Wrath chuckled as he waited for his squad to arrive. While he was waiting, he noticed tender tree shoots breaking through the surface of the soil.
Shoots were appearing everywhere at once. It was as if he was witnessing a sped up version of a video on the growth of plants.
But he wasn't surprised because this was a common sight in Lignum. In fact, he was used to it.
Then the sun rose up in the sky. Its light brightened the Lignum world and kicked it into gear.
The fresh shoots began to grow rapidly. They expanded and lengthened visibly as they reached for the skies. It was as if many years had passed in an instant.
This too is a common sight in Lignum. It is expected that by the time the sun sets, the forest would have returned to at least half its full size.
By night fall, no one would be able to know that a demigod had once uprooted all the trees in the surroundings and used them to fight. The forest would become available for another round of uprooting
The oddity in the operation of this world is the lake of lava. No shoot was growing in it, and he doubts anything will be able to grow in the area for a while.
But even he knows that it is only for a while. As soon as the lake solidifies in rock, the eager roots of trees will begin working to break it up. The rock will be crushed and weathered into soil quickly.
This is a process that will normally take millions of years on Earth-11. But it will probably be completed in less than a year on Lignum. Even before then, trees would have found a way to grow through the thick layer of rock and the forest would have returned.
Thinking about this possibility made him shake his head in wonder.
After his squad was complete, he rushed towards the giant worm nearby.
This was what he busied himself with over the following days. Aside from hiding whenever demigods showed up and began to fight, he did his best to kill enemies and earn merit points.
He grew rapidly for a while, but then his growth in kill count and merit points began to fall after three days. It is because the elves were giving ground and were falling back to gather their strength for another round.
Their strategic retreat took place after the fifteenth day that the Yggdrasil civilization began the invasion.
It could be because another elven king died or because the human army possessed too many strong soldiers compared to the defenders of Lignum.
The Yggdrasil civilization army was superior in quality and had many soldiers who had survived the invasion of many worlds. Plus, the human army was prepared for this invasion as opposed to the resistance army, which was caught off guard.
So the retreat of the resistance was bound to happen. This was why the Purple Moon Elven King was ambushing mortals.
She wanted to narrow the gap in top combatants of the mortals but overextended her reach when she tried to kill someone who could sense her.
She failed and died. Then another demigod died two days after.
Three days after her death, the elves began to fall back. They stopped creating more spiked trees and led their giant worms away.
This made Kelvin lose targets to kill and destroy, which slowed his growth. But it granted the human army much-needed space to entrench themselves into the world.
Without the acid rain, equipment could be used again. And without the spiked trees, the flying creatures and aircraft of the human army were no longer in danger of being picked off.
The offensive capabilities of the human army had increased now that they could use their equipment and cloaks and could combine ground assault with airstrikes.
But the human army didn't press the advantage. Instead, they began building bases and factories.
The first things they set up were refinement engines. These engines were large cylindrical structures with a single large opening for input at the end of the cylinder and many small exits for output along the length of the cylinder.
Sand and rocks were excavated from the world and poured into the input port. Then they were refined by the engine into various materials like metal sheets, metal rods, glass panes, and many more.
There was another type of refinement engine that worked solely with the atmosphere. It sucked in air from the atmosphere, compressed it, and separated it into different liquid gases.
All of these were powered with energy from the portable nuclear reactors that the army had prepared. This way, raw materials from the world were transformed into refined materials.
The refined materials were then placed in the 3D printers, which transformed them into the needed shapes and structures. Different guns, the army armor, and various equipment were built this way.
The refined materials could also be used directly to build structures directly. Bases and storage were built this way.
Soon a drone and bot assembly line was built. Excavators and aircraft were also built.
Raw materials from the world were being converted into manpower and firepower by the moment. So the resistance army was not the only one building their strength.
At this rate the advantage quantity of the resistance army will be slowly eroded. The longer the resistance waits before they strike, the more difficult it would be for them to uproot the invasive species that has entered their world.
While this was happening, the soldiers were not idle. They were given several missions of strategic importance. One of them drew Kelvin's attention.
Kelvin looked at it and was confused. He said, "This can't be right. They want us to chop down trees? Is that a good use of our time?"
He looked around him and noticed that every robot that was just created was sent to chop down trees as soon as they stepped out of the assembly line.