Chapter 349: Ready
Deep within the heart of the Silver Woods, the World Tree pulsed with a steady, rhythmic heartbeat that resonated through the souls of every living creature in the forest.
Inside the amber-lit war room carved directly into the colossal trunk of the ancient tree, Queen Aelinor slowly lowered her staff. The blinding, emerald light that had wreathed her body began to fade.
The ethereal leaves of pure life energy that had served as her hair settled, returning to their natural, cascading golden blonde.
For the past several hours, she had been projecting her 8th-Order authority hundreds of miles away. Using her Domain: Absolute Life, she had extended the World Tree’s massive root network to seamlessly lock down the borders between the Silver Woods and the collapsing Dragon Empire.
Any fleeing Void Cultists attempting to slip into the neutral elven zones had been instantly located and crushed beneath the earth by her suffocating, unyielding vines.
The borders were secure, but the atmosphere inside the war room was tense.
A dozen High Elf Elders, clad in their traditional silver-leaf armor and carrying staffs of polished wyrm-wood, stood around the circular scrying table in the center of the room. They had watched the Queen’s flawless execution of the border defense with absolute reverence.
"The perimeter is entirely sealed, Your Majesty," Elder Caelum, the Commander of the Ranger Corps, reported, bowing deeply.
"The Dwarven Ironclads hold the mountain passes to the South, and your roots have successfully established an impenetrable wall along the Eastern ridge. Not a single Cult worshipper has breached the Silver Woods."
Aelinor nodded wearily, taking her seat upon the living-wood throne. The physical toll of projecting an 8th-Order domain across such vast distances was immense, but she could not afford to show weakness.
"Furthermore, Your Majesty," another elder, an ancient woman named Elara, spoke up, her voice filled with a hesitant optimism. "We have received the latest census from the outer villages.
The kidnapping of our kin has dropped to an unprecedented zero. Over the last few months, the slaver networks that plagued our borders for decades have completely vanished. Our people are safer now than they have been since the Great War."