The time had come for the earth to express the anger it had long accumulated.
A low rumble flowed out from the heart of the Terra Empire’s fortress.
Layers of colossal rock shifted as though quietly pressing forward, and Montera’s heart completed yet another form.
That vibration, like the very breath of the earth, spread throughout the empire, and rocks and stones moved in rhythm with it.
Terramont stood alone upon the highest dais of the fortress.
Behind him was not a wall, but a structure of stone like a mountain range stacked in layers.
That place, formed of soil and rock, had now transformed into a fortress of will, a citadel of the earth.
He silently closed his eyes. He recalled what Oruma, emperor of Metalum, had said to him not long ago.
“The center must, by nature, have weight. Balance requires weight.”
“I am saying that I will become that counterweight. Someone must bear the weight.”
Oruma’s words had been simple, but they were not simplistic.
The existence of a center meant weight, and weight existed for the sake of balance.
And if there was weight, it would not move or waver easily.
Oruma’s words had challenged the weight of the center, and Terramont could not let that challenge pass lightly.
The cause of shaking was not merely that the force from outside was strong.
Perhaps it stemmed from weakness within.
Terramont raised his head and looked up at the sky above the fortress.
The fact that even the unmoving center could not avoid the aura of change was being conveyed through the present tremor.
The fortress was complete, but now was the time to pose another question atop that completion.
“Will I remain as the center, or will I establish the center anew?”
Terramont’s gaze grew even deeper.
Silence was still his weapon, but that silence had now begun to surge like a rumble beneath the earth.
“It is shaking again.”
On a plain in Montera, a large boulder muttered lowly atop the faintly trembling earth.
Beside him, a small pebble also rolled this way and that from the vibration.
“Whoa, Grandpa! Are we upgrading again?”
“It seems so. But this tremor feels a little different.”
“Huh? What’s different about it?”
The boulder slowly leaned its body.
“You know as well, do you not? A short while ago, some great lump of iron rolled in here.”
“Ah! Yes, I know! The earth shook every time it walked!”
The pebble hopped up excitedly.
The vibration Oruma had caused when he entered Terra’s territory was an amusing memory from the pebble’s point of view.
“That did not enter our land without reason. The energy of metal is trying to test this land. It was a powerful pressure attempting to prod at the balance. It was a moment when the standing of the center guarded by this earth became endangered.”
The pebble was startled, yet tilted its head.
“Wow, isn’t that going too far? Metal was born thanks to our land in the end, too… Isn’t this a situation where we should get angry? The center is our land.”
The boulder was silent for a moment, then laughed lowly.
“Hohoho. The center is the center because it does not move first. However, right now, the earth is reacting again.”
At those words, the pebble cautiously trembled.
It was extremely faint, but a definite tremor was spreading up from the ground.
“Is that lump of iron coming again?”
“I do not think so. This is a tremor coming from another direction. Two veins are intertwining somewhere beneath the earth.”
The pebble moved closer to the boulder and leaned against him.
The boulder still did not move, but his silence was no longer peaceful.
“I feel uneasy. It seems the world is about to grow noisy.”
“Yes… Soon, the center will have to speak.”
At the center of the newly upgraded fortress, earth energy reflected like golden light spread in all directions.
Terramont stood silently atop that fortress.
“Now, I am beginning to hear it more clearly.”
Though his feet were planted on the earth, he felt it through his senses.
As though the heart of the soil were beating, two different vibrations were colliding from two directions.
He closed his eyes and quietly spread his hand.
An extremely fine ripple of texture seeped onto his palm.
“This tremor… one comes from the deep forest path to the east, and the other from the burning land to the south.”
The identity of that ripple was a distortion of energy—no, the result of a mixture.
It was not a natural flow, but the trace of some artificial joining.
“These things… are beings that did not exist at all before.”
Gorban, who was watching beside him, spoke in a low voice.
“The energy is being transformed, Your Majesty. It seems the earth is becoming unstable.”
“Above all, this is a tremor someone created artificially.”
Terramont spoke quietly.
His words carried a resonance, as if they were traveling through the earth and descending below once more.
“Ignis, Silva. Just what are you doing?”
He slowly began to move.
To prevent the balance from collapsing at the center, he seemed to move like a counterweight, just as Oruma had said.
“Gaia, Gorban, Latos. The cause of these things is surely Ignis. Prepare to head south first. We must go and see for ourselves what lies sleeping at this epicenter.”
Gaia spoke in a worried tone.
“Your Majesty, it may be dangerous. We do not know what kind of threat may be lurking there.”
“No. If the balance is in peril, then it is right for the center to move. I intend to ask on behalf of the earth.”
He looked around at the surrounding earth one last time.
Beneath the fortress, deep underground, the question buried by the soil was now his to speak aloud.
The road heading south was not arduous.
The earth opened a path for them to pass, and even the wind maintained its silence.
But the earth was not calm.
The closer they drew, the more the hot, sharp pulses rising from beneath the ground stabbed into their bodies.
The border of the Ignis Empire was not very far from the border of the Terra Empire.
Before long, Terramont’s party entered Ignis territory.
Terramont’s rocky feet still made the ground there tremble.
“Uh…?”
“What is that?”
When the citizens of Ignis discovered them, they fixed their gazes on them as though slightly surprised.
The citizens murmured among themselves.
