Hrosskell Guthrumsson sat in front of the assembled Panomekon Council. The six heads of the six most influential associations seated at the Nexus of Panomekon were the real political power in the major sectors that spread out of the intersection. Hallowskon might dispute that primacy given the dual intersection they shared with the Nexus, at least over the Beta/Blue and Gamma/Red sectors, but outside of that empty boast… well, they were Guthrumsson’s bosses for his Alpha sheaf. They dictated policy and the Inquisition teams enforced it if necessary.

And they had a mission for him. An unusual one.

“A Divergence forcing. That’s a funny concept,” he said.

“I don’t have to remind you not to talk about it. Even the Professionals out of Earth-355 aren’t aware of how their Divergence happened. The research team from Katerlikon, whose reports were kept confidential, are the only ones in the know there,” the Librarian said.

“I can imagine that well. High tiers trying to turn a deep Divergence into their private kingdom are not that rare, although very regrettable and it never ends well, but the idea that you could tailor a Divergence to your liking…”

“But as you well know, anytime a Lord uses his Adjustment to mess with the Labyrinth infrastructure, you get problems. Voluntary, or not,” Maros the Cutter said.

“With all due respect, you don’t need to remind me of that. I had to slap down some Romans a few months ago for that one, even if it wasn’t a Lord doing it. They didn’t worry that the integrity got lower and lower every time they used these aether-based cannons. And Great Gates are the most sensitive ones to disruption, I know,” Guthrumsson replied.

“So, what we want is you to organize the Alpha Inquisition sub-teams for this one. You need to spread over all the empty zones in that sector, and check every probable tier-one zone for newly opened Gates. Although, given that those Gates apparently opened twenty years ago already, it is highly likely you will spot standard teams or signs of regular use before you even get there.”

“What if that Earth-113 sheaf is unmapped? Or off-Alpha?”

“Then, once we’ve eliminated that first possibility, we’ll expand the efforts and task the other Inquisition divisions. But there are over twenty-three possible mapped minor sheaves that still appear to lay fallow at tier-one, just in Alpha. Qigang has the master list.”

The Head Librarian faced Guthrumsson.

“Depending on pre-attuned Professionals, scouting all those tier-one zones in there is going to take us at least one year, if not more. And that’s by splitting your teams.”

“Once we go below tier-ten, sure, that’s not much of a problem. I only have one team with a tier average of just under twelve. But until then, most teams will work together, at least in trunks. We might be high-tier, but I’m not risking the Inquisition losing members by being hasty in solo endeavours,” he replied.

The Viking twirled his moustache, deep in thought.

“I probably need two weeks minimum, to organise everything based on prior accesses given your maps. Assuming all the teams are around and I have accurate access lists. Do I have permission to rope in other non-Inquisition teams to speed this up?”

“Absolutely not. You are known for your dedication to the Labyrinth, so we entrust you with that knowledge. Too many people being sent to the depths for places known to be empty might start making inquiries that would be prejudicial to the stability of all things. You must not share the real reasons with anyone, including your team. That idea is too dangerous.”

“What about the two natives of that Divergence? Those, I think I can tell I got a new lead for their Earth. Which is technically correct, even if I don’t explain exactly what kind of lead it is.”

The six exchanged glances. Then, they automatically raised open hands and fists in gestures of decision, and the Council leader instinctively tallied the result so that the discussion barely stopped.

“You may. But proceed with caution. Besides, if they’re mid-tier nine, they will be quite limited in the help they can provide. A sheaf or two, maybe?”

“They’re good at improvising. Starting duos are rare enough.”

“And they even did not spread their Professions overmuch,” the librarian commented.

“Adjustment pain is sometimes a good teacher. Not everyone laughs at the price of power like some of us,” Guthrumsson said.

For once, all of the team had come to the Faire, including Jonathan and Alton who had never bothered with the thing until today.

“So, Fleming’s okay with us trading stuff?” Jonas asked.

“More or less. The Duke revised the original charter for items recovered from the Labyrinth. The old was ‘whatever’, given it was mostly done for the princess and the team of nobles and retainers would go with her, and he’s picked something more classic once he started recruiting in earnest. The quartermaster sorts whatever we recover, as usual, and we can swap our normal gear for something in the stores, although since we’re the lowest levels of the company by almost a hundred levels, that’s usually not very useful for us. But the point is, he’s willing to let us keep gear for a while – the idea is that we’ll have to dump it at the store once we’re done,” Laura replied.

The Original Gatepost Trading Faire

Opens all Saturdays, from 8 am to 12 am. All welcome!

☜ Food and drinking

Sales and bulk trades ☞

From his vantage at the entrance, Jonas thought the Faire looked about as busy as it usually did, as if the recent events had not made a mark. Dozens of stalls, all sorts of Professionals carrying large bags full of gear. Most of it would end at furbishers anyway.

