Chapter 545 (2/2)

The coals in front of Randidly glowed orange and red, a luminous rainbow of ambient energy. It was impossible for him to up the scale of the experiment without alerting Ghost, so he had simply made a small example after a barbecue was held in the small shanty town.

It was very far from what happened in the case of a sun’s formation, of course. But it was illustrative of where the power came from. It was almost pseudo-science at this point, but that heated area slowly increased the possibility of something greater being born.

The supernova phenomenon occurred because at some point that seed of heat that bloomed was, to the functioning process of a sun, fundamentally more dangerous than any of the vast space had been previously. It broke the balance.

Unfortunately, no balance would be broken in a small fire.

Congratulations! Your Skill is now 75% formed.

But that didn’t mean there wasn’t something to learn.

However, before he could consider further, Randidly received a message from Dinesh.

I found another one of Unity Church’s facilities.

Randidly eyes glowed, emerald and vicious, in the darkness. It was time to find out what the Church was truly doing. He had been somewhat hesitant about what to do after learning that his Grandfather was part of the Church. After all, Randidly’s relationship with his mother was… strained to say the least. She had a similarly distant relationship with her father, who had raised her alone after his wife died.

But there was always a wariness there. On those rare occasions that Randidly saw his grandfather, he had always been on his best behavior. Because the man was extremely eccentric and volatile. One time, to prove to Randidly that there was nothing to fear from riding a bike, his grandfather had ridden a children’s bike 12 miles, from the store back to his house and back.

He had returned with Randidly’s overnight bag because he was staying with his grandfather at that time. Then his grandfather had checked his watch. “I might as well just tell your mother to pick you up here. Good day.”

Then he had left Randidly and the bike and gone home. It was confusing, more than anything else.

Plus, right now Randidly was Baloo Erickson. There didn’t seem to be any organic way to approach the man while he remained affected by the illusion. Well, other than joining the Unity Church, which was becoming increasingly popular in the area. More and more Raid Bosses had been showing up in the area, so their assistance was useful.

Of course, Randidly kept the area around him clean with the help of Sulfur and Acri, so it wasn’t too pressing. But it was slightly annoying. He had even begun to suspect that the Raid Bosses were being herded somehow into the area, to scare people into joining because there were suddenly so many more than there had been previously.

Letting his thoughts go for the moment, Randidly asked Dinesh for the location. Then he returned to the underground base, to meet with Bruya. She adjusted his illusion to look more like a Randidly sized Lucifer, with short but vivid orange hair and a strong nose.

Looking at himself in a mirror, Randidly flashed a smile. The mini-Lucifer sneered back at him, looking so haughty that he couldn’t help but laugh. “It’s perfect.”

So it was only an hour after he had received the message from Dinesh, the two of them were standing above the location of the compound. It was a peat bog from the look of it, and the day was humid and hot to match it. The wetland was covered in a dozen or so low mounds, and they stared at the smallest of these from a nearby hill.

“I followed a suspicious truck to this location,” Dinesh said quietly. “9 individuals were unloaded very quickly, while they were bound and seemed semi-conscious. I don’t have confirmation, but I knew you would want to know.”

Randidly nodded absently. Already, he reached out to the plants in the area, and their tendrils wound their way downward. He turned to Dinesh. “How many trucks did you need to follow to find this place?”

Dinesh simply shrugged. Chuckling, Randidly let it pass. Let it never be said that he complained of the presence of competence in his groups. Then, abruptly, he received feedback from the plants surrounding the underground bunker. Very quickly, his expression soured.

“We are going in,” Randidly grunted.