Yet the life energy of the magical beast still flowed through the Void.
The walk allowed the Abomination to both preserve most of the life force and honor the sacrifice of the Ry. That along with the guilt was enough to keep Derek’s mind keen as he scoured his surroundings for another prey.
With every sip of life force he consumed, his shame grew. The Void had killed the magical beast because possessed by the hunger, not because he wanted to. It was an unforgivable act of weakness, something that Derek wouldn’t allow to happen a second time.
On top of that, he no longer considered the endless appetite of the Abomination like a biological need but as an enemy. And like against all of his enemies, Derek McCoy kept his guard up and fought it with everything he had.
As he walked through an empty clearing, he perceived everything around him with painful clarity. The worms digging through the soft soil below him, the feeble vitality of the grass blades, and even the thin world energy spread throughout the air.
The whole Mogar looked like a meal to him but it was one made of scraps. Every bite reminded him of the pleasure of feeding but there wasn’t enough to slow down his growing hunger.
It frustrated him to the point that, under normal circumstances, he would have fallen into a frenzy like back on Mount Marala.
Not that night. The rage and the hunger only sharpened his senses as he used every iota of self-control he had to preserve what was left of the Ry’s life force one second longer.
It was the reason the Void perceived the shift in the world energy as the Chroniclers approached him.
The servants of the World Tree had found Lith with Root Cause and followed him, biding their time for the moment when he would be more vulnerable. They still had no idea how their colleague had failed to kill him and the fact that Lith still carried his equipment worried the elves.
He was one of the few people on Mogar capable of using Blade Spells so the Chroniclers couldn’t rush in. To make matters more confusing, Lith moved slowly while keeping high vigilance which contradicted the information about him suffering from amnesia.
The cloaking rings he wore blurred his figure under Soul Vision too much to be certain he really was in his Abomination form. In the darkness of the night and with most of his head covered by the helm, only his fangs were clearly visible.
The Chroniclers knew he wasn’t in his human form, but that was it.
Even without Solus, Lith was famous for his ability to plan complex schemes while leading his enemies to underestimate him. Now that the Yggdrasill was one of them, the Tree second-guessed every one of their moves, afraid of ending up like those who had tried to kill Lith in the past.
The Chroniclers had followed him for hours to check he wasn’t leading them into a trap of his own. They kept their distance, avoiding using spells that would have revealed their position to the Abomination’s hunger and relying on Soul Vision.
‘Something is wrong.’ Derek thought, his paranoia shutting his mouth for the first time in a while. ‘I can feel holes in the energy around me. I would think this is just another difference with Earth if these holes didn’t move in formation and weren’t surrounding me.’
The Darwen of the Chroniclers’ armor made them invisible to mystical senses and spells. A darkness enchantment canceled their smell while an air enchantment silenced their steps.
The only sign of their presence was the lack of any presence. If one looked carefully, they would notice that the world energy was thinner where a Chronicler hid. Or, in the Void’s case, he felt it in the pit of his ever-hungry stomach.
‘Danger, Will Robinson! Danger!’ The Voidfeather Dragon screamed telepathically, hoping that either the Void or Ragnarök would receive his warning.
The angry blade actually listened to the thoughts of both the Abomination and the Dragon. It conjured the Gleipnir enchantment to gain control over part of Derek’s mana and the power cores of the rest of the equipment.
‘He discovered us!’ The Chronicler closest to the Void spotted the golden chains with Soul Vision and warned the others.
They had no use for a mind link, using their Yggdrasill wood equipment to relay the message.
‘We need to stop him before he casts his Blade Spell or we’ll die before we can conjure Silverwing’s Annihilation!’
The World Tree didn’t take any risk. They wanted to kill Lith quickly, collect a piece of his equipment to convince Solus of his demise and break her will. The Tree needed her to stop fighting back to move on to the next phase of their plan.
The Tree’s scheme to gain the Zouwu’s trust and Menadion’s tower had been a success but everything after that had been an utter failure.
Even worse, as long as Lith was alive, there was a chance the Tree’s involvement might be exposed and their Fringe besieged by the Eldritches. Something the Yggdrasill wanted to avoid at all costs.
While seven Chroniclers assembled to conjure the anti-Guardian spell, the final member of the kill team jumped out of his hiding spot to draw the Abomination’s attention.
The elf had already prepared the tier five spell, Frozen Wasteland, and shapeshifted his staff into a polearm with a Davross head.
The sight of the black-clad figure stopped Derek on the spot way before Frozen Wasteland hit. His mind was flooded by the memory of the bloody wound blooming on Solus’ chest back at Mogar’s Garden.
Of the mysterious man who had taken the stone ring away from him back at the hunting cabin. Of the bastard who had robbed him of something, no, someone precious.
‘He’s one of the bastards who took Solus!’ The Voidfeather screamed in outrage and even though only the last word reached the Void’s mind, it was enough.
The boiling rage snapped Derek out of his shock and he stared in anger at the thief. The Darwen armor made Life Vision useless but he recognized the spell from memory.
The blue luminescence on the elf’s fingertips, the way he shifted his weight for the palm strike, everything triggered the memory of M’Rael hitting Lith. The memory of M’Rael stealing Solus.
The palm strike connected with unexpected ease, releasing Frozen Wasteland upon contact. The spell drained the humidity in the Void’s surroundings with air magic and unleashed a cold wave with water magic.
The two effects synergized in a loop that instantly dropped the temperature of the Abomination by over one hundred degrees. It was a spell devised by one of the first World Trees to get rid of any Dragon, especially Leegaain, who might get too much a fancy to their secrets.
The Void’s body exploded like an over-inflated balloon, generating a thin mist of silvery droplets from the shattered Voidwalker armor and black ones from his darkness body.
‘Wait, what?’ The Chronicler was flabbergasted. ‘Verhen has the mass of a Divine Beast. I wasn’t supposed to push him even one millimeter away. He can’t die this easily, can he?’