The assistant at the entrance recognized the team – or at least Jonas and Laura as regulars – and wasted no time directing Jonas to the management tent while Laura started to make the rounds of the stalls, accompanied by the rest of the team carrying the last pieces of their banked gear from their rescue trip last year.

“Jonas! The hero has come!” O’Hogan exclaimed as he reached the tent.

Jonas laughed.

“I’m no hero. Even if we had a procession in our honour last year.”

“I know your team was in that assault on the French bastion. Everyone’s still talking about it. The newspapers were full of the story, once it broke out after a few days.”

“Any news of the rest of the war? We were in the depths for over a week, scouting Gates, and I haven’t had time to read any paper.”

“Last news dispatch on the Gatepost Weekly’s special edition was that the main army corps had reached Paris and assaulted Versailles. That’s probably three days ago? And gosh, that story about freeing the royals and dukes of Europe from their French gaols. I wish I’d been there. Were you directly involved in that part, as they all say?”

“Yes. I realize there are probably things I still can’t talk about…”

“Well, what do you say if I finish starting this Faire properly, and we head to the Four Elementals, and share a good one, like old times, and you tell me all about what you can. Our Belgian brewmeister has yet another new one, using some funky hackberry things from a tier-three.”

“Oh? What’s it like?”

“You’ll see, my friend. Okay, looks like yet another dispute on stand placement… Seriously, it’s like the boat-licker doesn’t come nearly every month. You’d think improving Intellect even as a secondary would lead to common sense, but no.”

“How does it look?” Jonas asked Laura as they met after the team completed their first round.

“I’ve started drafting a list of the best vital-focused gear we have and will try to complete it and improve it. As long as I don’t pick something only Jonathan can use with his extra levels, we’ll swap it around when it comes to pushing the Gates. Give me some levels and if we’re lucky, we should break the 2000 cap with some hefty margin,” she explained.

“Really? I think we’ll need multiple sets, given our different baselines.”

“You’re too used to being in full combat gear. You should try out without your Artefacts,” she laughed.

To put the emphasis on her point, she blinked, using her Puppet to instantly switch from the full Strength-build leather outfit she wore to her more mundane looking skirt and blouse. She shrugged.

“Okay, strictly speaking, those have some Potentials on them. But strip us of everything and we’re all in the 900-1500 base range, save maybe for our primary vital. Let’s focus on a single big set covering everything first, and we’ll refine it if we have time. I’m not going to find any jewellery or Core, that’s true, but I have seven or eight locations to work with.”

She did a quick mental evaluation.

“Health and mind are never the lowest vitals in our builds, so I can squeeze around 1000 in those and 1400-1500 vitals for both aether and endurance. The only specialized set worth making would be Jonathan’s because he can break into 3000 on all four vitals if we pick the right ones. Don’t you have over 3000 health already without anything equipped?”

“I do,” the Calculating Guardian confirmed, “It’s endurance that’s my lowest.”

“Really? I’d have thought…” she said.

“Build’s variety. I got a few skills that even use all that aether,” he explained.

“Well, it will probably be easier than you might think. People rarely seek out full vitals gear. Main Potentials and useful skills typically take priority over those, and under heroic pieces, that’s a major trade-off to make. Look at us, we still grab whatever increases our main Potential, then see what else it offers. So, if people find some, they rarely keep it. So forget about heroics, but the triple-vital exceptional gear? I can get, certainly. Stuff with Intellect or Fortitude and raw vitals is still useful to multiple builds, but at upper tier-three, you’re starting to see more spread of Potentials in some builds, as people decide to target different tier-fours. Anyway, I’ve started dropping notices to all my old contacts that we’re looking for that kind of gear specifically, and not dump it on furbishers without checking with me.”

“Does our banked stock work out for those trades?”

“We’re almost out of that, but people at the Faire are starting to re-use the old Treasure-notes system from the time of the Gate closure, just improved.”

“Uh?”

“Yea. If I don’t have any useful level 150 exceptional gear to trade right now, I may offer a 4E150 note instead for instance. Once we have four pieces of level 150 or above exceptional gear, then we ‘buy back’ the note by offering the holder their pick of any from those.”

“How much can we get away with that stuff? It seems to be like printing money, and only royal banks are allowed that.”

“It’s considered barter, like the rest of the Faire. In the end, it’s an item for an item after all. There are few enough Professionals trading around that your reputation would fall quickly if you overdid it or keep offering the same bad items no one wants. The Faire actually offers a counter-sign, guaranteeing that a given team has not issued more than two notes at any time. I hear the Bank also does this now, and they offer to keep the gear in escrow to back them. We may have a slightly better time since it’s known we prowl far-away tier-three zones and have an easy time delving in the lairs, so we get more gear per month than most teams do per quarter. People have realized by now that they’re not bound by the old zones the Royal Labyrinth Company was focused on three years ago, and are slowly spreading out, even if it is slow and time-consuming.”

“Old habits die hard. So, only time before Markandon and the rest get overwhelmed, then,” Jonas said.

