Ar'Kendrithyst

Chapter 212, 1/2

Chapter 212, 1/2

The Sovereign City of Killtree was a major population center of roughly a hundred thousand people, or more. The census was never too exact about any of that. The city didn’t even have a wall, so it was rather hard to count people when there was no real way to separate the people of the main city from those who lived in the smaller satellite villages and towns. The whole place sort of ran together, across about 400 square kilometers of space, located north of a sometimes-floodplain which was rather good for [Grow]ing crops.

The takedown of Killtree had been an extreme example of how easy it was for Erick to enact his will upon a land of people who had no real power. Even the few Domain holders of this Sovereign City were unimportant to the final result of the ‘battle’, for those people were easily captured and contained by dragons, or by Kromolok’s forces, or by the Elites of Oceanside, or by any of the other forces working with Erick to quickly and systematically eliminate the threats of Killtree.

It had taken 24 minutes, and it had gone like this:

In the sky across that entire city, over the shanty towns of slatted wood, above the mansions of stone and glass, centered above the guard towers that made the whole place look like a prison town, and especially above the wide, muddy roads that led in and out…

Erick’s opening salvo was a sky of [Undertow Star]s.

And then he linked them all together with [Node of the Renewing Undertow], like they were constellations. This took 8 seconds. The next 15 seconds were used to place a hundred [Spatial Denial]s and [Prismatic Lullaby]s across the entire land, and then to link those spells to the constellations above. A lot of this was redundant, and Erick was not planning for the [Undertow Star]s to actually link properly with the [Node of the Renewing Undertow], transferring mana gained from one spell to the other, because that wasn’t how [Undertow Star]’s Drain worked. He had made that spell long before he had made his Node spell.

Undertow Star, instant, super long range, 4500 mana

Summon the Undertow Star! All are the same; all are different.

You may designate allies and enemies at will. All others are still subject to the star’s power.

Allies are excluded from the star’s wrath unless they get too close.

Drain 2x WIL Health and 2x WIL Mana per second from every target in a super large area of effect. Effect is stronger in the depths. Distant targets might not understand that they are being drained. Prevent all non-allied spatial travel within the star’s sight. Gradually erode any non-allied spellwork within the area of effect. The star will defend itself and allies with extreme light and against encroachment with worse.

Lasts 24 hours.

For every 10 resources drained, the spell will last 20 more minutes, gain 3 more points of [Dispel] protection, and be able to erode enemy spellwork with WIL extreme light damage.

Node of the Renewing Undertow, instant, super long range, 500 mana + Variable

Conjure a node that you can further direct to Renew spellwork within line of sight of the node. Nodes once linked to other spellwork will continue to Renew that spellwork until told otherwise, or until that spellwork is fully powered.

Ethereal. Permanent. Self-recreating, if part of a network.

10,000 base mana containment.

10,000 extra mana containment per 500 initial mana invested.

And so, perhaps Erick needed to make an [Undertow Star] that was one tier higher, using [Renew] itself, so that he could have them all link together and share mana how he wanted them to share mana.

And yet, a curious thing happened.

As the sky filled with Stars and house-sized tendrils of shadow began to Drain every single thing on the ground that had mana, something within the Nodes and the Stars began to work well together. The Stars directly over the city center, where the most population lay, began to grow strong, sending thousands of individual tendrils of shadow out into every single person down below. But the Nodes connected to those larger Stars began to swell with power, and that power began to flow through the constellations, to swell the strength of the Stars on the edges of the city.

So Erick didn’t need to change anything, apparently. By all rights, Erick’s Star should not work so well with the Node, but, apparently, it did. The Stars didn't even constantly drain the network; they only went to double max strength and then stopped absorbing power.

Well… Erick was a Wizard. So whatever.

Tendrils of shadow crashed into noble houses, sending pulses of Extreme Light into [Ward]s and spellwork of all kinds, breaking them. Flight spells faltered, sending people to the ground. [Teleport]s failed outright. [Telepathy] failed as tendrils of Light and Shadow cut through telepathic tendrils made of thick air.

And now, half an hour later, with the population of Killtree Drained of all resources, and the Stars cutting through all magic, and every single person who was able to flee being captured and returned to the city by Elites, or Benevolence Dragons, or by others…

Now was the time to talk.

- - - -

In the center of Killtree existed a city square about half a kilometer wide on each side. The four sides of the square went out to four different major stone roads. The southern road led toward mansions and massive estates. The east led off toward the palace, while west led off toward middle class areas, and the north road led toward the slummy side of town. There were stone houses and businesses on every road leading to the square, but on the north side, the road rapidly turned to mud, and the houses were wooden.

The city square was perhaps the only thing that truly marked Killtree as a single city, and not as four different pieces of a society imitating a unified place. This city square was not a place of business, though, as most city squares were, though there were business-like aspects to this land.

This was a place for announcements. Propaganda, mostly. ‘Entertainment’, if one were being more charitable in their assessment.

A wide guard tower stood in the center of the square. Artful lightwards held around the base of that tower, like animations, depicting over and over the evils of Erick the Wizard, showing white eyes in the Dark over Erick’s shoulders, and how Erick’s hands were actually the claws of Melemizargo. A lot of it was simple lies, like the one that showed a map of the world, and spots of darkness spreading out from Candlepoint.

But then there were the bounties. Those were done in paper and plastered dozens of times over and over around that central guard tower.

10,000,000 gold for Erick, dead.

Which was reasonable, Erick supposed, because according to them Erick was the largest evil to surface since the Sundering.

But then there were the bounties on Poi, and Kiri, and Teressa, and all of House Benevolence’s Overseers, and… More. The bounty on Jane was particularly heinous.

