Tree of Aeons

354 -

Year 328 and Year 329

Two years passed, and during this time, my domain holders fought wars everywhere, and I felt all of them grow stronger.

The three level 200s, Edna, Lumoof, and Stella fought deep within the depths of the true demon lands. They waged what could be described as guerilla warfare, striking the outer rim of true demon worlds, and every year we took out more worlds than we initially expected. 

Nine more worlds, and each time, we destroyed worlds and stole more of these world’s almost desiccated realm cores. A collection of these fragments of a world core. Each of them were similar, corpses of a dead world. Unfortunately, they were all in terrible states of decay, many of these remnant cores were just no bigger than a crate. 

They retained little of themselves, often just a faint memory, or a little, awfully short dream of a time long before. Their similar sizes and stages hinted that they might have all fallen at approximately the same time. 

Our attacks on these worlds should have moved faster, but as it turned out, waiting for the right moment took longer than expected. At each of these worlds, the demons retaliated, each time they sent more of that same thing. 

I liked to believe we were weakening them. That they had less of those 'true demons' to turn into stronger ones. But we really didn't know what was in there. What exactly awaited us in the depths. 

During this time, I gained two more levels, and so I too, strengthened to Level 277.

The pleasant buzz of the higher levels reminded me of my delayed decision. I had not yet selected my new Level 275 domain choice. I'd postponed it for a while, but it was time to make a choice and use that strength to move forward.

So, I summoned them to review my choices. 

[Subdomain : Treenopticon]

[You gain the ability to see through your familiar, your beetles, and anyone with an aeonic class. In addition, you can also now see through your flows of mana. You can now communicate telepathically with anyone in the world, wherever they are in that world, regardless of distance, so long as your clone or avatar is present in that world. Your mind reading tree’s range will now cover the entire world. Each of your Clones will also now function as the enhanced equivalent of a Grand Mind Tree, granting significant automation, and computational power.]

[Mages, domainholder linked through your Treenopticon will be able to leverage on your range, granting them ability to cast spells through your network of trees as if they were there personally. They will be able to see and cast spells through your avatar, clones, or trees. Domainholders may not use domain tier abilities through Treenopticon.]

[Subdomain : Unity of the Pantheon]

[You gain the ability to form links with your fellow pantheon members, and express your combined powers as though you are one. The effects of all the levels and base stats of the pantheon members will be combined additively. This power will require a willing mortal host. The host’s endurance depends on their level, and the amount of power used. Domain holders that serve as the host will be significantly empowered by the combined powers, but will need to undergo intensive regeneration after each use.]

These two choices were a repeat of what I had at Level 250, with some additional new perks. But there was one new choice, a defensive path. 

[Subdomain : Tree of the Realm ]

[ Each of your clones gains the ability to send roots to all parts of that realm and spawn trees anyway, with or without physical connection. This ability includes the ability to spread to secondary worlds, satellites, moons, and even invading objects. The Clones that form a strong connection with a realm's core will also be able to borrow more of the realm's strength, exert more power, and temporarily fight with an additional 50 levels of strength. This additional strength can also be shared with the Avatars, but is not stackable. In addition in each of your clone worlds, you can appoint a [Defender of the Realm]. The Defender of the Realm will be able to temporarily fight at the strength of a Level 200 domain holder, but only in a defensive situation, and the defender themself will not be able to gain levels beyond level 100 until he or she relinquishes his role as a [Defender of the Realm]. ] 

There were also slight, if additional abilities to the earlier two choices. 

[ Choosing Treenopticon will unlock an additional ten more clones and twenty more node trees. Treenopticon will also increase the number of clones unlocked with higher levels. Your node trees will also increase in strength, and more of your abilities will now be effective through your node tree connection.]

