Chapter 446: The State They Tried to Erase

Damon kept staring at the girl for several seconds, waiting for some sign of exaggeration or some indication that she was merely repeating a phrase she did not understand.

He found none.

She looked tired, dirty, and obviously weakened by the time she had spent imprisoned, but her eyes were attentive.

"What exactly did they do to us?" he asked.

The girl shook her head.

"I don’t know how to show it."

"But your mother does."

"Yes."

Damon looked toward the denser forest behind her, then back at Varos. The commander of the Scarlet Order remained motionless near the disabled machines. Two of his men were helping the wounded, while others tried to remove the stakes Eir had begun expelling from the main root. The operation was already lost. The more machines stopped working, the more the terrain recovered previous configurations. A section cleared for the wagons was already covered by young shrubs that, despite their recent appearance, had trunks far too thick to have grown in mere minutes.

"Are you going to try to stop us?" Damon asked.

Varos looked at the girl before answering.

"No."

"Sensible decision."

"Not because you convinced me."

"I don’t need that part."

Varos pointed toward the interior of the forest.

"If Eir has decided to receive you, there is no practical way to stop it. Even if I had a hundred men."

The girl corrected him:

"She didn’t receive you."

Varos’s jaw tightened.

Xue Mei looked at her.

"What’s your name?"

The girl took a moment to answer.

"Liora."

"Did Eir give you that name?"

"It was the first one she managed to say when she made me."

Aurelia approached.

"You were born from that tree?"

Liora looked at her as though searching for a simple way to explain it.

"My body grew from a seed. Then she put things inside me that she needed to carry outside."

"Memories?" Aria asked.

"Some."

"Consciousness?"

Liora hesitated.

"Mine."

That answered more than Aurelia had expected. Liora was not merely a projection of Eir. She could carry parts of the tree, but she understood herself as an individual.

Damon pointed at the marks on her arms.

"And those?"

"Small roots."

"Literally?"

"Yes."

Ester immediately approached.

"Can I examine them?"

Liora studied her face, then the needles stored on her belt.

"You stab people."

Damon smiled.

"A lot."

Ester ignored him.

"I heal people."

"By stabbing them."

"Sometimes."

Liora thought for a few seconds before extending one arm.

Ester ran her fingers near the skin without pressing. The dark veins truly had texture beneath the epidermis. They were not blood vessels. Small plant structures followed the muscles and joints, flexing along with the body.

"It doesn’t look parasitic."

"It isn’t," Liora replied.

"Do you need water or light differently?"

"I eat."

"That didn’t answer the question."

"I eat food."

Damon looked at Ester.

"Diagnosis complete."

"Be quiet."

Xue Lian watched the camp while they spoke.

"We shouldn’t let these people tamper with the machines."

Varos answered before Damon could.

"We’ll dismantle them."

"Why?"

"Because they no longer work."

Aurelia narrowed her eyes.

"You intend to come back."

Varos did not deny it.

Damon exhaled.

"Then let’s settle one thing."

He walked over to one of the machines, grabbed the metal structure, and toppled it onto its side. Two members of the Scarlet Order raised their weapons, but Varos signaled for them to stop.

Damon pointed at the cylinder filled with dark liquid.

"You’re leaving the forest. Take the wounded and anything that isn’t fixed to the ground. The chains stay."

Varos gave a short laugh.

"No."

"Then I break everything."

"You don’t know what you’re breaking."

"True. That’s why I’d rather leave it to Eir."

Varos studied the group. They had the numerical advantage, but the machines were no longer operating and the entire forest had begun shifting around the camp. He finally called two subordinates and ordered them to organize the retreat.

"This doesn’t end here."

Damon replied:

"Probably not. But it ends here today."

Liora tugged Xue Mei’s hand again.

"We need to go."

They left a few minutes later. The path that opened for them was not the same one they had used to reach the camp. It appeared between two thick trees after Liora placed her palm against an exposed root. There was no light or perceptible energy. The leaves simply shifted position, revealing a passage that had not existed before.

