The main arterial road of the Outer Ring of Solas was currently completely clear, with barricades and System Custodians calmly and politely telling everyone to keep the road clear until the Parade of Wonders has passed. The sidewalks, which were enormous, were packed with curious people. The airspace was thick with messenger drones, and in every part of the Outer Ring, [Messengers] and [Criers] had a blank check quest from The System to tell everyone. This was an opportunity to level that came once in a thousand lifetimes, and they were not going to be shy about it.

They barged into businesses, into homes, into public spaces. They banged on doors and wrote it on walls in enormous letters. They screamed and hollered and set off fireworks. They resisted arrest and ganged up on the police, dragging them to the Parade. The really brave or desperate ones even made it all the way down to The Roots and Solas Proper.

They didn’t need to have bothered. Those in the highest rings and tiers of power had already noticed something was going on. Quite a few of them were really pissed about it too, because it was the alien-equivalent of a friday, and suddenly they were going to be expected to stay late over some silly human nonsense. Again.

It was only when they saw the System Custodians that they realized this bit of human nonsense was not like the others. All hands on deck, something weird was going on.

The main road was clear, and the parade route was packed with the people of the Outer Ring and Solas and The Roots in all their diverse alien forms. Strangers standing next to one another conversing over a shared experience of strangeness, made equals and friends for this single event, and probably not again after. Only during.

They would then, during The Murmuring Phase, hear the first hints of sound. Like metal rings melodically marching, sching-sching-sching. Then the drums, banging away in the distance. A young elemental dressed in an outrageous semi-military uniform, accompanied by what was clearly the beginnings of an Elemental Circle, his minions, also dressed in the same way. The elemental was rushing this way and that in a chaotic, frantic way, blowing a chaotic, frantic tune on the trumpet that extended out from his face. The other elementals also had trumpets, and were playing along.

He would carelessly breach the barricades separating the crowd from the Parade, delighting young children and beautiful women, making men grin and aliens feel an alien joy. He destroyed the one defense these poor people had for what was coming next, the illusion of the barricades.

After Frankie, came rows upon rows of shining mechanical beings, wild things from the Overcavern Forest, a slow motion stampede of metal and chrome. Birds and deer and living construction equipment like backhoes and loaders all rumbled and roared and honked as they followed, ensuring the road was well and truly clear.

“Make way!” was the shout from the next group, “Make way for the Parade of Wonders! Make way for Prince Ben!” Rows upon rows of undead with golden blazing eyes, dressed in the dress uniform of a military that never was, holding each holding banners with Ben’s face on it. It wasn’t a great picture, but it wasn’t bad either.

Then, like a tsunami of color and sound and light, the Parade of Wonders arrived. It extended to the sky and moved along all available surfaces, walls of buildings, the street, the underside of bridges, everything that could be covered. Great ethereal winged serpents dashed and looped through the air, passing through solid objects without consequence. Blazing elemental beings of tremendous intensity floated along, harming no-one. Rows and rows of pallets piled high with treasure were carried along, spilling coin and gem and loot like an overfilled wine glass.

The God-Squad came in the next wave. They baffled the mind and mystified the senses, granting boons and blessings to any who could touch them, or any they found deserving. Winged Archangels, gigantic elephant men, deceitful looking Djinn, Transcendent looking so-called ‘heavenly masters’; from every culture on earth, myth and legend walked The World, all brought together to the City of Solas for a time. The boons and blessings were not temporary either, they were life-changing.

The next wave was of the highest leveled humans, of which about ninety-eight percent of them were children under the age of nine. Of everyone, including Ben I might add, they were having the most fun. They ran about and danced and yelled and cheered and their animals trumpeted and howled and yowled and growled and yipped. They pulled priceless treasure from their pockets and gave it away to other children, giggling and pulling them into the parade, the parents rushing after. Birds, flocks and flocks of hyper-intelligent birds of ever feather and stripe sang a song never heard before, a song of crow and eagle and finch and gull and vulture and rooster and lyre and kookaburra and sparrow. Joined together for the first time in song since the fabled days of Eden, before good and evil. They told the story of Earth, as seen by the birds, in a harmony coordinated by telepathic union.

