A growing garden
Year 192
With the battle against the demon king behind us, I moved Lumoof back to the North. The first order of the day was to find Ken again.
Where did he go?
And we couldnt find him. So, we made sure to keep all my artificial minds on the lookout. Its possible they sailed to the other continents, and if so, theres no point looking for them here in the North.
Around this ti, we received a letter from ela. Another eting with her, and Alexis.
-
We t again in that sa hotel, this ti, only Lumoof and Edna. There really was no need to bring anyone else.
Patriarch Lumoof, we et again. This is Alexis, my partner and co-leader of the Rosewoods. ela nodded, and this was when I saw Alexis again after so long. She was a tall, slender woman, her face was that of a human, with the exception of the beetle-like iris, and two little feelers on her forehead. She had humanlike fingers, but the tips were like little claws with tiny hooks.
Alexis nodded, and Edna too gave a knowing nod. Lumoof made a guess on her class.
[Assassin]
ela noticed the way Alexis and Edna looked at each other, and imdiately explained. I believe weve t under less than pleasant situations. But lets put that behind us and look forward. Alexis was still tense and she sat down. Edna could single-handedly defeat everyone in this room, and everyone knew it.
Lumoof smiled and sat on the chair. Indeed, I was also told by one forr hero that you two tried to attack her.
ela nodded knowingly. It was clear that shes a forr hero after that event, our lack of intel from the central continent made us blind. Its very unfortunate that our eting devolved in that manner.
Lumoof took a cup of tea and sipped. He wasnt worried whether it was poisoned. Oh, she was equally surprised to learn that the two of you were forr heroes of another generation. It seems to us that the number of forr heroes in the world only keeps growing.
ela laughed. I suddenly feel a lot less special.
Lumoof only nodded. So, lets start. I would like to preface our discussion with Aeons view. As he promised many years ago, he has no intention of ddling, and wishes to respect that both of you have separate lives.
Alexis imdiately leaned in. Define ddling. Is he not ddling, when the two of you are here? ela rely sighed at the response.
Lumoof was calm and he expected the question. Its important to look at context and the overall picture. Aeons ultimate goal is to break this world from the cycle. To do so, he has to occasionally step in to save the heroes, especially if they are cursed, in order to minimise the destruction from the demon king. Though, as we could see from Alvins case, he didnt do that well against the previous demon king. Nevertheless, after our incident in the North, Aeon decided that he needed to move in the North, as it seed that these islands are ho to quite a bit of the anti-hero factions, if only to maintain the balance.
Sounds like an excuse to expand his power.
Lumoof nodded. Oh, we make no excuses there. Aeon in its pursuit of power, will have to expand to everywhere in this world.
Alexis imdiately turned to face ela. The room already had anti-magic shielding.
The world will run out of ti. Lumoof said before Alexis can continue. Aiva told us that the gods powers fade. Well, we only heard from Aiva, we dont know whether the other gods are actually fading or not. In a century or two, Aiva will no longer support the summons, and the world may end up without heroes to face the corruption of the demons.
Wait. What? Alexis looked at ela. ela didnt respond to the statent.
Aeon is aware of your past disagreents with his thods. Rich, and hypocritical now that Alexis is an assassin that killed many others. But shes a smart girl, and I like to believe her intellect could be useful. But lets work together, at least, to overco this challenge. Past enmities can be managed.
Alexis sat down. Youre not lying.
We t Aiva herself. I wasnt sure whether to refer to Aiva as male or female. Honestly it could go either way, though the church of Aiva tends to refer to Aiva as a goddess, even though that isnt exactly in their scripture. Her presence was real.
Can you tell us why Aeon has all the hero fragnts? Alexis sat.
Lumoof ntally pinged , and I agreed. It was sothing he kept from everyone until recently, but he is what they call... collateral damage. An accidental tag-along during the hero summons. The fragnts were awarded to all those who tagged along.
There was silence, as Alexis and ela both processed it.
It was a long silence.
Youre telling now, that he understood all our references all this ti? And he never said a word? Alexis had a look that was mostly anger.
Yes. Infuriating as it may be, it was Aeons decision in the early days.
This is ridiculous. Alexis looked at ela. She stood and slamd the table. You believe this shit?
I must say I do. ela looked back. It makes a lot of sense, taking account of his paranoia with his knowledge of our world, he is quite like so of the more paranoid heroes. I didnt feel I was paranoid. I thought I was reasonable in protecting myself.
Why? Alexis stood.