[ Choosing Unity of the Pantheon will give every domain holder within the Pantheon the ability [Stronger Together], which temporarily adds 10 levels of strength during combat and overall stats with no experience drawbacks, and an additional 10 levels when more than two domain holders are fighting together]

Internally, this was a return to our old familiar debate, and I quickly ruled out Tree of the Realm for its defensive nature. I was not preparing for a defensive war against the demons. I wanted to bring the fight to the demons, and so that required me to expand extensively and strengthen the rest of my team.

So, naturally the only remaining choices were Treenopticon and Unity of the Pantheon. 

My evaluation and that of my council mainly focused on our collective offensive strength. We needed power to fight off whatever that's on the other side, and I felt Unity best provided that peak level strength. 

Treenopticon was wider and was better suited for holding on to the peripheral worlds, but I had no desire of establishing such a wide reach. 

In the end, there was only one choice, and so I selected Unity of the Pantheon. My power spread through my clones, and from my clones, I felt the collective pantheon strengthen.

***

"Well, are we ready?" Lumoof asked as our own internal timer ticked. 

Hoyia visited the four gods during the past two years just to get a sense of their preparations. Gaya refused to entertain us, so we could only presume the god was ready for whatever that was going to happen.  ɽÁŊ𝘰ꞖÈş

We did not see what they prepared, but both Hawa and Aiva assured us they were ready. As for Neira, he merely scoffed and told us to go for it. 

In his words, "They must have forgotten it was dragons that gave the demons and the ancient ravenous their first defeat. I look forward to reminding them of that fact."

The worlds populated and controlled by the Order had largely stabilized, even if this state was still fairly fragile. 

Lausanne, as one of the advocates of the peripheral worlds, strongly recommended delaying the destruction of the demon's barrier for at least ten years. 

In ten years, she hoped to build a decently strong force of warriors. But ten years was also time for the demons to get stronger. She argued passionately that the defenders would gain levels far faster than the strength of the demons within the barrier. 

But within the Order, there was also a sense that we were moving timelines constantly, and we had already pushed back this timeline a few times since we got Hawa's Shieldbreaker twenty years ago.

Twenty years.

It was relatively quick for me, but for the Order, they had been preparing for the attack on the demon worlds since the start of the peripheral expansion. 

We needed a firm deadline, or in an unusual reminder of my pre-Tree days as a game designer, this project was not getting shipped at all. It would just be constantly revised and revised and we would make perfection the enemy of good. 

"Let us made our plans based on seven years." I decided that there would only be one final extension to this deadline. "Lausanne, you have seven years. After that, I will blow up the barrier as and when I feel it is appropriate."

***

Year 330 to Year 337

Seven years. It was just a nap.

A short one as time passed by.

During these seven years, my domain holders expanded the Order in the various peripheral worlds and expanded recruitment. 

The core Valthorn elite force grew significantly, as the Valthorn force added an additional three hundred thousand members during this time, effectively bringing our overall Valthorn Elites to close to half a million, though we only managed to grow the Level 100 plus elites by an additional seven thousand.

This was partly because of time. It took a lot of time to get someone from the low level 20s and 30s up to the level 100s. Even with a dedicated dungeonworld and many, many dungeons, gains needed time. Levels and experience needed settling. There were many internal epiphanies and concepts that my new warriors had to form.

The much, much larger Valtrian Order was now so massive with direct members, employees  and contractors in the multiple tens of millions in order to effectively provide government services on an ever increasing number of new worlds. 

On these new worlds, we were the new government, and we came to fill a vacuum left by the demon's destruction. Our numbers had to scale appropriately to ensure that these peripheral worlds benefited from our presence and not suffered from them.

These tens of millions were mostly lower leveled individuals, who provided support roles such as administration, dealing with reports and transactions, providing social services, providing basic safety and security, and ensuring that there was a level of justice. 

In other words, they were government employees, and we were peacekeepers helping to reestablish regular governance. 

The headline number of tens of millions of employees felt huge. However, once divided across the number of peripheral worlds that we now claimed, it still felt insufficient and suboptimal, but significantly better than before. Hundreds of thousands employees in a single world with hundreds of cities were still only a thousand members per city. Across all services, that still meant certain services would still have ten or less employees. This didn't even include the thousands of smaller towns and villages any of the larger worlds had.

