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The day ended with Erick dismissing a hundred groups of people, almost all of which only wanted to talk to him for various, unconcerning reasons. There were people who wanted silver rains, or who wanted diamonds. There were those who had ‘fantastic opportunities’ that Erick ‘must invest in right now!’ for their products were surely going to be flying off the shelves in the coming days. He still helped those who needed help, but the line between necessary and frivolous was blurring.

Sitting down to dinner with everyone, Erick laid it out there, “I think I might have been wrong about there ‘always being’ monster problems. I think the people who needed help, who were in actual danger, were quick to ask for that help. I only had 20 monster kills today. Oddly enough, all of them were hydras.” He added, “I never thought hydras were such a big problem, but they are, aren’t they.”

“It’s the regeneration.” Teressa said, “Regenerating monsters sometimes learn to escape a conflict and to come back twice as strong. Most monsters fight and fight and then die after the fight is over. Wounds, and such.”

Jane nodded. “All the worst monsters are either the ones that regenerate, or breed quickly.”

“There’s also the monsters who don’t look like monsters when they’re juveniles. The hidden ones.” Nirzir said, “Like the mist stone gluttons. The parent monster is a tiny lizard that will transform into a mist stone glutton if it gets damaged in combat, or if it suffers a sickness. Both events will prevent it from expelling its core dust and becoming monsterized.”

“There’s a species of bird in the Wyrmridge Mountains that’s like that, but only if the mother suffers damage in mating season. Elbow Twits.” Teressa said, “The monstrous version lays eggs everywhere, too, with each tenth egg turning into another elbow twit. That one is both a ‘breed quickly’ and a ‘hidden’ type.”

“Well, I’m just glad that the problem here seems to be lessening.” Erick asked Teressa, “But why are they called elbow twits?”

“They like to attack joints. It’s the cartilage.” Teressa said, “They like all cartilage, actually. Noses and ears are fair game, too, but people try to defend their faces and ears and leave their elbows out there, so that’s how they got their name. A group of them can leave an unprepared group of people as no more than dismembered body parts.”

Erick shivered. “Oh. That’s awful.”

“They’re mostly insignificant monsters.” Poi said, “Only low-leveled, unprepared people are ever vulnerable to them.”

Teressa nodded. “Most monsters are insignificant once you get strong enough. Elbow twits usually end up killing other animals, though I have heard that they can be a problem in the Greensoil Republic.”

Erick said, “Anyway. Looks like I got most of the major monsters around here. Or at least the ones that people are willing to come to me about.”

Jane said, “Only the ones that people survived.”

“… Ah. Yeah.” Erick stopped, and considered.

He should just kill every single monster out there, shouldn’t he? Or at least all the big ones. Every single tangled hydra would be a good start. He almost did, right then and there.

Except…

That would be messing with the ecosystem, too much. Treehome had done a significant amount of prognostication to discover if killing all the moon reachers and deathsoul shrooms would be good, or bad, and Erick would need to do the same before he decided to erase any monster lineages from the world. After all, tangled hydras ate a lot of everything, all the time, including other monsters.

And with that thought coming to him…

Looking back on it, he hoped that he hadn’t fucked up the Tribulations west of Songli when he went on his money-replacing spree a few weeks ago. Killing the fast-breeding crystal mimics was one thing, but mist stone gluttons came from normal lizards, and they were not actually endless.

He hoped that he hadn’t fucked up the grassland ecosystem for the grass travelers, since he had killed almost every large monster out there in the last week. Something different and unknown might come in and take over, now that the major monstrous threats were no more.

Jane asked, “Whatcha thinkin about, dad?”

Erick said to Jane, “I could go kill every single tangled hydra out there, but until I know more about the long term effects of such an action, I will not be doing that, for I won’t always be here to solve whatever horde-type monsters come later, after the major predator had been removed from the environment.”

Jane smiled a little, as she said, “Probably for the best.” She added, “I doubt many places were wiped out completely, anyway. Most people can escape a tangled hydra. You probably heard about all the actual problem hydras.” She asked Teressa, “But that brings up a good question: How is Treehome doing now that the reachers and shrooms are gone?”

“From everything I have heard, Treehome is doing well. The Forest got a lot safer.” Teressa said, “There have been some unexpected hordes of shroomspawn exploding out of the Green here and there and there are some sort of beetle problems in the west, but other than that, it’s been good—” She looked west. “Warlord Niyazo is coming over.”

Erick almost panicked at the sudden shift in Teressa’s focus, but when her words weren’t disastrous, Erick calmed. He said, “Yeah. I see him, and Koori, too.” He ate a few more bites of dinner as he spoke through his lightform, as he did when he was speaking through Ophiel, “You all don’t have to be there for that, if you don’t wish. I think we’re going to talk politics.”

- - - -

Erick invited Niyazo and Koori into the dense air of his home. They declined to go inside, which Erick expected, so the four of them sat on the front porch. Jane came out of the house with a small keg of hot rice wine and four cups, though she declined to sit in attendance.

The night crept in as the sun set in the west, but bright wardlights shaped like tiki torches kept the darkness at bay. Up above, the [Undertow Star] glittered in the nearby sky. Celes, The Silver Star, and Hell, shed their wan lights onto the surrounding land, their white, silver, and pink reflections captured in the shiny metals scattered across the front yard, their diffuse glows barely illuminating anything else.

Steam rolled up from Erick’s cup as he raised it to Clan Pale Cow, smiling as he said, “Congratulations on your easy win today.”

“Ha,” Koori said, then she sipped her drink.

They all took a small drink.

“It is only thanks to you that we won, today.” Niyazo said, “Until a week ago, Green Grass was one of our harder prospects. It could have gone either way.”

“I’m glad to help, then.” Erick said, “Now that I’ve seen some of your land, and talked with your people, I believe that Integration is a bit more important than I thought it was.”

Koori asked, “Is that why you are still here? I thought that after finding your dragon, you would have either killed them or kept traveling.”

“All I did was talk with him. Or her. Not sure about that.” Erick said, “But the danger is still there. Do you wish I was gone? So that the dragon could move around unhindered?” He had asked the question sarcastically, if only because he was unsure of what answer they would give him.

Koori frowned. “I did not mean it like that. But this is not your land. Unless you are making it your land?” She asked, “So? Are you making it your land?”

Erick said, “I’m moving on as soon as I’m sure that I haven’t left a problem behind me, but I don’t know if the dragon is a problem or not. He seems to have only gone after me because I was hunting face stealers and exposing the shadows everywhere, and thus, they thought me a threat.” He shrugged. “Maybe I am an existential threat to someone like that. Maybe the dragon is a face stealer themselves. They probably are; it’s easier to move and hide quickly by abusing [Polymorph] in that way, than it is to use [Polymorph] in the correct manner. Or it could be that they only became a face stealer because they had no other choice; it was either that, or death.” Erick said, “But they’re likely not a face stealer; we got all of those.”

For a long moment, Koori sipped her wine, not saying a word. Thinking.

Then Niyazo said, “I would have you at tomorrow’s debate with Blue Sky, if you would be there.”

“Eh?” Erick asked, “Wouldn’t that be dishonorable? I mean… I know the elders have no actual power. But.” He waved his hand at the landscape of Ooloraptoor, saying a lot and nothing at the same time.

Koori said, “The elders are moderators. Nothing more. They certainly wish to be more than that, but as we are not actually Integrated at this point in time, what the elders say is little more than hot wind.”

“They’re useful for helping to establish a culture of Polite War and to keep actual conflict to a minimum, but many of them are actively against Integration.” Niyazo said, “What they want is power without responsibility, and one must push back against that sort of thing, or else you will wake up one day to find a collar around your neck without ever knowing how it got there.”

Koori added, “Still. There is some merit to adhering to the words of the elders. But only if we won’t lose by doing so.”

Niyazo said, “Which is why we would have you at tomorrow's debate, if you are willing. It need only be for a single 5 minute segment. The elders would push back, but we would win another debate without bringing out our big arguments, and this might be necessary for when we face Brown Dog. We saved a lot of audience goodwill today by not dragging out the talks, and I would keep that goodwill if possible.” He added, “Plus, I am sure that everyone would want to hear you speak more fully.”

Erick said, “I’m sure you can win on your own merit, and I need to think about more than Pale Cow. I will abide by the elders’ decision.”

Koori’s eyes went a bit wide at Erick’s stark refusal. She smiled, then rapidly hid that smile from Niyazo. She was delighted to hear that Erick chose to step back, but she had needed to come and support her husband, and so she spoke on his behalf. She was glad they had lost this tiny ‘debate’.

Niyazo stoically took the news like a man hearing that tomorrow’s weather would be bad, and yet he still needed to go out and work in the rain. He nodded, then said, “Understandable, and acceptable. Thank you.” He continued, “I would hear of your ideas of governance, anyway. If you would be willing to share them. What does a proper government look like to you?”

Well…

Sure. Erick could do that.

“Any design works, as long as it fulfills a few basic needs:” Erick explained, “The people are safe, without being constrained. Ideally, the average person is educated in the basics of how their world works, so that they can one day become one of the ruling class if they so wish. Social mobility is achievable in a myriad of ways, but all of that mobility comes from contributions of the individual to the rest of society, or through anything non-violent, really.

“The ruling class needs to be accountable to both themselves, and the people they rule, and everyone must be judged using the same set of laws. The law needs to be compassionate, with the enforcement of the law bending based on circumstances, and yet it must not bend so far that the whole system breaks.

“Anything that fulfills those needs works for me. Pretty much all the cities of the Crystal Forest fulfill this need, though each one of those is more ‘adventuring hub’ than actual city.” He paused.

Erick almost spoke of Portal, and how they were the exception to the rule, and how shitty that was for everyone else, as Portal was the Crystal Forest’s main trade route to the rest of the world. He was still mad at them. He was still not over what the Pearl King allowed to happen with Lower Trademaster Caradogh, and the destruction that erased Spur’s Farms. He chose not to speak of that, though, because something like that was surely able to get back to Portal, and Erick didn’t need to give himself a future headache. The Pearl King was very much capable of making life at Candlepoint harder than it had to be.

… Erick found he had no more to say, actually.

When it became clear that Erick was done, Koori said, “An admirable set of requirements. But trying to apply the law equally to those of true power usually results in the destruction of stability. Placating them into going away or indulging them long-term is usually the safest course of action.”

She was purposefully antagonizing him, wasn’t she? Bah.

“That might be true.” Erick said, “But one must have a shape they wish their society to take, or else their society will take whatever shape other people impose upon it. It’s okay if it’s not perfect, as long as the vast majority of people are free, and even the lowliest person —even those trapped by the most awful of circumstances— has a chance to break free of those circumstances.” Erick said, “Plus, if you have a solid code then you can tell visiting powerhouses what is okay, and what isn’t. Perhaps they’ll follow your lead, if you have an established lead to follow.”

Niyazo smiled wide. “I’m going to steal that line for myself, if you do not mind.”

“Go right ahead,” Erick said.

Koori was not satisfied, though. “I wish idealism was that simple to implement. Just tell them to behave? As if it is ever that simple.”

Erick felt a spike of anger rise up from the absolute depths of his soul, catching him off guard with its ferocity. Later, he would realize that his anger came from how he felt when everyone didn’t want to murder all the Shades. He kept a lid on much of that anger, but some of it came out as he said, “Then make it that simple, Koori.”