Erick casually flattened that guard tower with a display of pure power, not [Stoneshape], and had his Stars above sweep through the lightwards, destroying them. A [Cleanse] cleaned up the shredded paper from the bounties and a lot of the debris. And then, finally, a [Stoneshape] smoothed it all over.

All the captured nobility of Killtree watched Erick do this, from their corrals around the city square.

Erick almost went on to flatten the rest of the city square, for this was a land of lies. But it was also a cultural heritage site. Each corner of the square were amphitheater-like spaces; depressions in the ground and stands of stone that rose from those corners. Four ‘stages’ for bards to perform. The backside of each stage, which faced the center of the square where Erick and his captured nobility now stood, were absolutely layered with colorful fliers of all types.

Each flier was artfully decorated and announced, via images of suns either on an eastern horizon or western horizon, and via a big number to indicate the day when the depicted tales would be told by the various bards of this land. Even illiterate people could read time and tell the date that much, apparently.

Each flier like the announcement of a band, or something, but with no words, and with a lot of imagery to indicate what story was being told at which stage, and when. Images of people in love, and people killing people. One particularly interesting poster was of a woman with absolutely massive tits, who walked naked through a street, brandishing a sword and covered in blood. Erick wasn’t sure what all the various posters meant, but there was a clear pattern with some of them having arrows pointing up, or down, or up and down, and with smiling faces, or crying faces, that it was all some sort of code.

Very few posters had words on them at all, and if they did, those words were at the very bottom, in an out-of-the-way location. The poster with the massive-titted woman was a play by the name of ‘Bertha Comes To Town’. Erick kinda wanted to see that play. But probably not. He was rather angry at the lack of written words in this land.

The forgiving part of Erick felt that the lack of words was so the play would not alienate potential watchers.

The cynical (and probably correct) part of Erick, felt that the lack of words was specifically to ensure that no one was able to begin to learn to read. And maybe the people who made the plays couldn’t read, either? … Maybe. Probably not, though.

Sure, it would be more difficult to learn a play if you couldn’t read, but…

Eh. Erick couldn’t realistically continue down that thread of ‘explanation’ for what he was seeing, for he looked inside the play houses behind those amphitheaters. And he saw books, and loose papers, and quills and scratchpads and all sorts of diagrams for plays being worked out and designs for props being planned. So yes, the playwrights and actors and such could read, but the commoner could not.

Which was infuriating.

… Erick left the culture of Killtree alone. He left them their posters with zero words. He left them their playhouses. He would not leave their nobility intact.

A cold wind blew through the land, and people shivered. Erick had ripped many of them from their houses, from their calm, quiet times at the end of the day, and placed them here, for judgment.

Benevolence dragons surrounded this center square; seven of them, in every color of the pastel rainbow. Either sitting on the stone benches or on the roofs of the nearby playhouses, the dragons watched, and waited. Guarding. Their eyes glinted with soft lightning, but their lightning-touch claws had stopped leaving blackened tails on the stone as soon as the battle was actually over. Now, wherever they touched left small mosses, or flowers, or mushrooms.

The sky was full of Stars, and constellations made of Node-lines. But it was also filled with the actual stars of night. The lights of the city square were ample enough to illuminate everything happening here, though, for they had to be for the plays, and Erick had interrupted four concurrent plays with his act of war. A lot of actors and stage hands were still in their costumes and otherwise, and a few playwrights were sitting behind small windows in the stages, furiously writing down everything that they saw. They knew that the Wizard was making history here, and so did Erick.

Erick breathed deep.

He stood upon the flattened center of the square, and he turned to the captured people of Killtree.

The nobles numbered 587, with 124 of those people qualifying as ‘heads of household’. Those 124 people were the major movers and shakers of Killtree. The rest were extended family. In a larger way, there were 570 people who were the ‘merchant nobility’. Rich and influential people with nice houses. These people occupied the southern part of the square.

Over 2,500 soldiers packed the western side of the square.

259 people stood on the eastern side of the square. These were the royals, and the guards of the royals.

All of these people were varying levels of guilty for deciding to go to war with Erick. Some more than others, for sure, but every single person here was also Matriculated into the Script, which made them stronger than 90% of everyone else in their city. They were the ruling class of Killtree, and even if war was not their fault, they were still guilty of crimes uncountable.

It was rather easy to find the Matriculated among the non-Matriculated, for the [Undertow Star]s strongly tracked those who had more Health and Mana than the non-Matriculated. Every single warmonger in this square was currently supplying the Stars overhead with continuous streams of power. The rest of the city, with its thousands upon thousands of literally-unwashed-masses, barely trickled any power at all to the Stars.

That simple fact had made finding every single noble in Killtree rather damned easy.

In the course of this evening's events, though, Erick had also uncovered thousands of monsters of various types here and there. Cannibal humans. Slimes by the thousands. Two oozes. And those were just the ‘normal’ monsters. There were also Puppet minds. Spinal spiders. Various other mental monster threats. Erick had come through here with the Mind Mages once before to clear out all those mental monster problems, and that is what he had done. In the course of that action, Erick had specifically not looked too hard at the City, or else he knew he would have to act. But still, to see any mental monsters at all was a shame. The nobles were guilty of war, a thousand other crimes, and they were guilty of allowing these monsters to reestablish themselves in these lands.

A Shaped [Withering] had taken care of all of those problems, while leaving the dragons and himself free of that spellwork.

Thousands of blue Kill Notifications had scrolled past Erick’s eyes since the start of this ‘conflict’, and it was only here and now, in this square, as he was getting ready for the next part of this tragedy, that those boxes began to slow.

