For her journey towards Lake Mobius's World Tree, Mussodji had to learn to close her aura nodes. Letting her uncommon aura flow around her would be a magnet for undesirable attention.
No aura master ever left their nodes open at all times. Doing so was a sure way to over-exert themselves. The most experienced hunters would easily notice her unique aura. They would surely be curious about how she wasn't exhausted despite keeping her nodes constantly open.
The practice was uncomfortable. She felt restricted when she closed her nodes. It was unnatural to her, like trying to hold her breath. Her body vicariously needed the flow, as energy bubbled under her skin.
She also felt disconnected from herself, especially when she touched water. She quickly grew used to hearing whispering in the currents. Showering or drinking water was eerily silent with her aura flow restricted.
Kurapika assured her she would get used to the practice, but she doubted it. For the first time since she assumed being an incarnation, Mussodji felt alien to the general people. She never had to keep herself in check.
She was glad they retrieved the Dark Continent's volumes from the Hunter Association's headquarters. That allowed them to kill time during their train and ferry rides. Also, she was getting an idea of what was ahead of her.
The descriptions and drawings reminded her of the dreams she had inside her previous employer's estate. The carnivorous dry land, with its acid rain and cannibalistic beasts. The only thing she hadn't dreamed of was the Balanza Tree.
At least, she didn't remember having ever dreamed of the evil tree. She guessed she could ask Koni to show her what the wind remembered of their nemesis. Ever since she called for the Spirit of Wind, she acquired its remembrance abilities and could hear whispers blown in the wind.
Despite the Fâro reincarnating as a human, her shadow remained the same through the ages. The Spirit of Koni that stuck to her shadow was the same that stuck to Fâro. Mussodji wondered if the spirit hovered in the air between each incarnation, or if it returned to the original Fâro.
If so, Mussodji wondered if Fâro had a divine body somewhere in the universe, but didn't bother to return to Earth by herself. Picking an incarnation should be a useless step if the deity could return to make the deluge happen.
There had to be a reason for the cyclic incarnations. A small part inside Mussodji's mind wanted to believe it was to give people a choice. The deluge shouldn't always be the way to proceed. There must be something only a human could do on Earth.
She thought and overthought, but couldn't guess what that thing was. She had no idea what people could do that the deity couldn't. Especially when the incarnation had more restrictions than her community members.
When Mussodji and Kurapika arrived at the World Tree's feet, they had memorised the map depicted inside the first book. It was a rough sketch of where to find resources, but it also located the Balanza Tree.
She wondered if the author had been to all of these places. The described places looked perilous. Even the best of hunters couldn't survive in such a hostile land. Then again, that person lived on top of a multiple-kilometres-high tree. They might be one of a kind, but still.
To her travel companion's surprise, the author was none other than a friend's father. Mister Freecs was a renowned, but cryptid, hunter. He was also a man of many secrets, if he secretly published a book on the Dark Continent without having any records of venturing there.
Another surprise had been the man recognising Mussodji. He voiced how he hadn't expected her to stop by, but was glad she came after Zeno informed him she escaped to her island. She asked him why he had defaulted on the engagement he had taken before her grandmother.
The man hummed with a pensive look before answering that the stakes were too high for him to decide alone. At the time he discovered the plateau on the island, nobody was paying it any mind.
It was a secluded place where his boat crashed, on his quest towards the unknown. He explored what he thought was a deserted island. At first, it looked like a nice secret paradise. Then, he had been intrigued by the humanoid creatures, but had to run away from their hostility.
He climbed the mountains until he reached the plateau. There, he kept his distance from the community, as he guessed the closeted group wouldn't welcome a stranger. He roamed in the forest until a middle-aged woman encountered him.
They were both curious about the other, and rapidly learnt to communicate. He wanted to know how her community lived, and she wanted to know how he arrived on the plateau. When he showcased his aura-bending abilities, she asked him to teach her.
In exchange, she taught him her community's beliefs. He had mainly been interested in the parts concerning some ancient civilisation further than the sea, and wanted to explore it. Yet, his quest wasn't feasible given his human condition.
At least, she was sure he would die if he tried. He asked her how she could tell, and she hesitated before revealing their deity had returned. She had wished to learn aura bending to use a trick on her granddaughter, who happened to be the incarnation.
That's why she had approached him in the first place. She believed the Divine Creator had granted her wish. For her trick, she took a fragment of the incarnation and grafted it to her aura. That granted her the ability to have visions of the ancient civilisation's land during her sleep.
It was her grandmother who drew the map, aided by her visions. She also provided the intel he wrote inside his book. Finally, she asked him to return to the lowlands with the incarnation. She wanted him to teach aura-bending to her granddaughter.
The practice was frowned upon by her community, but she believed it was the key to stopping the never-ending cycle of deluge. Mister Freecs agreed to help the woman he considered to be a close friend, without understanding everything that was at stake.
It was only on the lowland, when he first channelled her divine energy, that he understood she was a ticking bomb. Unsure of what to do, he made a makeshift boat to return to the archipelago. There, he met with Zeno Zoldyck, as he trusted the hunter's judgement.
The latter reasoned that humanity's fate was too great to leave upon a child, but the outside world was too dangerous, given what world leaders would do if she manifested. Together, they decided to hide her inside the house of hunters and keep her identity secret.
They met again when she ran away during the cruise. Zeno assumed it wasn't their place to decide any more. Thus, they settled for remaining on high grounds and observing what would happen from there.
After his confession, Mister Freecs questioned Mussodji about her course of actions. He deduced she didn't want to unleash the deluge if she ventured outside her island. The young woman confirmed his guessing, but didn't give a clear plan of what she wanted to do.
