"Look at you run immortal, look at your fear and panic, you treat mortals lower then cattle from the day they are born, yet when faced with the fact of your own mortality you flee like the dogs you are"
-God Crono ~ 15 billion years ago befor entering rest
Flying ships arrived in the north point one after another, their number only seemed to grow as time passed numbering in the tens of billions.
Getting closer to the edge of the rift, the space in-between each ship decreased to several hundred meters close enough for some barriers to collide if one was not careful.
Different clusters of ships could be seen slowly forming larger clusters made up of many smaller clusters, and each cluster had multiple sections easy to tell apart from the other, and as more flying ships arrived certain groups were sent out to greet the new possible allies that had arrived late.
It was clear to see that those Arks over 250 kms in size were owned by the leading Races in the vast tree realm as the energy that could be felt coming from these Arks was clearly of a higher level then others.
These Arks were surrounded by a vast quantity of other Arks and flying ships each with their own group surrounding them and each their own faction.
As time passed the Arks that were arriving seemed to be moving with haste and some were damaged seeming to have been attacked in various ways. A breath of relief could be felt from afar from those watching the new arrivals.
People could speculate on what happened but overall few choose to ask, and those that did found out that some ships had been raided by other travelers, or by pirates and some even had feuds with other races and it seems that their nerves got the better of them.
The Vast tree realm was starting to look bleak, the void in the vast tree realm held around 90 septillion stars 50 thousand plus spiritual continents, tens to hundreds of billions of planets per galaxy, with a vast space between each galaxy and even while some continents spanned over 700 million Kms to others over 950 billion kms large it would take several months to hundreds of years of travel in the Vast tree realms void to find another continent without proper star maps or transportation the only thing one could count on was the radiant spiritual energy emitted by the various continents as a guide post to signs of life.
Planets generally did not have such powerful spirituality but were far more numerous and always orbited around stars at least for the most part those with life did.
Now the Vast tree realms western quadrant had lost its spirituality, and in several hundred to billions of years the light from west stars will finally stop arriving upon the rest of the realm returning to the void it once was.
Or it would have, but sadly even light was considered slow compared to the corruptions speed as if simply appearing rather then moving.
At this time silence was beginning to take over the Vast tree realm as almost half of it had been consumed leaving only trepidation on the rest of the universe.
The corruption spread from outside the realm struck the west of the realm first and had consumed it in its entirety and now the south and north of the realm were both being devastated while the east had yet to suffer the same consequences but it was an unavoidable calamity.
The only exit in the Vast tree realm was located in the Northern most point of the Vast tree realm with few other options available.
This was not because of overconfidence or a form of defense, but because the Vast tree realm was simply too stable during its lifetime that few flaws like these could be found, if not for being on the path of one of the major calamities it would last for an indefinite amount of time without worry.
While there are several other realms adjacent to the Vast tree realm they would soon face the same calamity as they had - if they weren't already, those realms could not by any sense of the word be considered equal in terms of size or power as the vast tree realm.
The nearest realm to the Vast tree realm was around 900 octillion light years away and was only about 1/10 the size of the vast tree realm with less cultivators then even 1/10,000 of the vast tree realm, and even the second largest realm that was only 1/4 the size of the Vast tree realm could not even be considered the equal to smaller realms due to its lacking spiritual energy making it unsuitable to wide spread cultivation.
The Vast tree realm was currently experiencing a collapse, the borders surrounding the vast tree realm that were originally semi transparent were finally showing themselves to be made up of vortexes pilled up one after the other crushing all that came into contact with them.
As the realm collapsed the vortexes got larger and spun faster, it seemed that the restrictions that contained the vortexes transforming them into the realm barrier could no longer keep the barrier as one and the vortexes started fusing and spreading across the realm causing great disturbances, luckily this had not yet reached the north most point so things were relatively calm.
As the realm broke down those waiting at the northern most point were slowly decreasing interactions with one another, soon a small planet covered in mist clouds traveled in front of everyone.
The planet was releasing massive amounts of spiritual energy as if all the energy in the realm originated from this one planet yet at the same time it seemed very mundane almost like a painting.
This planet stopped in front of the black rift, time passed silence spreading across the Arks and flying ships bathed in red light.
