Taboo Online

Lauren had found the knot, but knowing where it lay did not make it any safer to touch.

She kept the three currents separate in her awareness. Luke’s living mana pulsed beneath the dead loop, weak but still responsive, while the Heartroot strained against the other side. Whenever its immense current surged toward Earth, the residue tightened around Luke’s channel.

Tearing it away would pull part of him with it. Cutting through the knot carried an even greater risk.

Lauren stopped treating the residue as a blockage she had to remove. The Heartroot had grown through damaged ground for generations, bending around buried stone and abandoning roots that could no longer support it. It could do the same here if she gave it somewhere else to go.

Lauren drew a thread of mana from the young trunk and traced a route beside the trapped channel. She did not try to shape the root herself. Instead, she showed the Heartroot where the new path needed to run. Living mana followed her guidance, growing through the destination network, curving alongside partner resonance, and stopping just short of the source core.

Aelira felt the new growth through the exposed root beneath her palm.

The Heartroot can follow a living path, the Queen sent. Luke must withdraw from the trapped one before it can change routes.

That was the dangerous part.

Luke had kept the bridge open through pain, exhaustion, and the destruction of Lethariel. His first instinct would be to hold tighter, especially when so many lives still depended on the transfer.

Lauren pressed one clear meaning through their bond.

You are not letting go of me. Let the tree pass around you.

Luke felt Lauren’s message settle beneath the freezing pain in his wrist.

She sent no picture or spoken explanation, yet he understood what she needed. Lauren had shown the Heartroot another route. To make room for it, Luke had to withdraw his mana from the channel caught beneath the dead loop without lifting his palm from the core.

Iris watched the tension shift across his face.

"What did she show you?"

"She’s guiding the Heartroot toward another path." Luke swallowed and waited until his voice steadied. "I need to stop feeding the trapped channel, but I still have to keep physical contact."

Iris glanced at his nearly motionless arm, then tightened the golden support around his shoulder.

"You don’t have enough control left for a sudden change. Start small. The moment the cold moves past your wrist or your breathing changes, you tell me."

"I will."

Behind her, Dorian continued holding Kellan’s hip against the living rail. The stain beneath the outer wrapping had widened, although the cloth’s surface remained dry.

Luke’s attention drifted toward the injured leg.

Kellan noticed.

"Iris knows how much time I have," he said, his voice stripped of its earlier defiance. "Stop checking my leg and use yours before the rest of the platform disappears."

Luke nodded and closed his eyes.

Keeping his palm flat against the Heartroot, he searched for the warmth Lauren had placed beside the trapped route. The new channel felt thin and delicate, almost too small to carry the ancient core.

Then the destination answered.

Living mana crossed from Earth and touched the source core beside Luke’s hand. The Heartroot recognized the new path and sent one cautious pulse into it.

The dead loop cinched around Luke’s wrist.

Pain and instinct urged him to force his mana back through the old channel. That was how he had kept the bridge open from the beginning. Whenever something weakened, he pushed harder until it held.

Lauren remained steady at the far end, asking him to trust what she had shown the Heartroot instead of trying to carry the entire bridge himself.

Luke stopped fighting for control.

He let the Heartroot follow Lauren’s route and began drawing his mana out of the trapped channel. The change came slowly. The cold strand tightened whenever he withdrew, then loosened as the source current shifted away from it.

Luke felt the difference travel through his wrist and into his palm. The residue remained inside him, but the Heartroot was no longer pulling through it.

System messages opened above the shrinking platform.

[Alternative living source route established.]

[Foreign tether residue isolated from core transfer flow.]

[Source anchor entanglement resolving.]

Luke’s arm jerked once against Iris’s grip. Freezing pain flashed through the wrist, sharp enough to steal his breath, before it suddenly stopped.

[Safe source-anchor separation available after transfer completion.]

[Central Heartroot transplantation resumed.]

Silver-white light flooded the passage as the compressed core surged into the route Lauren had opened. The transfer accelerated, tearing the last abandoned pieces of the sanctuary shell away from the protected return zone. They dropped into the Warden’s Forge, sending smoke and heat rolling over the narrow platform.

Dorian lowered his head but kept Kellan’s leg aligned.

"The boundary is moving again."

Silver lines closed around the four awakened visitors. Dorian dragged Kellan inward while Iris shifted with Luke, careful not to stretch either active lifeline across the shrinking edge.

The wrapping around Kellan’s thigh darkened further. Iris leaned closer to examine it without disturbing the splints.

"The blood is close to the surface."

Kellan kept both hands pressed above the injury. "Then leave the line on Luke until the system releases him. I’ll tell you if the cloth turns wet."

"I’m watching it myself."

He nodded and saved his breath.