Koori’s slightly-widened eyes glinted in the false firelight all around.

Niyazo was almost forgotten to the side.

Koori asked, “How?” She asked, “How does one treat with Shades, and dragons, and all the other powers of this world, and come out stronger for it, without falling to the depths? How do you keep being a good person, when reality requires you to be evil? How do you—” Koori was conflicted in that moment, perhaps more than she ever had been before, and yet she made a decision to continue. She asked, “How do you forgive yourself for all the mistakes you have made?”

Ah.

Erick said, “Pick a good goal, and then stick to that goal, yet know that deviations will occur because no plan survives contact with reality. Be ready for those deviations. Acknowledge the mistakes you make, and then fix whatever mistakes you have made along the way, if you can. Always deal with the problems that come at you; never let them pile up. Always act with compassion. Don’t fall into thinking that the problems others create because of your actions are somehow your fault.” He added, “Unless they are your fault, and then you gotta fix them.”

Koori listened, breathlessly. Then she nodded.

Niyazo spoke up, shifting the conversation away from his wife, “I would hear how you think your three-branch government would work on Veird, if you were to implement it here.”

Erick felt a moment of whiplash, then he came back to himself. He thought for a second; did he want to tell this stuff to Niyazo? Jane had been right that it was nice to be able to talk to your leader, on Veird. It was nice that the space separating the average grass traveler from the ‘ruler’ was so small. But then again, any form of government that oversaw millions of people would suffer the same sorts of ‘disconnected from the common citizen’ fate that came from a three-part government. But at that same time, having a system in place where everyone was replaceable, meant that it could last long past the people who invented the system.

Erick decided to answer Niyazo’s question. He started off circumspect, saying, “Now, this probably won’t work on Veird, because a three-part system is not responsive to existential threats in the same way that most governments around here are responsive to existential threats. This is both good and bad. Good, in that malicious forces cannot bring down the system in one fell swoop. Bad, in that such a system should not be able to respond in the timely manner necessary to avert certain disasters, like monsters. And yet, with some tweaking, you should be able to make a three-part system that is responsive to monster threats, or what-have-you.”

“But what does that look like, exactly?” Niyazo asked.

Erick spoke.

Soon, they switched to coffee.

Niyazo asked questions, and he posed interesting arguments. More than once, he understood exactly what could go wrong with a three-branch system of government, long before Erick got to the specific warnings of what could go wrong. ‘If the majority of people thought a certain way, then there would be no room for minorities in your system’; ‘Which is why special care must be taken to ensure minorities have a voice, with leaders voted in who bring those voices to the table’. ‘We grass travelers often have to combat lies, which is why we have elders to show the easily-swayed what is truth and what is fiction. Where would you put the Elders in your system?’; ‘Anywhere people would vote for them to be, but probably as judges’.

They also spoke of voting, and local elections, and representatives which would form a council which would communicate the needs of their territories to the ruling party. And then Niyazo spoke of voting problems, where people either voted for a single party, or their vote was useless. Koori spoke up about how a ‘two party’ system was also a possible problem. To this, Erick brought up a novel form of voting, where people voted not for a single person, but instead ranked their top three or five people in order of who they want for a certain position, and then those people won council positions based on how many votes they received, and how many positions needed to be filled.

“That’s called transferable voting, and it does prevent the ‘party rule’ problem.” Koori said, “They use that in the Greensoil Republic.”

Erick smiled. “Ah! They do? I didn’t know they did that.” He chuckled. “I’m glad to see that the theory actually works! No one does that back home, and I wish they would have.”

“Their implementation only resembles the ideas that you speak of. Only nobles are allowed to vote over there, which is something we would not allow here.” Koori said, “But at least they’re not the Sovereign Cities.”

Erick nodded. “That place is still at civil war.”

“And they will be, as long as the nobility exists. Which is why we cannot have a nobility happen here.” Niyazo said, “I would say that is most everyone’s actual fear when it comes to Integration; the rise of a nobility. Too much power passing down into the hands of children who have done nothing to earn that power besides to be born into it.” He added, “And at the same time… Transferable votes are a headache and a half. Better than the clan system they have in Songli, though.”

Koori nodded, humming in acknowledgment as she sipped her hot rice wine. Mostly, she stayed silent as Erick and Niyazo spoke, her mind and her thoughts her own, but more than once she shared those thoughts.

The night wore on. Eventually, it got to be too late, and Niyazo and Koori went back to their own home. Erick wished them well in their debate with Blue Sky tomorrow. He might watch, but he would not participate…

Unless something horrible happened. But Erick didn’t say that part; he wasn’t willing to tempt Fate that much.

- - - -

As the sun rose in the east, Erick set to work making a better DC engine. He started with metals—

But before he began, Niyazo and Koori showed up at the edge of the property, walking his way. Erick re-enabled their [Prismatic Ward] permissions and welcomed them into his workshop, asking if they wanted a cup of coffee. He didn’t want to say it, but both of them looked exhausted, as though they had been awake all night long, talking to people. Maybe they had.

“We cannot stay overlong, Erick,” Niyazo said, standing next to a new pile of copper ingots Erick had purchased not ten minutes ago. “We came to inform you that we will be using some of your ideas in the debate today, so that you are aware of it before it happens.”

Erick’s eyes went wide. “You are? Well. Okay. Good luc—” He warned, “The systems I spoke about are likely not compatible with the realities of life on Veird. Here, you need to respond to danger and to the changing world in a single moment, and if you can’t, then you die. Back home, all the big problems were caused by the system’s inability to respond to existential threats, for everything was too entrenched, but at that same time, a lot of big problems were avoided, because everything was so entrenched; some wacko couldn’t come along and destroy everything all on their own. The system itself remained intact.” Erick said, “I think that the politics of my homeland and the reality of life here are intrinsically incompatible, and to attempt to map them together would only cause problems.”

Niyazo said, “The politics of your homeland were what they needed to be to allow your people to break the nobility that plagued your people, just like it plagues ours. Most of the ideas you spoke of don’t translate perfectly, but there are many that do. The main one is the establishment of a system that will last long after the creators are gone, that has checks against abuses and avenues for justice that the systems we have around here simply do not have.” Niyazo said, “That is much of what our arguments will focus on, going forward. With that, we hope to ensure that a nobility will never rise from the systems we lay down.”

Koori said, “We thank you for your assistance and your words and your knowledge, but we’re taking it from here. You are welcome to watch, if you wish.”

Erick looked at both of them for a moment, then he realized another problem that they didn’t discuss nearly enough. He said, “The city you want to make out of the clans of the grass travelers is not going to look how you want it to look. They’re going to want a lot of magic in their lives. They won’t be orthodox. You’re going to need to change.”

Niyazo’s eyebrows went up, as though he couldn’t believe that Erick was putting to words his own concern. Then he turned to see his wife’s reaction.

Koori stood resolute, like she was facing the executioner’s block with strength. She had some ‘big red buttons’ of her own, didn’t she? In that moment, she pressed one of those buttons; she stepped down a path that she did not want to go, but that she knew she must. Her voice was solid, yet smaller than usual, “I understand.”

Erick looked to Niyazo again, and then back to Koori, his gaze settling on the woman who a Registrar once offered to help become empress. He saw her in that moment, more than he had ever seen her before. Perhaps what he saw was a trick of the manasphere, or a particularly deep moment of mana sense; probably both.

Koori was dressed in a raiment of impeccable shadows made of thick air. A [Cleanse]d darkness that draped from every surface of her body and layered downward, like an ephemeral idea brought to this side of reality. Something dark swirled around her hornless head, resembling a crown, but also horns.

And then it was gone.

Erick would have said something, he would have asked questions, except, all he had seen was a figment of the manasphere; like a [Scry] eye that was only visible when under Meditation, or like one of the many monstrous forms that lurked in the un-Reality that surrounded them all.

So all Erick said was, “Good luck.”

Koori nodded. Hers was a stiff gesture, as though she was also trying to understand some odd thing in the moment. Perhaps she had seen what he had seen in the manasphere, though most people didn’t run Meditation unless they were expecting problems that required a magical solution, and two people almost never saw the same odd figments unless they were of like minds.

Niyazo noticed the oddity that passed between his wife and the archmage, but he just smiled a little, and moved on, saying, “Thank you, Erick.” He bowed a little. “Archmage.”

Koori just nodded deeply.

The two of them walked away, back to their clan.

Erick took a moment to actually mana sense toward the near past. He looked at Koori again, in that odd moment. She had no shadowy garments on this time, but there was a wispy sensation in the air around her. It almost looked like a garment made of nothing, for it was ‘made’ of the ‘blanking’ that occurred when someone purposefully erased the history of the manasphere, or when powerful magics tainted the manasphere. It was a weak effect, whatever it was, for as Erick watched that moment, frozen in time, the manasphere filled itself back in, and Koori just looked like Koori. No dark raiment; no thick shadows.

Odd.

Erick fully came back to himself.

He turned toward his metals…

And he got to work! What else was he supposed to do about an oddity such as Koori? Whatever he had seen certainly wasn’t a trick of the light, or a trick of Meditation. But whatever it was, it was not Erick’s problem…

… But he wanted to pick the brain of someone who might know more about this sort of thing. Teressa was still in the yurt, so it was easy enough to get to her. She was organizing monster-killing lesson plans out of a book for children.

Erick stepped into the room, asking, “Teressa. You’ve been reading up about fortune telling and stuff like that, right?”

Teressa looked up from her book. “...Yes?”

“Have you ever [Future Sight]ed around a person and seen something…” Erick wasn’t quite sure how to phrase it, so he said, “Seen something solidify? Around them? The notes I got from Redarrow spoke a bit about seeing someone’s future in the manasphere, but most of his words were open to interpretation, and I have not done nearly as much [Future Sight] as you have.”

Teressa looked up at nothing in particular, then she looked to Erick. “Did it look… malicious? Like death? Or did it look more like a blossoming?”

“… The second one. Pretty sure.” Erick said, “I’m not sure what I saw, so it’s bugging me more than I thought it would.”

Teressa’s eyes briefly unfocused, then she came back to herself. “I don’t see any— Ah. You saw something appear and then vanish, and now it’s not even in the manasphere, is it?”

“That’s exactly it.” Erick asked, “Do you know what it was?”

Nirzir, Jane, and Poi watched on, listening. Nirzir and Jane looked worried, but Poi was not worried at all.

“And it did not look like death to you?” Teressa asked, a little bit worried. She rapidly added, “If it looked like a good thing, tell no one what you saw.” She glanced to Poi. “If it was a good thing, it’s bad enough that two people know about it now.”

Poi shrugged.

Erick said, “It seemed neither good nor bad; just something that was.”

Teressa nodded, her worries falling away. “What you saw was likely a glimpse of the future. I’ve never seen them, but the best Prognosticators see them all the time... If they focus on seeing them, anyway. I’ve focused on large events and big happenings since Poi does the small stuff, so I doubt I’ll ever be able to see the small details.

“Fortune Tellers, for instance, focus on seeing those glimpses. Those types can study a person and see their path through life, or at least the larger events. There are Death Tellers that are either very good at predicting death, or very bad, but no one but them and the Mind Mages would know if they were good at their profession and Class, or not, because the future changes once people know of it. And a lot of people get the Death Teller Class specifically to stop the deaths they see.

