Chapter 37: Oh! We meet again!
Lighter and Lucy stared at the spectacle unfolding before them, their jaws practically glued to the floor. Ever since they had set foot in the Blazestone Fire Lake, the sheer scale of absurdity they had witnessed had left them in a perpetual state of shock.
"As expected of the legendary Proxy, Phaeton..." Lighter muttered, shaking his head in disbelief.
Wise wasn't just intimately familiar with the treacherous environment of the Hollows. He somehow possessed an otherworldly network of connections, bringing in allies armed with technology and abilities that completely shattered common sense.
Though, to be perfectly honest, Stelle's mental state remained a complete enigma to them.
High above the scorching abyss, Caesar was experiencing her own brand of mind-bending astonishment. The solid, reassuring weight of the earth had vanished entirely from beneath her boots.
She watched as the figures of her companions shrank into tiny specks on the distant pipes. The massive, terrifying expanse of the Blazestone Fire Lake rushed up to meet her, its heat radiating against her skin. Her heart hammered a frantic rhythm against her ribs.
She forced down the rising tide of vertigo. Dan Heng's calm, authoritative instructions echoed in her mind, grounding her focus. 'I have to concentrate! Just keep flying straight to the center of the Fire Lake!'
Steeling her resolve, she locked her gaze onto the final patch of surging, orange-red magma.
The absurd little bamboo-copter whirred with renewed vigor atop her head. Its tiny blades spun into a blur, propelling Caesar smoothly through the sweltering air at a velocity that put her fastest sprint to shame.
Down below, the group stood frozen. Every breath caught in their throats. Their eyes remained glued to that tiny, precarious figure suspended by a toy-like contraption in the hazy, ash-filled sky.
Time stretched into an agonizing crawl. Every passing second felt like an eternity of torment.
Caesar glided over massive, jagged clusters of deep purple Ethereal crystals. The dense, corruptive energy radiating from the cold, crystalline surfaces brushed against her boots, sending a chill up her spine despite the surrounding heat. It was a literal dance on the edge of a blade.
Finally, the swirling vortex of the target zone aligned directly beneath her boots.
'Now!'
Caesar drew her arm back, her muscles coiling tight. With a fierce shout, she hurled the ignition stone—the heavy, glowing rock she had been clutching like a lifeline—straight down into the churning heart of the magma.
The stone, carrying the weight of all their hopes, carved a fleeting arc through the ash-choked air. It plunged flawlessly into the scorching, molten depths.
BOOM!
A titanic shockwave ripped through the cavern. It was as if a primordial beast, slumbering beneath the earth for eons, had suddenly been violently awakened. The entirety of the Blazestone Fire Lake convulsed.
An instant later, blinding light fractured the crust. Colossal pillars of thick, orange-red magma erupted from the exact spot where the stone had sunk. Carrying apocalyptic, destructive energy, the molten geysers roared skyward like furious fire dragons breaking free from their chains.
The sheer, unadulterated heat instantly warped the atmosphere, turning the air above the lake into a shimmering mirage. A deafening, devastating roar swept across the cavern, drowning out all other sound.
"It worked! She actually did it!" Lucy and Lighter screamed from the safety of the pipes, their voices cracking with raw elation.
But that fleeting spark of triumph was brutally extinguished.
The terrifying proximity of the blast unleashed a violent, concussive wall of air. The thermal updraft slammed into Caesar with the force of a runaway freight train. Suspended precariously in mid-air, she instantly lost her center of gravity.
She tumbled backward, thrashing wildly against the hurricane-force winds. Above her head, the little bamboo-copter let out a high-pitched, mechanical shriek of absolute, unbearable strain.
Then, overwhelmed by the kinetic impact of the eruption, the gadget snapped.
"Oh crap!" Stelle yelled, her usual deadpan demeanor shattering.
"Caesar!" Lucy and Lighter's stomachs plummeted into an icy abyss.
Stripped of her flight, Caesar became nothing more than a kite with a severed string. The shockwave tossed her fragile form aside with merciless ease. She plummeted, accelerating straight down toward the very lake surface that was currently tearing itself apart in a frenzy of erupting magma and jagged rock.
"Caesar!" Lucy and Lighter shrieked, the sound tearing raw from their throats. Panic consumed them entirely.
They bolted. Boots pounded desperately against the hollow metal pipes suspended above the lake. They sprinted with reckless abandon toward the center of the inferno, chasing the trajectory of their falling leader.
Hot tears spilled over Lucy's cheeks, instantly blurring her vision. Her lungs burned, her legs ached, but she pushed herself harder. Faster. She had to be faster. If she just ran fast enough, maybe she could bridge the impossible gap. Maybe she could reach out and catch her.
But reality was cruel. The distance was simply too vast. The network of pipes abruptly ended long before reaching the center of the Blazestone Fire Lake. There was absolutely no physical way they could cross that expanse before gravity claimed its prize.
