I sent tendrils out to absorb the crystals around me first since they were the largest and sent them through the ceiling. I felt a surge of darkness as I felt everything become so distant so I pumped the miasma full of it and watched as it thickened. I sent out pieces of me that were filled with energy and despite my body telling me otherwise sent them into the worms and pools. The worms grew even fatter, filled with dark energy pushing out the imp essence. The pools grew even larger as fewer bubbles floated to the top. I stretched out my tendrils under the sand connecting all the pools and pulled imp essence to me while pumping more dark energy from other pools that the spiders aren’t twisting to those that are.

I redirected the essence toward the hole under my pool but could feel those impish thoughts swirl around—thoughts of leaving my pool and running away or attacking that damn ball. I resisted and pumped the area around the ridge of my pool with imp essence to be absorbed by the leftover crystals buried in the sand. I would use them later when I run out of this seemingly endless tide of twisted shadows. ‘Even if it managed to absorb every last burning imp left behind, it doesn’t explain this much essence.’ I thought to myself and tried to find the answer in the spiders but they are too weak to have memories, the only way to find out how this happened is by eating a piece of that ball.

With most of my crystals around me being used on the pools and worms they can push the wave out of the black sand. My parts tore spiders from below as I used the tendrils on the ceiling to reach down and tear even more apart. My tendrils targeted the largest of the spiders that were too slow to move out of the way pulled them up in the air and tore their limbs off until they stopped moving. The sand was soon stained as limbs of torn-apart spiders littered the ground and leaked black liquid. This pushed the wave further out until they were outside the reach of the miasma and my tendrils leaving only the worms to push them further away.

Sadly most of the larger worms stopped attacking once the spiders were beyond the black sand leaving the smaller worms to fight. Thankfully, with all the food the worms ate, new pools have started to form, spreading the black sand even further and I can feel the ceiling grow more in that direction. It will take time for the miasma to grow thick in that area especially with me absorbing all the imp essence I can through my tendrils. The hole is expanding even further under my pool thanks to all of this imp essence and the crystals are regrowing faster although filled with that twisted energy.

‘Right now I’ve managed to push back the wave but if those imps attack now then both me and that ball will be destroyed. I need to find a way to at least stop this wave so I can focus on regrowing the storage of dark energy.’ I thought to myself as I fought against the impish thoughts that swirled in the pool. ‘While the essence can be dealt with now, when the invasion finally comes then all this will become far worse to deal with and I won’t have the time to deal with it like now. I need to find a way to twist this essence to my advantage but the light at the core of it is the main issue.’ I thought to myself as I looked around myself for a way to deal with the imp essence once and for all. My gaze landed on the pocket filled with blood in the stalactite touching my pool and noticed that the blood was boiling. The fragments from my digging seem to have absorbed some of the essence that was in the blood and was heating everything. The ceiling didn’t react to the change and I barely even noticed it.

I pulled one of the fragments out of the pocket and dropped it on the black sand near my pool. I pulled my parts away from the wave so I could direct as much focus as I could afford at it. It radiated a fume that heated the sand under it. No, it wasn’t a fume but a flame, a lightless flame. It didn’t hurt but it heated everything it touched but it couldn’t burn shadow. I broke off a crystal from around my pool that had the twisted energy of those spiders and dropped it on top of the fragment. It was slow but the fume slowly grew and covered the crystal, burning the twisted energy. I focused on the fumes and I could see dark blue in the fumes as I felt the wrongness of that crystal slowly fade away. Soon the fume had shrunk back down to the fragment and the crystal was cracked, half melted, but all the twisted energy was gone leaving behind dark energy.

I quickly transferred most of the fragments to my pool and felt the heat build up as the impish thoughts burned away. I moved the fragments out of my tendrils to the rest of the pools and watched as my tendrils heated and gained a blue hue as the imp essence burned. The sand slowly melted around my tendrils and the heat built up all over my network but joy swirled my mind. A part of me hated the heat and I felt the worms squirm as fires danced across the miasma burning any trace of imp essence that escaped my tendrils but I resisted snuffing out the flames that made no light. I stopped fighting the wave and let only the small worms push it back. They didn’t last long but as the spiders entered the miasma they all squirmed and fell apart staining the sand black with blue hues. I had my separated parts returned to the nearest pools and had them collect fragments. Most I sent out under the wave letting the flame spread the flames but the rest I sent into the worms that were still fighting.

