Chapter 1484: The Magical Nexus at Ancestor’s Peak

While Wenna and Camilla kept a close eye on the shifting energies of Ancestor’s Peak from the city of Sainthelm at the mountain’s base, atop the summit, the joint efforts of the fairies and Cecil’s technical team were entering the final stages of preparing the Arcane Network Nexus.

The towering Arcane Nexus spire stood proudly on the ancient mountaintop. Under the deep night sky, a blanket of starlight shimmered softly over the tower’s surface like a delicate veil. Mechanical apparatuses at the pinnacle moved silently in the darkness, while massive arrays of artificial crystals subtly adjusted their angles. A low, resonant hum—born from the magical energy’s resonance—drifted through the night air like a haunting nocturne.

At the tower’s base, a sprawling complex of research facilities was fully operational. Industrial-grade floodlights bathed the summit in a bright glow, turning night into day. Nearby, a large vertical shaft plunged deep into the mountain’s heart. Elevators around the shaft were busy ferrying the last batch of equipment underground. Numerous engineering vehicles and emergency response teams stood ready around the open space, bracing for the night’s impending events.

A man in a white uniform—the chief technician from Cecil—stood at the edge of the shaft platform. He looked up at the neatly arranged devices illuminated by the floodlights. Drawing a deep breath in the chilly night air, he calmed his nerves bit by bit. Those devices—six towering installations arrayed around the platform—rested on heavy alloy bases and featured intricate crystal arrays. Their pristine exteriors revealed they had only recently been installed.

While ordinary technicians might find these devices unfamiliar, as the technical lead, he understood their purpose perfectly: these were the legendary Anti-Divine Barriers.

A marvel of magical engineering, these devices employed a “non-directional thought wave” technology derived from neural networks. By emitting a vast chaotic consciousness field, they blocked the spiritual contamination from divine beings. This was one of the pinnacles of modern arcane technology.

Though the “Lady” expected tonight had long since relinquished her divine status, and her spiritual pollution was no longer as lethally dangerous as that of primordial gods, these protective measures remained indispensable. After all, mortals were fragile creatures before gods. Even a careless glance from the Lady could turn nearby assistants into grotesque flesh monstrosities. In such circumstances, an extra layer of mechanical safeguards was a welcome reassurance.

Suddenly, a faint, rapid fluttering sound came from nearby, breaking the technician’s train of thought. A clear female voice chimed beside him: “The communication mode with the main network has been switched to the ‘Descent’ frequency. When is the Lady of the Tower arriving?”

The technician turned toward the voice and saw a tiny woman no larger than a palm, her nearly transparent wings fluttering vigorously as she hovered at his eye level. Her face shone with barely contained excitement, eyes sparkling in the night. She was clearly eager for what was about to unfold.

This was Stella, one of the “Five Kings” of the Ogure and leader of the fairy clan. Her people had lived on Ancestor’s Peak for generations. Since ancient times, the mountain had been the fairies’ domain. Even among the diverse Ogure tribes, the fairies’ authority over Ancestor’s Peak was supreme. Without their consent, no project—whether transforming the peak into a magical storm observation point or erecting the Arcane Nexus—could proceed.

Naturally, the technician regarded the fairy queen with respect. He smiled and greeted her before replying, “The Lady of the Tower just sent word. She’s still making final preparations. Altering the Deep Blue Flow isn’t simple—even for someone who once commanded all magic, she must proceed with utmost caution.”

“That’s true,” Stella nodded in agreement, then glanced toward the vertical shaft. “Honestly, I never expected that shaft we dug last month while searching for the magical nexus within Ancestor’s Peak would come in handy now. If the news had come ten or fifteen days later, we might have been planning to turn the bottom into a root cellar for pickles…”

The Ogure fairies loved their pickled vegetables. The technician had been surprised when he first learned this—he’d always thought pickles didn’t quite fit the image of these small, delicate creatures. But over time, his understanding of the fairies had deepened. These seemingly harmless little beings commanded the Ogure’s most formidable magical puppet armies and elite mage forces. They lived by a tradition of universal conscription and hunted giant beasts. Their ways defied conventional logic. Even their claim to the “Sacred Mountain” was secured only after they had decisively defeated the other Ogure tribes two or three thousand years ago.