They were forced to watch in utter, paralyzing helplessness. That familiar, beloved figure grew smaller and smaller, swallowed by the hazy distance as she accelerated toward a lethal bed of churning magma and razor-sharp Ethereal crystals.
Lucy skidded to a halt at the very edge of the severed pipe, her toes hanging over the molten drop. A crushing wave of powerlessness crashed over her. Her knees buckled. She collapsed hard onto the scorching metal grid, her hands gripping the edge as tears flooded from her eyes like a broken dam.
"No... please, no... Caesar... you can't..." she choked out, her voice fracturing into a pathetic rasp. She buried her face in her hands, her shoulders shaking as an uncontrollable, agonizing sob tore through her chest.
They had fought so hard. After surviving countless twists and turns, after defying the odds to reverse Pompey's tragic fate, the salvation of the Blazestone Fire Lake had finally been within their grasp.
She never imagined that the price of their victory would be their leader. The suffocating weight of grief wrapped around her throat, making it physically impossible to draw breath.
Bathed in the harsh, flickering glow of the soaring magma, Lucy's crumpled figure at the edge of the pipe looked incredibly small. Utterly broken.
Far below, Caesar had vanished entirely, swallowed by the chaotic inferno where surging fire and grim, corruptive crystals waged war.
The multiversal group chat fell dead silent. A heavy, suffocating atmosphere settled over the remaining members.
Stelle, Dan Heng, and March 7th of the Astral Express; the Traveler Lumine and her floating companion Paimon; the calm and analytical Proxy, Wise—all of them stood frozen, forced to witness the tragedy unfold without the power to intervene.
Dan Heng's jaw locked tight. His knuckles turned a stark, bloodless white as he gripped the shaft of Cloud-Piercer. The sight of a comrade falling into an abyss clawed at deeply buried, painful memories he had spent lifetimes trying to forget.
A bitter surge of regret flooded his chest. They had been too careless.
Blinded by the euphoria of successfully purifying Pompey and pulling off a literal miracle, they had let their guard down. In the brief, intoxicating exhilaration of igniting the Fire Lake, they had completely underestimated the sheer, volatile danger of the eruption itself.
The desperate silence threatened to swallow them whole. But Wise, who had been staring intently into the hazy abyss with a deep, analytical frown, suddenly snapped his head up. His eyes narrowed sharply.
"Wait!" Wise's voice cut through the gloom, carrying a sharp edge of incredulous surprise. "I'm detecting a massive spatial anomaly!"
His words shattered the deathly quiet. "It's right on top of us! Something is approaching fast!"
The warning acted like a jolt of electricity. Every single nerve in the group pulled taut.
Aside from Lucy, who remained slumped against the metal grating in a haze of grief, the rest of the crew reacted instantly. Lumine summoned her blade with a flash of light. Stelle hoisted her bat over her shoulder. Dan Heng leveled Cloud-Piercer, while March 7th knocked an icy arrow to her bow. Lighter's fists ignited with fiery energy as they all dropped into defensive stances.
Had Lucius returned for a counterattack? Or had the catastrophic explosion drawn the attention of an even stronger, mutated Ethereal from the depths of the Hollow?
Their eyes frantically scanned the coordinates Wise pointed out. It was hovering just above a section of the suspended pipe, mere feet from where Lucy lay weeping.
Right there, the air began to violently ripple and distort, folding in on itself like a disturbed pool of water.
With a sharp, tearing sound, an unstable spatial rift ripped open out of thin air. Its jagged edges flickered with a volatile, deep purple light, hovering less than two meters above the metal walkway.
Inside the tear, a bizarre, swirling vortex of chaotic colors churned, radiating intense, dizzying spatial fluctuations that made their teeth ache.
The very next second, as everyone braced for a monstrous attack, a shockingly familiar figure tumbled out of the void. Accompanied by a shower of scorched, splintered bamboo-copter fragments, the figure clumsily dropped straight out of the rift.
It was Caesar!
Lumine's reflexes were lightning-fast. The absolute millisecond Caesar's body cleared the portal and began to plummet toward the unforgiving metal grate, the Traveler unleashed the Anemo energy she had been pooling in her palm.
"Wind, hear me!"
A precise, emerald-green spiral of wind bloomed out of thin air directly beneath Caesar. Acting like a cushion of the softest clouds, the Anemo current caught her falling form with absolute gentleness.
The swirling breeze expertly bled away her downward momentum, lowering the leader of the Sons of Calydon safely onto the pipe platform right next to a completely stunned Lucy.
Caesar brushed a smudge of soot from her cheek. She looked up at the circle of dumbfounded faces staring down at her.
"Yo, everyone..." Her voice was a little hoarse from the smoke, but it brimmed with her usual, unshakeable vitality. She offered a casual, lopsided wave to the stunned crowd. "We meet again!"
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