A Song For The Ages

Far beyond the azure skies of Terra, past the swirling layers of clouds and into the boundless embrace of space, a golden star blazed brilliantly. Its radiant light bathed the planet, Terra, nurturing it with waves of pure, life-giving essence.

Beneath its nurturing gaze, across vast oceans from the Magnole continent, stretched another great landmass, a continent of colossal proportions, home to countless living beings.

Yet unlike Magnole, where powers rose and fell like the tide, here two titanic forces reigned supreme, the Northern Madic Empire, and the Southern Volkar Dominion. Their endless struggle had shaped the land into a hardened, war-forged world.

In the frigid north, within the towering spires of the Madic Empire, deep in the heart of the Research Department's Grand Hall, an aged elf let out a giddy, almost manic laugh.

Magnus, once a famed formation prodigy, now leader of the Research Department, hunched over a sprawling formation array engraved into the marble floor. His long silver hair trembled as he bent over, his wrinkled face smiling as his hands carefully inserted the final essence stone into place.

"I did it," he whispered to himself, awe lacing his voice. "I actually did it."

The Great Transfer Array , ancient beyond reckoning, built by Ascenders from an age when Terra was not isolated but interconnected with the stars , flickered to life for the first time in millennia.

The Empire's ancient records spoke of Terra once being part of a vibrant network of worlds, exchanging goods, knowledge, and cultivators between planets. But a great tragedy had severed those ties, locking Terra into an age of isolation and slow decline. The Ascenders vanished, and with them, the knowledge needed to truly ascend beyond the world.

Now, while they still had some regular Transfer Arrays that could still be used to travel within the continent, none could reach the level of complexity of the one in front of him. As sigils are replicas of the Runes granted by the Mortal Dao, they naturally represent various aspects and facets of the world.

Some, like the elements, can be more easily understood, especially past the Elemental Infusion Phase, where one's Essence Qi starts to take on their properties and the body can be strengthened.

But others, such as the ones making up the Great Transfer Array, are much more complex, touching upon aspects of the Astral Chakra Realm, such as gravity, space and time.

Magnus's eyes gleamed as he recalled his arduous journey. Born into a minor baronial house, his life had been one of meager privilege, enough to taste the riches of the upper class, but too little to claim them. He had fought tooth and nail against those born into greater fortunes, rising through the Empire's rigid hierarchy by the sheer force of his intellect, resilience, and obsession with cultivation and formations. Each step upward had cost him dearly, friendships, security, even the love of family who feared he had aimed too high.

He had painstakingly traversed all nine phases of Qi Condensation, each phase honed through endless trials, culminating in the formation of his cultivation spirit within his Qi Nexus, a luminous, revolving talisman that anchored his strength.

Achieving the Ninth Phase, the Quintessence Phase, marked him as one of the few among hundreds of millions. His cultivation spirit had taken the form of a talisman with shifting sigils, symbolizing his impressive accumulation.

He should have been content with such accomplishments, yet an invisible ceiling loomed over him. The Imperial Family, ruling the Madic Empire, guarded the true secrets of ascension with tyrannical jealousy, hoarding ancient techniques and severing any path beyond mortality for the masses. They kept the populace stagnant, the empire's power secure, and the outer world forgotten.

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The Volkar Dominion was no better. He had once tried to get in contact with some like-minded individuals, yet none could get ahold of what he wanted. The one that got closest to stealing the secrets was an old devil of his level who still got caught in the end. Last he heard is that he disappeared, while his sect got destroyed.

As for himself, Magnus knew only fragments, that one had to undergo a tribulation to awaken the first Astral Chakra, but how to prepare, how to withstand the descent of heavenly wrath, remained an enigma. Without that knowledge, even the strongest would die old and mortal. Though he stood as an elite among elites, he was still shackled by mortality, his body already beginning to wither, vitality slipping like sand through desperate fingers.

So he gambled, everything. His reputation, his resources, his future. All for this one sliver of hope: the Great Transfer Array.

A trembling hand brushed across the shimmering sigils as the entire hall began to hum. Magnus moved quickly, placing high-quality essence stones into the formation's key nodes, each one igniting with a brilliant blue light.

"Now," he muttered, excitement threading through his ancient voice. "Let's see what treasures you carry."

He was just about to inspect the stabilized coordinates connected to the array when it pulsed, not in passive activation, but in use. Someone, or something, was coming through.

Magnus stiffened. His heart raced, but experience kept him calm. Without hesitation, he drew talismans from his spatial ring, surrounding himself in defensive and sealing measures.

The sigils burned brighter.

A blinding flash.

Then, a figure.

Tall. Alien. Terrifying.

It stood on two thick, clawed legs, the knees inverted like a beast's. Dark brown armor, no, it was its skin, glistened under the hall's light. Massive, bladed arms ended in scythe-like appendages, and its elongated head, a hideous fusion of ant and mantis, twitched side to side.

It clicked its mandibles together in a sound akin to knives scraping bone.

Magnus's excitement turned to focused caution. This was no known race, no elf, no human, no beastkin, no demon, no giant. Nothing the Empire's records had prepared him for.

He attempted to speak, projecting calming waves through his spiritual sense.

The creature answered with violence.

It lunged toward him, launching like lightning.

With a flick of his wrist, Magnus activated one of his prepared talismans. Chains of gleaming spirit iron burst from the floor, coiling around the alien's limbs mid-attack, binding it in place with a groan of strained metal.

Magnus approached carefully, eyes shining with fascination.

"I wonder," he said aloud, voice almost tender, "what secrets you hold."

But before he could reach the creature, the formation pulsed again.

Another.

A second being, identical to the first, materialized in a blinding surge of light.

Snarling, Magnus hurled another talisman. A razor-thin wind blade shot forth, slicing the new arrival cleanly in half before it could react. Its bisected body slumped to the floor, black ichor hissing against the marble.

Magnus grimaced slightly.

"I'll have to be more careful," he muttered, turning back toward the still-struggling, chained first creature.

Without hesitation, he reached down and yanked the essence stones from their sockets. The Great Transfer Array dimmed, falling into dormancy with a shuddering sigh.

The hall returned to silence, save for the low, chittering growl of the alien.

Magnus smiled, cold and calculating.

"Don't worry," he said, voice dripping with wicked amusement, "I'll be sure to research you… very, very thoroughly."

He turned back toward his laboratory, dragging the chained creature behind him.

Far above Terra, in realms unseen, the faint pulse of the ancient array radiated outward.

A beacon in the darkness.

An invitation.

And across distant stars and long-forgotten worlds, something, some things, began to stir.