It still meant some places were still a little spotty in coverage, and services could be improved. 

In each of the new peripheral regions, we established three to four new 'core' worlds. Unlike the earlier core worlds, these new 'Peripheral Core' worlds were mainly manned by groups of high leveled Valthorns who made those areas their main home. 

We also noticed some differences, since these peripheral worlds were split between the domain holders. How they managed their respective realms were shaped by their own experiences.

Lausanne's worlds had this mix of an adventuring and wandering knight’s ethos. They inherited her past as an adventurer, and she made the Order the de-facto managing organization of adventurers on her worlds. The adventurers of Lausanne’s worlds took on the role as independent enforcers of justice and freedom, and  as a whole became a kind of supranational body of Order. Kei, one of Lausanne’s closest confidantes and constant companion in the Neiran peripheral worlds, described her worlds’ political structure as some kind of rule-by-knight errant that existed on top of the traditional feudal structure. 

Roon, Ezar, and Ebon's worlds were strongly military worlds, where the military elites were the dominant power players. They were brought up through the military process, and they seemed to really appreciate how a strong military was a stabilizing force for both peace and politics. All three of them also shaped the military into a quasi-independent organization, where the military had certain veto rights, while the civilian population dictated some other aspects of governance. It was awfully similar to military juntas, but as of now, far less destructive due to the founding group’s commitment to the Order’s ideas. 

Kafa, interestingly, was the closest one to the Order in spirit, with himself and a council of advisors as the main managing entity on his worlds. The main difference with Roon, Ezar, and Ebon were the prominence of the civil and social services. He gave matrons and village chiefs fairly equal powers as compared to the military leaders. 

Alka, unsurprisingly, made worlds where rulers are all graduates of an academy, and the academy became some kind of default pre-qualification for leadership on his dwarven and craftsmen-dominant worlds. He quickly set up schools that were modeled after the FTC and the Dwarven Academies on his worlds and set up rules such that graduates were granted senior positions in the leadership ladder.

It was a method of governance I had not truly seen in my own life, so it was the one I wanted to see in action and witness the consequences. However, it had only been a decade or two since Alka started managing his worlds, and the effects of this academy-dominant leadership structure had yet to be fully felt, since the initial political structure was still mainly hired from traditional methods. There were already some brewing conflicts, but nothing too major. 

For now, Alka's presence and stature as a demigod meant all conflicts were really just squabbles between his lessers. If he decided, the rest of them would obey. But the stability of such scholar-technocracy was not something tested by time or trials.

Johann tried something less direct, compared to his close friend and frequent partner, Roon. He established a nomadic ruling council that moved from place to place. There were no fixed 'capitals', but instead a moving one, because he had a Golden Dragon. The dragon was large and strong enough to pull a magical flying fortress from place to place. 

It was inspired by the two Beetle Carriers. In a way, Johann's methods were more of a caste system, where there were 'fixed' peoples who lived in towns and cities and an upper class of 'travelling' rulers that moved along with the flying fortress, and reminded me of world of the floating islands.

Hoyia, my second subdomain holder, didn't have to manage more worlds outside of Twinspace, but in Lumoof's absence due to the long crusade within the True Demon, she became my spokeswoman and voice. She was the preacher that visited all the worlds and spoke to the other gods. 

All of these different structures created some problems for their respective worlds, but as the Order, I did not advocate for a one-size-fit-all ruling policy. Standardization would not be the norm when each world had their own culture, customs, and actual racial differences. Each of my domain holders were also their own individuals, and I hoped that they played to their strengths and preferences. 

I decided not to intervene. 

A part of me knew we were nearing the end, and it was important to transition my closest warriors to a role outside of war. Managing worlds and protecting them could be a good way for my domain holders to find purpose outside of war. 

I know I personally enjoyed watching Treehome and the few core worlds blossom into something beautiful. 