“But any lay-person can see those glimpses when the events are large enough. Or at least... That’s what I’ve heard. I’ve also heard that glimpses aren’t spoiled by telling people about them. Except...” Teressa turned her head toward Clan Pale Cow, to where Niyazo and Koori had walked off. “I’m tempted to ask what you saw, but if it was good, then let’s not risk shifting it.”

Erick agreed.

- - - -

Once again back on the front lawn outside of his yurt, Erick stood with a bunch of metals and a brand new book he picked up in Songli not two minutes ago. It was a book of basic metallurgy for the prospective Smith, dealing mostly with iron and the process of making steel. Erick read it for a little while and confirmed many of his own half-remembered thoughts on the subject of smithing, but it didn’t go into depth about anything, and it used terminology for various metals that were a lot different from what Erick called them. Well what did he expect? To learn everything from a book, when Smithing was a rather secretive trade? Some parts of it were flat out wrong, though. It spoke of heating the metal and then cooling it under precise [Cooling Ward]s to ‘align the mana forces inherent in the metal’. Well, no, that’s not what careful cooling did…

Well maybe the book was right, but what the cooling and heating was for was to form grains and crystalline structures in the metal… But maybe mana played a heavy part in metal work on Veird.

It probably did.

Whatever!

Erick grabbed a hunk of iron —or perhaps steel— that had been gifted to him by the elders of Ooloraptoor, and prepared a test site to find out what it was made out of, exactly.

[Particle Vacuum] emptied the air of air and every other small particulate mass. The permeable sphere of translucent white magic settled in front of Erick; waiting. Erick had his notebook nearby so he could take down numbers while he used his sunform to hold the metals, and an Ophiel used [Incandescent Aura] to melt the metals.

He grabbed a block of iron with his light and pressed it into the vacuum. The grey metal ingot passed into the enchanted space without issue.

With a twitch of intent, Ophiel burst into flames, and then he concentrated that aura down into a small sphere, away from his body. The little guy singed himself a little and Erick apologized, but Ophiel brushed off the apology with a roll of his many eyes; there was work to be done!

Erick turned his attention back to the metal.

Heat met iron, and iron became red, then yellow, only to stabilize. Ophiel upped the heat and the iron fell apart into a liquid slurry, into Erick’s cupping light. The iron bubbled as gasses escaped from the iron, to escape the vacuum, but that was fine. Later, Erick would need to set up the separation spells beforehand, to catch whatever particulate out-gassed from the iron, but for now…

Erick cast two Condense spells into the space. First came [Condense Iron], Shaped like a curled teardrop. Then came [Condense Carbon], Shaped like an opposing teardrop. It was almost a ying-yang symbol, but it was not shaped like that for any mystical reasons, but instead so that Erick could shove the molten ingot into the Iron side of it all, and—

Yup! It worked.

Erick held the molten ingot into the [Condense Iron], and the spell grabbed the metal from his sunform grasp. He held his sunform out to try and collect any droplets, but nothing fell. Ophiel applied the heat, keeping it all molten.

It was almost like watching a lava lamp, as the molten metal hovered there in the [Condense Iron] side, around the tip of the [Condense Carbon] space. Soon enough, that inserted tip began to pull out specks of carbon from the free-floating iron, drawing that carbon to its own center. Some iron tried to follow the carbon as it floated away, but those bubbles of molten iron stopped when they hit the edge of [Condense Iron].

“Pretty,” Erick said.

He watched the dance of molten blobs float around, sorting themselves out in a lazy sort of way. Ophiel kept it all nice and molten.

… Even the carbon was molten, which was interesting to see. That took a lot of power… Or perhaps, magic that directly heated stuff by exciting its molecules lowered the melting temperature of the particles? … Probably not.

Maybe this was actually working? Maybe the Condensing spells were separating and trapping the carbon and iron properly within the vacuum? That’s what the spells should be doing, but it was hard to know, for sure, because none of the Particle spells worked directly on singular particles—

Erick’s thought train derailed.

If [Condense Carbon] didn’t work on individual carbon atoms, then wouldn’t [Condense Carbon] not work at all, in this case? There were no groups of carbon chain molecules within this steel…

All the iron counted as a molecule, though, since it was bonded to itself through valence bonds, but the carbon was scattered throughout the iron. Steel was an interstitial alloy, with none of the carbon touching other carbon atoms.

But there was clearly molten carbon collecting in the [Condense Carbon] area, and where the tail of [Condense Iron] stuck into that carbon collector, no iron was coming out. The [Condense Carbon] space was pure carbon. And none of it was in molecular form, at all… right?

Did…

Did Particle Magic itself change when Erick wasn’t looking? Was this magic able to affect individual particles now?

Or…

Was molten carbon a molecule? Is that what Erick was doing here? With the Condense line of spells, with molten elements? And that was another thing! The carbon was molten here! It took a lot of power to achieve that! Erick looked at Ophiel, and at the power of the [Incandescent Aura] he was putting out, into the vacuum. Melting iron was pretty easy, at around 1600 degrees Celsius, but melting carbon required 3600 degrees.

Erick queried Ophiel’s reserves by mana sensing the density of Ophiel’s mana-formed body. By his estimates, Ophiel had plenty of mana left. He might have spent barely two thousand mana to keep up this level of heat. Ophiel was putting out nearly quadruple power into his [Incandescent Aura] in order to make the carbon go molten, but...

But… Hmm.

No. Erick was not melting the carbon. If he were melting the carbon, he would be boiling the iron, since iron boiled at around 2900 degrees and Ophiel was applying the same level of heat to the entire spell. Boiling iron would cause all sorts of explosions and sputters, and there had been none of that so far.

Something odd was going on here, and Erick wasn’t sure what it was.

This required more testing, but at the same time, he was separating carbon from iron, exactly how he wanted. Erick could just ignore these oddities and proceed with the rest of the separations, to see what sort of other metals lurked inside the ingots from Ooloraptoor. He didn’t need to figure out what was going on with his spellwork right this second. At least not right now.

From eyeing the floating remnants of the iron bar, as compared to the bits of carbon inside the [Condense Carbon], Erick estimated that there had been about 1% carbon content in this bar, so that lined up with his estimates that this was rather high carbon steel. He would weigh it all out when the experiment was done, of course, but for now…

The spells seemed to be working well.

The spells seemed to be doing a lot more than Erick expected them to do, too.

He smiled. He decided to continue engineering, and to let the mystery of the magic go, for now. He’d figure out what was going on with all that, later, because he was having too much fun to stop and poke at any gods right now.

Magic was wonderful.

The test finished seconds before Erick was ready for it to finish. The vacuum went away all at once. The resultant shockwave from the returning atmosphere blasted apart the fragments of cooled carbon far and away, while the lump of iron had no chance to cool yet, and thus scattered across the front yard.

Erick was safe behind his sunform, though; he had been quick to deploy that.

As he eyed the scattered metals all around, Erick realized that he needed some scales and some weights, so that he could take actual measurements and record actual data.

- - - -

--

Iron bar #1

failure

--

--

Iron bar #2: 5021 g

[C Iron]: 4863 g

[C Carbon]: 62 g

Missing weight: 96 g

--

--

Iron bar #3, control: 5063 g

Heat in vacuum

Ending weight w/[Condense Iron]: 5034 g

Missing weight: 29 g

--

--

Iron bar #3: 5027 g

[C Iron]: 4660 g

[C Nickel]: 11 g

[C Chromium]: 15 g

[C Manganese]: 33 g

[C Vanadium]: 0 g

[C Molybdenum]: 0 g

[C Titanium]: 0 g

[C Carbon]: 59 g

Missing weight: 251 g

--

--

Iron bar #4: 5042 g

[C Iron]: 4662 g

[C Nickel]: 13 g

[C Chromium]: 21 g

[C Manganese]: 39 g

[C Carbon]: 58 g

Missing weight: 249 g

--

25 tests later, and eventually running through the entire periodic table of the elements, Erick saw a confirmation of what he saw in those first 3 (actually 4) tests. With every spell he tacked onto the working, no matter if it pulled anything out of the central melting pool or not, there was more and more missing weight, directly proportional to how much magic Erick performed on the molten metal.

If he only heated the metal, he’d lose half a percent of the iron.

If he targeted only the metals he knew were inside the ingot, then he’d get more of those end products.

But if he cast 40 different Condensing spells, most of which would do nothing, then every single metal that he expected to get would be lessened, which made no sense.

… Erick had a moment of inspiration, and changed around his methodology to run the next tests.

After ten more tests, it turned out all of that oddity with missing metals was just a methodology error.

Abandoning his ‘ying-yang’ setup, Erick had moved to a ‘venn diagram’ setup, where the heated target was in the conjoining all of the various Condensing spells. Iron flowed to the iron side, but in that movement, it hit the barriers of all the other Condensing spells, and if the iron contained something besides iron, those bits of molten metal bounced back; back into the splitting area. Inside of this splitting area, all of the various particles did a lot of bouncing from side to side, breaking apart into molten dust, which eventually passed through the barriers of all the other Condensing spells once the iron and other metals and particles were stripped away by the bouncing. These separated particles then settled into the larger, specific Condensing spell to which those particles were attuned. But in order to actually get those particles to better flow to the center of the designated space, in order to fully collect them, Erick cast more and more Condensing spells of the targeted type, in those smaller areas, like Russian nesting dolls. This design helped to cement all the stray dusted particles into the center of the Condensing spaces.

Using this new methodology, Erick had all but eliminated the problem of the missing metals.

Also! Whoever made these metals put some weird shit in them. Arsenic was present; a few grams per ingot. Silicon, too. Probably from sand getting into the mix? Sulfur and copper and tin were often present, but not always. Oxygen got into the mix, for sure, along with a bunch of other elements that always boiled away under as much heat as Erick was applying, so it was hard to tell how much of that was going on. Also: these metal ingots looked the same, with each of them being grey, 5 kilogram bars, but they all came from multiple different foundries, or at least from multiple different Smiths, for sure. Sometimes the carbon was at .5%, sometimes it was at 3%. Most of the time it was around 1-1.5%. The exact mix of metallic content varied, too, likely due to whatever metallic traditions that particular smelter followed.

And that was enough experimenting for now.

Erick stopped working, for the morning was gone, and it was almost time for the debates. Also, he realized he was unable to do anything with all of this information he had gathered. He knew the particles. He knew how to draw them out of the iron. He knew what interstitial and substitutional alloys were, and how all of that related to carbon and iron and many of the other elements…

But he didn’t know much about metals beyond all that. He had no actual history with metalwork.

This particular project needed to be shelved, for now. Perhaps the Smiths up north could give him some good lessons on this stuff, for there was not much more book learning Erick could do on the subject.