As the Heartroot continued forward, the bark finally slid beneath Luke’s palm instead of dragging his arm after it. Lauren’s route carried the ancient tree around the dead loop while his own mana remained safely separated.

A crack opened beneath his knees.

[Core transfer entering final stage.]

[Source anchor contact required until release authorization.]

Luke stared into the silver-white passage and reached for Lauren at the other end of the bond. The Heartroot’s presence overwhelmed almost everything between them, but the warmth she had sent him remained.

He pressed back once.

Lauren answered immediately.

At North Basin, the original Heartroot rose through the split earth.

The ancient trunk climbed between the younger destination roots, spreading silver light across the basin as thick branches began to unfold above the field. Near the artificial lake, the water churned around roots that had already reached deep into its bed.

A broken section of conduit burst from the ground and flew toward the anchor zone.

Rhea raised the damaged panel she had kept active. The shield caught the debris and held for one strained second before cracks raced across its entire surface.

Blue fragments scattered through the air and vanished before reaching Lauren.

The destruction of the panel made Rhea sway, but she widened her stance and planted both hands against Lauren’s shoulders.

Lauren felt the shield disappear from beside them.

"Did anything hit you?"

"No. The panel took it." Rhea braced her more firmly against the living support. "Keep your hands on the trunk. I can hold you without it."

Red Hound’s voice carried across the basin.

"Everyone stays behind the outer line. Medical teams hold position until the ground settles."

Aelira pressed one hand against the nearest root. Her command traveled through the living network, and Lauren passed its meaning to the Rootkeepers.

Keep the families together. No one approaches the trunk until the transfer is complete.

The elves obeyed. Several Rootkeepers lowered their heads, while a woman near the closest shelter covered her mouth as silver branches spread beneath Earth’s paling sky.

Lauren barely registered their reactions. The transfer filled her arms and chest, reaching through every destination root beneath North Basin.

At last, the pressure began to ease.

Most of the Heartroot had reached Earth. Only its final source connection remained in Lethariel, passing beneath Luke’s hand while he and the others waited inside the protected return zone.

A system sequence appeared before both bridge anchors.

[Central Heartroot core transfer: 100%.]

[Living source transferred successfully.]

[Source anchor release authorized.]

Lauren sent the command through their bond before Luke could finish reading it.

Now.

Luke opened his hand.

His palm separated from the core without resistance. The dead residue tightened once inside his wrist, but the Heartroot no longer pulled against it.

Iris released the lifeline around Luke as soon as his arm fell clear. The golden threads crossed the platform and wrapped around Kellan’s thigh just as blood reached the surface of the outer binding.

Kellan’s breath broke.

Dorian tightened his hold and kept the leg from shifting while Iris secured the damaged muscle.

"I have it supported again," she said. "Do not test the leg."

Kellan closed his eyes for a moment. "I wasn’t going to."

His voice had weakened, but he still answered.

The final strand of silver-green mana withdrew from Luke’s palm and disappeared into the passage.

Luke, Iris, Kellan, and Dorian remained on the narrow silver platform for a single heartbeat. Then every system window turned white.

[Central Heartroot transplantation complete.]

[Source world connection collapsing.]

[Emergency return initiated.]

Four columns of light rose around them.

Powerforge fell away from Luke. The last thing he sensed through the bridge was Lauren at the far end, still holding steady even though the path no longer needed either of them.

Then the world disappeared.

At North Basin, the young trunk between Lauren’s hands merged into the ancient bark surrounding it.

The roots around her wrists loosened one at a time. Behind her, the living support lowered her carefully until Rhea could take her full weight.

[Destination network self-sustaining.]

[Destination bridge anchor released.]

Lauren’s fingers slipped from the trunk.

The bridge closed, and Luke vanished with it.

She reached for partner resonance but found nothing beyond her own exhaustion. No warmth answered her, and no familiar pressure told her whether Luke had returned safely.

Lauren leaned toward the trunk before Rhea caught her.

"The bridge is gone," Rhea said. "Don’t force it open when we don’t know what the silence means."

Lauren searched again, more carefully this time, but found the same emptiness.

Aelira’s presence moved through the newly rooted Heartroot.

The path to the source world has closed. Its silence cannot tell us what happened after the humans returned to their bodies.

It offered no certainty, but it gave Lauren enough reason to stop reaching into the dead connection. She let Rhea support her while the Central Heartroot settled over North Basin.

Luke woke as the transparent capsule cover rose above him.

White light burned into his eyes. Alarms sounded nearby, and several gloved hands pressed him back when he tried to sit up. His right arm remained beside him, heavy and unresponsive.

"Luke, stay still," Dr. Shaw said. "You’re back in the supervised-dive facility."

Luke turned toward the neighboring capsules. Shapes moved behind the glass, but he could not tell who was awake.

His throat felt scraped raw when he forced out the only question that mattered.

"Where’s Lauren?"