The technician couldn’t help but marvel at how narrow his worldview had been back home. He’d thought a few books were enough to understand the world, but traveling abroad had shown him just how rich and strange this world truly was.

At that moment, a deep humming suddenly rose from the heart of the massive nexus tower, interrupting the conversation. Both the technician and the fairy queen turned toward the sound. In the next instant, the starlight cascading from the tower’s summit warped unnaturally.

It was as if an invisible gate had opened in the sky, its immense energy bending the path of the stars. The starry canopy above the tower twisted into a swirling vortex. From its center, a beam of light descended, rapidly expanding into a shimmering portal. The air vibrated with the roar of arcane energy as the gate swung open.

From the portal stepped a beautiful woman clad in an elegant black court gown, her face veiled in a misty shroud.

The technicians waiting on the platform all looked up toward the opening gate. Meanwhile, a group of “action operatives” in the uniforms of the Divine Authority Council tensed instantly. The chief technician inhaled softly and whispered to the fairy queen beside him, “The Lady of the Tower has arrived.”

Stella, only thirteen centimeters tall, was awestruck. “My goodness… she’s so tall…”

“That’s already the compressed form, little one,” came a voice from the portal. Though some distance separated them, the fairy queen’s whispered comment didn’t escape the Lady’s keen ears. The woman turned, her eyes above the veil sparkling with amusement. “Good evening.”

“Good evening, Lady of the Tower,” the technician hurried forward. The star-lit portal behind her was closing, its fading glow trailing like a disappearing cloak, lending the scene an eerie, sacred aura. He couldn’t help but admire, “Your entrance is truly impressive.”

“Nice, isn’t it? Comes with the winter skin pack,” she smiled. “It’s my first time using it.”

The technician’s eyes widened slightly. “Really? I hadn’t noticed.”

She quickly explained, “It’s the new interface released today. The first one on the second row. If you order and use my invite code, you get a 20% discount. The code is 7D8CE695…”

Stella watched the exchange, utterly baffled. The conversation seemed far beyond her understanding—and frankly, it didn’t sound related to the matter at hand, nor like something a ‘Goddess of Magic’ would say. She couldn’t help but interrupt, “Excuse me… what are you talking about?”

“Oh, just some unrelated chit-chat,” the tall Lady waved it off casually. Then her gaze swept the surroundings. She narrowed her eyes slightly, as if listening intently—or perhaps communicating with something deep within the mountain. At that moment, Stella noticed the relaxed, almost lazy aura she’d first projected had shifted.

The former “Master of All Magic” seemed to have sensed something unusual within Ancestor’s Peak.

“…Indeed, there are traces of the Deep Blue Flow here,” she said after a moment, opening her eyes fully. For mortals, the Deep Blue Flow—hidden in the cracks of the material world—was imperceptible without complex instruments. But for someone who once wielded supreme magical authority, certain “traces” were visible to the naked eye. “I can’t yet confirm if it matches the expected model. I’ll need a better vantage point—and a… ‘long-term station.’”

“Already prepared for you,” Stella nodded promptly, fluttering her wings as she gestured toward the shaft platform nearby. “This passage leads deep into Ancestor’s Peak. There’s a large magical nexus down there. According to our calculations, it’s the ‘primal focus’ directly influenced by the Deep Blue Flow. It should be perfect as the control center for your ‘Second Deep Blue Well.’”

The Lady looked surprised. “You found this in just a few days?”

“Actually, it wasn’t dug up in the last couple of days,” Stella explained quickly. “When we first learned the Deep Blue Source might lie deep within Ancestor’s Peak, we excavated this shaft to search for flow traces. But we only found the magical nexus. The deeper magical currents and spacetime structures became too complex and dangerous, so we didn’t dare dig further.”

