Lord Shadow - Chapter 2022 2022: Mysterious Mine

A vision. A vision of him drinking something. And seeing himself regains all colors and energies.

The vision was blurry and the vision itself was brief. There is no sound, like a dream that is muted.

But that vision is forgotten. But Azief must have engraved it deep into his soul

His mind even though has forgotten that vision has made the subconscious decision to keep waiting for Katarina.

Because in the vision, he saw Katarina talking to him.

And because he was there in Arturia, he managed to meet Katarina, Katarina told him about Erika and everything happens as it was in his vision.

Azief…was never a planner.

Most of his early action during the Fall is guided by his feelings.

His emotions, his desire and his insecurity.

He hides it well…but most of his action is guided by his emotion. It is not a good thing though.

But as he grows up, as he learns to live with his action, as he learns the responsibilities that he possesses and the impact he has on other people lives, on other people fates and destinies, knowing life and death, he thinks more before he does anything.

He believes that if one could experience reincarnation over and over again, experiencing the life of all, even if you are someone without a heart, you would grow a heart.

The Awakened One that Attain Oneness with All achieve the ceiling of power in the Omniverse by experiencing countless lives.

He understood the people hearts as if he himself lives their lives.

Some people would be burdened by such empathy that is feeling the heart of all living beings but a divine being is not.

Like a thousand, like a million, like a trillion souls residing in one heart, encompassing all, embracing all

Those who could understand others become strong. If mortal fears death, those who could see some other cause as more important than life itself….transcend something physical.

Azief did not yet reach such levels.

But he is learning.

But if not for the enemies around him spurring him on, he would not have learned this much

He learns to be calculating. He learns to be mysterious, enigmatic and unfathomable.

The harder it is for people to read you, the easier it is for him to read others.

And he somewhat perfected the art.

What sells it, is his imposing strength.

Not talking too much gives people the perception that he is in control, he is in power.

Indeed, talking too much gives the impression that you could not control your mouth and impulse.

And if you could not even control your mouth, you certainly could not control anything else.

That is only one of the few psychological things that Azief had learned.

But he learns more than just psychological tricks.

In the course of his journey, he learns how to be more empathetic.

He learns about why people choose certain actions, why people did things that might seem illogical.

Because even in a meaningless action…. was it really meaningless?

Some actions did not give effect in an instant.

Some actions are like a seed.

Some of this seed would grow and become towering trees that would create cause and effect.

Some actions needed someone to keep showering it with water so that it could grow. Some seed dies if not nurtured. Even the most meaningless actions have effect.

The only difference, some action has its effect displayed almost instantly. Some take time. Some takes…. a long time.

Right now, Azief came here not for the plans he has for Pandemonium.

But to fill the missing pieces. What missing pieces?

The pieces that are missing after being healed.

And suddenly he heard the question and he broke out from his contemplation. He looks behind him and look at Katarina waiting.

“I heard your question”

Katarina only smiles

“it is fine. I know what you are doing”

Azief thought for a moment and then said

“This is not about my plan for Pandemonium. This is for…. insurance in case my body could not take it. A…. buff if you could say it”

“but….it is also tied with my initial plan for the war”

Azief then walk forward and each step he takes, he travels dozen kilometers deeper.

Katarina follows.

Both of them seem leisurely walking but if there is an audience to this walking, they would surely rub their eyes a few times.

Because it almost seems like these two seems to flicker in and out of existence.

They were on one place and then if you blink you suddenly found them on a different place.

Like an intermittent space hopping.

But these two are just walking

Azief is walking toward the base of the energy lode.

The energy stones come in many ways. Some of them formed naturally.

In some places, the energy of heaven and earth condense into a mineral.

This would only happen in a place with dense energy of heaven and earth.

Some people called this energy mana.

Some people called it Qi.

There are many names for it.

But the common name for it is the energy of heaven and earth.

In some parts it is many.

In some others there are scarce.

Order of Thinkers how usually research this kind of stuff did not know what there is such a differentiation.

Why some places are blessed with many amounts of energy? Why are some places in the world are scarce of energy?

There must be a reason. It is just that they didn’t know why.

Azief however did not care.

But he probably knows best why.

But unlike the Order of Thinkers, Azief is not really a blabbermouth and he is not a scientist that would share his finding with the world.

And to Azief eyes, even if the world knows why some places have more energy and why some places didn’t, it would not change anything.

The information could probably be used by Order of Thinkers to create a place where there is more energy mines and more energy of heaven and earth.

But is that a good thing.

Artificially increasing the energy by manipulating the Heavenly Will and the Will of the World?

The thing about trying to change the natural order, is that the natural order doesn’t like it.

Sometimes, it is good to innovate.

But sometimes, it just breaking things for the sake of breaking things.

Maybe someday, the Order of Thinkers would find out why such thing happen.

But Azief would not tell it to them.

Let them naturally find it out and let the decide what to do with that information when they do find out.

And as Azief is finished thinking about this, he is now at the base of the energy mine.

He stopped walking. And then a few second later, Katarina appears behind him.

The energy lode.

What is an energy lode and how does it look like?

Katarina had never seen it as closely as it is now.

But as she goes deeper into this underground world…. yes, an underground world.

That is the only way to describe this descent into the deep.

The entrance of the cave, seeing the massive mountain…. that was just the tip.

Now that she follows Azief down, she could see it for what it was

She wondered why no one ever found this place.

Though thinking about it, she gets the answer almost immediately.

Probably there is all kinds of methods to make sure that when one does reach this place or seen anything suspicious, either the intelligence agency of Pandemonium shut them down, or they could not find the entrance and incapable of digging this deep

There are many kinds of energy lode.

Energy lode is a loaded word.

Some people called it the Mana lode.

And there are basically a few types. Some of them are like tree system.

Instead of vein of rocks like most mana lode, the lode behaves like the root system of a giant invisible tree.

Usually there is the massive central Heart Stone, the size of a building, usually, deep underground, with capillaries of energy rich minerals branching out for miles.

Their veins would pulse with light and when you come closer to the Heart Stone, the air would be heavy with energy pressure making anyone below Energy Disperse stage find it hard to even breathe or circulate energy.

The scale could span an entire mountain range, sometimes even acting as the nervous system of that mountain range.

There is one is Moscow.

Though that one is quite…. parasitic.

Need an entire battalion of the Republic Senatorial Guard to suppress that mine

That mine was alive.

Of course, since it is after all a mine, it could be carved, it could be mined. And being parasitic might be a bit troublesome but for the Republic, it is quite a boon. After all, no matter how parasitic it is, it emanated energies. And in the Republic, most of the Senators, the governors, the military leaders, are all in Disk Formation realm

In the worst-case scenario, they would simply all go out and absorbs the energy. The danger is mostly constrained on those lower realm people.

For those that reach Energy Disperse stage, no matter how crazy that parasitic mine wants to be, there is a limit to that mine ability to wreak havoc.

But this mine is quite different. In what way? Katarina herself could not pinpoint it

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