Damon walked beside Liora while Xue Mei remained on the other side.

"How long were you trapped?"

"Four days."

"And your mother couldn’t get you out?"

"If she broke the chains, she would break parts of me too."

"That’s what Aurelia said."

"They knew."

"How?"

Liora looked back in the direction of the now-hidden camp.

"Because they did it to another one before."

Aurelia immediately approached.

"Another daughter?"

Liora nodded.

"When?"

"A long time ago."

"Is she alive?"

The girl fell silent.

Aurelia did not press.

The trail descended through a humid region and eventually reached a river too wide to cross on foot. There was no bridge. Liora touched a fallen trunk near the bank, and ancient stones began emerging beneath the water in front of them. They did not appear from nowhere. The river simply dropped by several centimeters, revealing an old crossing of stone blocks that had remained submerged.

Aria watched carefully.

"She didn’t create the passage."

"No," Aurelia replied. "It was already here."

"How long ago?"

Liora answered:

"Before the river changed."

Aria wrote it down.

Damon looked at her.

"You’re really going to try recording a forest that changes whenever it wants?"

"I’m recording behavior, not geography."

"That’s surprisingly sensible."

"I’m writing down that you said that."

"No need."

After the river, the vegetation became older. Trees more than twenty meters in circumference began appearing among smaller ones, and the roots created rises large enough to conceal an entire person. There were no animals, but Damon now understood they had not simply fled.

Eir had moved them away from the region under attack.

About an hour later, they reached a circular clearing.

At the center stood a tree.

Not as large as Damon had expected.

Maybe thirty meters tall.

Its trunk was wide, twisted, and covered in hollows resembling closed eyes. Some were damaged. There were recent cuts in the bark and dark marks left by the chains. Three main roots had necrotic sections.

Aurelia stopped.

"That’s not the tree I saw."

Liora replied:

"It is."

"It was much larger."

"It still is."

Damon looked around.

"I don’t understand."

Liora pointed toward the ground.

"This is only where she speaks."

Xue Lian understood first.

"The entire forest."

Liora nodded.

"The central tree is an organ."

Aria stared at the dozens of kilometers of vegetation they had crossed.

"So Eir is the region."

"Yes."

Damon brought one hand to his waist.

"Caelum wanted to turn a person into a region."

Aurelia understood immediately.

"Eir was the opposite."

The tree opened one of its eyes.

It was not a human eye. It looked like an oval opening in the wood containing a wet green surface that contracted when it focused on the group.

Liora released Xue Mei’s hand and walked toward the trunk.

"I’m back."

A small root emerged from the ground and touched her ankle. The dark veins in her arms turned green. The girl closed her eyes for a few seconds and took a deep breath.

Ester watched.

"She’s recovering something."

"Water, nutrients, and memory," Aurelia answered.

Liora opened her eyes.

"My mother says thank you."

Damon stepped a little closer.

"Can she speak directly?"

The tree creaked.

Several leaves moved.

"A little."

The voice was clearer there.

Damon stopped five meters from the trunk.

"Then show us."

Aurelia looked at him.

"Maybe we should ask what will happen first."

"Good idea."

Damon corrected himself.

"What will happen?"

The leaves answered.

"Remember."

Xue Lian became serious.

"Our memories?"

"No."

Aurelia understood.

"Memory of the structure."

The tree replied:

"Yes."

Damon looked at his own arm.

"My body."

"That too."

That made him less comfortable.

Ester noticed.

"No one does anything until you explain exactly what that means."

Eir took a few seconds to respond.

"Not change."

"Only show?" Ester asked.

"Yes."

"Without restoring?"

"Yes."

"Without removing anything?"

"Yes."

Damon looked at Ester.

She still looked suspicious, but she nodded.

Eir made thin roots emerge from the ground.

One for each person.

They did not touch anyone.

They waited.

Damon understood immediately.

"Consent."

Aurelia watched the tree.

"She was already doing this before us."

Eir answered:

"Yes."

Damon lowered his hand and touched the root.

The others did the same, one by one.