There had been a few human deaths in that avalanche of monster kills. Erick was not proud of the human deaths, but they had happened. He would make amends as best he could; as best anyone could when it came to wartime accidental casualties. But not right now. Later.

After he dealt with all the warmongers around him.

Some people were truly innocent, though. Erick knew this. Of those who had been caught up in the ‘battle’, and who were likely not guilty at all, the merchant nobility was a large portion of that. There was also the guildmaster of the Adventurer's Guild, Guildmaster Rohn, who was decked out in full, off-white [Conjure Armor]. He stood with the royals. The Mage’s Guildmaster was a man in purple who stood beside Rohn. Next to them stood others who were undoubtedly guilty. Like the woman named Redwood who had been Jane’s handler when she was here on a unicorn hunt. Redwood was an Elite of Killtree, and so she was surely guilty of something. If nothing else, sooner or later Redwood would have been a part of the campaign to kill him, and Candlepoint, and Redwood worked with Rohn… So.

Fuck ‘em.

They were all guilty.

They would all be judged.

Erick turned to his own forces, directly next to him.

Quilatalap, the Archlich of Necromancy. He stood next to Erick, but two meters away. A lot of people were wondering about that, but they could continue to wonder.

Kromolok, the Inquisitor. He stood four meters away, with a few wrought. He was an incani-shaped white-metal man, and his incani shape had made a lot of people wary simply due to his shape. But for those in the know, like a few royals, and the Mage Guildmaster, seeing Kromolok here was like seeing death itself.

Kirginatharp, the Second of Rozeta. The Headmaster of Oceanside stood closer to Kromolok than to Erick. He wore his normal gold and white emperor-like robes. Everyone knew him, and by that knowing, they knew they were truly fucked. No one was coming to save them. They had been condemned.

And Erick readied himself to do that condemning.

The rain of notifications had stopped and so Erick stood upon the center of the square, ready to speak. He knew long before then that this was not just a trial of Killtree, but it was also a trial of himself, and of Quilatalap, and of how the world was supposed to be, going forward. Kromolok and Kirginatharp were allies, yes, but this was a big deal, and so, Erick was being judged by them, too.

Erick had workshopped what he was going to say before now. Those words were probably imperfect. Mostly, all he could really do was to be as clear, concise, and as moral as he possibly could.

Erick had an Ophiel open up his [Physical Domain], allowing him to speak to the entire city of Killtree, all at once. The sky filled with silence as Erick physically silenced all others. People who had been whispering grabbed at their throats, worried that something was happening to them—

The eyes of the nobility went wide—

Erick’s voice pressed down upon their whole world,

“If one does not shy away from the problems they see all around them, and if one has the capability to change those problems, then to do nothing is to commit evil. And since I am not an evil man, and since I can see much of everything wrong with your city, I must use my power to enact change.

“I offer Killtree three options to remove yourself from under my direct power. You of the nobility must submit to one of three options, and none of those options are death.

“Option one: Accept a [Reincarnation], with your future chosen by me, and your body chosen by you. This will reset you to level 0, and strip you of all your current power. I can turn a 90 year old person into a teenager again, if they wish for it. This will give you another life to live. This is the least option of the three.

“Option two: Accept a [Blessing of Empathy]. This will not reset your level. This option ensures that you might be able to maintain some of your power, but how you choose to use that power will change, because your entire person will change.

“Option three: Accept both a [Reincarnation] and a [Blessing of Empathy], and gain protection and assistance from me and mine for a period of one year. This assistance includes monster kills and various other kindly powers, such as a Gate from here to my Gate District. Fees for those who accept Option 3 will be waived, entirely, for a year. People who choose option three will become the new ruling class of Killtree, as determined by me and mine.

“Whatever option you choose is up to you, but you will choose one of them, for those are the only options I am giving every single one of you.” Erick said, “Killtree chose to go to war, and now we are here.”

Erick pulled back his [Physical Domain] slightly, allowing for a sudden outburst of talking and shouting, crying and wailing, yelling and screaming. Their words were worthless right now. Their pleas fell into an abyss of determination. If they didn’t want this to happen, then they shouldn’t have gone to war with him. Some of them were even yelling about how this war wasn’t their fault, and that they shouldn’t be blamed for the actions of their royalty.

The time for arguing was done, though. Erick had won, and this was going to happen.

When Erick and his dragons and his allies placed the nobles and near-nobles in this city square, they had placed the probably-important people near the front, closer toward Erick. And so, Erick was able to see important people react to his words, first. Guildmaster Rohn and the purple Mage Guildmaster, and some of the royal family and the stronger nobles and merchant nobles. The sergeants and captains and otherwise of the army were also nearer to the center of the square. They were all a good hundred meters away, though.

And they all looked guilty, in part.

Erick stretched his [Physical Domain] out once again, silencing all others. His voice raised above that silence, “I will not remain in this land once I know I am not leaving behind enemies. If there is anyone here who would take the third option and become the new king or queen of Killtree, under my power, speak up now.”

Erick pulled back his [Physical Domain].

There was a lot of sudden yelling. Most people screamed about how this was wrong, and about how Erick shouldn’t be doing this. Some yelled about how he should choose them, roaring at how they were the best person for the job. Some wanted to be king or queen while also denying Erick’s demand of them, shouting assurances that they would follow Erick’s demands without soul shackles placed upon them.

One complaint caught his attention.

“Fuck you and your Forgotten Campaign, Dark Tyrant!”

It was a small complaint in the center of a hundred larger complaints, said by a man from the royal side of the square, who was dressed in mage robes and looked rather old. Maybe 70. Maybe 85. Hard to tell with Vitality and the various other boons of the Script.

