Six chambers, three on either side, lined the walls of the room, emitting a subdued hum. In the center stood a square table, reminiscent of the one in the control room.
Theon moved cautiously towards the table, placing his palm on it and allowing his Lu to slowly resonate with the table. As if waiting for it, the table buzzed to light upon his touch, glowing with an ethereal azure glow that bathed the surroundings.
'This database has higher clearance than the one I've been using.'
With a swift movement Theon probed through the new database, fingers dancing across the surface as he pulled data and cross-referenced truths. Then—
"So that's it…." Theon murmured.
Ever since finding out that Serenera was a second planar world, Theon had always been curious about how he, someone with no cultivation, had held his own against the zombies the first time he had entered.
Now, the answer lay before him, sealed in the six chambers lining the walls.
Cryogenic vaults. Each housed a figure frozen in time, chosen by the Sylvian Empire to outlast ruin.
On the right lay the last remnants of the royal family: Lunfen Ashford, the very king he had seen the projection of. Amara Ashford, the queen, her face still regal in stasis; and Emeric Ashford, the sole surviving prince, his brothers lost to Nyxara's war.
On the left lay the Empire's finest loyalists: Helga Emberstrike, the most skilled alchemist in the Sylvan Empire, Reginald Hastings, the head butler of the royal family and one of the most skilled spearman within the empire, and lastly Nigel Whitworth, the only man in the entire history of the Sylvian empire that had reached the ninth level within the 2nd plane.
Though, such power could never come without sacrifice.
[Project Ash]
To sustain beings of such magnitude, an equal measure of energy was required—and so the Sylvain Empire had sacrificed its very foundation to survive.
Everything was spent. Treasures amassed over millennia, vaults of inherited wealth, entire legacies of knowledge—all discarded, all poured into the desperate machinery of their salvation. The king had stripped the palace bare, sending his most loyal into the world's forgotten corners to create outposts.
On the surface, the outposts seemed random. Hidden in dead cities, buried under mountains, sunk into lightless ocean trenches. But if all of the maps of the bases were to be layered— the truth would bleed through.
A formation spanning the entire planet.
The Sylvian Empire had gambled everything on this formation, and now its failure was Theon's opportunity. Using every resource they had accumulated, they had laid out a plot hidden for millennia. The formation hummed even now, syphoning Lu from the world itself, draining the lifeblood of their home to feed the six slumbering figures who were the empire's last hope.
But something was wrong, the mechanism had malfunctioned. The formation was overdrawing, consuming far more than necessary. The air here was thin, the ambient Lu weaker than even the most barren first-plane world.
Theon's fingers hovered over the database's terrain projections—once-lush forests now skeletal, their canopies reduced to ash after centuries of Lu starvation. Rivers ran sluggish and gray, their waters thick with sediment where energy should have flowed. Even the air carried the metallic tang of a world bleeding out, its core rhythms faltering.
Worst were the dead zones. Vast stretches where the formation's nodes had greedily overfed, reducing soil to barren powder. No crops grew there. No animals ventured close. Only the mindless dead wandered those wastes, their bodies stubbornly animate despite the land's expiration.
Theon's gaze swept over the six chambers embedded in the walls, each cradling a figure crucial to the Sylvain line. His fingers brushed the glass, tracing the faltering currents of energy, seeking out the weakest current.
His theory was simple: the stronger the cultivator, the more energy required to sustain them. Age and title supported it—the King, the very figurehead Theon had seen projected during his exploration, Lunfen Ashford, would be the easiest mark.
After the Prince, of course.
But the Prince would come later.
Kneeling beside the King's chamber, Theon traced the back of the pod, his fingertips seeking the hidden seams of the mechanism. The dim glow of the control panel cast jagged shadows across his face as he worked—bump, crevice, bump.
'There.'
His breath steadied. With deliberate precision, he began etching Lu into the chamber's surface, his energy leaving a faint, shimmering trail.
First formation: Absorption.
He closed his eyes, visualizing the pattern—a square within a circle, stability glyphs interlocking like chains. Lightning crackled to life under his touch, arcing across the chamber's surface in jagged blue veins.
The first formation would absorb the electrical Lu within the chamber rendering it useless for a second, causing the failsafe to initiate and awaken the King.
Second formation: Influx.
Theon's own Lu traced through the second formation—a spiral of inverted glyphs, their edges barbed like thorns. Sweat beaded at his temples. The air hummed with gathering power.
This second formation would stop the failsafe. It should flood Theon's own Lu into the chamber, and judging by what the electricity flowing in his meridians did to him, it should be enough to kill a weakened, unconscious King immediately.
Final formation: Resonance.
A double-helix of interwoven glyphs flared to life between the other two formations.
Though Theon might have made it sound simple, this was a highly intricate process and the transition between the absorption and influx would need a stabiliser, and that's where this formation would come in, making sure that the flow of Lu was as intended.
But just one formation complex wouldn't be enough.
'Two more.'
His fingers danced with lethal precision, each glyph searing itself into existence. The second formation unfolded like a blooming nightmare—a lattice of intersecting lines that throbbed with unnatural vitality. The third completed their unholy trinity, its inverted structure mirroring the first in perfect, predatory symmetry.
Theon exhaled—slow, deliberate—as if the weight of the world balanced on that single breath.
His Lu surged, a river of raw power flooding into the formation complexes. The air itself trembled in anticipation.
The storm was unleashed.
Lightning without sound split the chamber, a blinding cascade of blue-white fury. The formations detonated in perfect, devastating sequence:
Absorption struck first.
A flawless execution. The electrical currents within the King's chamber flickered—stuttered—then died. An involuntary shiver passed through Theon as the failsafe protocol activated, briefly awakening the King from his cryogenic sleep. However, his eyes remained closed, and the chamber returned to its dormant state.
Influx came next.
Theon's Lu twisted into the chamber, tendrils of his energy slithering into the King's dormant power. The reaction was instantaneous.
A crack—like the sky breaking apart.
Blue fire erupted, a maelstrom of energy whipping through the chamber. The walls groaned. The cryogenic pod trembled, its surface webbed with fractures as the King's Lu fought back—wild, untamed, a beast refusing the leash.
Theon's teeth clenched. His veins burned. Every fiber of his being screamed to pull back, but he held firm.
One. More. Push.
With a roar of will, he drove his power deeper.
The chamber exploded in light.
For an eternity, there was only brilliance—then silence.
Theon's vision cleared. The air reeked of scorched metal and spent energy. Before him, the King's chamber stood dark, the once-vibrant glow of his Lu now extinguished.
The King's chest did not rise. His fingers did not twitch.
Only stillness remained.
Success.