Nothing exploded.

The clearing remained exactly the same.

Then an image appeared on the ground between them.

Not inside their minds.

In the wood.

Lines emerged across the surface of a broad root and formed a simplified representation of a human body.

Then another.

Then dozens.

Aria knelt.

"Are these records?"

"Memories," Liora replied.

The figures changed.

Different bodies.

Humans.

Demons.

Species Damon did not recognize.

Each had internal lines resembling modern spiritual channels.

Then Eir showed earlier versions.

The channels were different.

Less organized.

More varied.

Xue Lian stepped closer.

"These are beings from before the network?"

"Before the current format," Eir replied.

Aurelia became serious.

"Who did this?"

The image changed again.

Small lines were inserted into the bodies.

Not complete functions.

Channels.

Routes.

Circulatory structures.

Aria stopped writing.

"Someone standardized organisms."

Damon watched.

"Why?"

Eir answered:

"Compatibility."

Silence.

Aurelia went pale.

"With the network."

"Yes."

Xue Lian looked at her own body.

"Then spiritual roots..."

"Came later," Eir replied.

Damon immediately turned.

"What?"

The representation changed. Some bodies now displayed concentrated structures near the center of circulation. Others possessed elemental patterns.

Aurelia whispered:

"Elemental roots."

Eir replied:

"Constructed."

No one spoke for several seconds.

Damon approached the image.

"By whom?"

Eir did not answer directly.

The representation changed again.

A symbol appeared.

It did not belong to the Architects.

Aria quickly stood and opened her notebook.

"It’s the same pattern as the chains."

Aurelia looked.

It was true.

Not identical, but belonging to the same structural language.

Damon became serious.

"The Scarlet Order."

Eir corrected him:

"Descendants."

"Descendants of whom?"

The tree opened three more eyes.

"Of the first ones who taught bodies to accept the world."

The sentence was too abstract for Damon.

"Explain better."

Eir tried again.

"Before, life changed by itself."

The image showed different bodies reacting to different environments.

"Then they created patterns."

The figures began sharing similar structures.

"Why?"

"To survive."

Aurelia understood part of it.

"A calamity."

Eir answered:

"Yes."

"Which one?"

The image disappeared.

In its place appeared a black circle far larger than any symbol belonging to the Architects.

Around it, entire regions seemed to lose their form.

Aria stared.

"This happened before the current network?"

"Yes."

"How long before?"

Eir answered:

"I don’t know how to count the way you do."

Damon pointed toward the chain symbol.

"So the ancestors of the Scarlet Order altered species to make them compatible with some kind of survival structure."

"Yes."

"And the network came afterward."

"Yes."

Xue Lian became serious.

"Then Caelum didn’t begin the idea of modifying people."

"No."

Aurelia closed her eyes.

He had inherited a method.

Turned it into a project.

But he had not created the principle.

Damon looked at Liora.

"That’s what you meant when you said what they did to us before we were born."

She nodded.

"Your bodies carry ancient choices."

Eir added:

"Some useful."

Another pause.

"Some not."

Damon exhaled.

"Naturally."

The image changed one final time.

Five structures appeared.

One roughly corresponded to humans.

Another to demons.

Another resembled spiritual patterns Damon knew.

The fourth was completely unfamiliar.

The fifth...

Eir highlighted it.

Damon went still.

The drawing had two overlapping systems.

One related to blood.

The other to desire, impulse, and vital circulation.

Incubus.

Vampire.

But beneath them lay something different.

A much older structure.

Eir spoke:

"You."

Damon did not answer immediately.

Ester looked at him.

"Is that your previous state?"

Eir answered before he could.

"No."

Damon narrowed his eyes.

"Then what is it?"

The tree opened every visible eye across its trunk.

"The state they tried to erase."

The silence in the clearing changed.

Damon looked at the drawing again.

For the first time since the Architects’ arc had ended, there was no system trying to tell him what he should become.

There was only an ancient forest showing him that someone, long before anyone alive in that place had been born, had already decided what his species should no longer be.