Each wave lasted exactly as long as it needed to, the intelligent time dilation effect stretching moments and warping seconds into minutes. After that day, some swore they listened to the birds sing for days upon days, and others said they talked with a god for an hour. Nobody got tired during the Parade of Wonders, nobody could get tired.

After the children and animals of Earth, came the Monsters of The System. They moved and crawled and belched and leered, singing their chorus, bawling out their arrogant pride and disdain.

“Come oh come, ye men of skill and strength! Where have you gone? Long have we awaited your challenge in the Final Fortress, and long have you cowered in fear! Gaze upon the faces of fear and tremble! You will never be free, because you will never FACE ME!”

It was less of a song, and more of a barbaric shout. There was no unity to them, no harmony. Each monster was an island of power unto themselves, and each monster took the time to leer and jeer at any high leveled individual who’d come to the parade. To cast shame and cast shade, to laugh at them and remind them that they never truly strove for greatness. Merely to be great enough.

Some ran in fear, some bowed their heads, some burned with impotent rage. . . and some met the eyes of those terrible monsters without fear, without shame, without impotent rage. Written in those eyes, many of whom were human, was an unspoken challenge. ‘I’m a monster too, and I’m coming FOR YOU.’

Upon those who dared to meet the eyes of the most terrible and tremendous monsters of The World, did those terrible and tremendous monsters grant their boons and blessings. Only to they who would come and slay them in the Final Fortress, or at least, those who would try.

As the wave of monsters left, they laughed at the adventurers of the world, taunting them. Leaving the planted seeds of heroes in their wake.

And then, positioned squarely in the middle of the Parade of Wonders, in the position of greatest honor and excitement, Prince Ben himself.

By the time Ben arrived at any given location, he could have been buck naked, scruffy and being ferried about in an overflowing garbage can, and still have the crowd go wild. The hype was real.

The reality was less gross and smelly, and more shiny and fragrant. Before and behind Ben were the System Custodians and the Treasure, and Wealth, Prosperity and all the various kinds of Elemental Manifestations The System had contributed to Ben’s wish. Picture them like this: Gigantic humanoid tornados of gold, silver and gemstone; of rare potion, elixir and pill; of sought after enchantment, stone and crystal; of wondrous food, drink and song. Not just one, but many of every kind, spilling forth their bounty on the crowd, who had already been showered by blessings and boons of many kinds.

After them came the children, who were eagerly and shamelessly picking up treasure and swag. The children played and frolicked and pranked and made friends, and their animal companions watched and kept them safe. More than once, a sobbing pair of human parents in various stages of [Evolution] charged out from behind the barricades and were reunited with their child. Elemental manifestations of Love were born, and made the air thick with positive energy.

Ben sat in a one bedroom apartment sized Parade Castle with no walls, only luxurious red drapes near the top, watching it all with a heart full to bursting. This was what he had wanted. He sat on a comfortable looking throne, with Red at one side and the Royal Sage of Solas walking about, chucking endlessly conjured treasure at people and just laughing his ass off. Thirty-One was there trying to hide as his sudden psychological realization of stage-fright asserted itself in a really inconvenient way. Ben waved and smiled at people and just took it all in, feeling very fucking content that he used his wish appropriately.

“Retirement,” Ben said behind a smile and a wave, “bah-humbug.”

Past the Manifestations and children, Ben was surrounded by clowns, led by Short Bus, clowns that grew in number with every passing moment. Anyone could join them, and be magically transformed for a while.

“[Fist of Joy]!” Short Bus shouted, knuckle busting a random person watching the Parade of Wonders right between the eyes. They went flying back and tumbled over.

They were also completely unharmed, and laughing their asses off.

“Ben!” Short Bus yelled, “I love being the [Clown Marshall]! [Fist of Joy]!” Short Bus yelled again, popping someone right in the mouth, leaving them giggling uncontrollably.

