Mu'ut flew as fast as the could towards the tree branch that had caught on fire and hit the earth with a force no lighter than any nuclear detonation. It made the earth quake, breaking and obliterating trees for miles from its impact point.
Most of the fruits of the tree exploded in smaller conflagrations but were no less dangerous than the crash. They were all full to the brim with precariously stabilized cosmic, mana, divine, and radioactive energy that they lost in mid-air. Like acetylene cylinders being roughly handled and dropped, they detonated in small chains of nuclear explosions.
Like she was in the midst of a minefield or a rain of grenades, she missed most of the explosions by a hair's breadth.
The rest she tanked and cried in pain because of. But her clothes were made by all the guardians.
As the princess of the guardians and one of the very few descendants of the guardians who linked with the planet and shared the guardians' destiny, she was bound to be protected.
Or at least to the guardians she was entitled to it. To Gammad, she was his daughter.
But since her mother was killed by a titan who also threatened to kill her.
She deserved all the protection he could give her. Avalendra couldn't agree more and had given her the armor she made herself. It wasn't like Avalendra's suit that was made for the half-titan, half-Ra who flew too close to the stars and survived in space. But it was made for a young goddess.
Made to protect her from the enemies of the guardians and offer protection from the Titan that killed her mother since that titan hasn't left yet. She couldn't track him to kill him for personal reasons and above all, her personal health. She may be in her own backyard but the Titan was something she couldn't offend. At least not yet.
But that was for another day.
Alas, she was going against the very foundation of the planet and the tree that had its own ridiculous rules and capabilities.
For example, there could never be two or more Yggdrassil plants on any planet. Its reach went beyond the various planes of existence. The land of the dead could see and touch it. In the Titan world Tiamart, where all planes met, or strings as scientists would say; the source of the vibrations of the strings were, it was just another tree in the backyard of the Titan king.
Sure, one of the countless vines that held stars in the sky, but it was still just an average, not so dangerous, poisonous tree.
Its fruits on the other hand were entirely a different story. There were never two branches with the same fruit. Or leaves. But that didn't mean they weren't special. The tree had leaves, fruits, and flowers of every single plant that existed on earth.
Or at least the version of the plant the people could see.
It was as though all plants decided to grow on the same tree trunk. But instead of each plant having its own properties, it had more. Wolfbane for example is dangerous on its own plant.
Deadly but it wasn't instant dead. If given time it could be treated no matter the amount. But of course the more poison, the lesser the time one has.
If it came from the world tree, it was another story entirely. A lot of guardians throughout their history had learned the hard way that it didnt matter how divine one was, if the tree was involved, it came down to luck.
Or a Ra.
A scratch would instantly kill even a guardian who had to drink a glass of pure 100 percent alcohol to get even tipsy for a minute, before getting back to full health.
Or it might heal you instantly instead of poisoning you. The same went for medicinal leaves or just normal ones.
The exception to the death roulette was the fruits.
At least by the tree's standard.
The fruits were tasty. Delicious beyond any earthly delight. They weren't nutritious. They were something else. They gave immortality. Healed all ails, even perfected the body beyond anything.
Eating one made one full for days. Even boosted everything.
All fruits were full to the brim with mana, some divine, even cosmic energies. That was why most if not all fruit glowed. The brighter the glow of the edible fruit was, the more energy it had and the more dangerous it was to your health.
The moment it shined like stars it was beyond dangerous for mortals. For immortals, it was breakfast or disintegration depending on the amount of radioactive energy it had.
If the fruit grew old enough, they could be turned into power sources for a biome, and if managed properly, the Ra and other powerful beings, even saints skilled enough could make them self-sustainable.
But they had a nasty side too.
If they touched anything that wasn't organic, they exploded. If the organic matter didn't have a life force, it would vanish.
If threatened, the Yggdrasil could wipe everything and start life anew using the fruits. A few metals and magic shields were just drops of water while it was the incomparable global ocean.
Even the raspberry-sized divine energy bomb was enough to move her hundreds of meters away.
It didn't kill her because the armor shielded her but it still inflicted enough pain on her. Enough burns to make her want to puke.
But she didn't care. She needed to save him.
"I'm coming." She silently cried as she kept on a straight path to intercept the falling branch the size of a mountain.
"Muut!" Gammad grabbed her and warped space back to Gaga who was busy moving the animals to safety.
"Mu'ut!" He shook her as she fought to rush back into the cataclysm happening in front of him.
She snarled and scratched at him, biting him in an attempt to break free.
He looked into her eyes and saw only her sclera. He sighed, knowing she was in her trans and whatever he did, she wouldn't stop until she did whatever caused her fit to kick in. Or snapped out of her fit.
Her wounds, when the armor moved aside in a golden and silvery liquid flow, almost drove him insane. The physical contact with her exposed skin made him feel all the pain she was subjected to.
He hugged her tight, sucking all the radiation she had accumulated and her pain before he chanted her mother's Embrace spell. He had never used it to heal her since she never got this hurt to warrant its use.
She fell limp as even his pain vanished and he felt his rage vanish. Almost as soothing as her her usual aura but stronger. A lot stronger. Like Mu'ut's mother was right next to them and she was hugging them.
"I'm sorry." The wind spelled the words making his heart ache.
"Take her home please." He asked Gaga as she herded most of the animals she saved away, through space cortexes.
"Okay. But take care and let everything settle."
"I will." He kissed her a second before she disappeared into a space vortex.
He turned around and cursed the sentinels around the tree.
So much for a heads-up! Couldn't they have said something this bad was about to happen as they warned him every time the gods came for the tree fruits?
He took a deep breath and quickly built all the chaotic energy around the falling branch into a thick shield and spread it around the area to prevent the energy from decimating every and activating the few dormant volcanoes the continent had.
He then started harvesting as many fruits as he could and flinging them onto his endless pocket made by Thoth, the last son of Atlantis.
It was a pocket of space stretched by magic and maintained by his energy.
Though he moved so fast he made sonic booms everywhere he turned or slowed down, he still couldn't get all of the fruits in the little time he had.
He went beyond the shield to reinforce it the best he could since he saw one fruit he possibly couldn't harvest and knew that once it touched the ground, it would either level everything or kill him if he touched it.
He could feel the fire energies being sucked out of the other fruits and the falling branch just to be compressed over and over like the beating of a heart. A heart beating almost beyond the speed of sound.
The branch touched the ground and with it, destruction tasted his land.
The ground quaked and tore at the weight of the tree.
The shockwaves from the contact ripped the entire forest off like it was nothing. It leveled the hills and an flung avalanche of trees and rocks at him, cracking the shield he had crafted that stretched for miles around the expected crater.
The fruits hit the ground and detonated with the strength of a wildebeest head butt and a choir of explosions that struck his shield like a heartbeat does a stethoscope. He embraced himself as the world within the shield burned, waiting impatiently for an explosion that would destroy everything.
Alas, what came was an explosion. Of some sort.