A golden sphere, the size of a nail spun rapidly along the surface of the ground, skidding upon it at breakneck speeds. With it being treated as the source a psychokinesis, a stream of Prana stretched out and held a large chakram at a height of 18 kilometres in the sky.
The chakram spanned a radius of five metres, and seated on it were the duo of Yarsha Zahara and Brangara. At this altitude, the air resistance was minimal, allowing for faster travel. Moreover, from time to time, Yarsha Zahara brought out a golden chakram that carried a Storage Lantern towards the surface and retracted it after a few seconds.
Filled to the brim within the Storage Lantern was fresh air that she and Brangara could use to breathe freely.
"How long?" Brangara asked, somewhat grumpy.
"I'm making the setup; it takes some time." Yarsha Zahara replied snappily as she used Harla Brimgan's Spirit Weapons to scoop the nearby earth and layer it on a complicated Spirit Weapon before her.
The Spirit Weapon had a series of concentric disks placed above each other, using a series of psychokinesis upon each other to keep each other afloat with negligible, if not zero resistance.
Following that, she layered the earth over the topmost disk and compressed it as much as possible. Upon crosschecking the earth multiple times, she judged that it was wholly functional.
The topmost disk was able to suspend itself over the network of disks and rotate. There was an immobile rim bordering it, engraved with a series of letters, numbers, and arrows.
"It's done," Yarsha Zahara said as she activated her Primary Nature and turned the earth on the topmost disk into the Sandy-Grey Void, unleashing her power with the intention to expand it without limit.
The moment she did this, Parute Trees popped up on the Sandy-Grey Void and rapidly absorbed the grey sand, so much so that the blanket of night generated by it was snuffed in a matter of seconds.
The concentration with which Yarsha Zahara had unleashed it wasn't strong enough to last for long against Parute Trees. Anywhere from three to five seconds was how long it would take around 36 Parute Trees to fully nullify the Sandy-Grey Void.
The one created by Maroppa had given her plenty of data, using which Yarsha Zahara had created this mechanism. She watched with a smile as the Parute Trees appear before her, with each of them aligned with a marking on the rim.
The moment they appeared, in the short few seconds of their existence, their actions caused the disk to rotate clockwise and counterclockwise faintly. The Parute Trees each pointed at a letter, word, or direction then.
It was like a mixture between a compass and a dial. Each Parute Tree acted as a compass and pointed at a certain word. And as the disc rotated back and forth, the compass pointed at various words at the end of each turn.
This created a set of letters that Yarsha Zahara observed and compiled to form a cohesive sentence.
[What is it?]
That was the first sentence, conveyed to her through the Parute Trees by Sumatra's Transcendent Eater. After it had revealed information regarding Orakha's actions to an excessive level, it was blocked out by Sumatra Continent.
Currently, it was unable to interfere even the slightest. However, that didn't mean its involutory actions were wholly blocked by Sumatra. Whenever any Sandy-Grey Void appears on Sumatra Continent, Sumatra's Transcendent Eater would spontaneously dispatch a series of Parute Trees to stop the damage from exceeding beyond a certain level.
The Parute Trees would contain the damage and eventually shrink the Sandy-Grey Void until the region recovered to its original level. These Parute Trees were no different from one of Sumatra Continent's defence mechanisms.
As a result, Yarsha Zahara took advantage of the loophole. This was the reason she had been gunning to capture Maroppa ever since Yamahara had been able to contact Sumatra's Transcendent Eater.
It was the only way she could converse with a Transcendent, gaining information from the omniscient perspective that Transcendents had of Sumatra Continent. Now, through this disc setup, she was able to converse with Sumatra's Transcendent Eater, even if every exchange of dialogue took a few seconds.
"I want to know where Yamahara is." Yarsha Zahara asked as she stared at one of the Parute Trees before her that had begun wilting once the Sandy-Grey Void had been eradicated.
Immediately after, she unleashed a new layer of Sandy-Grey Void atop the disc, watching a new batch of Parute Trees appear spontaneously to stop its spread. The absorption of the grey sand by their roots created uneven weight distribution on the earth covering the disk, which made it rotate according to the shift in its centre of gravity according to its axis of rotation.
The Parute Trees absorbed in a specific manner, causing the disc to rotate back and forth in a specific set to relay a message. For a Transcendent, it was easy to communicate in such a manner, especially after Yarsha Zahara relayed all the instructions to a Parute Tree.
