plummeting beside tons of burning steel and the bodies of soldiers still raining through the debris.
Infernal heat surged from the abyss, carrying smoke, soot, and the sickening stench of burned circuitry and flesh.
The wind of our descent whipped my clothes upward, making the open wound on my cheek sting beneath the ash.
My right arm was out of commission this time, but that still was not enough to stop me.
I used the Wind Transformation to stabilize myself without slowing down.
The faster we crossed that chimney of steel, the less time the internal defenses would have to lock onto us.
The first red targeting lasers began speckling the haze beneath us.
Then came hundreds more.
"Right!" Tsukumo shouted through the open air.
I tilted my body in free fall.
A barrage of shots screamed past my left side, while another struck the crater wall near me and tore loose a shower of incandescent molten steel.
Drones rose to intercept us during the descent.
I spun around my own axis and cut the first machine in half.
I planted one boot against one of its falling halves, pushed myself sideways, and drove my blade through the second drone's energy core.
The third was crushed like crumpled paper before I could reach it, a victim of Tsukumo's gravitational field.
We broke through the final layer of smoke.
Sector One opened beneath us in all its sickening scale.
It was too vast to feel like the inside of anything.
Columns as wide as buildings supported the ceiling.
Industrial platforms the size of city districts occupied different levels, connected by a web of cables, elevators, and bridges.
Monstrous hangars were embedded directly into walls of rock and steel, while rails crossed the void, carrying armored capsules from one end to the other.
There was no sky, but vapor escaping from the refrigeration systems damaged by our attack formed low clouds, producing a thin, freezing rain inside the sector.
And Gron-Tarh kept descending.
Far, far below.
The place was abyssal.
A colossal reception platform occupied the center of the airspace.
Hundreds of soldiers already waited for us there, weapons raised.
Heavy cannons locked onto us.
Falling beside me, Tsukumo spread his arms.
The movement was so abrupt that it seemed to tear through his muscles.
The bandages snapped, and fresh blood once again stained the cloth. Ignoring his own agony, he kept both palms firmly directed toward the opposing walls of the sector.
Two immense maintenance platforms immediately began to tremble.
They were impossibly heavy structures suspended by thick cables and loaded with ammunition crates, vehicles, and soldiers.
The support cables snapped like thread.
But the platforms did not fall.
They were pulled.
One came from the right.
The other from the left.
Tsukumo's gravitational field dragged the two islands of metal across the void at terrifying speed.
Soldiers plunged from the edges, desperately trying to save themselves.
Vehicles slid and fell.
Tsukumo clapped his hands together.
The platforms collided directly in the center of the enemy aerial formation.
It did not sound like a mechanical explosion.
It sounded like the brutal closing of a jaw the size of a city.
Steel, bodies, weapons, and machines were crushed in a single second. The shockwave swept through the inner sector, shattering the safety windows of the towers and ripping unsuspecting soldiers from the nearest walkways.
The misshapen mass of metal remained suspended for one second before falling like a meteor onto the reception platform below, sweeping away everyone still standing there.
I used the wind to launch myself toward a side walkway, escaping moments before the mass of wreckage destroyed the reception platform.
The impact made the entire prison tremble.
The crash of countless tons of debris striking metal traveled through Sector One in successive seismic waves.
My legs finally gave way.
I drove the tip of my sword into the floor to keep myself upright.
The world continued spinning violently around me for several seconds, and my vision pulsed in rhythm with my frantic heartbeat.
Tsukumo walked toward me through the scattered fires.
His mouth hung open as he breathed, his shoulders slumped.
"Still alive?" I asked hoarsely.
"I've had better days." He released a dry, humorless laugh.
"This place is enormous. How is any of this possible?"
The silence did not last.
The emergency sirens shifted into an even sharper, more aggressive tone.
Armored doors in the peripheral areas sealed themselves.
Below us, warning lights illuminated new elevators within the dark chasm.
They halted their descents and began rising rapidly toward us, carrying a sea of fresh troops from the depths of the prison.
Candice's insane plan was working.
"Troop transfer confirmed," Gordon's voice echoed through the radio.
"Sector One is drawing nearly every unit from the lower levels. Keep going."
I looked down at the kilometer-wide platforms below us.
"I hope those two are all right."
Then a deep, rhythmic vibration caught my attention.
It had nothing to do with the perfect cadence of the machinery or the tremors caused by the elevators.
It penetrated the impenetrable steel plates, traveled through my bones, and settled in the center of my chest, heavy and undeniable.
I stood still, trying to understand what it was.
