Halmahera!
The biome within the continent took up the same name, having been turned into a gigantic farm. It was created in the shape of a bird’s nest, with a mountain range forming the ends of the nest.
Halmahera wasn’t a single nest, but a series of concentric nests, each bigger than the previous, and enveloped over each other.
The mountain range curved inward at the top, serving as the boundary of the biome. It was a barrier of sorts, and running like veins within it were circuits transporting Prana. As the biome of Halmahera continues to draw in power from the Sunken Halmahera, the space within it continues to expand, horizontally.
Every expansion is done by creating the boundary, which is represented by the mountain ranges. At present, hundreds of such concentric mountain ranges cover the biome.
From the ground to the ceiling spans around two hundred kilometres, creating a vast world. The earth underground stretches for a thousand kilometres.
The area within the first mountain range, and between the successive ranges, was filled with lakes and endless plains.
The grass wasn’t the fun kind though, as merely brushing past it would cause rashes on the skin of an Iron Grade Pranic Beast. They existed to gradually seep irritation into even a Gold Grade Pranic Beast, for they covered the place.
At discrete locations, around the foot of the mountains in contact with lakes, grew Krave Fil. Their quantities were limited, but they grew in such locations perennially.
Also, in some discrete caves with significant humidity, Spirit Moss grew. Oftentimes, accompanying the Spirit Moss was a Parute Tree.
Past the second ring of mountain ranges, the Brully Race could be seen roaming free. Due to their nature, they typically avoided climbing mountains, and instead liked to run around on the plains.
However, this was where the grass came into play. Individually, it wasn’t potent enough to harm a Brully. Even when combined, their effects weren’t significant enough for a Brully to notice. Prolonged exposure caused irritation, which was spontaneously healed by their Prana.
But with nothing left to stimulate them, even the mildest of irritations felt magnified, which caused the Brully Race members to fight each other, triggered into conflict by the silliest of reasons, including breathing in their general direction.
Boom!
A Brully duo crashed into each other, their fists turning into a golden flash as they rained down dozens of attacks every second. Every hit was brutal, causing flesh to squelch and bones to clatter into smithereens.
A powerful punch launched a Brully into the air, its gaze focused on the aggressor. It was defending itself using its arms, having blocked the punch to its chest. Its arms held the familiar sheen of Rutham, and so did the aggressor.
[Your ugly face is triggering my anger!]
Said the aggressor as it cut off its right arm. The arm regrew, generating a new one made out of Rutham. Meanwhile, the severed arm hovered before it, fists clenched tight.
The Brully roared and rushed towards its opponent, unleashing a series of punches. Seamlessly weaving through the combo of attacks was its severed arm, propelled by psychokinesis as it deftly scurried past the opponent’s defences and grabbed the groin.
Its muscles, formed out of Rutham, twitched as through psychokinesis, the arm flexed its grip and crushed the groin. The pain wasn’t too high, however, thanks to the tolerance capacity of a Brully.
But it was enough to cause the opponent to flinch for a moment, during which attacks were concentrated upon its jaws until it was knocked unconscious. And before it could wake up, the attacker thrust its Rutham arms, cranked in power with psychokinesis, and punctured through the opponent’s chest.
First heart, second, and finally, the third. It ripped out all three hearts and stomped the opponent’s chest repeatedly until the Prana trying to regenerate the heart was fully expended.
Kreee!
The Brully roared in victory as its Spirit Weapon spun around its figure in dominance. After a few roars, it turned around and walked away. Cannibalism wasn’t a trait of the Brully Race.
It walked through the plains until it came across a Maetalla, a creeper found only within the stomach of an Empyrean Tusk in the outside world. Growing on the Maetalla were watermelon-like fruit, which were filled with meat. They were meat-bearing fruits.
It plucked a few and gorged upon them until its stomach was full. And then, it continued to walk aimlessly.
Once it was far away from the corpse of its brethren, there was a soft, yellowish-white glow. The glow cast upon the Brully corpse caused its arms to twitch, following which all the Rutham forming it melted out and seeped into the ground.
The same radiance fell upon the three hearts and caused a bluish substance to seep out, which was the Billakin forming their Spirit Containers.
