Taboo Online

The moment the transfer began, the bridge wrenched Lauren toward the passage.

Her arms stretched around the young trunk before the living support behind her tightened along her back and stopped her from pitching onto her knees. Beneath North Basin, the destination roots pulled taut and sent a deep fracture rolling across the field.

The soil between Lauren and the artificial lake rose in a long ridge. An empty stretcher flipped onto its side, and one of the few portable floodlights still standing inside the cleared area tipped toward the medical lane as the ground beneath it sank.

Rhea raised her arm. Only two blue panels answered, but they appeared above the nearest medics before the floodlight came down. Its metal frame struck both shields hard enough to spread bright cracks across their surfaces, then slid away from the medical lane while three Bureau workers rushed forward to drag it clear.

"Kill the inner power grid," Red Hound ordered. "Anything inside the marker flags comes down now. Get the remaining vehicles south of the lake road."

Technicians cut power to the surviving light towers while Bureau crews and reserve heroes carried cables, medical cases, and monitoring equipment across the uneven ground. The elven families had already moved beyond the active growth, but Rootkeepers kept them from drifting closer when the tremors began.

Lauren heard the commotion at the edge of her awareness. Almost everything else had been swallowed by the Central Heartroot.

The ancient core entered the bridge in layers rather than as a single solid object. Silver wood pressed through alongside stored mana and preserved memories, each adding a different kind of pressure to the living route between worlds.

A system window opened above the young trunk.

[Central Heartroot core transfer: 6%.]

[Destination load increasing.]

[Maintain destination stability.]

Lauren tightened her grip, though her fingers no longer felt the bark properly. The pressure reached her through the bones of her palms, followed by the movement of roots spreading farther beneath North Basin.

The destination network had grown too large for her to hold in full awareness. She narrowed her attention to the route connecting her to Luke and allowed the outer roots to report only serious changes.

His presence remained at the far end, buried beneath the Heartroot’s immense current but still recognizable.

Rhea dismissed one panel and kept the other beneath the fallen floodlight until the workers had removed it. Then she crouched beside Lauren.

"What did you feel?"

"The core entering the bridge." Another pull traveled through Lauren’s shoulders, forcing her deeper into the support behind her. "The elves crossed as separate lives. This feels like the entire sanctuary is trying to pass through at once."

Rhea studied the silver roots breaking through the field. "Can this side take the load?"

Lauren searched the network before answering.

Several roots had already reached the lake and thickened beneath the water. Others pushed into unused soil around the basin. Nothing had broken away, but each new branch carried more strain back toward the trunk in her hands.

"For now," Lauren said. "I can’t promise what happens during the next surge."

Rhea nodded once. "Then you keep the destination steady. I’ll keep everything else away from it."

In Lethariel, the protected return zone lurched beneath Luke.

The compressed Heartroot was already entering the silver-white passage. Behind it, the empty shell left outside the compressed core split away from the small platform where Luke, Iris, Kellan, and Dorian waited.

An abandoned terrace tipped into the ruins below.

Silver rails and empty shelters struck the exposed machinery of the Warden’s Forge, tearing loose black pipes and rusted support frames before disappearing into smoke. Heat rolled through the open space they left behind.

Dorian tightened his grip around Kellan’s hip when the protected circle tilted toward the drop. His damaged forearms shook under the strain, but he kept Kellan’s injured leg aligned with the white-bark splints.

"Did the thigh move?"

Kellan kept both hands above the bindings. "No. Keep your shoulder where it is until the floor settles."

Dorian adjusted his stance without loosening his hold.

Blood had already darkened the inner bindings beneath the splints. Iris checked the spreading stain, then looked toward the lifeline wrapped around Luke’s chest and ruined shoulder.

She could not return it to Kellan yet.

The golden bands tightened whenever another wave of pressure passed through Luke. His palm remained flat against the core, held there by the living roots and the bridge itself. Most of the feeling had vanished from his shoulder, leaving him unable to tell whether the damage had stopped or simply grown worse.

A system message appeared before the four awakened visitors.

[Source environment stability declining.]

[Protected return connection maintained.]

[Emergency return will initiate after source bridge separation.]

Iris read the final line before checking the silver boundary around them.

"The return link is holding. Nobody crosses that line. If it contracts again, let it move you instead of trying to jump ahead of it."

Dorian glanced toward the remaining shell collapsing into the Forge. "Assuming there’s enough floor left."

"It has held this long," Kellan said. His voice remained controlled, though the pallor in his face showed how much effort that took. "We don’t have another route."

No one argued with him.

Luke kept his attention on the passage. Silver-white light filled most of his vision while the compressed core advanced a little at a time, pulling against his palm with every pulse.

He had expected the strain to ease once the Heartroot began leaving Lethariel. Instead, it felt as though every remaining root and memory had been threaded through his arm.

[Central Heartroot core transfer: 18%.]

The protected return zone contracted.

Dorian dragged Kellan half a foot inward before the silver boundary stopped moving. Iris followed without loosening either lifeline, while the roots supporting Luke adjusted his body for him.

His palm never left the core.

Lauren remained at the other end of the bridge. Luke felt the destination shaking around her, yet her side of the connection stayed fixed. He tried to send reassurance through partner resonance, but the Heartroot’s current swallowed the weak pulse before he could tell whether she received it.

The core pulled again, and something cold tightened beneath Luke’s wrist.

He looked down, but no black brands marked his skin. The corruption that had climbed over his hand earlier had shattered when Lifeblade severed the hostile anchor. The destination network was clean, and the Warden’s Forge no longer controlled the Heartroot.

The cold pressure remained.

Luke flexed his fingers against the bark and received only a faint response.

"Luke."

Iris moved into his line of sight. When he did not react quickly enough, she touched the side of his face.

"Look at me."

He forced his eyes toward her. "I’m awake."

"Your breathing stopped."

Luke tried to inhale and found that his chest barely moved. "I didn’t notice."

"Then follow my count. Breathe in slowly."

The first attempt failed halfway. Iris tightened the lifeline and counted again until Luke managed to fill more of his lungs.

"Hold it. Now let it out."

By the third breath, he had settled into a shallow but steady rhythm.

Behind Iris, another section of the empty shell collapsed into the Forge.