Getting prototype-level gears and axles and such out of this metal won’t be too difficult, for Erick could over-engineer all of that, but making professional gears and frames and axles? Not happening. Erick would need some fantastic sources of molybdenum, first, and he didn’t find any of that in any of his extractions. He’d need good sources of chromium and manganese, too. Sulfur and phosphorus and silicon wouldn’t be too hard to get, for Erick was just now remembering that all of that stuff was important to have in chrome-moly steel…

He wasn’t sure of the quantities of specific metals, though… Or of anything, really. How much chromium? How much molybdenum? How much of all the other tiny inclusions? All he really knew was the name ‘chrome-moly’ to go on. How high of heat? How should it be cooled? How to make ‘martensite’ crystal structures in metal? He barely even remembered that name; ‘martensite’.

Today’s metallurgy had technically been a flop. Erick had not learned what his spells were doing, and he did not know how to make ‘the best steel for gears and such’, which was the nebulous goal at the moment.

But in other ways, the day’s efforts had paid off well. Erick had learned a lot, and now he had a lot of nice metals to play around with, too. He didn’t have all the metals he wanted to play around with, but he had enough to make some of his own steel. It might not turn out as well as the steel that these professionals had made, but it would be fun to try.

Another bit of learning came by varying Ophiel’s Heat Aura. In this way, Erick was able to confirm the melting points of various metals he already knew, and to learn a few of the physical properties of other metals that he did not know before today.

But he had gained one serious question: Had Particle Magic suddenly gained the ability to target individual atoms when Erick wasn’t looking? Or had he always just assumed that it couldn’t target single atoms, because that’s what everyone said? That’s what the gods said, too…

Yeah...

Erick was pretty sure that Particle Magic changed when he wasn’t looking.

… Or maybe, when things were molten, and under high vacuum, and there was little in the way of interference from non-selected particles, and everything was a soup of various melted stuff, then he could target individual atoms? Maybe there was a multiplicative effect gained through all the spells he nested inside one another, too. In some of these extractions there were over 250 spells going all at once.

Huh.

Okay… Maybe Erick was onto something there, with those last thoughts. But like any good scientist, just having a hypothesis that seemed right wasn’t good enough. It was time to test that hypothesis!

… After the debates… Which came after lunch, first.

Jane and Nirzir had brought back food from Pale Cow’s cooking yurts. Over that hearty stew, Erick sat down and extended his senses half toward the debate stage. No one there, yet. Looked like they were still setting up—

Erick asked Nirzir, “Do you have [Viewing Screen]? I keep meaning to get it, but I’ve never bothered.”

“I do have that spell, but only the low-grade and medium-grade versions.”

“What spells did you use for it?”

“The usual.” Nirzir said, “[Force Wall] and [Scry]. I’ve used [True Sight] in a separate spell for when that’s needed. None of my Screens are stable, though, but I don’t want to make the stable versions because I don’t want to be a hermit.”

“No popping protections?”

Nirzir nodded. “Correct; anyone on the other side can pop the sensor if they want to.” Nirzir said, “I don’t even use [True Viewing Screen] that often, as it’s too expensive for most long-term viewing. Usually, [Viewing Screen] is good enough for me. Neither are as good as a mana sense on-site, though. Or even a proper [True Scry]. That whole suite of spells is rather niche.”

Erick said, “I’m going to make a [Viewing Screen], then, so we can watch the debates.” He held out his left hand and rapidly channeled mana through the appropriate spells until they clicked together, into something harmonious— Erick stopped. “It’s missing something.”

Nirzir nodded as she stuck her fork into a piece of meat in her stew. “Yeah. That’s another reason I never made any high-grade [Viewing Screen]. You can go in almost any direction with that, and none of them sound complete. [Force Platform] makes the Screen move as you wish. Shifting the sound and intent can make the Screen appear at both locations, so that you can communicate with someone without using [Telepathy]— Ah. You need to add [Prestidigitation] for that one, so that the other side can hear what you say. [Prestidigitation] needs to go into any [Viewing Screen] you make, if you want anyone besides you to hear what’s happening on the other side. In a different sort of way, [Telepathy] can allow both sides to communicate with each other, but that can make for some nasty False Damage headaches if anyone on either side doesn’t want to participate.” Nirzir said, “You can go a lot of ways with that spell.”

Teressa spoke up, “The Army puts out a book on all sorts of [Viewing Screen] defensive and offensive measures. We could get you one?”

Poi nodded; this was easy enough to do.

Erick said, “Eh. I’ll just make the basic spell right now. Work on something better, later.”

And so he did. [True Sight] was massively expensive, though, at 25 mana per second, but he could handle those sorts of costs, so Erick included that into the spell. He did shuffle [Force Wall]’s 100 minute duration into something smaller, though, to lessen the final costs.

Near the end of his combination, Erick got the distinct impression that he was somehow using a magnifying glass and a sound amplifier to watch a TV that someone had placed at the other end of a stadium. It sounded odd, but it sounded clear, too, so he went with that, and continued onto the next part. After adding in the usual ‘renew-like’ magics that he included in most of his magic these days, the spell sounded clearer, like he was viewing some far away part of the world through a fiber optic cable.

It was weird, but it worked.

--

True Viewing Screen, instant, super long range, 12,250 mana

Conjure a quick sensor at a known location which sees through all nearby falsehoods, and projects an image of the location onto a screen in front of you. Lasts 10 minutes.

Recasting this spell on the same screen will renew the duration of the spell.

--

Erick felt a bit lightheaded as mana swirled out of him to create a ‘television screen’ that hovered to the side of the dinner table, showing the empty debate stage near the water. He smiled. “It worked.” He handed the spell out to Jane, who wordlessly wanted to know how his spell had turned out, and then, seeing the inquisitive eyes of Nirzir, he handed out the spell to everyone. “A bit expensive, but not too bad.”

Nirzir’s eyes went wide. “That’s a… large duration, there. Mine lasts a minute.”

“Yeah, but I can afford it. Anyway. Looks like the debate on? Whatever.” Erick turned away from the screen, asking Nirzir, “Have you gotten far with your self-repairing spellwork?”

“Haven’t managed it yet, though I have been able to see what you were talking about when it came to the natural degradation of a Permanent wardlight, and the wardlight’s ‘desire’ to recreate itself.” Nirzir asked, “Have you managed a new [Personal Ward]?”

Erick smiled. “Not yet. I’m pondering a simple Blood Magic, Variable Cost Variable Defense, though. Have you tried that?”

“It’s better than the base defense provided by [Personal Ward], for sure, but that comes with a few severe drawbacks that makes that option rather useless for most people; one more than most.” Nirzir handed Erick a blue box, saying, “Here. This is one of those I made a while ago. You can see the problem.”

--

Bloody Personal Ward, instant, personal ward, 100 mana + Variable

Conjure a defensive ward across your body that prevents 90% of damage, and up to a 2x Variable amount of damage prevented.

--

“Oh yeah.” Erick said, “Even if you can prevent 300,000 damage, you’d need 30,000 Health in order to make use of that protection.”

Nirzir nodded. “Exactly. I abandoned that path early on since I’m not a Scion of Balance, or a Blood Mage. If you’re a Blood Mage you should be able to get that percentage up to 95% and with a times-five Variable multiplier. For a Scion of Balance, [Bloody Personal Ward] is an also attractive option. But not for me.” She added, “Though, Health isn’t everything. Health-theory states that the natural body has a 5 to 10 damage resistance, so if all you’re taking is 100 Health hits, and you have a 90% modifier, then even without any Health at all, you won’t take actual damage— Well… Not dangerous damage. Usually”

Jane perked up. “If you had natural armor, though, you’d have a lot more effective Health, right?”

Poi instantly said to Jane, “Blood Magic is generally heavily restricted; outlawed, in a lot of places.”

“Yet another problem with Blood Magic.” Nirzir said, “But if you can do it, monsters almost always have a high damage resistance, and Polymages can easily take advantage of this benefit.” She waved an empty fork, saying, “I’ve gone pretty far down the ‘damage resistance route’ with my [Personal Ward]s, but it’s hard to do that without [Polymorph], and… No offense, but I’m not turning my skin into chitin. There is obvious useful overlap with some of the [Stone Body]-like magics we spoke of the other day, and there is merit there, but not enough to pursue.” She said, “[Bloody Personal Ward] is just not good enough for me.”

Jane glanced to Poi, then turned back to Nirzir, asking, “But if you had chitin, then you could Blood Magic up some really, really impressive defenses?”

“Only numerically.” Nirzir said, “Which is good enough for most uses, but not enough for me and my goals.”

Erick said, “Might be good enough for me. I’ll try it, after lunch.”

Poi sighed. “Of course you will.” He added, “You know Blood Magic is dangerous, right? Long term unforeseen effects pile up when you use Blood Magic, and this is a [Personal Ward] you’re talking about.”

Teressa hadn’t spoken much, but she clearly agreed with Poi, if her expression was anything to go by. Jane suddenly, silently agreed with him, too.

Nirzir nodded. “He’s right. That’s another reason I didn’t go that route. In the blue box, [Bloody Personal Ward] looks good, but in reality, it fails to live up to the numbers.”

Erick frowned. “Ah. Well. Hmm.”

Erick discarded that idea.

Poi made no attempt to hide his relieved expression, or his light, happy chuckle.

Teressa joked, “Disaster averted!”

Jane said, “But I have the monster ability Perfected Body , which makes me immune to all the long term effects of Blood Magic. I could use a [Bloody Personal Ward] just fine.”

Erick’s eyes weren’t the only ones to go a bit wide.

Nirzir exclaimed, “Lucky! Ugh! That’s the one thing I would want out of Polymage. Everything else I could do without.”

Jane looked like the cat that caught the canary.

“Would that work?” Erick asked Nirzir.

“It does work exactly like that.” Nirzir said.

Jane chuckled lightly.

Poi looked to her, saying, “You need a license.”

“Then I will get one!” Jane confidently declared.

The conversation moved on to other magics, with questions and answers passing back and forth between Nirzir, and Erick. They spoke of the metals outside, and of electromotive forces. Erick asked after what she knew about steel, and Nirzir admitted she had no idea about any of that, but it was an interesting challenge; to make metals strong and resilient to the normal damage that occurred through regular use. Usually only Smiths managed to make anything worthwhile, and those gains were mostly due to their Class Ability, Metal Sense. That Ability allowed rather fine observation of metals in a way that normal mana sense did not.

And that was an interesting problem. Teressa and Erick spoke of mana sensing the interiors of metals, wondering what it was that Smiths could see that they could not. Nirzir shrugged; she wasn’t privy to any Smithing secrets, either.

Erick renewed the Viewing Screen as needed. Jane, Poi, and Teressa, each eventually moved on from the table.

By the time Erick needed to go out to the meeting platform and help the people out there, the debates still hadn’t begun. They were an hour behind schedule. Once at the platform, and since he was already running around with Ophiel, Erick asked a few people here and there about the delay, concerned that something bad had happened. Niyazo and his leaders were in heavy discussions in their gathering yurt, though, so he didn’t disturb them.

Apparently, nothing was wrong; the debates would simply be three hours late.

So Erick went back to work.

Except for the monster hunts, which he could do on his own time, Erick completed all of the major problems people brought to him well before the debates actually began.

When the debates began, Erick was already sitting on his porch, watching through the [Viewing Screen] that hovered in the air, like it was a giant television.

Jane sat beside him, munching on some fried rice balls and sipping a beer. Teressa, Poi, and Nirzir sat behind Erick and Jane. Sitting down and settling in, Erick only now noticed that everyone had a snack except for him. All of them had gone out into the ‘temporary city’ of Ooloraptoor at some point in time, except for him.