Once both minerals were extracted, the radiance vanished. As for the Brully corpse, it would continue to remain there as is for weeks, until grass gradually covers it and consumes its nutrients.
A portion of the absorbed Rutham would find itself being deposited in secluded caves, waiting to be discovered by a Brully, which would hammer the mineral into its arms and eventually turn its arms into a Rutham version.
in the outer regions of Halmahera, the Brully Race lived aimless lives. When two of them chance upon each other, they fight to the death. Most of the times, they would be evenly matched, causing them to retreat once they had expended all Prana and stamina.
They would recover and innovate better means to kill their opponent, and would go on the hunt right after finishing preparations. This would continue until one of them dies.
However, this was only when the fighting duo were of the same gender. If they were of the opposite genders, the fight would end with the victor mating with the loser.
If the mating is ever successful, the female Brully would lay an egg, and then immediately start preparing for another fight. The egg would remain unattended in whatever cave it was left in.
There would be a yellowish-white flash from the formation that coursed through the place, alerting one of the Minor Treasures to take action.
From his vantage position, Inala watched a golden humanoid fly through the air while carrying a Brully egg. It seemed like the golden humanoid was flying. But he was just propped up using psychokinesis.
Inala’s eyes darted to the side and noticed faint golden shimmers from the ground, which served as Spirit Weapon anchors, using which the golden humanoid hovered in the air.
Minor Treasure—Kinesis Deity!
Boasting a Spirit Weapon range of 18 kilometres, they flew through the sky, using their psychokinesis to push the circuit lines in the ground. At their maximum height, they were hard to spot, since they could hide around and move through the clouds.
And also, when a golden humanoid grabs a Brully egg, there would only be a golden flash. The formation would alert one of them only after the mother Brully that had laid the egg had gone past detectable range.
Therefore, to date, the Brully Race has never known where their eggs went. First, they didn’t care. And second, they were all out of eyeshot when the Minor Treasures moved in.
"Another one," The golden humanoid commented as he landed on the ground while holding the Brully egg. "This concludes it,"
"Indeed," Another golden humanoid nodded, "After adding this to our data, it’s apparent that our efforts have succeeded."
"The Brully Race’s fertility has gone up by another percent."
’They are playing the long game!’ Inala thought as he eyed the closest golden humanoid, focusing on its forehead, ’They have numbered themselves.’
All the Minor Treasures here were the Minor Treasure of Kinesis Deity. They all seemed to have slightly different variations of the Brimgan Founder’s memories and personalities to boot. And depending on the order of their creation, they had numbered themselves, which was carved into their foreheads.
Kinesis Deity—Number 28!
This was the one that had brought in the Brully egg just now, and the one Inala noticed moving around the place tirelessly.
"Let’s see..." The golden humanoid numbered 43 touched Inala’s fingers and felt around in admiration. A short while later, he extracted a few droplets of blood, stored them safely in a test tube, and flew away.
They were currently in the innermost region, bordered by the first mountain range that had formed. It was circular in shape, with a radius of ninety kilometres. It was completely covered by weird structures made out of Billakin, and flying in and out of them were the golden humanoids.
Originally, when Inala was brought to the place, he wanted to resist. However, the moment he spotted the number on the golden humanoids, he knew he couldn’t win against a horde of Minor Treasures. After all...
Kinesis Deity—Number 144!
That was the highest number he had seen in the past month. This meant that Halmahera had a minimum of 144 Minor Treasures. Of course, the real number would be even more bloated.
’This is a farm created by that man, after all.’ Inala sighed and stared at the golden humanoids touching his hands casually, engaged in research, ’I wonder how long they training to attain such exceptional control over themselves?’
After all, when they touched him, they didn’t fuse with his body, which was how Minor Treasures functioned. It meant they had devised techniques to prevent such a phenomenon.
His curiosity was raving, as there were countless things he could learn in this place. However, there was one aspect of Halmahera that absolutely terrified him, ’This is why I never divulged any information about it back when I was the Royal Zinger.’
From time to time, there would be a shine through the ground, revealing the existence of a circuit, ’It’s such a ridiculously obsessive power with capabilities of infinite accumulation.’
Nature—Prana Circuit!