The earthquake lasted a full five minutes, and obvious fissures had appeared in the ground beneath their feet.
Frod looked into the distance with concern. Had this terrifying earthquake affected only one region, or the entire Dream Wilderness? If it was the latter, what was Firstheart City like now?
"Angel?" Sanders's voice pulled back Frod's attention, which had already wandered far away. When he turned, he saw that Angel, who had kept his eyes shut all this time, had finally opened them.
"This new Authority is..." Seeing Angel awaken, Sanders hurriedly asked.
Though Angel had opened his eyes, the shocking scene from before still echoed through his mind, leaving him in a daze. Faced with Sanders's question, Angel merely said instinctively—
"Tree..."
A tree? What tree? Both Sanders and Frod looked at Angel in confusion.
As they puzzled over it, a whisper as faint as a mosquito's buzz slipped from Angel's lips: "...Civilization."
"Civilization?" Sanders froze for a moment, then immediately understood. "Could it be—Tree Civilization?"
The new Authority was "Tree Civilization"? Bewilderment flashed through Sanders's eyes. If Angel's murmur was true, then the implications of that name alone were frightening.
To bear the suffix "civilization" implied a complete collective consciousness—one with inheritance and succession, one capable of shining brilliantly through the river of history!
From the Wizarding World's perspective, anything connected to "civilization," whether spiritual or material, was never something trivial.
Not everything could be associated with "civilization." Of the few examples Sanders knew, the Origin Fire worshiped by the Origin-Worshiping Clan was one—a "fire of civilization."
Now that Angel had spoken of "Tree Civilization," even Sanders was startled.
This Authority... involved the level of civilization?
Sanders's expression kept changing. If it truly was a civilization of trees, then this dissipated Authority, even if it was not a core