Erick asked, “And no one got me a snack?”

Nirzir almost panicked, gripping the last cookie of her bucket of cookies. She had already taken a bite out of the cookie, too.

Jane pointed. “All of your snacks are waiting for you to buy them way over there, at the food vendor street about four kilometers that way.” Then she held the bag out to him, “Or, we can share, but this one is the really spicy kind.” She added, “And I have no idea what sort of stuff out there you’d like. It’s all weird, dad.”

Teressa held close her own large paper bag of near-raw beef strips, not wanting to offer, but offering anyway, “You want a klorztal?”

Poi said, “I got dried fish. You don’t like dried fish.” Almost happily, he added, “No one likes dried fish.”

Erick said to them all, “I think you all purposefully cultivated a joy of terrible snacks in order to not have to share them with anyone else.”

Teressa laughed loud.

Poi just nodded; of course he had done this, for this was what you did while in the army.

Erick glanced to Nirzir’s empty cookie bucket, saying, “Nirzir gets a pass since she ate all of hers before the debate actually began.”

Nirzir just looked at the bite mark in her cookie, unsure of what to do. And then she held it out to Erick.

Erick smiled. “No thank you, but thank you for the offer.”

Nirzir, still unsure, took the cookie back.

Erick looked at Jane’s bag and the clumps of balled rice within. They were made of a savory marshmallow fluff and dusted with something green. “I am going to try one of these, though.”

“It’s spicy~~~” Jane teased.

Erick plucked one from the bag and smelled it—

Olfactory pain ripped through nostrils, throat, and mouth. He tossed the treat back into the bag as he turned his head and sneezed into the crook of his arm as his eyes watered.

Jane laughed, saying, “Gross! That’s the one you picked out!”

Erick kept sneezing. Tears rolled down his face.

Nirzir said, “I think I need a new snack, too. Anyone else want to come with me?”

Erick blinked out tears and regained himself, saying, “Sure!”

Poi set down his dried fish.

Soon, the three of them were at the food vendor street. Erick got snacks enough for everyone, and they were the good kind. ‘It’s all weird’; phssh! Erick was delayed getting back, though, because a lot of people noticed him and wanted to talk to him, though almost everyone was rather decent about not actually talking to him. Those that tried got told to take an application at the platform outside of his yurt.

The three of them made it back to their seats minutes before the debate started.

… Erick had a strange need for a soda, at that moment. No carbonated drinks on Veird, though; or at least none that weren’t also alcoholic. Meh; whatever.

- - - -

To the right, on the blue side, stood Niyazo and a few leaders of Pale Cow. Speaker Yorila was there, too, oddly enough, but perhaps even odder than that, was the presence of Koori. Yorila’s presence signified that Pale Cow was willing to submit a caster to the probable battle; they were willing to break their traditional orthodoxy. Erick shouldn’t have been too surprised by that, he supposed, since he participated in yesterday’s debate, and Blue Sky was, of course, going to field a caster or three. The rules of debate were already agreed upon before anyone stepped up to the stage, and these debates were strictly of the ‘standard’ variety.

But Koori being there meant that she would be participating in the battle, and that battle would include magic… And Koori had a personal hatred of magic.

She was breaking her own morality to be there on that stage.

Koori’s presence held much of Erick’s attention, and he was not the only one to take heavy note of her. To the left, on the orange side of the stage, the people of Blue Sky saw Koori and were nervous. All Erick truly knew was that Koori had some sort of [Cleansing Domain], but these people knew a lot more than that; they knew her actual capabilities.

A bit further to the left, outside of the debating area, stood two other groups of people with clear connections to Blue Sky. Linxel was the most noticeable, at well over two decimeters taller than the next tallest person. Some people with some brown dogs stood next to Green Grass and Blue Sky. They had to be from Clan Brown Dog, but Erick didn’t know much about them. Brown Dog only had three people in attendance, though, each with their own brown dog at their side. That full clan had yet to show up in Ooloraptoor, but they should all be here in the next day or so.

Elder Teer stood in front of the crowd, bringing the debate to order. She spoke a shortened version of her speech from yesterday, laying a foundation that would hopefully foster peaceful discussion of Integration.

And then the first speakers took their places by the podiums.

The actual debate started off normal enough. One of the leaders of Pale Cow got up on stage and spoke of how the world was changing, and how they needed to band together, or else outside forces would corrupt them from multiple directions at the same time. They spoke of hope; that the grass travelers could keep their nomadic ways of life, exactly how the orcols managed to keep their nomadic ways of life, even after the establishment of Treehome. Just like how it had been proven before, a civilization could be organized alongside a strong center without infringing on the individuality of separate clans.

And then a guy from Blue Sky took the stage and spoke of how the orcols were some of the worst people to take examples from, for they had failed to keep the Forest of Glaquin habitable. If the orcols were forest-cullers like Blue Sky, or like Green Grass, then maybe they wouldn’t have needed an archmage’s help to drive back the shadows in the Deep Green.

Teressa scoffed. “Now that’s just insulting.” She flicked a hand toward the screen, scowling deeply. “Assholes over here never grew up with forests that fight back and they think they could do better than us!”

Erick glanced backward for a moment. Teressa was truly angry.

He turned back to the screen.

The speaker for Blue Sky spoke of how Integration would drive people away from doing their sacred duty of burning all trees to the ground. Within twenty years of integration, forests would return to the grasslands, and with them would come the more dangerous monsters, and with that danger, would come death, and an expansion of the forest into a true Forest.

Pale Cow countered how, with a centralized system, they could raise forest cullers up to positions of power to keep the land clear of forests. Then they started offering solid organization solutions to how such an undertaking would be achieved. They spoke of offices and bureaucracy, and they also spoke of quick response times to danger that didn’t involve a nobility overseeing everything.

Blue Sky’s response was instant, “There would always be a nobility in these sorts of situations. There would always be a top, and a bottom, with a gulf between the two based on the size of the society. If all the wealth in a community is just ten gold, the most anyone could ever lord their money over another is with that ten gold, and that ten gold would soon become worthless in trade. But you’re talking about making a community with ever-increasing wealth; with a nobility that has no limits. Maybe the disparity you create won’t be of gold, but there will be a disparity, and that means an eventual nobility. There is no way around this.”

The speaker of Pale Cow was expecting this sort of response. So they launched right into the idea of transferable power, speaking of many things which Erick had spoken of last night, to Niyazo and Koori. They spoke of how the problems with transferable power only occurred when communities could not respect the institution, but the grass travelers had been having debates like this for a long time; they could do tradition, and they could even make new ones. Traditions that could stand the test of time. Traditions where nobility was not allowed footholds, for that sort of power would always be split among the people, instead.

Erick sighed, “Oh gods.”

Jane couldn’t hold it in any longer. She laughed, then said, “Serves you right! Telling them about this stuff.”

“It’s a nice idea, I suppose; transferable power.” Nirzir said, “Arcanaeums do it all the time the world over. Every commoner corporation or business does it… But to apply this idea to government? I mean. Commoner businesses exist because the nobility looks out for them, while arcanaeums exist because of the Headmaster.”

Teressa said, “I was gonna say that Treehome has an elected government, but the Arbors aren’t elected. So… Yeah.”

“There are problems with the idea of transferable power,” Erick said. “Most of them are solvable.” A bit sarcastically, he added, “You just need some immortal, incorruptible powerhouses which will let the people below them do their own things.”

“Easy to solve,” Jane said, copying her father’s sarcasm.

“… You both say it like the answer isn’t obvious.” Teressa said, “They just gotta make some arbors and get over their stupid aversion to the Forest.”

Poi kept his opinion to himself.

“Clan Void Song takes in lots of people and raises them all to power.” Nirzir said, “These people could do that, too.” She paused, then said, “We don’t meddle overmuch in the lives of people below us.”

“You two don’t get it.” Jane said, “These people don’t want anyone at the top, for they know that whoever is at the top likely won’t be them, or their children.”

Poi nodded.

Teressa and Nirzir fell silent.

The debates continued, with Blue Sky tearing down Pale Cow’s ideas, and Pale Cow continually offering solutions to all of Blue Sky’s concerns.

While all that happened, Erick killed monsters according to applications dropped off by various petitioners and Blessed people in the mountains, Erick’s attention was mostly on the debates, though.

After a while, after a few choice words by Clan Blue Sky, Erick’s attention went solely toward the debates, because something tickled his mind as he was watching; he was seeing something more than what most other people saw. Nearly an hour had passed with neither side losing a single speaker, for the elders had yet to vote either side off, and the audience was large, and listening. This was slightly abnormal; someone should have been voted off by now. And yet, the first two speakers were still up there.

Not too surprising, in retrospect, for aside from the first bit of banter, not a single old argument had been trod out to be judged. Everything the two speakers discussed was new, so of course the elders hadn’t voted anyone off.

And Erick had seen something in the way that Blue Sky spoke, and the way that Pale Cow answered, something he wasn’t quite sure he had truly seen. But...

Oh.

The Blue Sky speaker ended their turn, setting up the pins, “Every word out of your mouth is nothing more than wishful thinking. It’s all theory. It’s all imaginative lies; little more than a warm wind on the freezing cold tundra that is reality.”

And Pale Cow knocked them down, “But we do have proof that these ideas of transferable power work. We have spoken to Archmage Flatt about his world, where many of these ideas are present, and…”

The guy continued to speak, but Erick had seen enough.

Erick told his people, “So nothing is happening, but I have something to say. I’m putting up a Privacy for a moment.” And then he did. The world beyond the yurt remained visible, but they were cut off from all of it. He turned to his people, and to Nirzir. Poi nodded a little; knowing what was happening, but the other three were worried. Erick tried to put their worries to rest, “Nothing bad has happened, but I don’t want these words to be repeated outside of this space.” He moved right along, “I don’t know how it happened, or what happened, exactly, but it appears that Pale Cow and Blue Sky wanted to work together, and they’re doing it as covertly as they can. There’s a lot of true animosity between both sides, so all of that which you see up there has been real, and maybe the speakers after these first two will bring actual anger to the discussion, but Pale Cow and Blue Sky are working together.” Erick said, “We are not going to interfere in whatever they’re doing, and we’re not going to let anyone know that we know, either.”

Teressa was quick on the uptake, and on the ramifications. “So does that mean we’re moving on?”

“Not today, but sooner than I thought we would.” Erick said, “It means we might not have to worry about a dragon attack from Ordoonarati, though. Honestly… I don’t like what he did to Green Grass, or him sending the Mirage Dragon to try and assassinate me, and there might be some soul mutilation happening out there right now, but while I will check up on that, I’m not willing to start a war with a dragon that doesn’t want to fight anymore.”

Teressa and Poi instantly understood; both of them relaxed in that moment. Jane gradually understood, too, but she didn’t like his decision. Nirzir was… disappointed. Yup; disappointed.

The princess of Void Song said, “But you killed all the Shades. I’ve seen what you can do. A dragon shouldn’t pose any threat?” She added, “A dragon that has probably soul mutilated the people on that stage.”

Poi said, “We can check for soul mutilation, but that doesn’t matter when it comes to the larger powers, and dragons qualify.”

“But?” Nirzir’s frown deepened.