An infantryman attempted to flank me while we were distracted.
Tsukumo barely moved. He delivered a short right-handed punch and drove the man, armor and all, into a support column.
"Suki?" he called, suspicious of my paralysis.
The sensation came again.
It was incredibly distant.
Smothered beneath miles of tempered metal, reinforced concrete, and solid stone.
But it was... alive.
I raised trembling fingers to my communicator.
"Candice."
The deafening crack of a rifle burst answered me.
"Talk!" she shouted from the other side.
"In Sector Two... is there some kind of plantation down there?"
Silence lasted for only a second.
Tsukumo gave me a curious look.
"What?" Candice shouted.
"Earth. Trees. Roots. Anything natural."
Another gunshot rang through the radio.
This time, beneath the static, I heard the unmistakable whisper of leaves thrashing violently.
"How the hell do you know that?" Candice's bewilderment was clear in her voice.
The warm pulse beneath my boots grew stronger, almost eager.
"So there is."
"The entire sector has been swallowed by a forest!" she shouted.
"It isn't a greenhouse, Suki."
"It's literally a fucking forest. A dense one."
"We've been dodging bullets, drones, and goddamn oak trees for thirty minutes!"
"Havelyn can barely fly down here."
I slowly lowered my gaze toward the cold metal floor beneath my feet.
For the first time since we had stepped onto the frozen surface of Gron-Tarh, I could feel the presence of something real.
"Tsukumo."
The giant seized an enemy soldier by the barrel of his weapon, pulled him off balance with a violent jerk, and drove a knee into his body hard enough to break bone.
"What?"
"I need you to protect me."
Tsukumo discarded the limp body, hurling it like a sack of garbage into the front line of two other attackers.
"For how long?"
"I don't know."
His sharp eyes swept over the avenues surrounding us.
The situation was desperate. Tactical squads were pouring from three corridors simultaneously.
"Do what you have to do."
I sheathed my sword and let my body drop to its knees against the steel plate.
I closed my eyes.
The whispering wind that always accompanied me fell silent and withdrew from my pores.
The peculiar lightness of the air evaporated first, replaced by the muffled, distant sounds of Tsukumo's battle.
The Earth Transformation did not work like the fire I felt burning through my veins, nor like the wind that surrounded me as an expansive aura.
It had weight.
My center of gravity collapsed and anchored itself through my aching knees.
My heart slowed until it found a glacial, steady rhythm.
All the raw energy I usually expelled to destroy my enemies was reversed and driven violently downward, filtered through the bloodied palm I pressed against the frozen floor.
For the first second, nothing happened.
There was only the monotonous vibration of the industrial generators.
Then I learned to isolate the sounds of the dead world.
Turbines rotated in predictable cycles. I silenced them within my mind.
Elevators rose with a linear hiss. I erased them.
The footsteps of thousands of marching soldiers were merely superficial points of impact. I sank beneath them.
I peeled away the metallic noise of the prison until I touched that solitary organic pulse.
Then I threw myself toward it.
My consciousness plunged.
I passed through the titanium barriers of Sector One and sank through the colossal foundations that Gron-Tarh's architects had driven into the bedrock by force.
I slipped past gigantic concrete pillars, seeped through forgotten tectonic fissures, and followed the moisture silently bleeding between layers of stone.
I went deeper.
Dark.
Impenetrable.
Until I found water.
Not the chemical, recycled fluid flowing through the pipes.
Real water.
Cold and pure, permeating an impossible expanse of dark, damp soil.
Immediately beyond the water, I breathed air—air thick with humus, far denser and more alive than the prison's canned atmosphere.
And there, spread throughout that fertile darkness, I touched the roots.
There were millions of them.
Some were as thin as capillaries. Others were as broad and twisted as the columns of ancient temples.
They were young, ancient, violent, and thirsty, entwined around crystalline boulders, glacial lakes, and the subterranean machinery supporting that nightmare.
The forest of Sector Two took shape within my mind, even in absolute darkness.
I did not "see" the green leaves or the bark of the trees.
I "felt" them.
I felt the crushing weight of the wood, the ceaseless flow of sap, the vital moisture, and the claustrophobic pressure of life held in confinement.
I knew exactly where every ancient root scraped against stone, how they communicated through subtle vibrations beneath the soil, and—with bitter clarity—how every armored boot trampled, burned, and violated that silent network.
It was a magnificent ecosystem of terrifying beauty.
It might have been poetic if it had not been condemned, buried beneath megatons of military fury.
"The meditations worked, Silver," I said to myself.
