The eting had begun almost abruptly, without ceremony.
Maxwell stood at the front, posture straight, expression calm and resolute.
Margaret lingered just behind him, half-hidden at his shoulder, eyes darting across the room.
"Thank you all for coming," Maxwell said. "I have sothing important to tell you, and that is why I summoned you here."
He paused, drawing in a slow breath. "As you all know, and have likely been expecting, the gates are not far from us. I trust you are preparing yourselves."
He let the words settle, then continued, voice steady. "With that in mind, I have a proposal regarding the coming gates. For this one, I suggest we work together."
The atmosphere shifted at once. Murmurs died down. Eyes fixed on Maxwell, weighing his words.
"Trust , we cannot afford to take risks here. If it is a gate, we must bring it down. If we fail, we risk our entire vicinity. The only way to ensure success is to work together."
"I know many of you wish to start operating independently as soon as possible, even more so than during the last raid, exploring your abilities within your organized raid parties. But the celestial events are not common raids," he said. "We need results."
The silence that followed was heavy. Maxwell let it linger before Albert stepped forward.
"We are not here to put anyone on a leash," Albert said. "You will only need to follow specific instructions from us, not as your superiors, but as your allies."
"What kind of instructions?" asked a yellow-haired man near the back, lean, with sharp eyes and a restless stance, the kind of incarnation who looked ready to bolt into a fight at any mont.
"Whatever is necessary to clear the gates and retrieve the core stone," Albert replied.
"Unless you are an avarice, you know our Maire must be fed. Our vicinity has begun shrinking again. There is a lot at stake, and ti... we do not have ti."
That seed to seal it. The weight of the situation settled over the room.
Liam watched with casual detachnt, then shrugged. "Alright. I’m with you, I guess," he said, lifting one hand in a lazy wave.
"Yeah. too..." Icard added.
Katar, sitting much close to Icard who stood a bit away from any other person, shot him a sharp glare, the kind that said, ’You just agreed to that without even consulting ?’
Katar had agreed to co, not because it was necessary, but because he had co for sothing as well.
So he just went along, sticking really close to Icard.
"I’ll go with that too," Zayne said, and after him, others began to nod and voice their agreent.
Maxwell nodded. This was quite easier than he had expected. But then, it was definitely good.
"Alright. I truly appreciate your understanding" he continued.
"Now, let us discuss during this eting. We have co up with a few suggestions on how to go about this so do hear us out"
---
The Greater Shadow Soulless...
That was the level Zayne had reached in Icard’s previous turn, before they lost him.
Icard glanced at Zayne again, and mories surfaced, so warm, others bitter.
Fights fought side by side. Close calls that had ended in laughter.
Then the mont it all went wrong, when Zayne had stood his ground too long, pushing past his limits and fading into sothing Icard could not pull him back from.
The mory tightened in his chest.
The eting concluded with a simple agreent. They would work together, as they had so far, but on a structured scale.
Whenever a gate appeared, everyone would gather before it first, then enter together under their agreed and coordinated plan.
So would be assigned zones to hold, to deal with the lesser spawns.
Those strong enough would push straight for the chieftain. A quite simple structure.
And so, they all dispersed as soon as the eting was concluded, so weighing just how beneficial it could be for them.
By that ti, Katar had already left, imdiately after the eting.
"Icard," Redd called as people began to file out.
"You agreed to that pretty quickly," Redd said with a confident grin. "Do you really think it’s necessary?"
"Yeah," Icard replied, stopping to face him. "I do. I think we need to do it this way."
Redd studied him for a mont, then nodded and shrugged, the grin softening just a little.
"Well. By the way, we’ve made a plan to go on a raid outside," Redd blurted. "We’re gonna get much stronger. You wanna co with us?"
Icard narrowed his eyes slightly.
’If there was enough ti, this would be perfect before the second gate. We’d grow way faster,’ he thought.
’This is one reason why raid parties would prefer to take their chances and operate independently’
’But we’ve been lucky these past two raids. What if we actually run into a high grade spawn next ti? With the gates near, we can’t afford to risk damaging ourselves from sothing like that’
"When?" Icard then asked.
"Tomorrow."
’Hmm. They’re really trying to squeeze it in before the gates, huh,’ Icard thought.
Then his eyes widened.
’Wait. This guy.’
He glanced back at Redd, a slow, almost too-innocent smirk creeping onto his face, the kind that looked friendly but was actually screaming trouble.
It hit him then.
All this ti, he had been confused because he never rembered eting an outstanding incarnation like Redd in his previous turn.
If Redd had survived long enough to matter, Icard would have rembered him.
And now he knew why.
The first raid party back then that went out on an independent run, only to be wiped out by a high grade spawn far beyond their level.
The story had spread through the entire vicinity like wildfire.
Icard stared at Redd for a second, mouth parting slightly, then snapped himself out of it.
’So that was you!’
Letting an ally walk straight into his own death was not exactly great for future plans.
"Huh?" Redd muttered as Icard suddenly stepped in and tapped his right shoulder gently, face going flat and serious in an instant.
"Don’t go," Icard said, voice firm.
Redd blinked. "What?"
"Listen," Icard continued, leaning in just a little too close for comfort. "Why risk your life so pointlessly when the gates are already near?"
He leaned in even closer, their faces now awkwardly near. "Why don’t you just wait until after the gates, huh?"
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