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Last of The Fae Chapter 157: Ancient Roots
🕑 Added 2025-04-25 22:47:58 +0000 UTCThane landed with a craterous thud, the ground beneath him trembling slightly beneath his weight. Dust billowed up in soft clouds around his massive silver-scaled form as his winged arms slowly retracted, folding neatly along his back. The gossamer-thin membranes stretched between them shimmered in the waning light, settling like a regal cloak across his shoulders and down his flanks.
He stood still for a long moment, every breath a low, resonant rumble in his chest. The air around him buzzed faintly with leftover magic, still crackling from the battles that had just ended. A dull, persistent pain throbbed across his body—tiny reminders of the confrontation that had tested him like few things ever had. Scorch marks blackened patches of his shimmering scales, and several claw wounds still oozed glowing silvery ichor that hissed faintly when it struck the earth.
And yet, despite the bruises and the burn of exhausted muscles, Thane's chest swelled with a fierce, uncontainable pride.
He had held the sky. He had earned it.
One after another, the dragons had risen to challenge him—each individual a potential figure legend in its own right, their might undeniable. Yet none could match him. None had driven him from the air. And now, the mountain range lay silent, the roars of challenge replaced by a heavy stillness.
Thane raised his head, gazing once more toward the horizon where the last of the light bathed the Serra do Mar in hues of gold and amber. A low growl of satisfaction rumbled from deep within his throat, not just from the victory, but from the feeling that for the first time in a long time, he had stopped holding back.
Thane could have bathed in the afterglow for days, but there were far more pressing issues that needed his immediate attention.
Thane's reptilian eyes flickered over to a small opening in the mountain surrounded by the recently shattered remnants of a boulder that had rolled down the mountainside. At a glance, it appeared to be nothing more than another shallow crag in the rocky terrain, but Thane with his intrinsic magic could sense how far the tunnel extended into the earth deep below.
With slow, deliberate steps, Thane padded toward the fissure. The silver membranes draped along his back trailed behind him like royal banners, catching the golden light. He paused before the gap, knowing full well that even in his human form, the passage would be impassable.
Lowering his great head, he pressed his snout to the rock. For a breathless moment, nothing happened—then the mountain responded.
The stone softened beneath his touch, rippling like disturbed water. With a deep groan, the rock peeled away, receding as though in deference. The tiny fissure widened, stretching and deepening into a dark, yawning tunnel that plunged straight into the earth's heart. And from the depths, the faint but impossible depths of Yggdrasil's aura emanated, still so strong even after millions of years.
Standing on the precipice Thane couldn't help but feel a slight nervous energy pervade his body. Ever since learning about the trifecta that composed his soul, Thane had struggled with the question of how he would awaken the final part of his being.
He knew Yggdrasil was alive having sprouted from the core of the world after his awakening.
But that truth birthed questions that kept him sleepless and still. What was Yggdrasil, really? Was it once a tree that, through impossible circumstances, gained a soul—sentience born of a life force so ancient it transcended form? Or had it first been a spirit, formless and vast, that took root in the world and chose a tree as its vessel, anchoring the ineffable to the tangible?
Thane had no answers. Only more questions.
He was neither tree nor spirit and yet he was expected to fulfill the void Yggdrasil had left in the natural order. To become what had never before existed—a convergence of essence, memory, and evolution. A hybrid soul tasked with rekindling a flame that had nearly gone out.
It was a miracle, truly, that any remnants of Yggdrasil's first incarnation remained. Yet here they were, still echoing through the mountain's marrow. Thane could feel it now, calling to him. A rhythm that matched the beat of his heart, the tempo of his breath.
But the miracle was running thin. The world's magic was running on dregs. And no one seemed to understand the true cost of that loss.
The deeper mystery weighed on him like the cavern's ceiling: What was the origin point? Magic. Mana. Soul. They were inseparably bound, each unable to exist without the other. A perfect cycle. But that cycle was deteriorating and slowing down, and Thane had no idea how to restart it seeing as he couldn't identify either end or start.
So guided by the burning passion for knowledge Thane stepped over the precipice and into the bowels of the earth.
With his magic, Thane widened hairline cracks into tunnels large enough for his massive draconic form to scrape against the stone. While there was no light or breeze Thane felt right at home and a base part of him wanted to carve out a den from the slate.
But eventually, the passage opened.
Thane emerged into a subterranean expanse, an immense underground lake sprawled out before him, still and silent as obsidian glass. It had eaten its way into the slate over countless ages, carving a smooth, perfect basin that mirrored the ceiling above like a polished mirror. And spread across the ceiling were the veins of a buried god, ancient roots burrowed into the stone itself, anchoring into the mountain's spine. The ageless tendrils laced across the water's surface and plunged beneath it.
The ancient aura that had drawn Thane to the cavern bled from every inch of the fossilized wood filling the underground space with rich mana that made Thane feel almost giddy. But then Thane noticed that the mana wasn't still, several faint currents were leading out of the cavern channeled through roots that disappeared into the earth, moving up toward the surface rather than further down.
Picking the strongest current Thane padded over before diving through the stone surging upwards like a great leviathan coming up from the depths of the ocean.
Following the root Thane wondered what he would find at the very end. While the total mana being drawn wasn't outrageous, there was the factor of quality at play. If normal ambient mana was gasoline then the ancient mana left in Yggdrasil's fossilized roots was jet fuel.
'I don't think most magical beings could tolerate prolonged exposure, it would be akin to breathing concentrated oxygen.'
After a moment Thane felt the density of the stone surrounding him lesson considerably before he emerged in another cavern.
Immediately Thane realized that there was a breeze meaning the cave led to the surface. Thane also realized that the underground space was inhabited and its occupant wasn't pleased by his unauthorized intrusion.
A deep threatening hiss reverberated through the cave as the same Hungarian Horntail who had challenged him rose from atop a small hill of melted slag.
Unbothered by the threatening display Thane sniffed the air piecing together a puzzle even as the Horntail inflated its chest and spread its wings wide in an attempt to intimidate Thane.
'If you wanted to attack me you would have already, but you refuse to come down from that pile of slag, and I think I know why,'
Thane took a step forward which earned him a warning blast of fire. Still, he didn't back down instead Thane made a series of clicks in his mouth which seemed to calm the Horntail down.
Walking up the hill Thane peered over the lip and stared into the nest of eggs inside. The metallic shells, however even more entrancing were the thin vine-like roots that had grown over the eggs and faintly pulsed with ancient magic.
However, unlike the roots Thane had discovered in the underground aquifer, these were full of life, tender green instead of the fossilized grey he expected.
'The eggs are feeding off of the mana in the roots, which is allowing them to grow back?' Thane's mind was baffled, 'The only way that would make sense is if Mana is a waste product of Yggdrasil, one it needs to get rid of to function and thrive.'
Lifting his vision from the nest Thane looked at the expectant mother, 'That's why you came here, you understood the cycle...it's still in effect I just need to give it a boost.'
Thane's mind went into overdrive as a spotlight was cast on a path forward laid on a foundation of everything he had learned over the years, 'Four years until Yggdrasil emerges...it almost seems impossible...but I don't have any more time to waste.'