Erick let it pass without remark, even as those words hit him harder than he thought they would have.

He was busy listening to them all, sorting the anger from the hope.

He was also listening to himself, to Benevolence, trying to understand if it pointed at anyone in particular—

And then he heard it. Like a chime inside a voice that resonated with himself.

He flooded out his [Physical Domain] again, silencing the crowd. With a flicker of light, a woman got pulled out of the crowd. Anyone who had been near her would have heard her say something serious, but now, her words were silent, and everyone focused on her.

Erick spoke, “Say that again.”

The woman, who was suddenly terrified, regained some of her fervor. She was around 45, with a ruddy face and dark hair, and she had come from the merchant nobility, unless Erick was truly mistaken. She spat, “Anyone you crown is gonna get dead in a day! And they’d be right to do it!”

“That’s not what you said inside the crowd, where you thought I did not hear.”

The woman went silent, her eyes going wide.

Erick continued, “Those aren’t your true feelings. Your true feelings are much more revolutionary. So. Tell those true feelings to the crowd. It’s not like anyone here is getting out of this without accepting one of my options, and hey, if you tell the truth, you might even get a queendom out of it.”

The woman stared. “You’re really doing this shit to us?”

“Yup. That’s what happens in a war. Stuff happens that didn’t need to happen. Blame your rulers and yourselves for this.”

“… I’ll pave all the roads and [Cityshape] housing for all and matriculate the populace like how Rozeta wishes us to be,” the woman said, and suddenly a cacophony of naysayers and worse roared from the sides, as they realized she was going to get to be their queen because she bowed to Darkness.

A hundred meters separated the crowd from Erick and the woman. The crowd had been forced to remain inside the square, with many people trying to leave, but there were dragons in the way. But now, seeing that this was really going to happen, that some new person was going to be their queen, anarchy erupted. People surged forward. Some collapsed onto the ground, trying to hide in the open. Some tried casting magics, or willing their auras out, trying to disrupt the spellwork all around them, but the Stars above both Drained them harder, and cut their magic apart with Extreme Light—

Erick threw out a Shaped [Slowing Enclosure], enveloping all of the nobility, as he mentally instructed the Stars above to stop Draining and Extreme Lighting the people, so that the Slow could take hold.

In the sudden silence, Erick asked the woman, “Do you accept the burden of royalty?”

The woman shuddered, then steeled herself. She spat, “Ha! Burden. All they do is collect my tax money and spend it on themselves. Ain’t a single one of them worth anything at all!”

“Then you must correct that error, and be better than them.”

The woman stilled. She stared. “Aye. I suppose I must.”

“Do you accept a [Reincarnation] and a [Blessing of Empathy]?”

“… I do.”

“Got a name you’d like? I might be able to get you that name. Any preference for body?”

“… No preference for name…” The woman’s words left her for a moment, as the gravity of the situation hit her like a punch to the gut. “… Myself, but queenly?—” She scowled. “No fucking red hair, though. Killtrees are fucking dead to me, and good fucking riddance. My name is Bertha.”

Erick couldn’t help but grin. “Like the play?”

“Aye; like the play, but I like my small tits just fine, thank-you-kindly.”

Erick began Bertha’s transformation.

- - - -

To most of the people in the doughnut-shaped bubble of Slow, the sky shifted from star-filled night, to dawn, and then midday. The people furthest from the center, furthest from the Wizard, had the unenviable position of being able to see those people nearest the center vanish in flicks of light over the course of several seconds. It was almost like a wave of glowing white that spread outward, capturing all who it touched. They all saw what was happening. They thought they knew what the ‘bad outcome’ was when they decided to attack the Wizard of Stars. And now, here was one of those bad outcomes.

A lot of people did not take this well.

A woman in the very back of the soldier section of the field stood with another woman. Both of them were officers. Both were grey haired, and scared. They watched as flickering light grabbed more and more people, taking them away to be transformed by the Wizard. The soldiers in front of those two women, and many of those behind, roared and cried and screamed.

But the two old women had been through a lot of horror in their tenure as soldiers. They had faced bad odds before. They had seen friends die, and their world changed in a matter of moments. But nothing they had ever seen was as certain to change who they were, than this. They had been prepared for this, though, for as soon as the higher-ups started working out how to go to war with the Wizard, the two women had both thought that this was what would happen.

Or something like this.

In the dark nights, over candles and beer, they had spoken of hypotheticals. Of strategy and tactics that might be useful against Erick Flatt, Planar Human from Beyond the Stars, and Wizard of Darkness. How fitting that he used stars above to contain them all. Neither of them had guessed that particular outcome.

They had also spoken of good outcomes. Of Erick changing their society into something better, for that’s what he was doing over there in Candlepoint, with that Gate Network. Anyone caught saying those good words would be flayed till muscle and skin hung from the back in ribbons, though. But the people in charge knew what was what. They saw through most of the propaganda. Mostly. And so, the conversations between the women had worn on, and the women had spoken of times they had lost, and which they could never get back. Of what they could do differently if they had a [Reincarnation], like all those rich and powerful folks willing to bend the back to the Wizard.

And now, they were here.

And now, thiswas happening.

The first woman finally gathered the courage to say to the second—

Right as the second one began, “Let’s be together, okay?”

The first woman smiled. “Yeah. Let’s be together.”

“Option 3? Sounds like ruling class.”

“If you want to. I’m going for option 1. A farmer, maybe. I’m done with war. Ain’t nothing we could have done differently here.”

“He rolled us right over, didn’t he.” A smile. “I think I’d like to be a man next time.”