“It’s too many unknowns.” Teressa said, “You never fight an unknown if you don’t have to, and we have no idea where the dragon is, or what they can do.”

“But…” Nirzir just shook her head a little.

Jane looked at her father, saying, “I don’t like this decision either. The dragon tried to get at you twice, and he killed people and mutilated their souls in order to do that. This dragon is not someone you should leave at your back.”

Poi said, “I would prefer not to be near a dragon fight if it is not necessary, and it might not actually be necessary in this case. We can check for soul mutilations on the people out there.”

Teressa asked, “You could try to send a message to the dragon, boss? To see if you’re actually on the same side now?”

“We are not on the same side.” Erick said, “But I don’t…” He felt tired. He looked away. “I could reach out, perhaps. See if he will take back his promise to go to war if he loses these debates. See if he’s purposely losing, now, which he seems to be.” He added, “I just wanted to let you all know what I see, to let you know why I’ll be making some of the decisions I’ll be making in the near future, before I make them. Let’s not talk about this outside of a Privacy, or [Telepathy].”

A round of nods followed Erick’s words. Nirzir was deeply unhappy, but she hid that away as best she could. Jane, though, resigned herself to acceptance.

Erick told the young girl, “We can talk later about this, okay?”

Nirzir sat a bit straighter. She nodded.

Erick dispersed the Privacy, and recast the [True Viewing Screen].

They watched the debate for a while longer, but almost all of the tension was gone. A lot of the words that passed between the two first speakers, who were still talking, were not exactly choreographed, but they were definitely organized beforehand. Some of the elders were obviously in on the deception, too, though not many of them; more than enough to ensure that neither speaker could be voted off until they were done speaking. Teer was clearly a part of the choreography.

An hour and a half into the ‘debate’, something finally broke in the equilibrium between orange and blue, and Pale Cow got voted off, first. Blue Sky took a shot at the second trained speaker from Pale Cow, and then flubbed an argument on purpose to get voted off.

Nirzir’s voice was small, as she said, “It’s rather obvious when you look for it, isn’t it.”

“Yeah; it is.” Jane turned to her father, and said, “You know, dad. It turns out I really miss television. And snacks. I’m getting more snacks.” She asked everyone, “Anyone want some?”

Everyone wanted more snacks.

Jane smiled at her father, saying, “You should invent soda.”

Erick smiled. “I could, couldn’t I. Oh! I’ll make something lemony. I always liked that stuff.”

“A lemon and lime combination flavor, perhaps? Maybe seven flavors, together?” Jane smirked as she asked, “What will you call it?”

Erick announced, “Archmage Flatt’s Fizzy Citrus Surprise!”

Jane’s smile vanished, then it came back as she laughed.

“There will be no copyright infringement on my watch,” Erick said, most seriously.

Nirzir was lost. She asked Teressa, “What’s a copyright?”

“Some earth-thing, for sure,” Teressa said.

- - - -

It started off as a lark, but Erick could make soda if he wanted, couldn’t he? So while he watched the debates, and snacked on sweet rice and marshmallow treats, he did a bit of magic on the side. [Condense Carbon] and [Condense Oxygen] were not enough, though; Erick needed to create usable CO2, which meant a solid that could be easily transported, or contained, and not a gas. To make that final leap, Erick included another spell that he had gotten from a different member of the mage trio, back in Spur.

--

Frozen Mist X, instant, medium range, 25 MP

Cool a small area, dealing physical damage per second. Creatures caught in the effect are slowed if they cannot become warm. Effect stacks. Lasts 10 minutes.

--

Eduard had invented that one, right alongside his sister Maia’s [Incandescent].

And since Erick was creating a new spell anyway, and for some symmetry, Erick channeled [Frozen Mist] and Aurify through an Ophiel hanging out high in the sky. Ice instantly formed on beating wings, then shed away like so much scattered frost. The air turned to winter, as a cold mist billowed away from Ophiel.

And Ophiel kinda liked it. He ducked and weaved into the air, trailing a chill all around him, scattering ice with every beat of his wings, and with every note of his violin song.

--

Frozen Mist Aura, instant, medium range, 1 mana per second + Variable

Cool a small area, dealing physical damage per second. Creatures caught in the effect are slowed if they cannot become warm. Effect can be modulated at will.

--

Erick let that aura lapse. It was dry ice making time! He combined the original [Frozen Mist] with—

He stopped.

Why not use [Mysticalshape] to make it work better? Well. Yeah. That was one of the Big Things he wanted to try using that spell for, wasn’t it; to make some Particle Magic without extraneous contaminants, like what happened when he used [Crystallize Diamond].

Erick smiled. Okay. Well. He had to make this one himself; he couldn’t make this spell through Ophiel as he sat there, on the porch of his yurt. So he excused himself from the screening area, saying, “I’m going to make a spell. Shouldn’t take too long.”

Nirzir instantly, and excitedly asked, “What spell! Can I watch?”

Jane just smiled as she watched Erick go.

“Of course.” Erick stepped off of the yurt and walked a bit away, saying, “It’ll be a spell that makes the material which can then be used to make a drink carbonated.”

“What’s ‘carbonated’?” Nirzir asked. “Something to do with making something have more carbon?”

“Exactly. The formula for this molecule is one carbon and two oxygen. I’m adding in [Mysticalshape] and [Frozen Mist] to see if I can make the spell operate without producing byproducts, and to make a solid material that can be transported later, in case I want to make a product with this spell at another time.”

Nirzir nodded, waiting for the magic. She asked no more questions.

Erick held a hand forward and channeled mana through his various spells. The Particle spells sounded of static, but [Mysticalshape] sounded like a possibility sliding into place, while [Frozen Mist] was the sound of a frozen morning, crackling with ice— Huh. That spell had gained some sound to it, too. Before, it was just another static sound.

Anyway.

Erick tuned the song a few different ways, trying to find the vibrations that turned cold possibility into a fizzy, harmless sensation. He didn’t find the correct combination right away, but knowing that CO2 condensed into a solid well below 0 degrees, he went for a deeper cast of [Frozen Mist], trying to make it cold enough for—

Yup!

That did it. That was the proper sound of a cold soda.

Smiling, Erick cast, twisting magics together, targeting the space above the corner of a stone platform.

Flowing streamers of misty white cold swirled out of the manasphere, condensing into a small teaspoon-sized pile that grew larger as moments piled up; like the falling of snow onto a specific part of the world. The yield was small, and the production was slow, but CO2 was precipitating out of the air, well enough.

Ah! To have this spell back on Earth— Actually. Having [Grow] would probably be a better solution to climate change than carbon sequestration. Erick always thought that was just pushing the problem forward, onto the next generation.

Anyway.

Erick threw a [Cleanse] on the pile, bursting white light across the space to check to see if there were any toxic byproducts. No thick air came up from the pile, though it was a bit hard to see through the cold, white swirls flowing through the space.

He’d throw another [Cleanse] over the whole thing once it was done.

A blue box appeared well before the crystallization was complete.

--

Harmless Frozen Particles, instant, close range, 250 mana

Cause particles of a specific type to condense in a small area. Lasts 10 minutes.

--

The name was a bit odd and the description was rather purposefully vague, but the spell was a success, though the product was slower forming than Erick had expected.

Nirzir asked, “Was that a success?”

“Yes. But I think I can adjust the yield by changing the local environment, as with any Particle Spell.”

Erick grabbed some nearby grasses with an Ophiel, brought those grasses into the dry ice spell, and had Ophiel [Incandescent Aura] the grass into particulate. Almost instantly, Erick knew he had harmed his new spell with the heat, for the whole freezing sphere of magic suddenly shrunk; probably due to the heating spell, which was rather perfectly aligned against the cold spell. Particle spells worked well against each other, after all. The grass still went up in flames, though, producing ash which was swept up by the white streamers of the cold spell, into the interior, where the yield of dry ice suddenly doubled, then tripled, like snow knocked down onto the ground.

Erick decided to let the spell run its course without any more interference, for it was working well enough on its own. The yield was growing faster than diamonds grew, so this was fine.

He said, “The next version of this spell is the aura, but that can come later.”

Nirzir asked, “What can you do with the snow, though? Er. It’s not snow, is it.”

Erick smiled. Nirzir was rather smart. And the pile of CO2 snow was about two handfuls large; this was more than enough to show her what dry ice could do. Erick canceled the rest of the spell then cast a [Cleanse] over the space. White streamers vanished back into the manasphere and thick air flexed, yet removed none of the particulate from the ground.

Success! Including [Mysticalshape] had worked wonders.

“You put it in a drink and you drink it!” Jane said, coming forward with a pitcher of lemon water that she had been working on while Erick made his spell. She handed the container off to her father. “It’s mostly sugar and the juice of half a lemon. It should function, but the recipe needs obvious work.”

With a sweep of hard light, Erick compacted most of the dry ice into a small block of solid white, about half the size of his fist, while he also took the pitcher from Jane. The ice went into the container, and instantly started bubbling. Nirzir craned her neck, eyeing the smoke pouring off of the bubbling lemonade.

“And that’s it!” Erick said. “All you have to do is let the dry ice fully dissolve into the drink, and that’s all it takes to make soda water.” He handed the container back to Jane, adding, “You should lightly close off the lid, though, to ensure the carbonation takes.”

Jane eagerly took the pitcher, giving a laugh as she wrapped it in shadows, saying, “You could have done this a year ago, dad.”

“A year ago, the Queen Daydropper had killed most of Odaali using what I assume is a variation of this spellwork, and [Grow].”

Jane winced. “… Ah. Yeah.”

Nirzir’s eyes shot wide. “It’s dead air!?”

“That’s what most people would call it, yes,” Erick said. “But it’s no more dangerous than any other magic out there.”

Nirzir instantly regained control of herself. “I— Yes. Of course. I was simply surprised. Pardon my temporary naivety. Would you mind if I cast a [Cleanse] upon the… bubbling water? To. Uh. To alleviate my own concerns?”

Erick smirked. “Go ahead.”

Nirzir did so. The white smoke coming out of the pitcher was unaffected. “… I see you are correct.”

“We’ll wait until it finishes bubbling, then we can try some,” Erick said. “Don’t ever drink dry ice. That might kill you.”

Nirzir stood straight. “Ah.”

Jane said, “Oh! It won’t kill you.”

“It could seriously hurt you, Jane,” Erick said. “… Though, with Health… I don’t know.”

Nirzir still looked unsure, but Jane was wholly ready for a soda. Soon enough, they returned to watching the debates, and this time they had another beverage option. Jane sipped her lemon soda, smiling gently as she watched Teressa sputter her drink to the side, spitting out the ‘nasty’ stuff that ‘stung’. Jane teased Teressa mercilessly over that, but Erick just smiled as he sipped his own drink. And yeah… It did sting a bit more than Erick remembered. Teressa declared all of the people of Earth ‘Obvious sadists’, which earned a large laugh from both Erick and Jane.

Poi emphatically declared that soda did not live up to the hype, but he drank it anyway.

The five of them continued to watch the debates, but none of what was said would likely impact any of them, except for maybe Nirzir.

… The debates were important. The world was changing, and the grass travelers were beset on all sides and from within, by pressures that would sweep over them if they did not solidify in the face of those pressures. But the debates weren’t important to Erick, except that he needed to leave allies behind everywhere he went. Allies were important.

