Chapter 430: Resilience

It was late afternoon on a small, rocky planet entirely covered by an immense primordial forest.

The little planet exuded a majestic natural aura, standing like an untouched, solitary sanctuary. There were no other planets anywhere nearby; it was bathed in the light of a single, modest sun, while a discreet moon silently orbited around it.

However, right at the center of the planet stood its only man-made monument, an imposing structure that stood out from everything else. It was a colossal black castle, so enormous that it could be seen even from staggering distances, rising above the forest canopy.

It was a place that could send a chill down the spine of any inhabitant of the planet and inspire visceral hatred simply by accidentally laying eyes on it.

After all, it was the exact place where everyone, without exception, had lost loved ones.

On this day...

Suddenly, amid the vast expanse of the forest, a handful of people noticed a subtle change in the atmosphere.

The more experienced ones raised their eyes toward the sky, but very few actually managed to see a tiny spatial fissure cutting across the heavens before it vanished the very next second.

...

In a dense forest at the planet’s southernmost end, an almost imperceptible tremor shook the ground.

Then, two figures who should never have been there under any circumstances breathed in the pure air and felt the crystalline energy emanating from the entire planet.

Meien was utterly dumbfounded.

Deep within the very core of her being, she felt an uncontrollable euphoria. It was the feeling of finally setting foot in a place she’d always longed to reach, even though she hadn’t even known such a desire existed within her. It was a truly confusing experience.

Priam focused his mind, pushing his senses to their absolute limits.

Within seconds...

He turned his attention northward, noticing the imposing presence of the black castle on the horizon.

’This...’

Priam’s eyes widened instantly.

He detected a dozen monstrous auras emanating from within the castle.

Those people weren’t making the slightest effort to conceal their presence. Furthermore, they seemed to be engaged in some kind of ritual that caused their energies to spread even further throughout the surroundings.

As if that weren’t enough, the castle’s structure had been built from an anomalous, extraordinary material that emitted a frighteningly familiar vibration...

Priam took the black branch out of his spatial ring.

He confirmed his suspicion. In that very instant, his heart began pounding faster in his chest.

The frequency was practically identical. He could sense an undeniable connection between the curse contained within his black branch and the structure of that castle.

That alone would have been shocking enough, but...

What truly stunned Priam was the realization that all those figures were unquestionably Exalted Sages. And to make the situation even more critical, they were Celestials, yet their auras were a thousand times more terrifying than those of anyone he’d ever seen before. In other words, they could only be at the highest level of the Acquired Celestials: Specialists.

Priam felt an overwhelming pressure radiating from them — an unmistakable warning of death, telling him that if he were discovered right now, he wouldn’t have the slightest chance to react or fight back.

At that moment, Priam felt Meien begin to loosen her grip on his hand, seemingly about to impulsively step forward. He grabbed her hand with extreme firmness.

’Don’t leave my side under any circumstances. And maintain physical contact with me at all times. Otherwise, your presence will be detected immediately.’

Receiving the grave mental warning, Meien swallowed hard and quickly nodded, squeezing his hand tightly.

Priam took a deep breath. He’d successfully infiltrated the domain, but even the slightest mistake would mean the end.

At the moment, he didn’t have access to his spatial bloodline to escape. On top of that, Transcendental Concealment was continuously consuming his energy reserves to hide two people.

But he’d come prepared. Throughout the journey, he’d stocked the maximum possible amount of Aether and energy power runes inside his Nexus Seed.

’I should be able to remain hidden in this place for a maximum of seven days. That should be enough time to recover my bloodline and map out a safe escape route. In the meantime, I need to explore the territory as cautiously as possible.’

He quickly transmitted the plan to Meien mentally. She was visibly tense, and her hand was sweating coldly as she held his.

Priam sighed, trying to reassure her.

’The real dangers are concentrated at that distant location. For now, our objective is to locate that race and gather them all together.’

"!"

Suddenly, Priam turned his head to the right when he noticed figures emerging from the nearby bushes.

It was a couple. Both had silver skin and vibrant, multicolored eyes... but they weren’t ordinary Pristine Wild-Spirits.

Priam was certain of it: they were Primordials.

Upon seeing those figures, Meien froze.

The couple stared fixedly at the two newcomers, immediate terror showing in their eyes.

"We’re not enemies. Please, listen to what I have to say," Priam said quickly, using the gentlest, most reassuring tone he could manage before they could flee.

The couple trembled. It was clear that they were overwhelmed by fear, but they didn’t retreat.

"Do you still preserve the words of the Fiendlight Goddess?" Priam asked without wasting any time. "I’m her emissary. I’ve come here to free you and take you away from this place."

In that very instant, the expressions in the couple’s eyes changed drastically.