[I don't know where he is. Blola erased all my means to watch the Varahan Empire when he arrived there. Beyond that, I don't know. But he's alive, somewhere. If he's killed, there's a small possibility that Sumatra would lower the restrictions it has placed around itself and allow the Transcendents to interfere.]
'That makes sense. So, are they keeping him captive to ensure he doesn't create any more Boar Kings?' Yarsha Zahara thought and further inquired about the situation of the Varahan
Empire.
[I can't see any Boar Kings there. Majority of the Wean Clansmen have dropped to the 1-Life Stage and are currently embroiled in a civil war with the Free Humans.]
"Fuck!" Yarsha Zahara cursed in anger, "How can this happen?"
"What about the Royal Guard?" Brangara asked from the side, "In our absence, they will do their best to protect the Wean Clansmen. I had trained them to react in such a manner if that situation ever occurs."
[The Royal Guards are busy escorting the Wean Clansmen to the Varahan Enclave. The Civil War is intensifying as powerful Free Humans with Gold Grade strength have popped up all over the Varahan Empire. And one of them has crowned himself the Emperor.] "That makes no sense!" Yarsha Zahara frowned, "The people won't accept anyone not a Wean Clansmen as their leader. That's common sense in he Varahan Empire."
[There are lots of people who oppose the crowning of the new Emperor. However, there are equally many in support of him too. Narkahamy, that guy, is pretty much an Enigma.]
"Narkahamy..." Yarsha Zahara muttered, frowning as she felt like she had looked into a report with such a name many years ago. However, back then, Narkahamy was merely mentioned by her Peace Keepers as someone to keep a note of for the time being, a deviant mildly different
from the norm.
[He's Lord Nay, leader of Talamas!]
"Shit!" She was frustrated for a moment, "After everything I did to curb stomp that terrorist organisation..."
"Even for you, it's impossible to control everything." Brangara muttered from the side, "We should be able to rectify everything once we arrive there anyway. There's no use losing your mind over this."
"That's my DECADES of HARDWORK!" Yarsha Zahara screamed, "Do you even understand how much effort I put in to create the strongest Empire possible? We were easily on track to dominate the entirety of Sumatra Continent in due time. And now, despite all my
preparations, we're crumbling from within."
"A cavil war? That shouldn't have happened!"
"But it did," Brangara retorted calmly, "The effects have appeared internally, but the cause
could very well be external."
"I know the Mystic Seven is involved in this!" Yarsha Zahara grunted, "That's why I created so many measures to detect them if they were to ever set foot into the Empire."
"They somehow managed to outwit you, accept that and think of a solution." Brangara said, only to be glared at by Yarsha Zahara.
"It's easy for you to say. You're not the one making the plans." She huffed towards the end, following which she closed her eyes in frustration, 'Whatever! They're your descendants more than mine! If you don't care much about them, I won't either.'
'As long as Barla and the rest are safe, I could care shit about the rest!' She scowled and stared
at the wilting Parute Trees, asking, "Tell me whatever you can about our enemies?"
[Inala, Virala, Blola, Grehha, and Resha are nowhere to be seen. I suspect they're with Blola to avoid my detection. As for Yennda, I know where he is currently. Gannala is also nearby.]
"Where is she?" Before Yarsha Zahara could ask anything, there was a surge in presence from nearby as Brangara stared at the Parute Trees with a voracious gaze that even they trembled instinctively, "Where?"
[I'll show you.]
As Yarsha Zahara created the Sandy-Grey Void once again, the Parute Trees appeared to
nullify it, with them aligning with a certain arrow along the process, pointing at a certain
direction.
"Go!" Brangara growled as Yarsha Zahara changed directions immediately, grunting in irritation upon sensing a stream of Astral World's influence pour into her and affect her actions, "Stop urging me!"
"Go, that's all I ask of you, Yarsha." Brangara realised what he was doing and hurriedly retracted his influence, softening his voice upon being glared at by Yarsha Zahara.
"Do that fucking thing one more time and I'm walking away from all this shit!" She screeched
while changing directions to speed in a straight line as pointed by the arrow. From time to time, she recorrected their course according to what the Parute Trees showed every time she unleashed the Sandy-Grey Void.
Five days later, they entered a vast grassland, immediately upon which Brangara's lips parted widely, revealing his teeth as a soft, but excited gasp echoed out, "Hehe! That's the distinct scent of an Empyrean Tusk!"
"I can smell that she's here!"