For someone, someday, would discover that he was a Wizard. And the Shades still had a heavy interest in him. And he had shadelings to watch over. And a Crystal Forest to clean up of crystal mimics. And there was still a Converter Angel out there, though Erick hadn’t seen any of the Angel’s soul modifications in a long while.

Erick had irrevocably changed the world in so many different ways, and he had a responsibility to see that the changes he caused were good ones, and that people weren’t coming after him for what he had done.

But the debates here weren’t that important for Erick, for he might be done with the grass travelers, especially if Ordoonarati had truly abandoned his need to assassinate Erick. Though what, exactly, had he done to stop the dragon from choosing violence? Could have been anything, really.

A lot happened past the edges of Erick’s sight.

- - - -

In a distant yurt, far away from Ooloraptoor, a man warmed himself by the firepit in the center of his home, enjoying the flames in the deepening night, though the light could have been brighter, and the warmth stronger. He was still cold, but he wanted to save on wood, so he simply grabbed a nearby blanket and layered it over the one he already had around his shoulders.

And he waited, his eyes locked on the flap of leather that served as a door. He had been waiting for hours. Green shadows swirled behind him; the firelight doing nothing against that ephemeral darkness. Rather than banish the shadows to the corners, the light seemed to deepen them. The cold seemed to deepen, too.

The flap of the yurt suddenly swung open, letting out the heat, letting out the light, letting in the intruder.

She was a woman, completely unlike the man, completely out of place in the rustic setting of the man’s humble yurt. Her armor was of thin red silk; diaphanous and flowing. Her strength was in her spine, and in the depths of her ruby eyes. Her weapons were her words, and she would likely draw more blood than the man tonight.

Red went on the offense, “You play a dangerous game.”

“We play the game well.”

“A bluff.” Red said, “You tried to kill him, but then you realized you were too weak so you switched tactics. Do not pretend you have tricked anyone into doing anything, for you are not nearly clever enough for that.”

The green shadows swirled, but the man’s face remained impassive.

One of Red’s perfectly shaped eyebrows rose, ever so slightly. “You didn’t respond to the goad. Something else is going on here. Enlighten us now, or face extinction.”

Another goad, meant to draw him out in a way that would expose something vital. If her threat was anything less than solid, then the man would have changed tactics, again; he would have gone on the offensive. But unlike Erick, Red gave no mercy. She would have to find the man first, but with the world of the grass travelers changing, many routines would change as well. He didn’t think he would mess up and accidentally expose himself to another unknown dragon, but that was what Integration risked. It was a risk that he had to take, though.

The man said, “All the usual opposition to Integration has vanished, either through purge or conversion or honest change. Erick won without really trying, so who are we to get in the way of his Worldly Path? We would have to be fools of the highest caliber to go up against his light.”

Red’s face became a mask. “Are you trying for Empire?”

“We are trying to remain alive in a changing world, and apparently, hiding among the itinerant masses is not good enough. So we will take refuge in the houses our people build.” He went on the offensive, saying, “Which brings us to this: My people are deciding that they need a centralized government, and they wish to be treated as equals by your people. Is this a problem for you? A single, allied city that is not under your direct control? One out of ten thousand?”

“Not at all.” Red’s mask broke in fractions, becoming something nicer and more sinister all at once. “Hopefully not in a hundred years, either, when your pitiful population has a hundred cities and finally gains some true numbers.”

The man felt the need to goad the woman about her own desires for Empire, but that would be a foolish [Strike] indeed. So he said, “Allied states are good to have. You might actually get one on your northern borders after all this time, as long as you leave us alone.”

Red’s mask fully broke as she smiled; a genuine threat and an expression of joy all in one. “You may keep your shitty cow-flecked land and demented ideas of government to yourself. All I need from your people is beef to feed our people. So don’t skimp on herding after you finally Integrate, or else we will need to have a second conversation, and you will not enjoy that.” She lost her smile and stared for a long moment; until she was satisfied that she had won.

And she had; after all these years, she had finally won.

The woman went to exit the yurt, grabbing the leather flap— She stopped. She turned back, her ruby eyes glinting in the firelight. “We probably aren’t coming for you when we roll over the rest of this shitty continent, so don’t give us a reason to reconsider that stance.”

And then she left.

The room grew colder again. The man threw another log on the fire. Warmth soon swirled around the cabin as the green shadows vanished, pulling back from the meeting.

The man yawned. It was warmer now, and the sounds of the rest of his clan came to him; a comfort. It was getting late. Perhaps he should just go to bed, and yet— Oh. He must have dozed off a bit, there. He checked on the debates— They were still happening, but the man had lost interest. It was time for bed.

- - - -

Erick didn’t watch the whole debate. Mostly, he did everything else he had to do, and then he did more. When he ran out of monster kill requests, he went out and gathered more applications from the people waiting outside of his protected space.

But as the sun set, and the sky turned purple and gold, Erick returned to watch the debates, because Koori took the podium.

The eighth speaker from Blue Sky was nearing the end of the elder’s patience, so they went out in style, attacking a great deal of people by speaking of how Pale Cow’s orthodoxy was a problem. Every single idea that Pale Cow put forth was fundamentally flawed because they came from a place of willful ignorance about how the world truly worked. People used magic in the real world; they didn’t hide it like some shameful secret.

That much insult finally earned that speaker the elders’ ire; they got voted off.

The speaker from Pale Cow was already barely staying afloat, so they graciously left, which bought the rest of Pale Cow some goodwill. That was when Koori took the stand.

Koori said, “Many of you know me, or perhaps you know of my history with the depths of magic, and the dangers. For those of you who do not know, I will tell you.

“I have achieved tier 9 spellwork. I am an archmage by all conventional use of the word, though I would never call myself by such a title. I achieved this ranking many years ago, learning from a Speaker who I turned my back on later in life, much to my shame. But when I was not orthodox, back before I learned of what magic had done to my body, back before the failures, I was an archmage.

“Everything I ever gained, and lost, was because of magic; because of [Cleanse].

“Four miscarriages, before I was finally graced with my daughter. I thought I was broken inside, but I was not; magic did that to me.” She paused. She continued, “A child, one year old. A sky tether yanked him out of his mother’s arms, and my own mistarget erased both the monster and the child.

“And then there was my brother. I was angry at him, once, and now I can never see him again.”

Erick’s eyes went wide. The audience was dead silent. Jane stopped chewing her snacks, and she wasn’t the only one.

“All of my failures are horrific, and I’m sure many of you have the same sorts of experience. If it were only I who failed to wield magic properly, if it were only I that made mistakes, then orthodoxy wouldn’t be so prevalent among our people.” Koori said, “Magic is deceptive in what it grants you. Those blue boxes hold power that no one should wield. They are unknowable boundaries that no one should push. And yet we use this power because we have this power, for the Darkness and the monsters are always out there, always threatening.

“Make no mistake. I do not think that anyone should openly wield the power that the Script grants us all, but I understand the need. I understand. That need is what drove me to learn magic in the first place.

“Pale Cow understands that most people use magic and that we will have to accept the open use of magic after Integration. Many of our people might even choose to go standard.” She said, “And I will be one of them.” The crowd gasped. “That is why I am on the stage today. My break from orthodoxy is an example of the commitment of Pale Cow to the prosperity of every single grass traveler, and as a show of solidarity, I will be participating in the standard Polite Battle after this debate, if it should get so far. Let us hope that it does not go that far, for power is dangerous, and not all of us are able to wield it so well as other archmages around here.” Koori said, “It is my hope that if we do Integrate, that we continue to have orthodoxy, but Pale Cow certainly understands that orthodoxy is not for everyone. Just as we would expect none of you to impose your beliefs on us, Pale Cow would never seek to impose upon you...”

Her speech moved on to the importance of having the freedom to choose one’s own beliefs, and of how an Integrated government should not impinge on those beliefs, in any direction.

The debate wore on till a few hours after sundown, with Pale Cow having lost 8 speakers, and Blue Sky having lost all 10. Pale Cow was declared the winner, and Blue Sky accepted their loss; there would be no battle over this debate.

Most people had stopped watching long before that, including all of Erick’s party, except for Erick himself. After Elder Teer gave a final exit speech, Erick shut off the [True Viewing Screen], and then he was on first watch.

- - - -

The next morning, Amasar showed up at the edge of the property bright and early. Erick let him in, and the man spoke quickly and professionally, stating that Clan Brown Dog had chosen to forgo a debate. Clan Pale Cow had won their three scheduled debates, which meant that Green Grass, Blue Sky, and Brown Dog would reach out and accept envoys from Songli. They would learn more of Integration, and of the greater political and economic realities of Nelboor. Amasar assured Erick that he was welcome to stay as long as he wished; Niyazo and Koori would have come to tell him this, but they are in talks with many other clans right now.

Erick thanked Amasar for his report.

His duty discharged, Amasar bowed, and said one more thing, “Clan Pale Cow is hosting a feast tonight to celebrate the win. We wish for you to be there. Will you attend?”

“Of course!”

Amasar bowed again, and then left.

Erick turned away, and smiled a little.

This particular chapter of the Integrator versus True Traveler conflict was over, and though Ordoonarati had threatened destruction if he lost, he had taken the loss. This all but proved that Ordoonarati had changed his mind. Perhaps Erick would accept the offer of a feast from clan Green Grass, from Linxel, too.

It might be nice to see that guy again, and in a better setting.

But first came steel making, motor construction, and all the other small jobs he had lined up for himself, along with one more: Dry ice production. Not for himself, but because Jane wished to try her hand at remaking some of her favorite sodas.

Halfway through the afternoon, and yet already done with most of the important tasks of the day, Jane had one more important thing for him to do: Taste testing various drinks. She had ten options lined up, and she had to have his opinion.

Erick felt a wonderful surge of happiness in his chest as he tasted the first one. “It’s good.”

Jane, with all her seriousness, asked, “But does it taste like it should? Or is this next one better?”

Erick laughed a little, then tried the second option. “This one is great, too.”

“Come on, dad. I want actual criticism.”

Erick shrugged, then tried number three. “Ah. This one is the best of them all.”

Jane couldn’t stop a small smile from creeping onto her face, but she got rid of it as fast as she could. She pretended to ignore her father, then asked Nirzir, “Which one did you like?”

Nirzir said, “I like number 6 the best.”

Jane frowned. “The berry-based one?”

Erick was already tasting number six. “Tastes like strawberries and blueberries. It’s pretty good, too!”

- - - -

Lanterns hung from ropes that had been strung between yurts, providing soft glows to the people that drank and ate and danced below. A band of seven men and women played instruments on a stage across the field from the cooking yurts, which held so many different types of food and in such quantities that the gatherings of Songli would be shamed. Erick even said as much to Niyazo. Niyazo’s head went back as he laughed loudly into the night, a boisterous sound, splashing his drink to the grassland underfoot. He wasn’t the only one having a good time.

It was a good night, filled with many speeches over possible futures, but thankfully they were kept small.

Erick debuted ‘Jane’s fizzy drink’, which earned him a great big frown from his daughter, but she couldn't fool him; she loved the attention. Some of the people loved her drinks, too, but most just loved the misty smoke coming off of the drinks.