“People still need to get enabled across the zones to get there. The only ones are some scouts and most of the lower-tier assault force, and even those are higher tier and won’t bother with the line itself. But even if it’s not realistic, people realize that if you spread out enough, you don’t need to deal with the lair licenses. You may run the risk – if you’re the only one regularly going there, why not?”

“So? What do you think of it,” O’Hogan asked as Jonas gingerly tasted the foaming tankard.

“It’s… weird. It’s as if someone dunked some kind of citrus or something similar in a batch of beer.”

“It’s mostly a secret, but I know the zone he gets the hops-equivalent for that brew. So far, it’s still exclusive for the house.”

“I could see the appeal of novelty,” Jonas admitted.

“Well, not for everyone. A few non-Professionals tasted it, and while it is good and has a nice kick… it gives them the runs. Drink a pint, three hours later, you can’t tell if you’re pissing or dumping.”

Jonas winced at the image, but then, it was an Irishman speaking.

“Okay, I can see why that would limit the market.”

“Besides, you still need specific supplies from the Labyrinth for each batch,” O’Hogan admitted.

Both Ira and Jonathan raised their tankards in a toast.

“To the exclusive Professional beer!”

All, save Laura and Guss had gathered in the Four Elementals alehouse for the invitation by the fairemeister himself. Who was only paying for the first round, as he had judiciously pointed out, despite having a large partnership in the establishment. Or maybe because.

“So, tell me all. Or at least, all you can say.”

“What’s to tell? We came, we overcame, and we won. Mostly,” Ira said.

“You really went to Versailles? The palace and all?”

“We didn’t set foot in there. Too much risk of high tier Professionals around. Not that there were…” Jonas admitted.

“We missed that rat Bonaparte,” Jonathan interrupted, grumbling.

“They said he fled into the Labyrinth,” O’Hogan said.

“No such luck. He was simply away, apparently running the legendary guardians of their zones with the rest of the high tiers. He only left a handful of people to guard his realm. And then, we came, broke his toys and freed his prisoners,” Jonas said, smiling at the last part.

“So… he’s still free.”

“But stuck in the Labyrinth. While we conquer his Dominion,” Ira said, raising his tankard again to toast with Jonathan.

“You said the army had reached Paris?” Jonas asked.

“That’s what the latest in the Times says. There have been some heavy battles at the approach, apparently. Versailles had a serious garrison of Professionals, but not very high tier. Bonaparte uses those like the Royal Company mostly did in the old days, primarily as harvesters for the Labyrinth materials,” O’Hogan explained.

“The Chinese use Professionals armies,” Ira noted.

“Yes, but unlike the Indies, we could bring a large enough army that we could overcome those, apparently. Artillery and lots of concentrated fire, with skyships’ pinpoint bombardment. Nobody speaks of the losses, so they must have been heavy, but if we won, there’s that.”

“They are probably demoralized by the fact that their leadership is in exile,” Jonathan surmised.

“What I wonder is how you managed it. Infiltrating the Dominion must not be easy. Maybe you or I can pass for a mundane, and the French managed to sneak in a few agents last year, but the kind of forces they speak of in the Times is unmissable.”

“That’s one of the things we can’t talk about,” Jonas replied.

“More special Adjustment tricks?” O’Hogan asked.

“Not that special. But yes, we cheated somewhat,” Jonas admitted.

“If you aren’t cheating, you aren’t trying,” he replied.

“Really?”

“What can I say? I’m Irish, that’s how we do it.”

Jonas suddenly started, as a woman entered the alehouse. She was familiar… One of the assault teams on the Village, and tasked to escort the freed royalty of Europe out of harm. Her presence there could only mean one thing, so he excused himself and went to talk to her.

“Light Tactician Evelyn Nagle. Good to see you here. Does this mean the evacuation is done?”

“Sims! It probably is by now. We met with the forward scouts of the army only two days out of Versailles. The army decided to start ferrying the most important royals, like the Crown of Spain, using one of the skyships. Well, those who accepted travelling that way, that is. Most of them have been locked away for a decade or even more, and they had no idea we have such things. A lot preferred to keep going to the Channel, to be evacuated by normal boat instead.”

Jonas raised his tankard in cheer, and the woman laughed as her own order was placed on the bar.

“I mean, you should probably go to the Palace and check. I’m sure the Princess’s consort will want to thank you for rescuing his father.”

“They’re staying there? I thought she had her own house.”

“His Majesty wants her close by, I think. Like his own daughters, although she’s married now, thank God. So, that makes it an official visit of sorts for your deeds.”

“I didn’t, we all did. You’re the one who knows how to speak Swedish, after all.”

“You were first in, that’s what counts. And you’re one of the few Knighted Professionals anyway. There’s talk of creating a special distinction for all of us for the assault, but there’s too many to raise to the order of the Bath,” Nagle said.

She waved as a few more Professionals entered, and Jonas excused himself as the rest of her team joined her. He went straight to the table to tell his own team about the news.

All, including O’Hogan, raised a toast again, to the restoration of the proper order of Europe.