“You’re really going to do that, eh? Then maybe I’ll do it, too.”

A laugh. “You sure about that?”

“Not at all. I think I’ll stay a woman. I would like to be purposefully more humorous, though.”

A hand reached for another, as the wave of light came closer. It was half a minute away now. The sky was bright with daylight. Time had passed. A hand squeezed in a hand, and then both hands squeezed hard.

“I think you’re hilarious,” said the second woman, her voice a fragile thing.

“You can be a man; fine. But you’re not allowed to be bad at sex,” said the first woman, deadpan. “Don’t lose that part of yourself, you hear?”

Laughter.

And then light.

- - - -

After the battle was over, as Erick’s allies started to talk, to dissect how the battle had gone, it became apparent that Erick was fully capable of doing the entire capture and transformation of a city with as little as 20 active dragons, 10 passive dragons working the edges to make sure no one escaped, 50 other people, and with some Inquisitor and Mind Mage backup. A hundred people to take a city of a hundred thousand. It also became rather apparent that Erick truly was going to transform the entire nobility of Killtree, and his threat of ‘options’ was not a boast.

Kirginatharp decided to further assist Erick by returning to Oceanside, and using his [Eyes of the Goddess] to find, roughly, the Sovereign City royalty, wherever they might have gone. Syllea and Treehome went to Candlepoint, to act as backup for the Gate District, though they would return to the front lines for the assault on the other four Cities.

While Ophiels were doing five transformations at a time, and Erick was interviewing people as fast as he could get them to calm, and to talk, Nirzir and Grand Matriarch Lingxing Void Song paid Erick a visit in person.

The young woman and the older woman from Songli stood atop the stone of the city square, looking almost ageless in their white-skinned beauty, and in their white and violet dresses. They both bowed to Erick.

And Erick finished off the transformation of the person in front of him, saying, “One second, Nirzir, Lingxing.” With a flourish of power, Erick sent the sleeping Option 3 person into a waiting room that was inside a [Fairy Stronghold], and also inside a [Slowing Enclosure]. “I need to put all these new people away so that I can release them all at once, when the other cities fall… And that’s that one.” He turned to the archmage Songstress and the normal Songstress. “What’s up?”

Nirzir said, “We wish to speed along the creation of a Local Area Gate Network in Songli. We’ve been in talks with the other High Clans, and we’re ready to resume talks with you, though I assure you they will be rather quick if you are amenable to the normal sorts of trade agreements that you seem to be working towards in all other lands. As for my own indiscretion of requesting a marriage last time, that was uncouth, and I apologize.” She bowed again.

Lingxing bowed again, too.

Erick was emotionally drained from listening to people rant at him and then having to shove them into bodies and choices that they had not agreed to, but hearing Nirzir and Lingxing speak of movement in the High Clans… It was a good feeling. Erick smiled softly, and then he nodded. “I look forward to opening some Gates soon. Thank you both for showing up for this… It’s rather awful business but… Thank you for being allies.”

The two women straightened up.

Lingxing said, “Good day, Wizard Flatt. We will be taking our leave now, unless you have dire need of us. But, from the earlier discussion, you do not?”

“Not right now, and everyone has their own lands to protect. Thanks for staying as long as you did.”

“We will stay longer, if you desire it, but I honestly feel superfluous.” Lingxing glanced upward, at the Stars and lines of light hanging in the mid-morning light. “I have never seen a magic of such scale and precision and power before.”

Erick smiled a little. “If Nirzir wants to learn about the lines in the sky, she’s more than welcome to come by the House whenever. I have an art contest for how to best shape those lines over the Gate District. It explains about what the spell is and does; I am absolutely sure she can figure it out from that alone, once [Renew] is in the Open Script in a few months.” He added, “I haven’t actually gotten any of the people you wanted [Reincarnation]ed yet, Lingxing. Have them show up whenever, too— Whenever this war is over, anyway.”

Lingxing and Nirzir glanced outward at the Slowed nobility and soldiery of Killtree.

Lingxing looked like she had a lot of thoughts on Erick’s casual offer of [Reincarnation]s, but she kept those thoughts close to her chest, and simply bowed, saying, “I will endeavor to ensure that they make those appointments they were supposed to make.” She rose. “Good day, Wizard Flatt.”

Nirzir bowed once again, quickly this time.

And then the two women blipped away.

Erick went back to turning nobles into better people.

- - - -

Erick stood with Kromolok, Quilatalap, and Mox, in the middle of an empty city square as night began to fall once again. Dragons stood here and there on the roofs, and in the stands, while wrought and Elites from Oceanside stood apart, but only a little. Killtree was completely subjugated. Now came the necessity of occupying this foreign land.

Erick spoke to the crowds of allies, and House members, “Killtree has fallen, and Killtree will rise again. Hopefully, with the transformation of their nobility, their city will follow.

“Hopefully, there will be fewer horrors. Fewer monsters in the sewers, and in abandoned houses, and under beds. Fewer monsters in the palace, sitting on thrones made of tyranny. But there are still monsters coming down from the north, from the Forest. That will never change.

“I know some of you here wish to ensure that Killtree will rise correctly, and that includes many of the people of Candlepoint who did not participate in this capture, but who are watching through [Scry]s. So, I will allow any who wish to stay behind and control this land in the interim, to do exactly that, as long as you fulfill the basic requirements of governance; until the people of Killtree can once again fend for themselves.

“And so, I’m splitting our forces here.

“Overseer Mox and her hidden people, alongside many others, will be the start of those who remain in Killtree. They will also follow behind and set up interim governments that anyone else here can participate in, through to-be-determined mechanisms of government oversight.

