Chapter 1206: Just A Breath Away

An upgraded subordinate materialized from the Distortion Door as Hackzord stepped through.

“Have you found anything?”

“No.” Hackzord studied its own hands. “Probably the Eye Demon guard made a mistake.”

“That does happen occasionally.” The subordinate paused. “You could rest at the Red Mist Pond, sir. Sir Valkries always bathes there. I think you could relax your muscles from time to time.”

It was a reasonable suggestion. Hackzord had not been immune to the appeal — the Realm of Mind offered pleasures neither war nor duty allowed. But if anything went wrong with the Western Front plan, the king would not place the blame on the Nightmare. The weight of consequences fell on Hackzord alone.

“It would be too much for you to connect four Eye Demon guards simultaneously,” Hackzord said after a moment. “We’ve entered the most crucial stage. I’d better monitor the situation myself. This is the last stronghold on the Western Front — we mustn’t fail the king.”

The subordinate stiffened at the name. Its fervor came quick and bright, like kindling catching. “You’re right, sir! I shall not let the king down!”

Valkries was the one that let its guard down.

Hackzord thought this without expression.

After Ursrook’s death at Taquila, this mountain district had become the fulcrum of the entire Western Front. Hackzord had pressed hard for four Eye Demon guards — rare, precious, jealously hoarded at the front — to be assigned here. Constant vigilance was the price of the plan.

Eye Demons suffered no restriction of distance, light, or scale. Their vision reached everywhere at once, and any creature that posed a real threat or behaved strangely was immediately transmitted to the connected demons. The connection drained magic power in enormous quantities, so only upgraded demons could sustain it. The world Eye Demons perceived was overwhelming in its complexity: too much information, taken whole, would paralyze rather than serve. So they screened. They evaluated. They filtered the world down to what mattered.

Hackzord had felt the alert just moments ago.

As the subordinate said, Eye Demons erred. Creatures carried their own inscrutably individual patterns of behavior — no comprehensive logic governed them all. There was the king, unreadable as ever, and eccentrics like the Mask. Eye Demons lacked the critical faculty to reason through such anomalies, and that deficiency had cost them: not a single Eye Demon had upgraded to Senior Lord across thousands of years, despite their massive magic reserves. Yet the clan counted them rare regardless, their birth rate barely exceeding those of the Hatcher and the Mother of Soul.

Hackzord changed direction. “How is the Birth Tower revival progressing?”

“Almost complete. Everything is going well.”

“Good. Take me there.”

“Yes, my lord!”

The God’s Stones prevented any direct descent into the valley floor. Hackzord followed the staircase down through layered rock, each step carrying them deeper into a thickening redness. The air grew heavy with Red Mist. The towering precipice walls formed a natural vessel — stone shaped by no hand into a basin perfect for accumulation. More than half a year had passed since they began, and the lower reaches of the rapture now ran dense with Mist enough to sustain thousands of lives.

Still not enough.

Only the Birth Tower, rooted in the God’s Stone mine itself, would anchor their survival to this land — free them from the fear of sudden supply failure.

The sunlight did not reach the bottom. A blue-purple ghost-light took its place, sourceless and cold. Between the God’s Stone of Punishment Pillars, a stone tower rose in magnificence.

Something struck Hackzord in the chest — not quite wonder, not quite pride. A faint tremor of excitement, difficult to name.

“No matter how many times I see it,” the guard said quietly, “it awes me. Before, we could only erect the tower when the Origin of Magic appeared.”

“Yes,” Hackzord said. “But this is not the second Battle of Divine Will.”

The Birth Tower before them had not grown from the God’s Stone mine. It was an older structure, transported and set in place — blotchy gray, inert against its massive base, not yet alive. Hackzord knew that appearance was temporary. Soon the Mother of Soul would thread its connection down through the stone, linking tower to mine, and the gray would give way to something else.

This was the inheritance of the legacy shards. Four hundred years of hard revision — their understanding of magic power, of magic stones, of what they required to survive — had accumulated to this: they were less beholden to the Red Mist than they had ever been. The towers could be moved. The process could be shortened.

But humans had also progressed. Hackzord held no illusions about that.

Hackzord stopped at the tower base and looked at the dormant Mother of Soul.

She was the origin of everything. The most irreplaceable individual in the entire clan. Her maturity required magic power at its fullest peak and the emergence of Divine Will — at which point she would fuse with raw God’s Punishment Stone, and within years the mine would transform into a high tower producing Red Mist through magic power alone.

Their new technology had compressed that long labor considerably. A faster Birth Tower meant a shorter preparation cycle, less time wasted before the war could be carried to its conclusion. With Red Mist produced in abundance, they could use it as a weapon outright — push it into enemy territory, claim that land as their own.

Nearly a hundred Inferior Demons tended the Mother of Soul: cleaning her, feeding her. The entire floor of the rapture swarmed with thousands of them. Through the tower base’s windows Hackzord watched them — excavating, transporting, moving in the ceaseless rhythm of an army at work. Upgraded demons directed operations from atop their Bogle Beasts. At the rapture’s center stood the symbiotic demons the Mask had newly created: powerful war machines waiting for the word.

For a moment, the rapture felt like a front in itself.

In a sense, it was. If they failed to stop humanity on this continent, their civilization’s future became uncertain beyond imagining. This battle had to be won.

For the clan. For the king.

They must not fail.