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As flames broke out across the endless wave the spiders finally started to scatter. Most of them ran into the pockets of flames trying to get to me but some either ran around these flames to only be eaten by my burning worms or just ran away. I left the broken wave to my worms as now I don’t have to worry about them being corrupted by imp essence in the hopes that new pools will form and feed the ceiling’s growth. I left some parts of me at the edge of the black sand just in case something did happen and the wave managed to push past the worms and the miasma.

I examined the fragments and found newer fragments made by expanding the whole don’t carry the same flame as the ones I have scattered around me. I pulled some of those strange fragments back and compared them to the new ones but I found nothing different between them besides the older ones burned imp essence. I see that not all of the fragments that were in the pocket shared the same level of flame as others. Some burned imp essence faster while others made less heat. I store less effective and inert fragments in the pocket as I move the faster ones around my network of tendrils. I would prefer the fragments that made less heat I can’t risk getting overwhelmed again so I made sure to put more fragments in the pools in the direction of the wave.

I send some of me that are at the edge of the black sand toward the black ball as I’ve noticed fewer spiders coming my way. The ball is smaller than before and the pool where the spiders crawled out of is still. I don’t notice a wave of heat from the ball so I move my parts closer to the pool. The ball releases a flash of light that burns everything. My parts writhe in pain under the sand and the wave of spiders is destroyed. My worms that were above the sand are destroyed but those under the sand merely shrink. Thanks to the thick miasma that covers everything below the ceiling barely any light reaches my pool but the few that do make it smoke along with the rest of the pools. I quickly pull back my parts running away from the pain but the ring of fire around the ball has shrunk. It can’t do that too many times or it will use up all of its imp essence.

The worms that survive the attack pull back and soak in the new pools that have formed as I try my best to contain my foaming anger. It would be easy to outlast that damn ball and make it waste all of its power but I would be weakened for it. The invasion could happen whenever so it would be better to regrow my crystals and find a way to make more of this flame to use against the imps. With the waves having ended I can finally relax my straining mind as I let all of the emotions that had been building up bubble away from my pool. While it would be best to leave some part of me near the ball to keep an eye on it the strain is catching up on me so I return everything to me. I feel less than I was before probably due to feeding myself to those worms as I feel through my tendrils.

I have grown to cover so much of the layer that I am probably the size of that city, settlement? I don’t know what it is called but my pool was probably the size of Redwood’s castle and the ceiling covers as much area as their port and farms cover. My tendrils cover the same area of Redwood’s castle and everything around it. Rammstein’s and Rat’s memories are conflicting so I’ll just call that human settlement, Redwood. I cover the area of Redwood. I feel every bit through my tendrils except for the worms that stay still between pools. My tendrils that go through the sand have gained a crystal-like structure around them due to the sand melting before and having cooled down. I don’t like the feeling of my tendrils trapped but with a simple movement the crystal breaks easily so I leave it be for now. With all of the imp essence being burnt away everything has cooled down but I am worried about that light. The lightless flames did nothing to stop that light from burning me so if that twisted shadow ball could make that light then the imps must have a way to do the same.

My gaze landed on my miasma as it slowly thickened but my mind was slowing down so I returned my gaze to the inside of the pool. It had shrunk with everything that had happened but now carried hints of blue in it. I was tempted to pull power from the other pools but decided otherwise as I barely felt my hunger. I let my gaze fall deeper into my pool until the only thing I felt was my tendrils pulse with power as I let go so much into the miasma. Hunger scratched my mind as I felt so many memories simply fade away. My gaze fell into the hole that had grown thanks to all of the imp essence now it was about the size of an imp’s skull. I felt my tendrils converge here as I felt pulses come and go to the rest of the network. Like a grand web or like those pieces of meat that those brains that processed everything that those bodies half ignored. Tendrils filled the hole and my gaze faded as I settled at the center of all of those tendrils. ‘Sleep before the light comes, then a feast.’ The last thoughts that floated in the pool before everything in the pool was sucked into the heart of the network.