“Inquisitor Kromolok and I, and any who wish to continue, will be continuing on.

“When we conquer the other Cities, more and more of you will likely split off, either to place yourselves in charge of the other cities, under Overseer Mox, or to do whatever you want. At the end of this war, I expect my dragons to form the bulk of the actual interim government, under Mox, as I have spoken with all of them and they all seem rather keen on that. The Dicers might slot in there as well. Kirginatharp’s forces will likely slot in there as well.

“As for our allies, I will be granting you all whatever sorts of spellworks and otherwise you think you might want, as rewards for this arduous task. I offer magics and my own promise of work, but not how to make those magics work. You have someone who wants a [Reincarnation]? Ask, and you will probably receive.

“The battle will resume in one hour real time.” Erick said, “If anyone wishes a night of rest in a [Hasted Shelter], let me know, and I will begin doling those out.”

The dragons bowed, their fealty openly displayed as their massive scaled heads and horns and bodies all dipped, and their eyes briefly shut. The Elites of Oceanside nodded, for though they would not bow to a foreign power, they were more than willing to show respect. A lot of people took after those Elites.

But the people of House Benevolence all took a knee, with many of them slamming a fist on their chest as they went down, lowering their heads. Only Mox remained looking at Erick, like Erick was the sun, and Mox loved to see the day.

Kromolok spoke some words of organization, and people started moving again.

Quilatalap merely smiled a little.

Erick took over a grand hotel of a thousand rooms with an [Expanded Hasted Shelter] in order to give half a day of rest to everyone who wanted it. Thirty minutes later, the flight of dragons and House Benevolence continued on to the next Sovereign City.

- - - -

The grand kingdom of Charme was located on a peninsula about 1,500 kilometers south of Killtree, and 1,500 kilometers west of the Curios. It was known as the land of a thousand Princes, with hundreds of smaller fiefdoms connected by well-maintained white roads to the shining white Sovereign City of Charme itself, which was positioned at the end of that peninsula. Surrounded by harbors and stone towers poking up from the Wikwacchi Ocean like distant lighthouses, the City itself was one of the most well defended oceanic cities in the world, on par with Eidolon in Continental Nergal and Eralis over in the Songli Highlands. The fiefdoms surrounding the City, spreading out across five hundred kilometers from the white city itself, were also a great defense against the armies of the other Sovereign Cities, who preyed upon Charme as Charme preyed upon them in turn.

Erick and his people had torn through all of those land-based defenses in the matter of a single night.

Erick had briefly considered flying right over the ‘suburbs’ of Charme and going straight to the capital in order to solve this ‘war’ right away, but Kromolok, who was very familiar with war and also with the various problems of Charme, advised Erick against a direct assault. After attacking the first major suburb about 200 kilometers outside of Charme, Erick knew Kromolok’s suggestion to be the correct course of action.

Erick opened with an [Undertow Star] upon that fiefdom outside of Charme, positioning it right above a grand hilltop castle. As tendrils of shadow and light touched down, the buildings, keeps, towers, and houses began to boil with people trying to escape in any way they could. Many of these methods of escape were yet more horrors for Erick’s nightmare vault, where he kept his thoughts on Shades, and on Terror Peaks, and on all the other shit he had needed to live through here on Veird.

The man who was the Prince of this hilltop town was an expert in Blood Magic, and that right there was almost enough to judge the man long before Erick actually saw him. But then Erick saw him, and it was so much worse than his imagination. As that Prince raced out of his castle he began spewing mutative magics, likely [Baleful Polymorph]-based, transforming guards and others into physical copies of himself. Suddenly there were dozens of tall, fit Princes, with blonde hair and blue eyes, running everywhere they could, trying to get away. It would have been comical to see so many men in dresses, or wearing nothing at all as their child-sized clothes burst, or watching them being trapped in armor that was a size too small, but Erick knew what he was looking at. There was no humor here.

There were simply people, temporarily transformed against their will, into other forms.

For a brief, irrational moment, Erick felt that the actions of the Prince mirrored Erick’s own actions in the transformation of Killtree. But then the duplicated people did not remain duplicates, and Erick realized he was being dumb. Half of the transformed simply exploded when Erick’s forces surrounded them, filling the air with even more transformative Blood Magic, of the subset known as Disease Magic. The other half turned into ravenous blood oozes when cornered.

None of those secondary clouds of Disease Magic produced more transformations, but they did leave a nasty Decay effect on anyone who got too close. Luckily, the Undertow Stars in the sky killed those clouds of magic, too. The Propagation Ban was already in full effect, though, so those clouds of Disease were not nearly as ruinous as they could have been. If it weren’t for that Ban, Erick suspected that Charme would have overrun Veird with copied Princes and blood oozes, long before now.

It took half an hour, but Erick and his people cleaned up that castle, while Quilatalap brought back the recently dead, and Erick turned blood oozes back into people.

Erick didn’t give the next Prince’s castle any warning at all. Their collective forces directly collected ‘Princes of Charme’ right out of their castles, first, and then they went for every single person who caused Erick’s [Undertow Star]s to really focus on them. Those tendrils of shadowed light easily showed who was Matriculated and who was not, based on the thickness of those tendrils and the light therein.

Assaulting and controlling Charme itself was a much larger task, for the city had a population of 150,000, and it was 75% well-maintained, with the slums only existing outside of the main city walls. Everything inside was stone, and it was built up in three levels, with the palace of the King of Charme located at the top level. It was well defended, and those defenses were half-active.

