A few pieces of tal rained down as debris, clattering against the roots and ground with a sharp clang.
Lucius raised his head, watching the fragnts fall like arrows from the heavens, and a cold feeling settled in his chest.
He had a suspicion of what this ant, a theory already forming in his mind.
Yet, he forced himself not to jump to conclusions. Guesswork wouldn’t save the settlent. Answers would.
Without another mont of hesitation, he launched himself upward, climbing through the vast spirals of the World Tree until he breached its thick canopy.
What awaited him there was chaos. Shards of twisted tal, glowing faintly with residual mana, were tumbling from the sky in clusters.
The air was heavy with heat and the acrid tang of burning steel. It was as though the heavens themselves had torn apart and were hurling their waste at the world below.
Then, the device in his hand flickered. It pulsed with bright light, stronger than ever, almost alive.
The glow intensified with each passing second, and Lucius realized with a jolt that it wasn’t random—the device was acting like a beacon, pulling the debris toward him, toward the Dawn Settlent.
His grip tightened, and his eyes darkened.
"Of course. This thing isn’t just a curiosity—it’s a damn signal."
Before the next wave of debris could tear through the canopy, Lucius bolted, leaping from the branches and sprinting out of the village periter.
tal crashed down behind him, tearing gouges in the ground, but he moved swiftly, avoiding every falling chunk with sharp instinct.
The villagers’ shouts grew faint as he put distance between himself and the World Tree.
Finally, in the barren field past the settlent’s boundary, Lucius stopped. He looked at the strange device, its core still glowing hot, almost throbbing in his palm.
There was no point in simply carrying it around—he had to understand what it was.
Closing his eyes, Lucius funneled his mana into the object, commanding the system to scan it thoroughly.
The familiar voice of the system echoed in his mind:
[Scan complete.]
[Two-way communication device detected. Capable of transmitting and receiving signals from beyond the upper atmosphere.]
[Caution: prolonged use may reveal user’s location.]
Lucius’ eyes narrowed as the aning sank in.
"So, this thing... can speak to the world above the sky."
Curiosity sparked within him despite the danger. He had always suspected there was more beyond their realm, that the heavens weren’t just a ceiling of stars but sothing tangible, reachable.
And now, in his hand, was proof. Still, the thrill was tempered by pragmatism. A communication device ant soone—or sothing—might already know he held it.
"To use it, I need to live first."
He muttered under his breath, tucking the object safely into his cloak.
With that resolve, Lucius turned back toward the place where Belphegor had originally picked up the strange piece of junk—the garbage site.
It was more than a landfill; it was a scar on the land, a graveyard of broken machinery and discarded relics from another ti.
He made his way through the sharp tangles of rusted tal until he reached the odd, uneven ground where the device had been buried.
Kneeling, Lucius placed his hand against the soil. The earth here was thin, unnatural. Mana currents twisted awkwardly, as though hiding sothing.
He pressed down harder, forcing the ground open with sheer will. The soil trembled, cracking, before giving way under the pressure of his mana.
Shards of old iron bent and snapped, torn apart like paper under his strength.
Beneath the first layer of rubble, an echoing hollow greeted him. Lucius paused, listening. There was space below—more than the shallow pocket of earth suggested.
A deep chamber, hidden beneath decades of debris.
His eyes hardened with resolve.
"So, you were hiding this all along."
He braced himself, then tore the last of the twisted tal free, revealing the mouth of another opening.
Cold air wafted up, carrying with it the scent of oil, dust, and sothing faintly tallic.
The darkness below seed endless, but Lucius could feel it—more ruins, perhaps even another passageway leading deeper into forgotten relics of the sky.
And sowhere in that darkness, he suspected, waited answers.
Lucius dropped lightly into the opening, landing on a grated floor that groaned beneath his weight. The air here was stale, heavy with dust and faint traces of oil.
As his eyes adjusted, he realized the underground chamber stretched wider than he had expected, lined with broken pipes and scattered fragnts of machinery.
But what drew his attention was at the far end—a sleek terminal half-buried in debris, its dark screen faintly glowing.
He approached cautiously, brushing the dust off its surface. The terminal was old, far older than anything he’d seen in the settlent, yet still humming faintly with power.
Its structure reminded him less of human craftsmanship and more of the advanced relics sotis whispered about in temple archives.
"System, link with this machine. See what’s inside."
Lucius muttered, placing his hand against the console.
A faint hum reverberated in his mind as his personal system acknowledged the command.
Lines of data scrolled across his vision, alien characters briefly flickering before translating themselves into sothing he could understand.
[Establishing connection...]
[Scanning host terminal...]
[Attempting link to main Divine System.]
Lucius’ heart skipped a beat.
"Divine System? As in...your main body ?"
The scan continued, a deep vibration echoing through the chamber as the console’s lights pulsed erratically.
For a mont, he felt the air shift, as if sothing vast was stirring on the other end of the signal.
Then the ssage appeared:
[Connection failed. Main body cannot be found.]
[Warning: Terminal is corrupted. Access is unstable.]
Lucius frowned, stepping back.
"So, the system is trying to connect to sothing higher... but the main body isn’t there anymore. Does that an it’s destroyed? Or hidden?"
The console gave a final flicker before its glow dimd, though the faint hum of power persisted, like a heartbeat refusing to stop.
Lucius clenched his fist, a mixture of anticipation and unease building in him.
If this was truly a fragnt of the Divine System, then whatever had once ruled from above the sky was either gone... or watching from the shadows.
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