Even if they eventually decided not to pursue this path, at least, the experience would be valuable.

My three demigods, Stella, Edna and Lumoof, spent most of their time deep in the demonic territory, and over these past seven years of intense guerilla warfare, surpassing estimates they'd destroyed an additional sixty worlds. 

They'd also gotten stronger.

Everyone got stronger. My other domain holders fought demon kings every year, and they'd also gained levels. 

Also, my earlier investment in converting Deadworld into Dungeonworld finally produced benefits. 

Over these seven years, we added one new domain holder to our pantheon.

Blackmoore, a mage and our first [Domain of the Earthmagus]. 

A shame that we didn't get more, but domain holders were rare, and one new one was a welcome addition.

***

"Finally ready to visit the inner worlds?" Lumoof smiled, he was stronger, and now Level 214. All three of the demigods gained levels in the seven years of almost constant war, and they also gained some new abilities. Most of them augmented and expanded on their current skillsets.

Our last stop before we blew up the barrier. 

The three of them traveled closer and indeed, many of the middle worlds that were once teeming with demons were now moving and producing demons at a slower rate. 

If only by a little. There were about a thousand true demon worlds in the outer ring of worlds, and we'd only destroyed, in total, about eighty worlds. 

That overwhelming presence that coated the inner ring of demonworlds now didn't feel so daunting. It was strong, but now with my Level 275 choice, it felt like something we could face and survive. 

"Let's go." 

The True Demonlands were pretty much split into 'four' large areas, or rings.

The outer true demonflesh worlds, there were about a thousand here, and these were populated by these 'living' demons. From what we'd seen across the eighty or so destroyed worlds, their sole purpose was to produce more demons.

Between the outer worlds and the middle worlds was a rather large chasm of empty space that was filled with a strong void current. The six gigantic beams of void mana from the six Sun Rings radiated some of their void mana around these chasms. 

It would be quite difficult for regular void archmages to venture through these chasms. But for Stella's [Void Inheritor], it was pretty much waddling through a kiddy pool.

After that 'gap', there was a group of middle worlds. These were worlds filled with arenas and construction worlds. Here, there were also a few demonic comets moving really slowly. We considered them the processing plants of these demons. We had no trouble visiting these middle worlds, and we realized we could also destroy these middle worlds, but they were a little too close to the inner worlds that we decided that we wanted to scout out the Inner Worlds, before we began any kind of rampage through the middle worlds.

Then, there was another smaller gap, again filled with void mana. Here, the energies were intense. Still, for the [Void Inheritor], not a problem. 

Then, the inner worlds. These worlds were coated with presence. Something that felt like a domain but was spread out. The nature of such presence was hard to make out, and felt confusing. It felt like we were looking at a nest of giant demonic hornets, and we were about to agitate it all to hell. 

From our distance, we could not be sure what these worlds were.

But the five core worlds of Eras were amongst these inner worlds. 

The Forge of Eras, the Crucible of Eras, The Library of Eras, The Bestiary of Eras, and The Store of Eras. Jorkun, the Golem, had given us plenty of information on these worlds, and we wanted to know what they've become since then.

We chose the Library of Eras, if only to hope to find something that still remained of the Erasian Core Worlds. These realms that Jorkun described as worlds of wonder and creation.

Stella readied her bubble of void energy and drew a path from the middle worlds right to the edges of the Inner World.

Collectively, we felt that presence reacted. It was like a jolt, because that entire presence shivered. And yet it seemed unsure. Uncertain. It didn't know what hit it. 

"Let's go." Stella said, we stepped into the ball of void energy and hurled ourselves right into the Inner worlds.

We landed right at the Library of Eras, our black ball of void slammed into the ground. We emerged from that shell, and looked around. 

And we found no ruins.

Instead, a vibrant, booming world with dwarves everywhere, with great, awe inspiring monuments in worship of Eras and the Reviver, the two great twin gods of true peace and creation.

A world filled with mostly dwarves, and creatures that resembled twisted Wadrans?

***