“I see,” the Lady nodded, then strode toward the shaft. “Then let’s not waste time. Take me down to have a look.”

Stella was momentarily stunned by the Lady’s decisiveness.

This was her first time dealing with a “god,” but the reality was different from what she’d imagined. The deity was more straightforward and approachable than expected—chatting casually, asking serious questions about the work, and when action was needed, simply getting on with it. None of it matched Stella’s preconceived notions of a god.

She suddenly recalled a popular new drama sweeping the entire alliance: Master of All Magic.

As one of the Ogure Five Kings, Stella had always thought the show’s portrayal of the Goddess of Magic was more propaganda than reality—every move designed to serve the Divine Authority Council’s experimental goals.

Turns out, it was a documentary… and the Lady of the Tower was playing herself?

The tiny fairy queen shook her head, pushing aside the distracting thoughts, and flapped her wings to follow the technician and the Lady of the Tower down the path ahead.

Accompanied by the creaking and grinding of machinery, the elevator rapidly descended through the vertical shaft. The rugged steel support beams and the magically reinforced rock layers sped past their view, moving upward as they went down. The entire descent took several minutes before they finally reached the bottom of this deep shaft—a spacious cavern that had seen little renovation.

The vast cave was brightly lit, hundreds of high-powered magic crystal lamps illuminating this sealed space far beneath the surface. Above, the towering rock ceiling was crisscrossed with metal support beams, countless runes flickering between the beams and the stone overhead. These were elemental runes forming a large-scale reinforcement array. Massive support pillars were scattered around the cavern, each surrounded by numerous temporary sensor devices and arcane network units.

About a third of the cavern floor had been roughly leveled and repaired. Magical energy smoothed out the jagged rocks in the center, leaving a coarse but even surface. Beyond this leveled area, the original terrain dipped down unevenly.

A faint blue glow gently rippled across those lower sections, light flowing like water seeping through cracks in the rock. The fissures themselves formed intricate patterns, almost like natural runes, their watery glimmers pulsing softly in the depths.

The whole scene resembled a vast, shimmering pool, with the only flat patch in the cavern’s center standing like an island floating in the middle of this glowing water.

Roughness and mystery, man-made traces and natural wonders, modern machinery and primal magic—all these elements blended here in this enormous cave in a way that was contradictory yet harmonious. Rather than feeling out of place, the sight was strangely pleasing to the eye.

After a moment, Myrmyna glanced at the fairy queen beside her. “This cavern looks like it formed naturally.”

“Yes,” Stella nodded without hesitation. “We followed the magical sensor’s signals downward and uncovered this natural cave hidden deep within the ancestral peak. The entire cavern is a massive focal point of magical energy. According to our instruments, there should be more of these ‘voids’ nearby… it’s an incredible geological formation.”

“…It’s not just a geological anomaly,” Myrmyna slowly shifted her gaze, scanning the rough rock walls and the ceiling above. Traces invisible to ordinary eyes were crystal clear to her. “The magic here has subtly reshaped the rock over millions of years. The primal energy released by the magic focal point has eroded and assimilated the surrounding stone, transforming it into magical energy that slowly seeps into the mountain itself. Some of this energy radiates outward, causing the frequent anomalies around the ancestral peak. The rest remains trapped at the cavern’s edges, forming a hardened ‘support shell’ that stabilizes the entire structure. See those faintly glowing rocks? They must be incredibly hard—no wonder you managed to drill a hole through such a ceiling.”

“No wonder!” Stella’s face lit up with sudden understanding. “We burned through over twenty focusing crystals on that shell, exhausted eight archmages, and even broke the drill bit on ‘Super Strong’ before finally making a breakthrough! We’ve been wondering why the rock shell of this cavern was so tough…”

The technical supervisor was speechless.

Myrmyna was silent as well.

(The End of this chapter)