100\% DROP RATE : Why is My Inventory Always so Full? Chapter 748 - Caught Off Guard

Once the affected factions granted permission, the ancient beasts first moved to the factions’ territories on the five continents.

From there, they used the emergency Teleportation Discs linked to the conquered worlds.

One after another, the ancient beasts vanished from the five continents and reappeared near the protected boundaries of the threatened worlds.

After that, Lucien could only wait for updates through the Concord Link.

•••

The reports came quickly.

One of the first boundaries reinforced by Lootwell had already suffered multiple failures by the time Astraea arrived.

The conquered world itself still remained intact behind a vast translucent barrier stretching across the darkness.

From a distance, the formation looked almost beautiful. Golden lines curved around the world like a second horizon.

Up close, the damage was obvious.

Several sections flickered.

One region had gone completely dark.

Emergency formation anchors floated in the void while exhausted formation masters tried to reconnect the broken segment before the neighboring sections overloaded.

Beyond them, countless Black Mass monsters crowded the surrounding void.

Some were little more than warped bodies wrapped in miasma.

Others were large enough that each impact against the barrier sent ripples across a region hundreds of kilometers wide.

Faction elders fought between the monsters and the damaged boundary, preventing the larger creatures from reaching the weakened section.

The casualties had come there.

From the defenders standing in the void because if they retreated, the barrier would take the full force of the attack.

Then space trembled.

Astraea arrived.

Her true form unfolded against the darkness, so immense that the glowing world behind her made her silhouette look carved across the stars.

Tempest authority spread.

There was no sky in the void, but lightning formed anyway.

The first strike tore through the Black Mass formation before several monsters even understood another enemy had arrived.

A second strike followed.

Then a third.

Miasma scattered through the void in enormous black streams.

The pressure against the barrier eased almost immediately.

Faction elders who had been forced to defend the same damaged section for hours finally gained room to move.

They did not waste it.

Some joined Astraea.

Others withdrew toward the barrier and helped the formation masters stabilize the failing nodes.

The response changed from desperate defense to controlled counterattack.

That was exactly what Lucien wanted.

•••

Similar scenes unfolded elsewhere.

Condoriano arrived at a world whose outer defense had been reduced to half its original strength.

Vaelcar crashed into another battlefield like a living calamity, tearing through the monsters gathered against the world’s barrier before they could regroup.

Saber intercepted a Black Mass group before it could reach a cracked spatial anchor.

Kira joined three faction elders who had been rotating through combat without rest because every time one withdrew, the monsters concentrated on the barrier.

The balance changed.

Faction defenders were no longer forced to choose between killing monsters and repairing their boundaries at the same time.

Formation masters gained breathing room.

Damaged barriers were restored.

Outer defensive stations were reclaimed.

Several monster groups were driven far enough away that local forces could finally reorganize.

Casualty projections dropped.

Lucien should have felt relieved.

He did not.

Every successful reinforcement confirmed the same underlying problem.

There were too many boundaries to reinforce.

•••

By the end of the day, the Shadow Information Network had confirmed additional Black Mass sightings near conquered worlds that had not yet been attacked.

Some groups vanished after scouts detected them.

Others remained at extreme distance.

Watching.

Lucien stood before a projection of the Big World and the surrounding mapped void.

The five continents occupied the center.

Around them stretched a web of distant markers representing known faction territories beyond the world.

Until now, Lucien had always regarded many of those conquered worlds as extensions of individual powers.

Now several of those markers had turned red.

The map looked different.

They were not merely possessions anymore.

They were exposed points along a civilization that had stretched itself far beyond its original world.

And something had begun pressing against those points one after another.

•••

Lucien stared at the pattern for a long time.

The Black Mass could have attacked the five continents directly.

Perhaps that was still coming.

But doing so carried obvious risks.

The Tidewatch Network had transformed the seas surrounding the continents into a massive early warning layer.

Large abnormalities had become increasingly difficult to approach unnoticed.

Lootwell had emergency teleportation hubs.

Ancient beasts were positioned across the world.

Major factions had been preparing for months.

The training region had produced forces specifically accustomed to suppression, extraction, controlled retreat, and coordinated response.

The five continents were becoming harder to surprise.

The conquered worlds were different.

They were protected.

Some extremely well.

But their defenses were isolated.

There was no equivalent of Tidewatch spanning every world in the void, no unified monitoring network, no shared standard for barriers, and no common reinforcement protocol.

One faction might surround its world with an enormous spatial shell.

Another might rely on layered formations and several defensive stations.

Some possessed permanent gateways linked directly to the five continents.

Some worlds had been held for centuries and carried formidable defenses.

Newer ones had far less.

The Black Mass did not need every target to be weak.

It only needed enough differences to find where pressure produced the best result.

Lucien exhaled slowly.

"They changed the battlefield."

That was all he said.

No one needed to answer.

•••

He could not prove the Primordial Incarnations were directing these attacks.

Not yet.

The Black Mass possessed instincts of its own.

Perhaps some of these movements were natural.

Lucien no longer believed the larger pattern was.

Multiple factions.

Multiple boundaries.

Similar timing.

Pressure strong enough to pull elders into the void without immediately provoking full mobilization.

If all of that was accidental, then coincidence had developed an unpleasant understanding of warfare.

Primordial influence made far more sense.

Perhaps the Incarnations were not commanding every monster individually.

They would not need to.

A direction might be enough.

The rest would happen naturally.

•••

Lucien finally understood what had bothered him about the months of silence.

They had prepared for the enemy to come to them.

The enemy had never agreed to that arrangement.

The five continents were only one part of the battlefield.

The Thousand Races had expanded into the void for generations.

They had claimed resource worlds, colonies, hidden territories, outposts, and spatial routes.

That expansion had made them prosperous.

Now it gave the Black Mass countless places to apply pressure.

The war had not ignored their preparations.

It had stepped around them.

Lucien felt a reluctant thread of admiration.

It was smart.

Annoyingly smart.

He had been caught off guard.

Not enough for any conquered world to fall.

But enough for barriers to break.

Enough for elders to die.

Enough for factions to begin moving forces away from where everyone had expected the war to happen.

He hated that distinction.