Chương 211

The chalk tapped loudly against the slate board, drawing the attention of the two dozen witches gathered in the hastily cleared antechamber of the observatory. It had only been a day since the Sanctum forces arrived, turning the abandoned structure into a busy Forward Operating Base. Tents had been set up in the snow, communication relays established, and a constant flow of personnel came and went, completing scouting missions, relaying orders from the Sanctum command, and making it a very active place.

Orion pointed to the rough anatomical diagram he had drawn of a monster's core, hiding a smile at how nostalgic this whole thing made him feel.

"The corruption from the canisters affects the ability to draw mana first," Orion explained, keeping his voice calm and steady.

"You won't see normal territorial displays. The creature won't try to intimidate you, and it won't back down if wounded. It will just try to kill you, completely ignoring its own self-preservation." He paused and adjusted his glasses. A few of the older witches in the front row exchanged skeptical glances. One of them, a Magistra with silver streaks in her hair, looked offended just to be there.

It wasn't hard to read the room; being lectured on biology by a young male who hadn't even graduated irritated their pride.

"If the corruption is so absolute," a younger witch drawled, crossing her arms, "why not just burn the forests and sweep the ashes? Why tiptoe around these 'canisters'? We can easily restore the environment once we're done." Orion didn't bristle at the interruption, though he really wanted to. Instead, he limited himself to tapping the diagram again and giving her a dry look.

"Because the canisters are pressurized with a highly concentrated, alchemically altered variant of the Silence. If you indiscriminately burn the area, the heat will rupture the casings. A single canister bursting will release a cloud of anti-magic gas that we expect to spread to hundreds of feet. If you are caught in it, your ability to cast will be greatly reduced, and you will be defenseless against whatever frenzied wildlife survives the fire."

The witch opened her mouth to argue further, but a sudden drop in temperature silenced her. The classroom door opened on its own, just as Asteria was passing by. She didn't look at them or speak, but the ambient mana in the room subtly shifted, pressing down on the gathered witches like a physical reprimand. The woman swallowed her objection, and her posture immediately straightened.

"You will have to approach the targets with surgical precision," Orion resumed, as if there had been no interruption. He'd have preferred it if his mother didn't need to occasionally remind the witches of her presence, but fortunately, the first successful team had returned early that morning, so he wouldn't have to teach for much longer.

"Isolate the affected monsters, eliminate them without area-of-effect collateral, and secure the device. That should be the order of operations. As long as you remember that, and don't bite more than you can chew, you should be fine." He paused to see if there would be more questions, but when no one spoke up, he gave a curt nod.

"Dismissed." The witches filed out, moving to form their respective squads, and Orion let out a quiet sigh, wiping the chalk dust from his hands.

"You handled that well," Dorian noted, stepping up beside him, fully armored and carrying his shield.

"They only listen because my mother is breathing down their necks," Orion muttered.

"I suspect there will be quite a few accidents out in the fields. Hopefully, the witches who have just come back will have better results. Is the team ready?"

"Yep!" Luna said, spinning her wand between her fingers. She was clearly eager to get back into the field, and while he'd normally make a joke here, he was very much in the same situation. I knew calling for help would make this a big deal, but I'd hoped we'd be moving faster. Oh well, I guess that's the price to pay with an organization like the Sanctum. Slow to get started, but incredibly hard to stop once it begins. Selene emerged from the shadows near the doorway, offering a scroll.

"I've gotten confirmation of our sector. We can leave whenever we want." Orion nodded and took it, briefly skimming its contents. Their mission was to reach a peak called the Shaded Ridge, a dense forest of snow pines that clung to the slopes just below the frost line. They left the observatory in good time, flying away on their brooms thanks to the many wards set around the peak to calm the winds, and in less than an hour, they reached their destination. The Shaded Ridge truly lived up to its name.

The canopy of the snow-pines was so dense it blocked out most of the sunlight, keeping the forest floor in constant twilight, and the snow was patchy, mixed with dead needles and frozen mud. Once they landed, it didn't take long for Orion to find the first signs of corruption. If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

"Look at the bark," he whispered, holding up a hand to stop the formation. The massive pine trunks oozed black and gray sludge that pooled in the snow, giving off a chemical smell that made it hard to enjoy the scenery.

"The roots must be drinking it directly from the water table," Luna murmured in preoccupation.

"Watch your step," Selene said, her voice dropping an octave. Her silver eyes glowed as they fixated on the supposedly solid ground ahead.

"The enemy is already aware of us." Orion engaged [Hypotheticism], scanning the mana field and saw that indeed, the ambient energy of the forest was erratic enough to suggest magic was being cast, but he couldn't find the origin.

"They'll strike in five seconds," she warned, lifting her wand in preparation.

"Beneath you, Dorian!" Dorian didn't hesitate to follow her command. He simply drove the bottom edge of his shield into the dirt, casting the hexagonal shield Orion had drilled into him just moments before as the earth exploded beneath him. A root as wide as a man erupted from the soil, hitting the bottom of Dorian's shield with the force of a truck. The golden-white shield blazed brightly, maintaining its shape, and the root cracked against the unyielding surface, splintering into wooden shrapnel.