The artificial forest was probably Gron-Tarh's hidden lung.
It recycled the stagnant air, filtered the water flowing through the pipes, and perhaps even produced the basic food supply for the prison's depths.
They had chained nature itself to keep hell alive.
The real world shook my meditation.
A terrifying impact rocked the platform and nearly threw me sideways.
I kept my eyes closed and forced myself to maintain my concentration.
I heard Tsukumo's guttural roar and, through the vibrations in the ground, felt an approaching armored vehicle being ripped from the asphalt.
The gravitational field lifted the front of the bipedal vehicle, twisted the colossal machine sideways, and slammed it down onto the bulk of the enemy infantry attempting to advance through the main corridor.
Bullets struck the floor and ricocheted mere inches from my planted hand.
Tsukumo intervened again.
"HURRY UP, SUKI!" His roar had reached its limit.
But I was no longer there.
My consciousness roamed through Sector Two.
Through the earth, I found Candice.
Squads were everywhere.
I felt their boots gathering behind the enormous exposed roots, the faint antigravitational hum of drones scraping through the highest leaves, and light vehicles crushing the undergrowth beneath their wheels.
Candice and Havelyn were pinned down, trapped behind a rise of rotting trunks that were being systematically reduced to splinters beneath the crossfire.
Candice's ice did not work particularly well inside a dense forest.
I poured my will into the roots covering the ground beneath them.
The earth refused to obey at first.
It was apathetic, gagged beneath the weight of distant steel and separated from my core by miles of labyrinthine concrete and wire.
I was no god to them.
I was a distant stranger screaming through the dark.
I dug my broken nails against the cold plate in Sector One, clenching my teeth until blood seeped from my gums.
"I know you can hear me," I murmured—not to some divine force, but to the living pulse buried beneath the earth, the same telluric energy that set my soul ablaze.
The Earth Transformation reverberated deep within me. Its stripes moved in a more natural rhythm.
I had reached a new stage.
At last, the subterranean forest recognized the familiar touch.
In Sector Two, the earth awakened in fury.
A massive wall of compacted stone and soil erupted upward, bursting between Candice, Havelyn, and the firing line at the exact millisecond the entire battalion emptied its magazines.
The torrent of heavy-caliber rounds splashed uselessly against the earthen barrier and buried itself in dead soil.
Two hunter drones diving to pulverize them were struck from below by the rising pillar of earth and flattened grotesquely against the thick canopy of branches.
"What the fuck was that?!" Candice's stunned voice exploded through my radio.
"That was me," I said—not through the communicator, but directly inside both their minds.
"You're stuck in Sector One, you idiot!"
"AND HOW THE HELL ARE YOU INSIDE MY HEAD?!"
"I know. Calm down and listen to me."
I heard the dull impact of Tsukumo's fist striking flesh, breaking ribs, and launching another body over the edge of the platform.
I felt a fresh wave of reinforcements flooding Sector Two, their boots pounding across the damp moss.
There were many of them—an entire platoon of at least thirty soldiers rapidly spreading out to flank the blind side of the earthen wall I had created.
They avoided the illuminated central trails, slipping intelligently between the thick oak trees and vaulting over exposed roots to maintain cover.
Poor strategy.
Inside that forest, I was not blind.
I had a million eyes.
With every step one of them took, a root whispered his exact position to me.
I drove my aura through the branching network.
The ambush began.
The carpet of dead leaves shattered beneath the enemy platoon.
Slabs of solid earth burst from the ground and spun through the air like guillotines, severing soldiers' legs and sending them down screaming.
Before the sergeant could shout an order to reposition, the ancient roots rebelled.
They erupted from the dark soil like furious serpents, coiling around steel-plated ankles, pulverizing tight formations, and dragging screaming soldiers into the dense darkness behind the enormous trunks.
The assault did not remain confined to the ground.
The high branches, suddenly hardened by the Earth energy injected through the trunks, attacked like lances.
They plunged from the canopy, pierced the titanium armor of unsuspecting soldiers, and impaled the men against the very trees they had trusted for protection.
Terrified screams of agony and the grotesque sound of waterlogged wood tearing through steel flooded my transmission.
Candice seized the opening brilliantly.
Through the rhythmic tremors in the ground, I tracked the exact moment she abandoned cover.
The air split violently beneath the sweep of her enormous scythe as it tore through the chest of the first survivor to cross her path.
Above her, bursts of wind revealed Havelyn taking flight. She immediately folded her long, dark wings when she saw lines of tracer fire stitching through the upper gaps in the vegetation.
