While the Great Devourer waged endless battles in Terra, attempting to devour a richer and more advanced civilization that transcended magic and swordsmanship...
‘So there are ostrich farms domestically as well,’ Lin Miao thought.
During this time, Lin Miao also kept the terrarium open, constantly throwing in various items he had obtained from the outside world.
The most abundant of these items were magic stones smuggled out by the Awakened company.
For the Great Devourer, these massive magic stones did not require any special mining techniques. They could be directly processed into fragments and then converted by the high-tier units that had been implanted with magic hearts—the Tyrants and Lictors.
Second to that was the genetic information of various organisms.
Whenever live creatures could be captured, they were tossed directly inside; if that was impossible, chunks of flesh or blood samples were used instead.
Under Elise's leadership and with Lin Miao's assistance, the Great Devourer continuously improved and modified itself.
This “Great Devourer-style bioengineering”—which combined the unique traits of various organisms and utilized acquired knowledge of magic, Spirit-Tech, and other civilizations to maximize and modify their capabilities—was a power unique to them in this entire universe.
“How can this be? The main city is about to fall!”
The power developed through the Great Devourer's unique methods was now poised to pierce the heart of the once-vast Elven Empire.
Following the aerial raid, the ground forces that had infiltrated the Great Forest swarmed in from all directions, launching an assault on the elves.
The dense and treacherous Great Forest had always served as a natural fortress protecting the elves.
Any external force wishing to wage war here would have to steel themselves to pay a devastating price.
However, for the Great Devourer, the dense forest was not an obstacle at all.
Although the mutants found it slightly more difficult to navigate as they grew larger and more heavily armored, their ability to break through hazardous terrain remained unmatched.
In fact, the more rugged the terrain, the more formidable the Great Devourer's combat capabilities became.
“When on earth are the reinforcements going to arrive? Are they just going to stand by and watch that sea of monsters march through the Great Forest?!”
“The—the reinforcements have arrived, but they are currently struggling to make their way into the Great Forest.”
In stark contrast, the reinforcements composed of foreign race units controlled and conscripted by the elves were facing immense difficulties fighting in the Great Forest.
The foreign troops unfamiliar with the woodland terrain struggled to maintain formations, making it impossible for them to engage the Great Devourer effectively amidst the dense obstacles.
“W-what is that thing?”
A beastkin warrior at the forefront of a foreign race unit was charging bravely when he suddenly came face-to-face with a bizarre mutant.
It had a flat body covered in a hard carapace from head to tail, resembling a woodlouse, but its true abnormality lay hidden beneath its semi-upright lower torso.
“Argh...”
A massive, pincer-like organ concealed beneath its carapace suddenly burst open, launching stored psionic energy and compressed air projectiles with devastating force.
The impact was so immense that it obliterated the heavily armored body of the robust beastkin warrior, tearing him to shreds.
These jumping bugs combined the traits of pistol shrimp and woodlice, possessing both formidable defense and offense. Stationed at every major choke point, they systematically slaughtered the foreign race units that had come to reinforce Rune.
“I-is this hell?”
The captain of the foreign race unit, who had been rallying his men, looked around blankly as screams and explosions echoed all around him.
The Great Devourer blocked the paths through the Great Forest. While besieging the elves, they used the terrain to their advantage to annihilate the incoming reinforcements.
The ground collapsed as giant-jawed ants lying in ambush raised their massive mandibles, tearing the soldiers who fell into the pitfall to pieces.
Centipedes with colossal, dragon-like bodies emerged in their wake, spraying toxic gas and crushing the survivors with venomous fangs.
Massive wings flapped relentlessly, scattering flesh-corroding toxic dust. The moment these giant moths appeared, the air turned a deep, bruised purple, causing soldiers to drop dead before they could even let out a scream.
Life was ruthlessly hunted down within this massive deathtrap.
The Great Devourer had transformed this forest—revered since ancient times as the cradle of life—into a living hell.
...
Perched atop the World Tree, Sarel grit his teeth as he witnessed the devastation.
The most sacred sanctuary of the Elven Empire, the homeland of his people, was being ruthlessly trampled by monsters.
There was no escape from this vast forest. If they failed to defend it, they would only die here and turn to ash.
Lisette flew up to Sarel and removed her mask. “Well? This is the choice you made.”
Seething with rage, Sarel pointed at the dying forest. “Look, Lisette! Look at what will happen to the world if the Great Devourer takes over!”
The forest was already on the verge of death, ravaged by the acidic toxins and venoms secreted by the Great Devourer.
“It is a tragedy, but the world you envisioned would have been no different,” Lisette replied, her voice cold. “You would have reduced lands far wider than this forest to the exact same state.”
She did not even blink, long since sickened by their hypocrisy and lies.
“Lisette, do you truly intend to destroy the World Tree? The very origin and foundation of our race?!”
“There is no other way if we are to purge the wicked god residing within it. Sarel, you who call yourselves the ‘new elves’ are the ones who forced this end and rebirth upon us from the very beginning.”
Severing the World Tree. Such was the heavy price required to banish the ‘deity’ that had cast its gaze upon this world.
Having learned the truth, Lisette was fully prepared to go down in elven history as their most heinous traitor.
“You speak so grandly, yet in the end, you utter nothing but foolishness!”
In that instant, Sarel screamed as if he could no longer contain his fury. His body rose into the air, instantly swallowed by the violently thrashing branches of the World Tree.
“Sarel!”
Lisette gasped, too shocked to react.
Having merged into the trunk of the World Tree, Sarel began to execute the final command of his god.