Ghost Ears accompanied the manifestations, blasting his [Swag Cannon] and watching with amused confusion as the crowd reacted to the t-shirts and various bits of swag with the same level of enthusiasm as they did literal treasure. [Swag Cannon] had no cooldown, so Ghost Ears entertained himself by shooting as many people as he possibly could, and hear them say things like ‘Woohoo!’ and ‘Thank You’. Some quirk of the Parade of Wonders prevented anyone from getting actually hurt while it was going on, so Ghost Ears would get really close and shoot people in the face, knocking them over.

“Parades are weird,” Ghost Ears said, laughing and blasting another random stranger in the chest.

Vivi, as the [Hype Man], had an ability Ben wished he didn’t have, called [Verified Boast]. It allowed him to make a boast on Ben’s behalf, which Ben was immediately empowered to make good on, only for a moment.

“He can shoot lasers from his eyes!” Vivi yelled, and Ben shot lasers from his eyes into the sky.

“Vivi, stop!” Ben yelled, and Vivi continued to ignore him, as he’d been doing.

“He’s able to change size at will!” Vivi boasted, and Ben immediately began to change size at ‘will’.

“Stop!” Ben yelled again, because Vivi’s boasts were getting more and more absurd.

“His reproductive organs are-”

“Shoot him,” Ben ordered Red, who immediately leveled her AK-47 at Vivi and barraged him with bullets. The Aeon Slug yelped in pain, the bullets bouncing off his side like it was armored, glared at Ben and Red, then coughed. The crowd started howling with laughter.

“His smile is radiant and wonderful!” Vivi said, and Ben smiled. Literal light came off of his white teeth. More laughter from the crowd.

“Better!” Ben shouted, grinning, “Good shot Red,” Ben said, giving Red a friendly punch to the arm.

Anna was all over the place. As a [Parade Commentator] she’d gotten the skill [In The Thick Of It], which allowed her to always be wherever the most interesting part of the Parade was at any given time. Her skill heavily relied on the twisty time dilation effect of the Parade of Wonders, giving her time to cover everything at her leisure. She’d also gained the [Tireless] skill, and was secretly pouting that it would go away once the Parade was over. Other than that small detail, Anna was having the single greatest time of her entire life. She was also rapidly becoming one of the single biggest content producers on the Smartest Phone Internet. The entire world, at least the portion of it that had access to a phone, was watching.

People hung out of windows, up high, high high up in the sky, watching. Time was warped, and space as well, so that all who wanted to stand below and watch were able to. A stretch of a hundred yards became ten thousand, and it seemed as though all of Solas, all the millions and millions and billions of them, were standing along the parade route. Any attempts to get an accurate number of actual attendees was thwarted by the mischievous whims of space-time. Around the world, rich young people rushed to break open family vaults to find a Scroll of Greater Teleport or something, anything that would let them actually be there.

Trailing behind Ben, the Main Event so to speak, was a repeat of what came before him, but a bit more subdued. A wind down, so to speak, letting people know that the Parade was over, and that it was time to go about their lives.

The high and mighty of Solas, of the Outer Ring, of The Roots, watched in horrified fascination as the Parade of Wonders threw the balance of power into complete chaos. The flow of the economy, the distribution of magic, the concentrations of rare skills and abilities; everything that made a magical city work, blasted away in a single day, by a single skill, used by a single human. Prince Ben.

“Wasn’t he one of the ones we were supposed to assassinate?” a high level [Crime Lord] of The Roots asked his counterpart in Solas.

“He was in the party with the Aeon Slug, yes,” the [Council Leader] responded, watching.

“Going to be kind of hard to make him disappear now,” the [Crime Lord] said, laughing. “I think he’s the single most well liked individual in Solas right now.”

“Thank you, I’m aware of that,” the [Council Leader] snapped, feeling all of their usual tools and techniques for dealing with problems evaporate under the blinding light of global attention.

“Something about a Purebeast, right?” the [Crime Lord] taunted, “and summoning? Oh well, looks like you’ll have to play this one strictly by the book. Give them their rights and all that. I’ll be seeing you,” the [Crime Lord] said, turning around and walking away.