"We have a problem, Suki!" Candice reported, her breathing locked into a flawless martial rhythm.
"They sealed the entrance to the next main elevator!"
Through the veins of the earth, I uncovered the barricade waiting for them.
It was monumental.
Three dense walls of heavy infantry blocked the rear, completely shielding the central corridor with kinetic barriers.
A black cloud of drones hummed just beneath the main canopy.
Strategically concealed within large hollow boulders forged from concrete at the center of the perimeter sat two stationary automated gun turrets.
Behind that entire logistical nightmare, a monumental gate embedded in the rock guarded their objective.
The situation demanded surgical brutality, and there still was not enough room for the two of them.
"Havelyn," I ordered coldly.
"Ready," the warrior answered between ragged breaths.
"When I give the word... tear the sky apart."
"The trees are tangled across the passage, idiot! Everything's blocked!"
"Just wait."
Sector Two erupted into an apocalypse.
The wood groaned with the heavy, frightening sound that always preceded a storm.
It marked the definitive end of peace in that place.
The gigantic sequoias and immense oak trees began to contort, bending their thick trunks to the brink of breaking.
Like enraged beasts, the trees withdrew into the darkness of the forest.
They leaned their crushing weight to either side, nearly touching the ground, but did not fall.
Instead, they opened a path.
The dense curtain of leaves tore apart all at once.
Amid the chaos of dark soil, a wide, straight, unobstructed corridor formed.
It was a brutal trail carved through the destruction, connecting Candice directly to her sole objective: the fortress's immense armored gate.
The drastic change in terrain ripped the battlefield wide open.
The enemy soldiers who had been blocking the gate did not understand what was happening.
Exposed and trapped by the forest itself, they lost every tactical advantage they thought they possessed.
The effort nearly made me collapse, but the earth obeyed.
Two immense walls of solid stone erupted violently along either side of the new corridor.
They rose in the blink of an eye and curved overhead, creating a rocky tunnel completely impervious to bullets.
A perfect barrier.
The enemies outside, now crushed against the thorns and sharpened trunks of the rebellious forest, began firing blindly in sheer panic.
Their desperation struck harmlessly against my walls of stone.
Along the route, beneath the metal framework protecting the two heavy automated cannons, I forced a monstrous root to explode from the ground.
The shrieking impact twisted the machinery and ripped through the steel.
The foundation gave way, and both artillery turrets toppled sideways.
Unbalanced and with their axles crushed, the two cannons turned grotesquely toward each other, facing their own allies and losing any chance of targeting the women.
"Havelyn! Hell's wide open!" I shouted into their minds, my lungs burning.
She seized Candice again and beat her wings, flying straight through the path I had opened.
Roots invaded the gate mechanisms and forced them apart, finally allowing the two women to enter Sector Three.
I deactivated the transformation.
The strength abandoned the forest all at once.
The branches stopped moving. The bent trees slowly returned to their original positions, and the roots vanished beneath the mud, dragging the final screams down with them.
Behind Candice and Havelyn, the walls of stone lost their support and collapsed across the corridor, cutting off pursuit.
I released the metal and pitched forward, my limp, exhausted weight collapsing against the floor as I sucked in damp dust.
The deafening pandemonium burst back into my ears in one screaming, savage snap.
Sirens shrieked. Gunfire detonated in deafening echoes, swallowed by desolation and dread beneath the filthy clang of blood-slick metal footsteps and distant screams.
Tsukumo's large, exhausted golden eyes turned toward me.
"So... did it work?"
I braced my battered knees and forced the shell holding me together back to its feet.
My joints threatened to give way.
"They're officially inside Sector Three."
He released a dry, exhausted laugh, his shoulders rising and falling slowly as I took in the true sea of bodies surrounding us—a barrier he had held alone, tooth and nail, solely to keep me protected.
I pressed the communicator against my ear, trying to filter out the static.
"Candice."
Her voice came through faintly over the radio.
"WE'RE INSIDE!" she shouted over the metallic interference.
"And you?"
"Still in Sector One. It looks like the troops gave us a break... They pulled back and concentrated on the surface."
I looked around.
The air smelled of ozone and burned flesh, and the sudden absence of gunfire felt wrong—almost unnatural.
"Be careful, boys," she warned, her voice low and weighted with cold gravity.
"Silence in this place is never a good sign."
"Understood."
The transmission cut out.
The static died, leaving only the sound of our own labored breathing.
An uneasy chill crawled up my spine.
That moment of calm was not relief.
It was the warning of an even worse storm to come.