She wasn't confident into sharing her plans with someone who single-handedly decided to change plans made with her grandmothers, went to someone else behind her back, and ultimately betrayed his vow.
With her travel companion, she returned disappointed to the ground level. Meeting the hunter at the top of the World Tree hadn't given her any more intel regarding her quest towards the ancient continent.
They would have to compose without any lived experience of a dangerous place. The endeavour sounded unrealistic. She dreaded travelling through a deserted area without clear measures of the lengths between the continent's shore and its Balanza Tree.
Kurapika thought the same and concluded they couldn't travel alone. He voiced that they needed at least another qualified hunter to mount the guard in rotation during the night. Having someone who could help them survive in the wild would also be useful.
He suggested asking an old friend, but she didn't answer. Instead, she offered to take the afternoon to process their dispositions before including other people. She mostly wanted to try reaching the bottom of the sea again, curious to know if being at the feet of a Balanza Tree would allow her to connect with the Earth deity.
The aura that ran through the World Tree was more vibrant than the one she usually sensed so far. She guessed it was because aura-bending abilities originated from its parent tree's fruits, and felt compelled to test if the Spirit of Fâro could inspire her the way to go.
Looking ahead, her eyes clung onto the sea that sparkled under the sun rays. The archipelago's Balanza Tree was located on a peninsula at the heart of the map. The place was remote, surrounded by acres of forest where hardly anyone ventured. She felt the urge to open her aura nodes and dive into the sea that stretched before her.
While her travel companion boarded the canoe, she entered the sea and slowly merged inside. From there, quietude invaded her senses and she felt omnipotent. She was confident she could rise the wind and set the sea in motion.
Engulfing the Earth would be so easy in that form. She could glide over the ancient continent until she reached the first Balanza Tree. And then, she could storm over the evil tree until its roots were lifted from the earth.
Mussodji shuddered at her thoughts' process. She refused to give into chaos. Storming the ancient continent couldn't be without consequences on the archipelago. She focused on feeling the wind gently blow over the sea, as the waves melodiously crashed on the beach.
The World Tree's leaves were rustling, and she felt its roots reach from her energy soaked in the water that permeated the soil. Keeping her focus, she sensed the other energy sucked by the tree's roots.
She supposed it was the Spirit of Earth's energy. It pulsated through the ground, matching the heart beats that echoed at the bottom of the sea. The pull to connect with that energy was strong, as if the Earth was calling her name.
When she reached for the Earth's energy with hers, she felt transported into another dimension. The air was thick, suffocating and hot. She could barely move and couldn't see anything besides the incandescent figure before her.
The energy radiating from the figure was evidence she stood in front of Pemba, the buried Earth deity. A tangible rage oozed from the divine being, and petrified her. She felt the urge to return to the sea, but the figure's gravity pulled her.
In less than a second, Mussodji had a vision of the deity's plead to be freed from the first Balanza's roots, but also his thirst for domination. She channelled all the energy she had, and was propulsed at the sea's surface.
Mussodji promptly opened her eyes and was welcomed by the darkening sky of dawn. She noticed that her body had reformed on its own, and her connection to the earth's energy was severed.
Mussodji deciphered her first encounter with the Earth deity. She was forced to conclude the latter wouldn't help her save the creation. Such anger and drive for power couldn't produce any good for humankind.
She faced a dilemma. She had to destroy the Balanza Trees that drained the earth's resources, and whose creatures hunted every form of life. But doing so would free the Earth deity, whose only goal was asserting power over the creation.
In the tale, Pemba was moved by hastiness and his desire for conquest. On the contrary, Fâro closed on herself after her twin broke their shared placenta. The creation was in disarray until Mangala, the Divine Creator, intervened.
If the Earth deity hadn't changed his heart from the beginning, she guessed the Water deity hadn't either. That could imply the cycle of incarnations wasn't Fâro's wish, but rather the Divine Creator's will.
She might be over-thinking, but that could explain why there were incarnations instead of the Water deity physically returning to earth. The Spirit of Water wasn't supposed to return constantly.
The incarnation's role was to overcome Fâro's detachment and complete the creation with the original twins' energy. At least, she felt compelled to ensure a better future than indiscriminate destruction for humankind. She needed to reason with Pemba, as she couldn't force the deity's cooperation.
In the tale, he created the first woman to appease his loneliness. He could have returned to his original half, but chose to create an artificial partner, whose allure flattered his desire. The latter eventually emancipated, and he fell for her trick, ending up buried for millennia.
Mussodji wondered if the Earth deity learned something from that mistake. He must have realised that he couldn't artificially create genuine affection. She might convince him that his true happiness was joining forces with his original half to give life to a stable creation.
After debating with herself for the night, she decided to expose what she discovered to her travel companion. She thought he could provide interesting ideas to get the Earth deity on their side.
Instead, he suggested using the Balanza Trees' energy to circumvent the greedy deity. He thought that if the trees could absorb their energy, the reverse should be possible. According to him, she should be able to drain the trees and Earth deity's energy.
Mussodji didn't like his idea, even if she didn't have any clues to negotiate with Pemba. If his demise had been the Divine Creator's wish, the latter would have already retrieved the life he breathed into the deity.
Facing her refusal, he stressed they didn't have another option besides the deluge. In that instant, the blonde hunter's eyes shined with an angry red light. Deciding she had enough of ill-tempered characters, she entered the sea and decided to remain there until she could convince Pemba.
Unknown to her, her travel companion intended to harvest the World Tree's energy, with or without her cooperation.