Except…

It started with catching the frightened eyes of a young girl who saw the smoke coming off of Jane’s concoctions. In that moment, his perception shifted, slightly.

And as Erick looked around, he saw more and more scared eyes of the people of Clan Pale Cow, sparking in the firelight. Some people looked away as soon as they saw that Erick had seen them, or they tried to play off their terror as something else. But he caught the whispers. ‘The debate is over, he should be leaving now, right?’ and ‘What is that stuff coming out of the drinks?! I’m not drinking that.’ and ‘Archmages! tsk.’

Erick had overstayed his welcome, and Pale Cow was not as happy as they appeared to be.

As the old saying went, ‘Guests are like fish; they get old after three days.’ It had been many more than three days since Erick forced his way into Clan Pale Cow. The people here genuinely came to appreciate him, though, and he had done a lot of good for this community, but now they were wondering when he would leave. They were scared of what his presence signified.

Niyazo continued to be truly welcoming, though. He even asked if Erick would be willing to move to Clan Pale Cow permanently, and it was only half a joke; the other half was a true inquiry, for Pale Cow could do well with a second archmage among them.

As though hearing her name, Koori came over to Erick and Niyazo, carrying another drink in her hand to hand off to her husband. Then, she turned to Erick, genuinely saying, “Thank you, Erick.” Her words encompassed a lot more than a simple ‘thank you’, though.

Erick was feeling a bit melancholy, but he could act personable enough. He teased, “For what, exactly?”

Koori leveled a withering stare at him.

Niyazo playfully threw an arm around his wife, saying, “Come now, Koori! You’re in the searchlight now.”

With a heavy sigh, Koori reached up and took Niyazo’s free hand in hers, holding on tight, as she looked to Erick, saying, “The powerful can never show weakness, Erick, especially to other people in power. So I will say thank you, and leave it at that.”

“I accept your thanks, but your idea that the powerful can never show weakness is untrue.” Erick smiled, saying, “But not every archmage is the same.”

Koori stared for a moment, then she sipped her drink, saying nothing.

The night wore on.

Erick went back to the people that truly mattered to him, trying to recapture the celebration amongst all the falsity. He only found a more uncomfortable truth. He saw now that Jane did not love the attention upon her new drinks, for most people who tried them did not truly like them, either. More than once, Jane spoke a bit too loudly that ‘her father made the snow that went into the drinks’ and ‘I didn’t make it myself’. She said that so that people would like it, and they at least pretended to. Jane was not happy that her drinks weren’t more popular, though.

Teressa seemed to be doing fine while the children had been clamoring around her, asking for more stories, but by now the kids had been forced to go to bed by their parents. Now, Teressa was surrounded by horny men who kept trying to peek under her veils. It was a miracle that she hadn’t clobbered anyone yet.

Nirzir and Poi, though, were both divorced from the party. The people of Pale Cow had never truly warmed up to the Mind Mage, and though Nirzir had a working relationship with those at the cooking yurt, it seemed the older woman Cook, Waveni, was the only one who truly cared about the princess of Void Song.

Erick decided to end the night—

Ah. Looks like the night was not going to end there.

Erick’s heart fluttered uncomfortably as Linxel Green Grass walked into the party, coming in off of the Teleport Square set up outside. He wore a thick leather robe of greys and whites, obscuring much of the form of his body, but hinting at everything that lay beneath. Gold jewelry wrapped around the base of his black horns, glinting in the firelight. Niyazo and Koori were there to greet the tall man as he entered the party, but he looked around until he saw Erick. They locked eyes for a moment, both of them giving a tiny, unprompted grin, and then Linxel was able to focus on Niyazo and Koori, to accept their welcome into the gathering.

Beyond Linxel came leaders from other clans.

Clan Blue Sky’s Leader, Roodi, came in from Linxel’s left. The warlord was a pale man of average height, with a shaved head, and two tiny pale horns poking up from his forehead. The man scanned the welcoming party, and locked eyes with Erick from twenty meters away. He didn’t look happy, but he also looked like he wanted to talk.

Clan Brown Dog’s Leader Fara came in on Linxel’s right. She was a brown-skinned woman of no odd features, with thick braids gathered in a bun. Her right hand was half raised to her side, gently commanding a gigantic brown dog to stand down. The dog looked like a cross between a mastiff and a lion, and it obeyed Fara’s command with a perfect adherence. The dog’s eyes scanned the crowd with just as much intelligence behind them as any other person, which was odd, because it seemed like just a normal dog. It wasn’t a monster.

Someone else seemed to enjoy the sight of the dogs, though.

At Erick’s side, Teressa giddily whispered, “It’s the dogs! The famous dogs!”

“What?” Jane asked.

“The wardogs of Nelboor!” All of Teressa’s previous tension seemed to leave her in that moment as she smiled brightly, under her veil. “I wondered if we would ever see them.”

Nirzir looked up at Teressa, weirded out, then she seemed to accept what she was seeing. “I suppose their story is a bit popular. But that story doesn’t come from these dogs; it comes from the wardog people of northwest Nelboor.”

Jane repeated, “What?”

“They breed dogs to fight monsters. Very respectable.” Teressa said, “Beastmasters back home use all kinds of beasts against the Forest, but only dogs have ever proven repeatedly viable. Dogs can join a community, and this fact sets them apart from many other Beastmaster options. Very loving creatures.” Teressa added, “Their sense of smell makes them great trackers, too; easy to sniff out nearby monsters.”

“Oh.” Jane looked at the large dog again, but this time she seemed to be appraising the animal. “I wouldn’t be comfortable being a dog.”

Erick burst a laugh that drew some attention. “Spiders are better?”

“They are,” Jane said, nodding resolutely.

“Dogs are great, Jane, they— Ach.” Teressa began moving into position, to stand behind Erick. “They’re coming this way.”

Linxel led the slow, methodical charge toward Erick. His allied leaders followed his lead, the people of Pale Cow parting for their path. Soon, the tall man stood only two meters away. Erick had to look up to see his face, and he liked that. For a moment, he was unprofessional, but he quickly banished that feeling and tried to be simply personable.

Linxel said, “Greetings, Erick.”

Roodi and Fara added their own, “Greetings.”

“Greetings, Linxel. Roodi. Fara.” Erick asked, “What brings you all here tonight?”

“Aligned interests with Pale Cow which we hope will lead to friendship.” Linxel said, “And since you’re here, I hoped to speak to you, as well, but I will let the others go first.”

Not wasting any time, Roodi stepped forward, saying, “From what I understand, you are the one to thank for much of Pale Cow’s newfound spine, and also their newfound flexibility. Before, they didn’t have any true answers to any of our larger questions, and all decorum aside, Koori has been an utterly intractable witch.” The pale man turned to Koori, who did not look angry at all, saying, “I’m glad to see you come to your senses. Pale Cow and Blue Sky have been friends before, and I would see us be friends again. I would speak with you, if you are amenable.”

Koori said, “I am.”

Roodi said, “Thank you, Archmage Flatt. Good night.”

“Good night, Leader Roodi. A pleasure to meet you.”

Roodi paused a bit, examining Erick for a moment, looking for dishonesty. He found none, so he nodded, then walked off with Koori, speaking in hushed, halfway-angry tones at the woman as the two of them went to the tables full of drinks.

Fara’s dog huffed a bit as both the beast and his master spared a glance to watch Roodi and Koori walk away, then the two of them turned to Erick in unison. Fara’s voice was rough, but even, “You did a good service for us grass travelers, Archmage Flatt. Our dogs kept us free of face stealers and otherwise, but we couldn’t provide that sort of service to everyone, like you. Thanks for cleaning up our lands. But I heard you were here for a dragon, so if we catch wind of a dragon, you got some way to contact you? I’d prefer to not have one of those things around here, either.”

Erick was momentarily stunned, then he said, “Uh. I do not, actually.” He would have offered a telepathic contact, but Erick wouldn’t be here in grass traveler land for much longer. He said, “Send a message to Silverite at Spur, perhaps?” He looked to Poi for confirmation.

Poi said, “A standard [Telepathy] will reach the archmage, anywhere in the world; we will ensure it, but please do not abuse this function.”

“Easy, then. Understood.” Fara turned to Niyazo, saying, “Now you and I gotta talk.” Briefly, she said, “Nice meeting you, Archmage Flatt.”

“Nice meeting you, too,” Erick said.

As Fara and Niyazo walked away together, with Fara’s massive hound trundling alongside them, Teressa subvocalized toward the dog, ‘Nice meeting you, doggie!’

Erick grinned at that.

Linxel seemed to take that smile in another way, as he said, “And that leaves you for me. Would you care for a walk upon the plains?”

“Yes.” Erick’s grin remained as he said, “I was about to end the night here, so I’ll end the night with you, instead.” He told his people, “You can all head back to the yurt.”

Teressa happily said, “See you later, boss,” while Nirzir’s eyes shot wide as she said, “Real— Okay! Uh,” and Jane gave a tiny chuckle. Poi just nodded, and led the way back to the yurt.

- - - -

Under the bright, night sky, Erick silently walked beside Linxel, feeling butterflies in his stomach for the first time in a while. He was also feeling the stirring of something wanting for the first time in a while, too. Erick tried not to look at Linxel, to gauge the man’s reaction, to see if he felt the same, but he couldn’t help himself, for he had to keep aware of his surroundings, right? Right.

And yeah.

Linxel was experiencing the same sort of stirrings as Erick. Heart beating faster. Blood rushing to other places...

Erick distracted himself with a glance north. Clan Pale Cow’s party and all their people were half a kilometer away; little more than a bit of light on the horizon that melded into all the other lights, from all the other clans camped out in Ooloraptoor.

That quick look seemed to break some building tension, or perhaps Linxel was worried that Erick was going to run. Maybe Erick should run, but before he could, Linxel broke the silence of the night, “I am not good at this sort of thing, but if you are sticking around Ooloraptoor, I would court you. Romantically.”

For a long moment, Erick felt lighter than air, and then the rest of Linxel’s words came to him.

Crushed.

An apt description for his emotional state. It was an emotion that he shared with Linxel, though. Linxel looked ready to be crushed in turn, to be denied.

“I’m moving on as soon as I’m sure that I’ve left no enemies behind.” He looked up to Linxel. The man looked away. Erick said, “Otherwise, I would accept your courtship. Or at least I’d like to know you in a more relaxed setting.”

Linxel turned back. He said nothing.

So Erick said, “Believe me that I am interested. But I can’t stay here. People are scared and I have obligations in other directions.”

Linxel smiled softly, his voice cracking a little, “I had to take my [Strike], but I understand.”

“Would you like to visit Spur, sometime?” Erick said, “Or I might actually come back here, but not for a while. I can’t actually live here, for all my obligations are over there, but I might have [Gate] soon, so that could work.”

Linxel blinked a few times. “Oh. You aren’t just letting me down easy, are you.” A joyful chuckle came out of his throat. “Oh. I actually have a chance. Uh. I didn’t expect this.”

Erick smiled brightly. “Yeah. You have a, uh, large chance. You are… very attractive.”

“Uh. You too.” 

Linxel went full mast under his robes. Erick was already there. Linxel leaned down. He tasted of want, and Erick found he enjoyed that a lot.

A [Sealed Privacy Ward] went up.