But as the sun began to rise, Kromolok and a newly expanded squadron of wrought inquisitors, priests, and soldiers of Stratagold, showed that they knew how to win a war in the span of a few hours. With Erick providing supreme air control and lockdown magics, they managed to capture and contain Charme in under an hour, even with all of Charme’s defenses and powers-that-be on high alert.

This was not a Forgotten Campaign, but Erick could definitely see that some of the new wrought thought of it as such. By the time the fighting was over, Erick had heard the phrase ‘Forgotten Campaign’ more than a few times from the contained populace.

Erick brought up the topic with Kromolok.

Kromolok said to Erick, “This is not a Forgotten Campaign at all… But it is close, which is why Rozeta had me come here and assist you, and why I chose to accept this godly command. Hopefully what we’re doing here is all we really need to do to clean up these Cities and leave them a lot better than how we found them. Soul Magic like your Blessing has needed to happen before, to properly contain some of the worst magics this world has ever produced, so we know that this works.” Kromolok said, “But, in an effort for transparency, you might be called upon one day to do this exact same thing, under my command instead of me being under your command, if it turns out that a magic you have made and released out into the world requires this level of ‘correction’. More likely, though, is that someone else will cause a problem that requires an actual Forgotten Campaign. You will be asked to assist with that, and I hope you will accept. It is our hope that you do not falter when we ask you to assist us to remake the world should something like that happen.”

“… Of course, Kromolok.” Erick said, “If you need me for a Forgotten Campaign, I will comply, but I say now that I would hope whatever horror happens doesn’t require a Campaign, and that Benevolence can see those problems before they get that big.”

Kromolok relaxed a fraction. “That is our hope, too. Thank you, Erick.”

A blue box appeared.

Thank you, Erick.

The box closed.

Kromolok added, “We should talk about waking up some of the people from Killtree, instead of letting them all sleep till the end of the war, too.”

Erick wasn’t sure about that. “Ah? Okay?… It’s a bad idea to let them all come out at once, I take it? Why? Less of a headache to deal with those people all at once, I would think?”

“You really should consider letting people get back to their lives, post-Blessing, and by doing so, you will show that if people comply then they can go back to their lives as quickly as we can get to them. We might even get some of these cities to voluntarily submit instead of fighting us every step of the way.”

“… Ah. That’s a good suggestion.” Erick thought for a second. “We’ll make some overtures to the Curios, after we’re done with Charme and I release both Charme and Killtree to their interim governments.”

Kromolok nodded solemnly.

Erick turned his attentions back to Charme.

- - - -

The sun held halfway up the eastern sky. It was maybe 9 am.

All the nobility and powers-that-be of Charme had been gathered together at yet another city square. There were roughly 7,500 people there in that square. There were a lot of members of the royal family, which was extensive, and a lot of them looked rather exactly the same, but with minor variations. There was a clear gender expression differentiation between the men and the women, but between those two groups, extensive blood magic was on clear display in the uniformity of statures, noses, and body types. Most of the nobility of Charme was directly related to the royal family in one way or another, so they almost fell into those same sorts of looks.

Then there was the guard of the city; the first real group that looked truly different. The guard came from every kind of person.

Erick’s raid had uncovered various Hunter guilds that operated underfoot, in the sewers. The Cinnabar Hand had many chapters inside this place, with many face stealers among the people. Erick uncovered most of those face stealers simply by virtue of how his [Undertow Star] tracked the powerful, and though there might be a reason why a young woman working as a nondescript teacher in an orphanage (as one example out of a hundred) had multiple thousands of Mana and Health, there was only one reason that made a whole lot of sense.

He had also uncovered blood oozes in the sewers. These ‘monsters’ had once been people, but through the punitive justice of Charme they had been turned into ‘automatic’ sewer cleaners.

Erick hated this fucking place.

He almost wanted to wipe it from the map. Over half the people in the crowd were directly responsible for at least one horror, inside their own homes; some of the Princes had blood oozes in their private cesspools underneath their mansions. The other half were complicit. Maybe 5% of people Erick and his allies had rounded up were ‘innocent’, for a certain definition of innocent, but Erick wasn’t about to split hairs to free those people from what was about to come.

Of the worst offenders of Charme were either the royals, or those from The Blood Halls; Erick wasn’t quite sure. The Halls were a magic school that taught variations on Blood Magic, like Abomination Magic, Cosmetic Magic, Lineage Magic, and the ‘Princely’ Disease Magic. Quilatalap expressed displeasure at their whole school, saying it was full of idiots who had no idea what they were truly doing, and that the only reason they were powerful at all was because it was easy to do horrific things with Blood Magic.

Erick gathered all his thoughts on one he had seen, as he stood before the gathered forces of Charme, and then he spoke,

“I and my allies have taken Killtree and remade its nobility and thus the entire city into a better existence. I had originally thought to transform every City like I did to Killtree, before waking all of you up at once and letting you go about your lives, but this was an untenable idea. I have instead decided to wake up Killtree when I wake all of you. Maybe, by this act of openness, I can prove that this is not a bad thing that I am doing to all of you.” He almost spoke of the horrors he had seen, but then he realized there would be no need, for though a lot of the people here would probably pick [Reincarnation], Erick would be forcing Empathy on the lot of them, too. Erick said, “Charme is getting the same options as Killtree. Option 1: [Reincarnation]. Option 2: [Blessing of Empathy]. Option 3: Both. But this City needs a major change, more than most, so a lot of you are getting Empathy even if you don’t pick it; especially all the people in your courts and your royalty and in your Blood Halls… And probably more places, too.”

People in the audience held a brief flicker of hope, and then that hope died and turned to ash as Erick went over their ‘Options’, and spoke of Empathy.

