When he decided to collect war intel, Varian thought of a lot of possibilities.
Perhaps he would find a venom to work against the Sequoias, or maybe its secret weakness.
Regarding the Shadow Order and Chaos families, he decided to collect the information of hidden powerhouses.
The kind that army weren't aware of. That way, they wouldn't be caught off guard.
Given the scale of war, it might not amount to much, but Varian knew it was the best he could do.
But life had a way of throwing surprises that would leave even the wisest of men baffled, much less an 18 year old teenager.
So seeing the [Level 6 Water Path (Locked)], Varian momentarily froze in place.
Locked?
Previously, he assumed that this silent man was the vice leader of Shadow Order or something. That led to him believing the other party was a level 9.
So, when he found out that the silent man only level 7, Varian was shocked.
But the next reveal caused him to question whether he was trapped in an illusion. So, he unsheathed his sword and pressed his finger on its tip.
Splurt!
"M-Master, what are you doing?" Boo asked in worry.
Varian didn't reply.
The pain was real. Even his mental sense found no problem. That proved this wasn't an illusion.
Varian channeled prana and his finger turned into a leaf and quickly healed. Meanwhile, Varian stared at the silent man in the space shuttle.
Draven, the Shadow Lord and the man sat opposite to each other in silence.
Yet, Varian could now clearly notice something he previously didn't. Draven, was being respectful towards the level 7, almost to the point of being subservient.
And who would a leader of Shadow Order be subservient towards?
'I see.' Varian exhaled.
'System, humans can't lock their divine paths yet, right?'
[They might find something that could do the job in ruins. Perhaps.]
'But even then, they wouldn't be eligible to let a level 9 respect them.' Varian concluded.
"Master, what happened?" Boo asked in worry.
"He's an Abyssal Prince." Varian said, causing to jump in fright.
"W-What?"
"He is a dual awakener. He locked his second path at level 6. Humans can't do that, so…" Varian explained his reasoning, causing Boo to wipe its forehead.
'Ghosts don't sweat, what are you wiping your forehead for?' Varian wanted to say, but didn't.
"Abyssal? Prince too? What is he doing here? Wait, how did you know their levels?"
'You're asking now?' Varian facepalmed and answered. "I have my means."
"But an Abyssal disguising as human is very hard, no?"
"Yes." Varian nodded. "They even need to significantly change their body. Even then, they give off a different aura from humans. But he…I think he's using a very expensive treasure."
Boo was about to ask "for what", but Varian already answered. "Follow them and we'll know."
The ghost ship followed the Abyss Prince and after changing space shuttles several times, they finally reached the 12th secret realm.
This secret realm had only one vast spherical red dome occupying around half of its land.
To put it into perspective, this dome covered almost 10% of Valos' land.
Outside the dome was land filled with huge craters. Some were new, some were old.
Strangely, it didn't look like an attack from awakeners.
Varian shook his head and followed the Abyss Prince as they entered the red dome.
Hundreds of researchers wearing white coats and safety glasses moved to and fro as huge machinery of various shapes and sizes worked incessantly. There were thousands of small blue spheres in the doom that looked out of place.
There was a lanky man leading the Abyss Prince and Draven with a fanatical expression on his face.
"We did it, Lord! We did it! The aura resonan—"
The Abyss Prince raised his hand and the lanky researcher shut up. The prince spoke for the first time. "Demonstrate."
"Yes, yes. Right away, sir. Frank will do it right away." Frank, the lanky researcher nodded vehemently and smashed his comm.
In a matter of seconds, three more researchers appeared carrying a metallic blue sphere.
It was only the size of a cherry and was as normal as it could appear. Yet, this normal item was held in a vacuum container and was carried with extreme care.
The other researchers saw what they were doing and stopped their work. They followed them out and soon, hundreds of researchers were standing behind Draven, the Abyss Prince, Frank and three researchers.
In front of them was a hologram showing a test site hundred miles away. The land in that site was filled with a metallic sheet.
'To reduce damage, huh.' Varian thought.
With a snap of their fingers, a drone carried the blue sphere all the way to the test site.
Then it opened the container and dropped the sphere onto the ground.
Right then, thick metallic sheets appeared and guarded the researchers behind them.
The small blue sphere also touched the ground.
Then…the world went still.
Boom!
The secret realm shook as the ground trembled. It was like they were on a boat and some huge monster was shaking it violently.
A cloud of dust enveloped the test site as shockwaves emerged from it and swept across the secret realm.
Varian's heart raced as he watched the explosion with a heavy heart. He saw thousands of such blue spheres inside the dome. If those thousands blew up at the same time…
Humans were indeed capable of such explosions, but they were either mainly nuclear.
After Blink, however, the lethality of these weapons came down. Scientists couldn't find the exact reason, but they attributed it to aura's omnipresence.
Since then, while humanity did possess such weapons, their relevance continued to fall.
Of course, they were still used, but they weren't effective against high awakeners and would kill both friend and foe if used on mid awakeners.
But more importantly, the technocrats from Abyssal side developed the necessary anti-missile technology in their own fashion.
Even if humans used any such warheads, they'd be countered, just like in the first war.
But this…this bomb was bizarre.
It was something like a star treasure. Like the thunder fury Varian used in the Solar Trial.
But it was much, much stronger. It could easily kill a level 7 awakener. And more importantly, it's mass produced!
As the dust cleared, Varian was forced to take a deep breath. It was as if someone dug away the land for several miles.
Now he understood where the craters came from.
"Good!" The Abyss Prince nodded and the researchers cheered.
"Yaay!"
Varian watched in silence as they tried a few more explosives. Looking at the growing smile of the Abyss Prince, he clenched his fists.
"Prince Abrax, Ragnarorks will do their job. We'll take care of the rest. The cluster cities will be over. Leave it to me." Draven patted his chest and assured.
This was a problem. No conventional detection method would work against these bombs.
The defense systems of the cluster cities would also have a hard time against them.
But could they really 'finish off' cluster cities?
Varian didn't think so. Despite not being able to 'detect' them through normal methods, technocrats weren't weaklings. They controlled the defense weapons and were very flexible with their powers.
They could use their mental sense to lock these bombs and then use their powers to bombard them.
Despite the shocking element, Varian didn't think they posed a real threat to the cities.
But he knew better than to underestimate his enemies. Since they were so confident, they had more plans.
"They're waiting for us. We need to start soon." Saying so, the Abyss Prince boarded his space shuttle and left.
Varian was about to follow when Boo hurriedly said. "Master, the Sequoia plants are being taken!"
"Fuck! Fuck!" Varian cursed as he looked at the Abyss Prince's space shuttle.
The Abyss Prince didn't carry any comm. And he changed space shuttles frequently. If he didn't follow now, Varian would likely never find him again.
"Argh…" But Varian eventually sighed and shook his head.
This Abyss prince might be key to attack on cluster cities, but Sequoias…they were the principle threat to planetoids.
In fact, if the situation continued, then Sequoias would also become the main threat to planetoids of all planets and eventually the principle threat to planets themselves.
"Go to Sequoia plants."