The death of the Earth-shaking Root Parasite Queen triggered the total collapse of the void swarm throughout the Kermadec-Tonga crust-sink zone.
Deprived of their central bio-processor and the constant broadcast of mutagenic pheromones, the leftover hundreds of thousands of void-annelids and blind sea monsters fell into immediate nerve disarray. Without the queen’s man-made void directives, their autonomous nervous systems reverted to natural hungry panic.
Echo took immediate command of the hadal waters.
The Nine-Heavens Azure Dragon swept his one-hundred-and-fifty-meter frame through the upper trench hall, his star-finned Kunpeng wings unfurling to channel a massive, sweeping Wood-Water Cleansing Vortex.
WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSH.
A gentle, irresistible current of purified turquoise salt water surged through every fracture and canyon of the sub-mantle fault. The cleansing vortex swept the disoriented void scavengers harmlessly out of the hadal trenches and into the deep ocean deep-sea plains, while at the same time dissolving every leftover spore of void fungus into harmless, inert minerals.
Within ten minutes, forty linear miles of the hadal trench were fully purged.
Arthur Vance knelt on the edge of the newly revealed dark rock platform. He ran his gloved fingers over the giant stone engravings of the Continental Core Gate.