“I think this is the first time someone has come to our land.”
“That’s Terra, right? But why did they come?”
“No idea. Are they asking for help?”
Terramont’s party continued south.
They were drawing ever closer to Volcanium, the heart of Ignis.
“It is around here. From this point, I can smell energy mixing.”
Gorban said as he placed his hand on the ground.
At his fingertips clung not soil, but fragments of some kind of energy.
It seemed like fire, and it also seemed like metal.
“Fire…? Or metal…? This is an energy I have never seen before, Your Majesty.”
Latos lifted a clump of soil and examined it.
Within it, a red crystal shone, bearing traces of metal partially tangled within.
It was clear that those incomplete remnants had spread all the way here through the earth’s veins.
“An experiment.”
Terramont spoke quietly.
“They are experimenting on something. Without a doubt, they are trying to create something new.”
Gorban carefully posed a question.
“Then the true nature of this tremor is…?”
“A warning from the balance.”
Terramont kept his mouth firmly closed as he looked at the outline of Volcanium not far away.
That place was rising with the same red energy as before, but beneath it, he could clearly feel the aura of something hidden boiling.
“Vulcanus. Now is the time to speak with you directly.”
Terramont no longer hesitated and immediately moved toward the fortress of Volcanium.
In the central fortress of Volcanium, Vulcanus, seated upon the throne, felt the energy change.
Someone was entering his domain.
“What brings you here?”
Vulcanus formed a subtle smile, then rose from his seat and headed toward the enormous gate burning red.
Outside the fortress stood a vast silhouette that embraced the earth.
Terramont.
His energy was still, but the weight contained within it was by no means light.
“It has been a long time, Vulcanus.”
His voice was low and heavy.
“This must be the first time the center has moved.”
Vulcanus responded with a smile.
But tension was spreading through his eyes.
Terramont said,
“I will ask you now. Why are you trying to shake this balance?”
Vulcanus shook his head.
“I have never shaken it. I merely burn. My energy merely spreads, as fire should. If that is the shaking you speak of, then would that not mean it is not wrong?”
“Then is the act of transforming energies also conduct befitting the energy of fire?”
Terramont’s words were resolute.
Vulcanus’s eyes, glaring at him, gleamed.
“This world stands at the threshold of change. And I will be the one who opens that path.”
Vulcanus slowly raised his hand.
A small spark bloomed at his fingertip.
“The weak are extinguished, and the strong grow even greater. This is the simple and self-evident principle of the world.”
“You are no different from an invader!”
Vulcanus flinched for an instant at Terramont’s words, but soon burst into laughter.
“Kahaha! Are you speaking on behalf of Metalum now? We attacked Metalum, so why are you making a fuss?”
Terramont once again felt turmoil within his body.
As it happened, Terra and Metalum had a mutually generative relationship.
Yet Ignis also had a mutually generative relationship with Terra, and Vulcanus seemed to reject that relationship.
After a moment of silence, Terramont spoke.
“I move only for the balance of this world. Do not cross the boundary of that balance.”
“Balance, is it? You say only stifling things.”
Ignis’s red eyes were still glaring at him.
“The world sides with the strong. That is why one must not stop, but become stronger. I don’t know who else you gave such useless advice to, but even if the manner of speech differs, what is pursued in the end is all the same. Balance or whatever else—it is the desire to become a strong existence. Ah, I suppose I should tell you this as well.”
Ignis paused briefly, then continued.
“I will tell you in advance. We have Silva’s core as well. Should you not be a little careful?”
Terramont did not answer.
Perhaps he could not.
He turned away and left behind his words.
“I shall see just where that power leads you.”
Watching Terramont recede into the distance, Ignis spoke softly.
“We shall have to see who becomes the center of the world.”
As Terramont’s party left Ignis and returned to Terra, the earth’s quiet vibration enveloped his surroundings.
He said nothing, and Gaia, Gorban, and Latos, who followed him, exchanged glances instead.
Gorban was the first to carefully open his mouth.
“His words, about even Silva’s core… Is there no chance they were false?”
Latos answered.
“It would be better to hope they are false. If they are true, it means he has now become one who can handle two kinds of energy…”
Gaia’s voice was a little more resolute.
“If two energies coexist, then the balance has already begun to tilt. If so, is this not the moment when we must move as well?”
Terramont stopped walking.
He looked down at the ground for a moment and slowly spoke.
“Balance is not motionless stillness. Even when force is applied from every direction, protecting the center is balance.”
“But right now…”
As Latos tried to speak, Terramont continued.
“It is true that flame is growing fiercer and fiercer. But no matter which way fire or the others lean, we must protect the center. The south has crossed the boundary, and the west has raised a blade toward the center. And not only them—the east, which has joined hands with the north, has also shown a signal.”
Terramont closed his eyes.
Deep within the heart of the earth, something was vibrating faintly.
It was as though he were trying to feel every energy that existed upon the earth of the world.
“Very well.”
He opened his eyes again and looked at the distant sky.
“To think you would try to covet the center of the world with nothing more than that. Fire, water, wood, metal… all of you have crossed the line!”
There were no more words.
But his eyes were speaking.
‘The center of the world is still this earth.’
His footsteps once again stepped upon the ground.
A quiet vibration followed, and the three retainers followed behind him.
The earth still said nothing, but that stillness made one sense the storm that would soon arrive.