Reincarnated as an Elf Prince-Chapter 481: Veyrath (7)

Lindarion didn’t respond immediately. His gaze swept over the horizon, where faint glints of crystalline structures rose from the dust. They looked like roots, or perhaps bones, turned to glass. The closer they drew, the more they shimmered with strange light.

The sky itself seemed fractured. Clouds formed circular patterns, as if circling a wound the world had never healed.

Ashwing muttered, "Looks like someone tore the sky open and forgot to fix it."

"Someone did," Nysha said quietly. "The last time this land saw fire, the Demi-Gods fell."

Lindarion stopped at the edge of a ridge. Below, the land dipped into a wide basin, a frozen battlefield. Shattered weapons lay scattered, half-buried in dust and glass.

Ancient banners still fluttered in the dead wind, the sigils long faded. And through it all, thin roots of translucent crystal ran like veins, pulsating faintly with pale blue light.

"This," Lindarion murmured, "is where Veyrath was chained."

His voice carried with eerie certainty, though he didn’t know why. The name felt alive on his tongue, as though something inside him remembered.

[System Update: Ambient divine energy concentration — 47%]

[Warning: Localized time distortions detected.]

[Advisory: Proceed with caution.]

Nysha frowned. "Time distortions?"

Ashwing perked up. "You mean like, back in time stuff?"

"More like fractured echoes," Lindarion said. "Moments trapped in the mana field, repeating themselves."

He descended into the basin, each step sending small ripples through the glassy soil. The air shimmered faintly, and for a moment, the landscape flickered, warriors made of light appeared, clashing in silence, their weapons striking but making no sound. The illusion dissolved seconds later, leaving behind stillness.

"The past doesn’t rest here," Nysha whispered.

"No," Lindarion said softly. "It remembers."

They walked deeper into the heart of the battlefield. The crystalline roots grew thicker, converging into a massive formation at the center, a tree of glass, long dead but impossibly beautiful. It rose nearly thirty meters, its trunk spiraled with cracks of frozen light. The shape of its branches mirrored the World Tree, but hollow, devoid of life.

Lindarion stepped closer, drawn by an unspoken pull. His reflection warped across the glass, his white hair caught in the refracted glow, his golden eyes shimmering with threads of deeper color, almost like serpentine slits.

Nysha’s voice was soft but sharp. "Lindarion. The Tree’s influence doesn’t reach here. Be careful."

He didn’t answer. His palm touched the surface of the glass.

A heartbeat. Then another.

The moment he made contact, the world tilted.

The air vanished. The battlefield fell away, replaced by endless black. He was standing in a void of fractured stars, each one pulsing like a dying ember. And in front of him, a voice coiled through the dark.

"You return so soon, little heir."

Veyrath’s tone was not mocking this time. It was calm, almost contemplative.

"This place," Lindarion said, his voice steady despite the emptiness, "is your grave."

A faint laugh echoed. "Grave? No. My seed. Every root that drinks from the world remembers me. Every shadow cast by the Tree carries a trace of my breath."

The darkness folded inward. Veyrath appeared, not in flesh, but as a projection of golden light, serpentine in outline, eyes glowing faintly. "You tread where your kind sealed me. The borderlands are not merely earth. They are my memory."

Lindarion’s fists clenched. "Then why do I feel your mana in me?"

"Because you accepted the Tree’s blessing. And the Tree, young one, was born of our war. Its roots were fed by our corpses."

The words struck like thunder through the void. The image around them changed. The darkness became flame. The sky turned gold and black as divine figures clashed, dragons, serpents, beings of fire and shadow.

Lindarion stood at the center of the vision, his heartbeat syncing with the pulsing light. Each flash revealed more: elves wielding primordial weapons, the Demi-Gods tearing reality apart in their final stand.

Veyrath’s voice whispered beside him, too close. "The Tree was never just a creation of light. It is balance incarnate. It feeds on endings as much as beginnings. You, its chosen, are the bridge between both."

Lindarion turned sharply, eyes blazing. "If you mean to control me—"

"Control?" Veyrath’s laughter was quiet, tired. "No. You cannot control what you already are becoming."

The illusion shattered.

Lindarion gasped, stepping back into reality. His hand still rested on the glass trunk, but now faint cracks of golden light ran through it where his fingers had touched.

Nysha grabbed his arm, concern in her eyes. "What happened?"

He blinked hard, steadying himself. "I saw the war. I saw how it began."

Ashwing tilted his head. "And?"

Lindarion’s expression darkened. "The gods didn’t fall. They transformed. Their power didn’t die—it took root. Every time we use mana, we’re feeding what they left behind."

The dragon blinked slowly. "That’s... not great news."

"No," Lindarion agreed, his golden eyes glinting. "It isn’t."

He looked again at the glass tree. The cracks he’d left continued to glow faintly, golden lines spreading through the transparent trunk like veins of light. Beneath it, the soil trembled.

A low hum rolled through the basin.

[Alert: Dormant divine energy awakening.]

[Source: Unknown — linked to user signature.]

Nysha drew an arrow. "Lindarion—"

He raised his hand slightly. "I know."

The ground split open. From the base of the tree, a spiral of energy erupted upward, a pulse of pale blue light mixed with gold, rippling through the air. Lindarion’s cloak snapped in the force of it.

Ashwing hissed, wings flaring. "Tell me that’s normal!"

Lindarion’s voice was quiet but resolute. "No. But it’s calling me."

Nysha’s eyes widened. "Calling?"

"Something beneath us wants to wake."

The pulse spread outward, rippling across the land like a heartbeat through stone. The mist beyond the basin thickened again, swirling in strange shapes. In the distance, faint figures began to move, silhouettes of warriors long dead, drawn toward the light.

Ashwing looked at Lindarion, uneasy. "So what’s the plan, oh enlightened one?"

Lindarion’s gaze remained on the glowing fissure below the glass tree. The golden lines pulsed in rhythm with his heart.

"We go down," he said quietly. "If the past is still breathing, then it’s time I learned why it refuses to die."

The ground beneath them split again, forming a spiral staircase of glass leading into the earth.

Without hesitation, Lindarion stepped onto it.

The others followed, into the heart of the forgotten battlefield, where the remnants of gods and men still whispered beneath the soil.