I took over Lumoof, as Lumoofs eyes glowed. I spoke through him.
Because a tree cannot move. If the entire world knew of my origins, would they turn on ? Maybe yes, maybe not. But I did not take chances, not with what little power I had then. I am unlike the rest of you, who can afford to run, to hide, to alter how they appear with magic, or with the right spells, to move to another world. If we made a wrong move, I am a sitting duck. I have been on the receiving end of so many hexbombs, that I no longer bother to count them. The truth costs a lot more. I am willing to admit the truth, because now, I can afford to. The world is not a pleasant place. Youve seen how assassins tried to kill heroes even with the overwhelming power of heroes. What could a tree, an immobile tree, do?
ela sighed. Alexis was silent.
ela and Alexis, we et again after so long, and I would have preferred we t under more auspicious and pleasant circumstances. But the reality is this, we have just a few centuries left to chart our path, and prepare for the monts when our crutches are off.
They were listening, even if they felt intimidated.
It may seem long, but its only 15 to 20 demon kings. That may not be enough to level enough of us, such that we can survive subsequent demon kings without the support of heroes consistently. Not just one demon king, but for the rest of this worlds existence. Without divine support.
ela nodded. I understand, and so, whats the plan?
Alexis turned. ela.
Aeon is right. If the summoning of the heroes will stop, this world is truly fucked. Like it or not, we cant ever reach that level. We certainly dont have the right skills or items to even stand up to any regular hero, what more the demon king. ela defended . Weve worked at this for a century, and youre still only level 90, and Im barely above level 100. If Aeon is able to even graze the level of the gods, then we need to work with him.
I said frankly. Honestly, I am willing to let the two of you continue as is. There really is no need for both of you to make massive adjustnts to the new lives you have built over the last century. But I hoped to rely on both of you for intelligence, for support should it be needed, and mainly, to put things bluntly, dont get in the way. What I want at the mont, is an intelligence sharing agreent, and a non-interference with our actions here in the North, or wherever you may operate. I can dictate that by force, if I need to, but thats an unnecessary waste of manpower.
With the Valthorns, I could field far more power than they have. There was no need to have them enter combat, or enter into a formal alliance. They just had to stay out of the way, and if they dont, Ill have to force them to.
ela turned. I can agree to that.
Alexis stood and looked at her partner, there was a hint of displeasure in her statent. We should discuss this.
Non-interference should be a clear yes, Alexis. This doesnt change anything significantly, not with the proverbial [Soul Contract] on our souls. Intelligence is also an acceptable trade, we have an interest in keeping the world safe and supporting the heroes in their mission. We can do more working with Aeon, than against him.
Alexis wanted to respond, and then she sat back down. She didnt look too happy, but she seed to accept it.
You ntioned there were others like us? Like Miss Kei? ela asked. The point that I havent quite decided on, was whether I should expose them to Kei, Stella, or any of the other future heroes who may co under my umbrella.
Yes. How about you, have you seen any of your own?
...Yes. We have two under our care at the mont. But tell , whats their role in this? How do they fit in?
Two? Hmmm. Im beginning to suspect accidents are more common than I thought. I decided I could share so information. Theyre mostly helping where they can, and how they could apply their own knowledge to improve things. One of them worked on portals. Another is helping with crystalline bombs which we will deploy against the demon kings.
Ah, Ive heard of the bombs. ela said. Fascinating stuff. Alexis even got her hands on a few undetonated ones. Now that we know Aeon was from Earth, it really explained so of these unusual combat strategies.
Alexis asked. How does Aeon plan to end the cycle? Weve heard the goal, but does he have a plan in mind?
Lumoof shrugged. This is partly why we are here. We dont have a firm plan, we are attempting quite a few things, but if we had more minds, with different viewpoints, we could have more leads. So of the ideas are quite outrageous.
Alexis stared at ela. So all that rhetoric of a grand goal, and Aeon doesnt have a plan.
ela smiled back. Well, dont all great plans begin with a vision?
Maybe its a vision that will lead us to hell.
Are we not in so kind of hell-world already? ela responded.
The two of them seed to be pretty tense with each other. Maybe theyve been together for too long. Its hard to imagine a friendship thats a century-long would still be cordial. Lumoof and Edna just watched.
No point jumping into their fire.
What I found strange was that they did not respond to the portals. Did they hear it, or were they also working on sothing similar? Strange.
-
Stella finally completed her examination of the demon kings core. Its a dud. Again.
The core received star mana damage, and its clearly ssed up whatever that was in there. Sorry, Aeon. Not good enough.