Noticing this, Priam let out a silent sigh of relief deep within himself. Dandara’s legacy was truly monumental. All the races bound to her seemed to preserve their devotion at any cost.

Only the Ylisse clan and the ’Enchanting Elves’ who inhabited that planet in the mortal plane had preserved nothing of her beyond forgotten records. The decision to abandon their worship and focus purely on clandestine survival had most likely been the reason why the Vanculari race and the Cursed Forest Elves had managed to endure.

"You... is it really true...?" The woman’s voice sounded fragile, trembling, and filled with disbelief.

Priam smiled softly. "Yes. I promise I’ll lead all of you to a safe haven. The Fiendlight Goddess guided my steps to this place. She promised she’d return before she left, and she kept her word. She’s back, and the other allied races and I are gathering together once more."

The overwhelming emotion that flooded the couple’s eyes was simply too much to bear.

At the same time, Meien was trembling from head to toe beside Priam. It was as if every word he spoke resonated within the deepest, most hidden depths of her own soul.

Priam held his breath as the couple rushed desperately toward them, dropping to their knees and bowing reverently.

"Thank you so much... thank you so much for coming to rescue us..." they exclaimed in a state of pure euphoria.

...

...

...

A short while later, Priam and Meien arrived at a simple, quiet village hidden beneath the forest’s dense canopy.

Everything there was made up of rustic wooden huts and thatched roofs. However, what truly shocked Priam was the composition of the population: there were only a few dozen extremely young couples and children.

Almost all the women were either pregnant or holding infants in their arms. There wasn’t a single elderly person in the village, nor were there any unmarried young adults.

This was merely a small encampment; hundreds of others were scattered across the planet. According to the couple of Primordials guiding them — who also led this particular settlement — each tribe was headed by a pair of Primordials.

They weren’t as emaciated or severely malnourished as the dying tribe Priam had encountered in the mortal plane, but the atmosphere surrounding them was terribly bizarre and oppressive.

With Priam and Meien’s arrival, an overwhelming commotion threatened to erupt among the villagers. However, knowing that any commotion would draw the attention of the black castle’s enforcers, everyone suppressed their tears and tried to put on a forced appearance of normality.

After taking shelter inside one of the huts, Priam listened silently as the Primordial couple revealed the structure of their personal hell.

The absence of elderly people and unmarried adults was the result of a cruel, absolute system of control. Every few months, officials from the black castle traveled through all the forests to inspect and evaluate their "livestock."

As soon as they turned fifteen and reached physical maturity, everyone deemed average or below average was taken away... never to return.

This meant the outright eradication of more than two-thirds of each generation.

The rare survivors who passed the screening were forced to pair up immediately for reproduction. The requirements were merciless: if a woman went more than six months without becoming pregnant, even if she’d already had children before, she was summarily classified as a useless breeding female. The entire couple would then be discarded and dragged off to their deaths.

Maintaining this uninterrupted fertility rate under constant stress was an ordeal. However, even if a couple met their reproductive quotas for decades, their expiration date remained inevitable.

At fifty years of age — when their bodies’ vitality began to decline naturally, since they were prevented from becoming Mages — they were taken away to meet their end.

Even before that, even if they did everything right... it wasn’t uncommon for castle patrols to suddenly appear in the middle of a village without warning and simply take the entire settlement away without offering any justification.

Of course, individual disappearances also happened from time to time. Even if they obeyed every rule, everyone’s life depended entirely on the whims of those living in the castle.

Only the Primordials enjoyed marginally better treatment. They weren’t taken away without warning, nor were they subjected to the slaughter at fifteen. However, they were still required to produce offspring every year, under the same threat of extermination if they failed.

They had no shortage of resources to survive; the forest was prosperous and overflowing with natural life. However, the psychological terror they lived under was indescribable.

Those people continuously brought children into the world, yet rarely got to see their faces after the age of fifteen. Bonds of friendship, love, and family were as fragile as dry leaves in the wind. Everyone there was born into this ritual slaughterhouse, developing a tragic indifference and painful apathy toward death.

No one had the slightest sparkle in their eyes, nor did anyone seem to know the genuine joy of being alive. Their existences had been reduced to a reproductive cycle, or to objects that could be consumed at any moment.

The only flame keeping their minds alive... was the sacred words whispered in secret from generation to generation since time immemorial.

Survive.

Endure.

The Goddess will return.

The race had to survive at all costs. At least their enslavers didn’t want the species to go extinct — quite the opposite; they wanted the resource-producing factory to keep running forever.

And so, they simply carried on. Enduring the pain, swallowing their grief, and resisting in silence.

This agonizing wait had dragged on for millions of years in the darkness.

But now... all that supernatural resilience, all the blood spilled, and every tear swallowed throughout the ages would finally find their end.