Not wanting to be a party to this, several people in the audience activated Blood Magic failsafes, rapidly transforming themselves into blood amalgamation oozes, or something similar. Erick suspected they used [Second Wind], which instantly replenished some measure of Health, in return for a day-long debuff of burning a large portion of one’s base Health. They had then used Health along with the Blood Mana Class ability, which Erick had, to spend that Health on magic, which allowed for their internal transformation magic when all external magic was Star’d away.

Such last-resort measures did the monsters of Charme no good.

Erick solved the interruption to his decree with minimal casualties, and then transformed those blood oozes back into people while the rest of Charme watched. And then he put those onlookers into a [Slowing Enclosure].

A day later, all of Charme’s leaders had been transformed in one way or another. In many cases, the leaders had gone through an intermediary step of being a blood ooze, before Erick could turn them back into people.

- - - -

With Mox and many dragons and otherwise standing by, Erick began waking up the transformed people of Charme and Killtree in batches.

It was a clusterfuck of crying and thousand-meter stares. A small amount of their horrors had been over what had been lost, from important spells that people complained that they would never be able to get again, to the loss of godly blessings. A lot more tears were shed over what they had done to others; this was particularly true in Charme. Nobles roared at the sky, begging for forgiveness that they knew they would never receive. Many begged to be allowed back to their homes, into positions of power, to fix what they had done wrong. Many wanted to run away from what they had done. None were allowed to leave just yet, though.

Two days passed.

Slowly, under observation from Stratagold and a lot of other people, including Rozeta, people returned to their lives. Mostly. The vast majority of Princes could not make themselves go back to their cities or villages out there, in the lands outside of Charme; they wanted to run. Even those Princes who only received a [Blessing of Empathy], and who kept their bodies and their power, all expressed real, true remorse at their previous lives, and at what they had done.

Erick wasn’t sure how, exactly, it had started, but somewhere in all of the mess of waking people up and getting Charme and Killtree back operational on their own (but with oversight), people started divulging everything they had done wrong, in an effort to cleanse themselves of their sins. Erick heard it all. Rape. Murder. Bribery. Theft of lands. Theft of money. Theft of power. Soul mutilation and body mutilation.

A select few people even spoke of the true reasons for this war with Erick, though many different people had ideas of what the ‘true reason’ was, and so Erick didn’t think about all that talk too deeply. There was no way to separate fact from fiction with only two populations speaking about a 5-population-involved war.

From a certain perspective, the ruling class were perhaps the worst offenders of basic morality, using everything in their physical and magical might to subjugate those below them. But the people below those ruling classes were also guilty of so many more types of crimes. Erick had trouble guessing which one was worse; the people at the top who harmed others with threats and made the world work the way they wanted it to work, or those people directly below those at the top, who happily carried out those most heinous orders because that was what they loved to do.

Either way, Erick didn’t need to think too much about the recidivism of Charme, because every single person he transformed became a different person. [Reincarnation] and [Blessing of Empathy], together, produced the most possible change, turning even the most hardened serial killer into someone who wanted to raise orphans and build houses for the homeless, instead of murder both orphans and homeless every chance they could. [Blessing of Empathy], on its own, was likely going to be responsible for a full change of the guard, resulting in eventual governments of both Charme and Killtree that would do better tomorrow than they had done yesterday. [Reincarnation], on its own, would be more of a long-term sort of effect, for all Erick had really done in those cases was to take away a person’s magic (which was absolutely necessary for every single noble who had that nasty Disease Magic (those people also got Empathy’d without recourse)) and remake them into a person with a brighter future than the one they had had before.

And so, over those two days, Killtree and Charme mostly resumed normal operations.

Everything had changed. Everything was different.

But commoners still went to work. People still needed food. And the ruling class wanted to make it work; they wanted to make right by their people. They wanted to make Charme and Killtree places where people wanted to live, not where people had to live because to live elsewhere was to die to monsters.

It was complicated. It was messy.

But in those two days, everything… sort of worked like it was supposed to work?

But also not at all.

And yet… it was okay, for a certain definition of okay.

The Benevolence dragons were pulling some major monster-killing work, too, which made the whole thing a lot more palatable. Those dragons were also being fawned over by the new ruling class, which made them fall in love with these cities quite easily. This same thing was happening to Erick too, because he didn’t know all of the awful, real history of a lot of these people, and it was easy to like people who wanted the best for others, and then went out and did that; raising houses, clearing out sewers properly, reinstalling water that had been shut off, and systematically dismantling the systems of oppression that they had themselves instituted.

It would still take years for Killtree and Charme to show any real transformation.

Erick and his dragons would help with that transformation in the long term, too. Aside from remaking the leadership of Charme and Killtree, Erick had stopped 31 attempted murders of that new nobility in those last two days. And then he ‘solved’ those attempted murders by fast-tracking those would-be murderers through a justice system and Empathying them for their crimes. He suspected that he would be repeating that action for a long time to come, for he was already in talks with judges and new royalty about implementing [Blessing of Empathy] as a new outcome for what had traditionally either been transformation to blood ooze, or forced conscription. There was a lot of work left to do in Killtree and Charme...

But Erick still had three more Sovereign Cities to conquer.

Thankfully, as predicted by Kromolok, showing the world that Killtree and Charme were mostly intact had caused North Curio and South Curio to reach out to him, to beg for peace talks. Maybe Erick could remake both Curios without needing to capture and contain them all, first? It had to be a trap, though. Almost 100% a trap.

But Erick still had to try for peace, because that was what reasonable people did. Even if it was a trap, and even if the other side would never actually accept Erick’s form of ‘peace’, he still had to try.