I was down to one disc, but I had a problem.

I'd aligned the mechanism and the final disc was rotating when I suddenly was scooped up by a Viktor who was in mid run. I soon saw what he was concerned about as a massive abomination was looming on the horizon. The flood of little mobs had slowed to a trickle, ostensibly because the rest of them were all packed up in the building sized leviathan rumbling its way down the street.

"I'm not done yet," I told the tabletop posing as Viktor's shoulder, "I need just a little more time to get the last disc aligned."

"We do not have that kind of time," István said, "It will be here in under a minute. We have already evacuated your family into the building, you are the last one out here."

And indeed I was, somehow everyone else had disappeared and these two gentlemen had fought the monsters to a standstill while I manipulated the mechanism that was going to do… something.

"Celistar," I said out loud, so he could understand what I was doing, "What happens after we get this done?"

From my backwards looking perspective, I could see Steeve in her place on the stone, where a set of monsters doing their level best to attack her with their whips. It meant little to the fox as she'd just teleport herself to different locations when they swung, resulting in an amusing game of whack-a-mole whereby they hit nothing but air.

If it hadn't been for the gravitas of the situation we were in, I'd probably been amused at some of the more gravity defying locations she chose, like one sticking straight out the side of the little pillar like a tree branch.

Once you get the alignment of the mechanism set, it needs to charge up, Celistar replied, and I immediately cringed.

Of course it did, why wouldn't we have some kind of sequence to make an already tense situation worse.

That said, I think I might be able to help out a little. I'll need István's assistance though.

"István," I said, "Celistar needs you help with something. You might feel a little tug at your… inside bits or something."

The man in question started to give me an interested look, then it immediately turned into an enlightened one as I saw a thin line of golden Nebula reaching from me to him. I didn't feel any more effort on my Soul, though, as all of this was seemingly powered by Steeve's Power Generation and Entertainment Services, LFC.

He reached into the inside of his overcoat as he ran, pulling out some artifacts — ones I could see were Nature Aligned. He began forcefully jamming them into the ground as we went, somehow making the whole process look far more graceful than it should have been with a series of rather acrobatic maneuvers he used to maintain his forward momentum. I'd have slammed my face into the ground at least twice.

As the last one hit the dirt, I felt a new pull on my Soul as Celistar leveraged both power from Steeve and my own reserves. Then I heard a series deep rumblings.

Roots, thick as one of Viktor's arms, blasted out of the soil, growing with speed that defied common sense. A thick entanglement of them left the ground near the building, and another close to the pedestal. Still a third leapt up and wrapped up the big monstrosity that was tailing us up the hill towards the building. It was more of a footless blob covered in whips, but as the momentum of its bottom half got arrested, the top began to tip before the whole thing came crashing to the ground.

Due to the size, however, the top was not far from the control dais I had been at. It was well within striking distance as poor Steeve was forced to dodge even more strikes, although she'd taken to running around the sides of the pillar instead of teleporting, which looked just as silly, but was probably less strain on the little enigma herself.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

The nature energy can serve as a conduit, Celistar said into my head, Go to the node near the building. I'll do what I can to buy you time.

At roughly the same time I heard her say this, I heard the distant shrieking of tearing metal, and looked up to discover that the tear in reality now filled half the sky, and was eating away at the buildings not that far behind the last stragglers of the abomination army.

I twisted my self to face forward, Viktor helping by shifting me, as he'd learned a few things since last time he'd been my temporary mode of transportation.

"You know the drill," I said, pointing at the newly created chunk of wood right outside what used to be our office.

And indeed he did as he set about flinging me that way, in the third such time in recent memory I'd been thrown by him. At least two of those thirds had been voluntary. I was beginning to wonder if 'Char shot-put' should be a formal sport. I mean, there'd only be one contestant.

Or none, if I didn't hurry up.

Being delivered via Viktorpult was at least efficient, as he'd even chosen a good arc. I wound up being able to land mostly on my feet, although my knees were going to feel that landing tomorrow.

Having a vague idea of what Celistar meant, I put my hands on the wood and flooded it with my Nebula, feeling how it was easier to conduct and control it through the Nature Aligned form. Spreading my consciousness out towards the dais, I was quickly able to restore my view, although it was much less clear now that I wasn't in directly above it. I honestly had no idea how someone without my abilities would have even accomplished this. Questions for a later time, to be sure.

Thankfully for all of us, I had a good idea of where I'd left off, and was able to set the final disc turning within seconds of my first contact with the wood. Which was good, as I could see the, uh, 'monster' monster being all monstrously strong and starting to tear at Celistar's restraints.

I positioned the wheel into place, and then nothing happened.

"Celistar, what now?" I said, probably both louder and higher pitched than I had intended. We were cutting it way too close, I could see reality unwinding directly at far reaches of the the street our office sat on. The big blob thing wouldn't have to worry about having feet before too long.

Just think about turning it on, it'll do the rest.

I would like to say her words were reassuring, but that wasn't so much the case, even as felt a blast of power spread out focused on the center of the control point blasted out, both sideways and upwards in a visible wave.

I was letting go of the gnarl of wood as I saw the four vertical 'locks' I'd originally opened slam back home, and could hear the entire contraption start spinning up, even from above ground. This low whum noise that vibrated my bones was gradually increasing in pitch as bolts of lightning started jumping from the void — where reality was disappearing at an increasing pace — into the center of the controls. I was glad I wasn't still there.

The one of these arm-thick strikes directly on one of the anomalies, effectively vaporizing it as it vanished from view a searing flash bright enough I saw after images. A peal of thunder with enough punch to stun my senses echoed out, and I quickly got smarter and covered my ears.

Viktor arrived, only a little out of breath, followed shortly by István. The lightning had finished obliterating the monsters, which was good, but Steeve was no where to be seen, which made me worried.

A bubble of light popped out of the ground on the dais, expanding slowly as yet more lightning jumped to it. It seemed almost like it was powering the expansion via pissing the gap in reality off, or so my head cannon went.

The three of us just watched this, having nothing to do without Celistar around to guide us, or in Viktor's case, nothing to fight. He seemed to be bored by the spectacle below us and was instead examining the wooden burl I'd used to kick the whole thing off, as if the secrets of the universe were contained within.

Suddenly, I saw some figures appear within the golden bubble of light. I was about to be examine them, when Steeve appeared in front of us, a fox tail reaching out to touch everyone present. There was a very odd tug behind my navel and before I realized it I was inside the bubble, as though Steeve had folded space in on itself and then punted me onto the other side.

Rude.

The noise from below had increased to a fever pitch as the seals on the ground glowed brighter and brighter. Steeve reappeared in her place on the platform.

The magical Celistar waterfall flowed into existence, and she looked around. I realized that the people who had been in the building were now on the dais as well.

Apparently Steeve's company also provided transportation services.

Outside, I could see the void surging forward, surrounding and consuming us before the golden light washed everything else out. About half the people with us were freaked out, while Alessa and Liam looked around in wonder. There was also the surreal scene of Gran sitting next to them on a chair made out of more roots, knitting something colorful. I looked at Celistar.

"What's happening?" I asked her.

The moon fairy looked around at everything, her eyes bright.

"We're going home!"

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