"Get ready to cross the rift, I will only keep it open for 3 days anyone still left on this side will have to risk traveling across the rift storms on their own" a mans voice spoke abruptly from the small planet.
Saying so he gave no one any time to take in the news and the silent void started to rumble, the area in front of the rift started to crumble as if a wall had been broken.
Very quickly a large suction force spread across the area encompassed by the red light of the nearby rift and started to drag all the Arks.
Quickly people woke up from the daze they were under and steered their Arks away from one another, after taking control of the various flying vessel's everyone had trouble controlling the direction and speed of the Arks while being dragged by the rift but luckily few impacts between Arks happened avoiding a disaster.
Lerim who was on watching this from the small misty planet looked on, he had not prepared a speech nor any last words for those left behind he simply wanted to get it over with.
He knew what awaits outside the realm.
Most cultivators in the universe did not know what lay beyond this rift, if not for the fact they had been told to gather here they wouldn't even know of its existence.
They hardly knew a fraction of a fraction of the events and locations inside the universe let alone outside of it.
The Arks being pulled with the most force amongst the many flying vessels and many larger ships had made their way to the forefront of these cluster armadas.
Lerim had designed the Salvation Arks to be durable against the Endless voids degrading aspect, but these ships were not made for speed or combat, those effects will have to be provided by the inhabitants of the Arks themselves.
People considered the arks the peak of flying ships type flying vessels but in truth they could only be considered basic to major powers.
Most of the Arks in the forefront were the largest of Arks inhabited by the strongest cultivators.
Flying ships, planets even entire spiritual continents had made their way into the rift in droves.
The smaller arks and flying vessel's were trying to get ahead of the pack to not be left behind as the smaller Arks were generally from smaller powers considered expendable.
The Five family union (FFU) didn't manage to form satisfactory enough connections as such they had been pushed towards the back with the other powerless beings.
Many of these small Arks also acted as subordinates to larger powers used for reconnaissance which can be considered risky, but a small price to play
For protection and a chance of survival for their sect or family.
The FFU was a little too proud, they wouldn't bow down in such a way.
Most of the large Arks entered the rift first to show that they were leading races, second because they were being dragged and third to be the one of the first to leave this fallen realm.
As several of the larger Arks made their way into the rift they quickly sent battle ships to the front in preparation for any unexpected encounters.
Moons, planets, gigantic beasts carrying huge swaths of land to even singular individuals could be seen entering the rift leaving the Vast tree realm.
Soon half of the ships that had arrived had entered the rift with few of the major powers remaining still to come and a few that had to wait for others to enter due to their own circumstances.
Certain special ships had now arrived in the distance, these ships carried some of the most important places in the vast tree realm this included the Golden phoenix palace - which was the current leading ship amongst them.
One particular ships was of a scale that made even the most powerful of forces seem insignificant, this ship carried the very plant that the realm was named after and could be seen from afar across the universe, with proper equipment of course.
The top of the ship was clear like glass yet lines forming hexagons could be seen, the sides were smooth and the bottom looked like waves in constant motion smooth without a break in their uniformity as if looking from below the waters surface.
The inside of this massive vessel held the most important part of the universe the - Vast tree -, a tree so massive its leaves could be confused for entire countries its branches so tough that even pinnacle Gods might not be able to break them, its trunk so tall and thick several continents could fit from the bottom to the top with ease.
Each leaf was green but covered with so much dirt that entire ecosystems had formed on top of each one, deserts, mountains, rivers, swamps, barren lands all manner of things could be seen it was as if each leaf held a part of the Vast tree realm replicated upon it. The bottom of the leaves was black, with specks of stardust shinning providing shade for all below it.
The branches of the tree seemed to be brown but odd golden and silver shines could clearly be seen, several of the deeper areas of the branches had vast rivers and lakes to entire oceans with raging storms currently taking place.
One could not see the roots under all the foliage but one could imagine how grand they were.
The tree shines so brightly that all light becomes distorted magnifying its presence.
Surrounding the Vast trees upper foliage, thousands of small moons and planets orbited around it adding to its magnificence.
As the vessel holding the Vast tree Was about to enter the rift, the vast tree realm seemed to rouse up, and with a great rumbling- light shined across the North most point drowning all ships yet to enter in light that could be felt like water, light that one could taste, light that gave comfort, light that from this day would no longer shine.
A happy light, a sad light, an empty light.