Chapter 1206 - Just A Breath Away

Translator: Transn Editor: Transn “Have you found anything?” An upgraded subordinate came up to Hackzord as it revealed from the Distortion Door. “No…” Hackzord said while studying its hands attentively. “Probably the Eye Demon guard made a mistake.” “That does happen occasionally. You could take a rest at the Red Mist Pond, sir. I’ll alert you if anything comes up.” The subordinate paused for a second before it went on, “Sir Valkries always bathes in this pond. I think… you could also relax your muscles in there every now and then.” This was a pretty good idea. Hackzord did want to indulge in such a mundane pleasure and explore the beauty of the Realm of Mind. However, the king would not put blames on the Nightmare if anything went wrong with the plan for the Western Front. Instead, Hackzord was the one who would bear all the consequences. After a moment of silence, Hackzord answered, “It would be too much for you to connect four Eye Demon guards at the same time. We’ve entered the most crucial stage of our plan, so I’d better monitor the situation myself. This is the last stronghold on the Western Front, and we mustn’t fail the king.” The subordinate’s manner instantly tightened into formality as it heard the king’s name. It replied fervently, “You’re right, sir! I shall not let the king down!” Valkries was the one that let its guard down. Hackzord thought to himself expressionlessly. After Ursrook’s tragic death at Taquila, this mountainous area became the focus of the Western Front plan. Hackzord exercised all its efforts to monitor this district. It had persuaded the front to spare four precious Eye Demon guards to monitor this area so that Hackzord could remain constant vigilance about lurking enemies. Eye Demons, whose vision would not be restricted by distance, lighting conditions, or the size of objects, were the most astute observers. They could immediately sense enemies and inform the demons connected to them. As the connection required a great deal of magic power, only upgraded ones were qualified to connect with Eye Demons. The world that Eye Demons saw were extremely complicated. They would not be able to mobilize themselves if they accepted all the information they received. Therefore, Eye Demons would normally conduct a preliminary screening and evaluate each creature they beheld in advance. Only those who posed a real threat or act strangely would be informed to the connected demons. Hackzord had sensed unusual movements just a moment ago. Like the subordinate had said, Eye Demons did make errors from time to time. This was because creatures tended to have their own unique ways to respond to nature, and not all of their behaviors were comprehensible. There was, for example, someone as inscrutable as the king, and also eccentrics like the Mask. Eye Demons, which lacked independent and critical thinking skills, sacrificed a lot for the thousands of eyes that encrusted their heads. As such, even though they possessed enormous magic power, not a single Eye Demon had upgraded to a Senior Lord over the past thousands of years. Nevertheless, Eye Demons were still deemed as a rare species by the clan, whose birth rate was only a little higher than those of the Hatcher and the Mother of Soul. Hackzord changed the subject. “How’s the revival of the Birth Tower going?” “It’s almost done. Everything’s going well.” “Very good. Take me there.” “Yes, my lord!” Due to the impact of God’s Stones, Hackzord could not go straight to the bottom of the valley and had to slowly make its descent through a flight of stairs. As they went down, the surroundings gradually turned into a whirl of crimson. The air was impregnated with the Red Mist, and the towering precipices formed a giant vessel, a natural container chiseled out of rocks, where the Red Mist could easily accumulate. After more than half a year of accumulation, the lower part of the rapture was now permeated with the thick, dense Red Mist that could support thousands of lives. However, Hackzord needed more than that. Only when they erected the Birth Tower from the God’s Stone mine could their kind truly survive on this land, without fearing a sudden disruption of the Red Mist supply. The sunlight was completely replaced by a ghostly blue-purple light at the very bottom of the rapture. A stone tower stood magnificently before Hackzord among the God’s Stone of Punishment Pillars. A faint tremor of excitement smote upon Hackzord. “No matter how many times I view it, it always awes me,” the guard commented. “Before, we were only able to erect the tower when the Origin of Magic appeared.” “Yes, but it isn’t the second Battle of Divine Will anymore,” Hackzord said with a nod. This particular Birth Tower was actually not supposed to be here because it did not grow out of the God’s Stone mine but was an old one that had been set up a while ago. Although it currently relied on a huge base to support its weight, and its blotchy gray color signified a state of inactiveness, Hackzord knew this was just temporary. Soon, the tower would be reconnected to the God’s Stone mine via the Mother of Soul. This was the upgrade they had obtained from the legacy shards. Over the past 400 years, their understanding of magic power and magic stones had experienced various drastic changes. The most important change was that they slowly became less independent of the Red Mist. Nonetheless, human beings also made remarkable progress. Hackzord approached the tower base and gazed at the dormant Mother of Soul. The Mother of Soul was the origin of everything, the most important individual out of the whole clan. It would only reach its maturity when magic power reached its peak and when the Divine Will emerged. By that time, the Mother of Soul would be fused with the raw God’s Punishment Stone. Within a few years, the God’s Stone mine would transform into a high tower that would further produce more Red Mist via magic power. Yet their new technology had considerably shortened this lengthy process. A fast-growing Birth Tower meant much less time to prepare for the war. As they would soon have ample Red Mist, they could even use the Red Mist as a weapon and quickly convert the enemy’s territory into their own. There were nearly 100 Inferior Demons taking care of the Mother of Soul. They cleaned and fed her. In fact, the bottom of the great rapture was filled with thousands of such Inferior Demons. Through the window of the tower base, Hackzord saw those demons busy excavating the ground and transporting supplies. Some upgraded demons, on the other hand, were issuing commands on their Bogle Beasts. In the center of the rapture stood the symbotic demon newly created by the Mask. These powerful war machines would swarm toward their enemies upon an order. For a moment, Hackzord had an illusion that this place was the real front. In fact, this rapture was, in a sense, a frontline. If they failed to stop human beings on this continent, their future would become dismally uncertain. They had to defeat the mankind here to save their civilization. Therefore, they must win this battle for the king!