Chapter 125: A New Lead

Chapter 125: Chapter 125: A New Lead

After a few more deliberations, the meeting finally came to an end.

Everyone left the hall with the same goal in mind.

They needed to become stronger, keep the Frostveil Expanse under control, and find out what was really happening to the Distorted Zones.

Damon was about to leave with Caelia when Cornelius stopped him.

"Damon, stay for a moment."

Damon looked at him.

"Of course."

Caelia stayed as well.

The other elders left the hall to pass on the new mission and begin putting the family’s plans into action.

Once the doors closed, Cornelius walked closer.

"I want to thank you again."

Damon waved his hand.

"You’ve thanked me enough."

Cornelius smiled.

"Even so, I mean it."

Damon simply nodded.

Cornelius then became more serious.

"There is something I want to ask about your theory."

"My theory?"

"The Distorted Zones affecting one another."

Damon nodded.

"How certain are you?"

Damon thought about it.

"Not very."

Cornelius seemed surprised by the honesty.

Damon continued.

"There are too many things we don’t know yet. We need to check how the Aether moves, what the zones respond to, and whether the changes happen in the same way everywhere."

He paused.

"If one Distorted Zone really responds to the unstable Aether leaking from another, then something has to respond to that Aether."

Damon frowned slightly.

"Something inside the zone."

Caelia’s expression changed.

"The zone heart."

Damon looked at her.

"Exactly."

He hadn’t thought about it that way before.

If the unstable Aether was entering another Distorted Zone, then the zone itself had to react to it somehow.

And if there was something that controlled or maintained the zone...

The Zone Heart made the most sense.

Damon’s thoughts started moving faster.

"There should be some kind of resonance."

Cornelius nodded.

"That was what Caelia found in her research."

Damon looked at her.

Caelia nodded.

"The records I studied mentioned unstable Aether and changes around the Zone Heart, but there wasn’t enough evidence to prove the connection."

"Which means we need to see it ourselves."

Caelia smiled.

"That’s what I was thinking."

Damon smiled back.

Now this was getting interesting.

Cornelius looked between the two of them.

"I want you both to investigate it."

Damon didn’t hesitate.

"Alright."

Caelia also nodded.

Cornelius seemed relieved.

"I knew I could count on you."

Damon stood.

"Besides, I’m curious too."

That was the real reason.

There was something strange happening inside these Distorted Zones, and now they had a direction to investigate.

He wanted answers.

And if those answers were hiding inside a dangerous zone, then so be it.

After leaving the hall, Damon and Caelia walked together for a while.

They discussed where they would begin.

The passage was the obvious choice.

If the Aether was flowing between Distorted Zones, that was where they should be able to find the clearest signs.

"We’ll go there tomorrow," Caelia said.

Damon nodded.

"Good."

The next morning came quickly.

Caelia led the way through the Frostveil Expanse.

She knew the area far better than Damon did, so reaching the passage didn’t take long.

But as they got closer, Damon immediately noticed something.

The Aether had changed.

It felt unstable.

Not enough to be dangerous yet, but there was a clear difference in the air.

Damon slowed down.

"Do you feel that?"

Caelia nodded.

"I do."

Freya and Sylphie also reacted through their bond.

But Shiro reacted even more strongly.

The Frost Qilin raised his head.

His eyes narrowed as he sensed the Ice Elemental essence around them.

Damon noticed immediately.

Shiro had become much more sensitive to Ice Elemental essence after his evolution.

After spending so much time connected to Damon and being nurtured by the Spirit Origin, the difference between ordinary elemental essence and the pure energy inside his second core had become much easier for him to recognize.

Damon suddenly stopped.

"Wait."

Caelia looked at him.

"What?"

Damon looked toward Shiro.

Then he looked around them.

The Aether was clearly more unstable here than it had been farther away.

But that wasn’t the only thing.

"On our way here, the Aether was much more stable."

Caelia nodded.

"So?"

"So the instability is increasing as we get closer to the passage."

Caelia’s eyes widened slightly.

Damon smiled.

"And that’s not all."

They continued forward.

The closer they got, the clearer the strange traces became.

Damon could sense Lightning and Wind Elemental essence mixed into the unstable Aether.

He recognized both immediately.

He had those elements.

So did Freya and Sylphie.

"The passage is leaking elemental essence,"

Damon said.

Caelia looked toward him.

"Lightning and Wind?"

"Yeah."

Damon nodded.

"That explains what I felt before."

The passage wasn’t simply connecting two places.

Something was flowing through it.

Aether.

Elemental essence.

And perhaps more.

Damon’s expression became thoughtful.

"If we’re right, then this passage is one of the paths through which the instability is spreading."

Caelia looked ahead.

"Then Tempest Hollow..."

Damon nodded.

"Could be in an even worse state."

He didn’t say anything else.

There was no need.

If Frostveil was already this unstable, he didn’t want to imagine what was happening in another Distorted Zone connected through a similar passage.

They continued toward it.

Damon also noticed something else.

There was no guardian.

That meant there was nothing stopping anyone from discovering this passage and eventually passing through it.

Damon didn’t dwell on it.

They had more important things to investigate.

He wanted to test another idea.

The Frostveil Expanse had not completely mutated yet.

At least, he didn’t think it had.

If that was true, then the Zone Heart should still contain a large amount of stable Ice Elemental essence and Aether.

Perhaps even purer than what could normally be found throughout the zone.

And that gave Damon an idea.

He looked at Shiro.

The Frost Qilin was already watching the surroundings carefully.

"Shiro."

Shiro turned toward him.

Damon opened his second core and released him.

The Frost Qilin appeared beside him.

Damon crouched slightly.

"Can you feel it?"

Shiro sniffed the air.

His ears moved.

Then he looked deeper into the Frostveil Expanse.

Damon’s eyes lit up.