"Treants!" Dorian shouted, bracing himself as the ground shook. All around them, the trees began to shift, showing that they weren't just pines but monsters. The treants pulled their roots out of the polluted soil, their bark shifting to reveal glowing, grey-veined hollows where their faces should be. Damn it. Normal treants are already tough enough to handle, but corrupted ones? We might really have to go scorched earth here.

[Corrupted Snowpine Treant - Fallen Guardian] Class: [Snowpine Treant] [C-rank] Level: 59 Mind: 11 Attunement: 121 Body: 289 Traits: Internal Mana Manipulation [C-rank]; Tremorsense [C-rank]; Sturdy Bark [C-rank]; Magic Resistance [C-rank] There were four of them, surrounding them on all sides, and while each one individually wasn't much of a threat, it was a different story when they worked together. And even worse, this is only the start. If there is one group of treants, there will always be more.

"Selene, on your left!" Orion called out, taking aim at the fastest one that was approaching her with its roots.

"I have it!" Selene didn't try to retreat behind Dorian, as he'd expected. Instead, she moved smoothly to the side, anticipating a sweeping branch before it even swung, and just as the wooden arm passed inches over her head, she thrust her wand upward. An orb of intense light exploded directly against the Treant's joint, shattering the iron-hard wood and completely tearing off the limb. The Treant shrieked, and its roots writhed, although the damage was relatively minor considering the number of its appendages.

Luna, on the other hand, had taken advantage of the chaos to concentrate on the middle of their formation. Power was gathering around her, and Orion ensured she had the time she needed, pushing the monsters back with repeated [Gravity Cannons]. Finally, she exhaled and pointed her wand at one of the treants. An orange beam hissed through the forest, punching through the monster's thick trunk and burning a neat hole right through where its organs were. The giant tree froze, then collapsed backward into the snow.

"Two down, two to go!" Dorian called out, holding his ground as the next Treant charged him. Seeing that his friends had it under control, Orion limited himself to increasing the gravity on the remaining monsters, turning their dangerous root attacks into sluggish ones. Shadows flickered around the edges of the clearing, but he paid them no mind. Luna didn't let the chance pass her by and nailed the last free one with a beam that burned it from the inside, killing it.

Orion was vaguely aware that both Dorian and Luna had been growing since his return, having both knuckled down in their studies, but it was only now that he was seeing how far they had come. They were only a couple of levels away from tier two and were already performing at the level you'd expect from a newly ranked-up witch. And if that wasn't enough, their skills complemented his and Selene's perfectly.

If he hadn't been their friend since early childhood, he might have thought someone had a hand in shaping their team.

"And that's the last one," Dorian huffed, but Selene only tensed up more.

"Where?" Orion asked immediately, knowing she must have sensed something if she was acting like that. He was flashing his inspect skill around, trying to locate more treants, but hadn't found any so far. Abruptly, Selene started running ahead, ignoring the fallen monsters, and they hurried to follow her, only for her to stop just as suddenly, a few hundred feet away.

"There," she whispered, pointing at an ancient pine that hadn't moved yet. Orion cautiously approached, but the monster didn't stir. It was only because of his glasses that he could tell it wasn't just a tree.

[Corrupted Snowpine Treant - Fallen Guardian] Class: [Ancient Snowpine Treant] [C-rank] Level: 79 Mind: 44 Attunement: 230 Body: 450 Traits: Internal Mana Manipulation [C-rank]; Tremorsense [C-rank]; Sturdy Bark [C-rank]; Magic Resistance [C-rank] The trunk was huge, about thirty feet around, but hollow at the base, and within a dense web of roots, the canister was nestled. It had been entirely absorbed by the Treant's root system.

The tree was feeding directly off the leaking valve, drawing the Silence into its wood and spreading it to the rest of its kin through its roots. Those same roots were wrapped tightly around the brass-and-crystal casing, fused to the metal.

"It's not moving," Luna pointed out.

"Should we take it out now, before it stirs?"

"No!" Orion barked, pushing her wand down.

"Look at the roots. They've breached the canister's outer casing. The metal's structural integrity is compromised."

"Could we hide within my shield?" Dorian asked, but Nick was already shaking his head.

"It's one thing to absorb a blow, but this would take hours to disperse." They couldn't cut it out, or the pressure would explode, and they definitely couldn't leave it, since the tree was actively pumping the corruption into the surrounding forest.

"We have to contain the blast somehow," Orion muttered, and an idea came to him. A week ago, he had used [Atmospheric Centrifuge] to blow the toxic dust away, acting like a giant fan. But if he reversed the direction…

"Luna, Selene. I need you both to target the core of the Treant, right above the root mass. On my mark, hit it with everything you've got, and do not hold back."

"You just said hitting it would blow the canister," Luna argued.

"It will. I'm going to ensure the explosion has somewhere to go," Orion said as he stepped forward, stopping ten feet from the massive root cage, and clasped both hands around the CC to connect deeply with the Field and draw as much mana as he safely could. The wind inside started to pick up, and Orion pushed more mana into it, speeding up the rotation. The air spun faster and faster, turning the snow and loose dirt into a vortex. Faster.

He pushed the rotation beyond hurricane speeds, harnessing all the power a tier-two spell could summon. The centrifugal force formed a wall of hyper-pressurized wind, an absolute atmospheric barrier that anything trying to pass through would be violently deflected along the curve.

"Now!"