“Where are you going?” the [Council Leader] snapped, glaring daggers at her husband.

“I’m going to keep our fool daughter safe and get some of that swag,” Anna’s father, the [Crime Lord] of The Roots said to Anna’s mother, the [Council Leader] of all Sunlets and Solas.

--

There were a lot of probabilistic factors that went into what happened next. A stop never taken along the long road from the Dark Cities to Solas, a stop not taken out of the petty virtue of cruelty. A broken wagon wheel which had been argued about in more total time than fixed. A few well placed comments about where and when they would arrive.

Mostly, it was the girls in the lead wagon scheming and engineering events so the Black Circus would collide headfirst with the Parade of Wonders. They didn’t know a damn thing about what to do for a half-dead stranger on the road from Jericho to Jerusalem, aside from giving them a good kick and a hateful comment, but they were well trained in the art of scheming and manipulation.

The Priest of the Lowest Depths, ‘damn his black heart’ as they would say in the Dark Cities, which would be ‘bless his heart’ as they would say anywhere else, had no idea what was going on in Solas. He was merrily brooding, whipping the clowns as they pulled the wagon along, completely unaware of the fate he was being driven towards.

If he’d known what was happening, he would have been proud of his charges for their methods, and angry as hell about the end results. Here’s what he saw:

The Outer Ring of Solas was deserted. He’d been expecting them to clear out, but usually there were a few dark souls that came out to see them. But in a city of countless souls, not a single one could be found. Their caravan of wagons rolled along side streets until they found the main road, which was barricaded off.

“Girls!” he snapped, “it seems we’ve met some resistance! Get out here and move- Oh, you’re already moving. Good,” he said, confused that his charges had been moving to remove the barricades before he’d snapped at them, and that they were moving very fast for teenage girls. Universal fact, groups of teenage girls of any moral alignment are really difficult to order around, and if they are cooperating, suspect mischief, immediately.

The Priest of the Lowest Depth did not suspect mischief. He, damn his pieous black heart, thought they were excited to begin their religious mission of making the world a worse and more evil place. After all, he’d been excited for his first mission, so why wouldn’t they be?

They didn’t get back on the wagon, actually, now that he wasn’t brooding. Actually, now that he was looking around, he could see quite a few of his young sinners jumping from their wagons away from their minders and getting over the barricades. Actually, now that he looked closely at the situation, the girls actually reinforced the barricades to make it more difficult for the wagons to get through.

“Oh no,” he said with a growing sense of horror, “they’re going rogue! Clowns!” he snapped, then released the clowns, “move those barriers! We’re going to hunt those girls down and lock them in the humiliation chambers!” he cracked his whip and went ‘Yea Yea!’ like a cowboy or something. The clowns ran forward and pushed the obstacles out of the way, then reattached themselves to the harnesses and started pulling.

The Priest of the Lowest Depth frowned as his wagon entered the main road, because he immediately felt that he was in an area of heavy dimensional distortion.

“Heaven’s breath,” he swore, “what in the name of angels is going on?”

A wave of something bright and beautiful blasted down the road, something so strong he didn’t even need his specialized skills for sensing moral polarity to feel it. He coughed and clutched at his chest, which was suddenly warm and buzzing.

“Aaaahhhhh,” he hissed, his mouth open and drool pouring out from the sudden sense of feeling. His heart was burning. His! After everything he’d done to kill the damn thing, it was still alive!

Another blast of holy energy. His clowns started howling in pain and longing, reaching out for what could make them free. The Priest of the Lowest Depths looked up, and then looked behind him. He heard music, metal rings melodically marching, sching-sching-sching. Then the drums, banging away in the distance. A young elemental dressed in an outrageous semi-military uniform, accompanied by what was clearly the beginnings of an Elemental Circle, his minions, also dressed in the same way. . .

The twisted space released the Priest of the Lowest Depths, and he saw to his horror that the roads were lined with Solas in its entirety.

And they were cheering for this Holy Disaster.