Only a select few at the very top, including Sarel, knew the truth: the god ruling the elves was actually the Lord of the World Tree from another planet, an entity specialized in dominating and controlling the elven race and the divine tree.
“The great nature of this land will never tolerate these alien insects that defile our world!”
The fusion entity born from the pure-blooded elf Sarel and the World Tree made its final, desperate stand.
Channeling its will through the roots that spread across the entire Great Forest, it seized control of the land itself, unleashing the true power of the millennial divine tree.
...
【Elise senses the true nature of this unique power and expresses interest】
“Whoa, isn't this a total cheat?”
The furious awakening of the World Tree startled both Elise and Lin Miao.
Lin Miao, in particular, clicked his tongue as he watched the World Tree violently shake, erupting with waves of magic power.
The sheer force of the magic shockwave caused the flying units to fall from the sky like stones. Even Lisette was violently blown back, crashing hard onto the ground.
Even with her formidable strength, Lisette struggled to stand, groaning in pain.
“What is this...”
“The—the earth has gone mad! Get out of the way!”
Worse still, countless roots erupted from the ground, indiscriminately wrapping around elves and foreign race units alike. In an instant, their life force was drained, reducing them to withered mummies.
Already exhausted from battling the Great Devourer, the soldiers panicked upon seeing their comrades shrivel into mummies. Abandoning all thoughts of fighting, they broke ranks and fled in terror.
The World Tree then channeled all the absorbed life force, instantly transforming the surrounding trees into colossal treants to battle the Great Devourer.
Operating as avatars of the Elven God, these treants felt neither pain nor fear. They entered a berserk state, ruthlessly bludgeoning the Great Devourer's units.
This was a desperate contingency plan by the World Tree, which perceived the psionic energy contained within the Great Devourer—as well as the mixed energy it had absorbed—as a vile, unassimilable force.
“To protect this land from external invaders... to maintain order... this is our duty...” Sarel rasped weakly.
“Stop this at once! You're hurting your own people again!”
Lisette yelled in horror as she stared at Sarel, whose face was now a grotesque protrusion of bark on the massive trunk.
Even as an elf, she had never imagined the World Tree was capable of such atrocities.
In truth, this was only possible through the power of a god who thoroughly understood the elves and the World Tree, so Lisette could not be blamed for her ignorance.
“I, and them... We elves are merely fulfilling our purpose. Don't you know, Lisette? We exist for this very reason. In the end, we are nothing but fertilizer. All for this eternal world.”
“Shut up.”
“You must have known. That is why you fled in fear, abandoning your own bloodline to merge with those monsters. But remember, Lisette. You can never escape us.”
Sarel's words shook Lisette's resolve.
Having witnessed the true, terrifying power of the World Tree, a seed of doubt sprouted in her subconscious—perhaps his words were indeed the truth.
“How boring.”
But as Elise, who had been watching the entire spectacle, let out a genuinely bored sneer, Sarel's eyes widened in shock.
“Cough, urgh?! H-how is this possible?”
The once-transcendent Sarel, who had spoken as if he possessed all the wisdom of the universe, suddenly began to groan in sheer panic.
At the same time, the violently thrashing World Tree began to quiet down.
“Ah.”
In that moment, Lisette understood.
Through her connection to the hive mind, she sensed that something had burrowed deep underground and was currently gnawing at the roots and trunk of the World Tree.
“Aaaaaaargh!”
A blood-curdling scream of agony ripped through Sarel's mouth.
Suddenly, the trunk of the World Tree ruptured, and a writhing white shape poked its head out.
It was a colossal termite, using its razor-sharp mandibles to voraciously devour the interior of the tree, which was larger than any skyscraper.
“How dare you commit such an atrocity!”
Enraged, the World Tree mobilized its power, rapidly regenerating its tissues to crush the invading termite.
“Give up. The Queen has already prepared a way to hunt you down.”
Lisette looked at the struggling Sarel and the World Tree with pity.
Behind her, accompanied by the deafening buzz of countless wings, hundreds of giant cicadas flew into view.
Each one was as large as a heavy wagon—true monstrous aberrations.
The giant cicadas landed all over the World Tree, plunging their massive proboscises deep into the wood to greedily guzzle its sap.
“No!”
Sarel's eyes bulged, his voice failing him.
What the cicadas were draining was no ordinary sap.
They were extracting and absorbing the colossal magic power stored within the World Tree.
Once their bellies bloated with magic power, the cicadas withdrew their mouthparts, flew down, and regurgitated the mana to distribute it to the worker ants.
With their bellies emptied, they plunged their proboscises back into the World Tree to resume their relentless exploitation.
Under the onslaught of the swarming cicadas, the World Tree's lush green leaves withered rapidly from the tips, and branches snapped and fell.
The colossal treants, which relied on the World Tree's power to move, collapsed one after another. The World Tree's control over the Great Forest was rapidly fading.
Shaking uncontrollably, Sarel stammered, “Don't tell me...”
“Indeed. I do not know how long it will take, but they will drain every last drop of the World Tree's power.”
Before the World Tree could completely wither, Lisette retrieved a single red fruit hanging from its very crown.
The fruit was larger than her own head.
Inside lay the seed of the World Tree.
“A true, brand-new World Tree—not a fused monstrosity like you—will grow peacefully somewhere else.”
“Lisette!”
Watching her slowly descend to the ground, Sarel—fused with the World Tree as the last servant of his god—screamed in endless agony as his bodily fluids were drained and his insides devoured.
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