I felt like stomping my feet. We worked so hard and it wasnt enough! Of course, Edna expected it. Its not like we did most of the damage.
Your domain skill really delivered though. I praised Edna then. We just need to work on damage. We both needed to work on damage. Even my fragnts didnt seem to make much of a difference against the demon king. Its likely that the fragnts are only effective for non-demon kings. This, of course, suggested that demon kings are not demons, but in their own class entirely.
We also examined the mana I drained from the core to prevent that last minute ltdown. Its a lot of void mana and demonic mana mixed in, and the trees and potatoes that I used to hold these manas were corroding rather quickly, and I needed to constantly heal the potatoes so that these void mana didnt leak out and blow the whole place up.
But the mana type nor the ratio didnt tell us much other than what we already know. The demon king contained void mana within itself, and most of this was about to blow. Luckily, this ti, I was able to absorb significantly higher quantities of mana to avoid any catastrophic blowup. In the first place, it was already weakened and had already consud a bit of its void and demonic mana.
Oh well. Maybe the third ti well get it.
-
Our spies were helpful, but they were not able to extract Neira's secret god-communion thods. More correctly, they were not even sure it existed.
Among the mid-tier leadership team, they were not aware of any ans of seeking out their god. They have the understanding that they will be contacted by their god, not the other way round.
This, of course, made wonder, why do their followers even pray, then? If their prayers do not actually go to their respective gods, then what is it for? Yet, despite the prayers never reaching the god, those who pray sohow receive blessings? How does that work?
I attempted to make sense of this whole prayer thing.
As I understood it, Lilies once said a domain is a higher-order access to the system. But looking at what Ive seen so far, its probably not just that. At this point, I theorise that a domain holder essentially creates a spot for itself in the system. This was why Lilies felt my presence spread throughout the system.
If so, when prayers are given, I believe these prayers are then recorded by the system, and theres a code or a program in the system itself, created either indirectly or directly by a persons ascension to the higher levels of domains, that then absorbs these prayers and then responds to them.
In other words, the system functioned as an automated god system on behalf of the gods. The god may have set criterias for the system, or the system itself interpreted a set of criterias from the gods behavior that ford the basis of how it responded to prayers.
I an, that has to be how it worked, because Im not linked or giving powers to those who have [aeonic] classes, and yet they clearly derive so power that is modelled after mine. The system did that, not .
I did not assess these believers whether they were worthy or not, it was the system who did it. The system, as the only impartial operator in the world, made that judgent call.
Thus, its likely that even if Aiva drifted out of range of her normal, direct powers, the benefits from an Aivan blessing or class would continue.
No, thinking about it, would it be a good idea to link the world to where the gods are, if they are friendly? Such that they can use their powers more directly here.
Certainly that would be good for the world, in the sense that Aiva can then protect this world directly, but not good for , since they probably would not tolerate being so close to them. A portal worked both ways.
-
The four heroes ca to the Central Continent again, this ti on their own accord. Theyve finished the clean up of the demons in the West.
I didnt like that they wanted to co, of course, but they were heroes, and they could just teleport to our continent if they wanted to. So, rather than resist and fail, since theres four of them, I decided to just allow them entry.
I want snacks. All types of them. Prabu told the attendants at the port. The attendants hurried to retrieve snacks from the warehouse.
A Valthorn quickly reached out to . As the heroes are not invited on an official visit, should we charge them the cost of their lodgings and food? This was a diplomatic headache, of course. Previously they ca at Keis invitation, and so I agreed to waive the cost of whatever they consud. I decided to call on my council for their input.
I think we should absorb it, for now. One of the Lords advised. Most kingdoms absorb the cost of hero visits. After all, they never really stay for long. Most end up starting their own kingdoms.
I think we should be more concerned if one of these heroes wanted to start their own kingdom here. Another Lord responded. But until then, most kingdoms put on their best face forward.
What if the heroes start to mate with any of the younger princes or princesses around the Central Continent? That could cause so of the kingdoms to stray from influence.
And is that likely? I asked.
Its possible. Many kingdoms historically attempted, with so successes, to absorb heroes into their royal families as a way of enhancing the unique status of the royal family. Granted this has not happened yet in the recent Aeonic era, but it was a common thing, historically. So heroes end up usurping the throne via marriage.
Fuck.
A hero as one of the Kings? Theres no way I could keep them in line if that happened.
Prabu munched on a plate of snacks. I love snacks so much Im going to stay in the Central Continent.
Fuck.
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