Eli POV

Two days after killing Victoria and the congresswoman, I finished the body of the airship. Repairing the damage to it was the most straightforward part of the reconstruction, but hardly the only thing I had to do around the house or even to the ship. When I wasn’t putting packet-switched enchantments into my clothes, a measure merited from the increasing aggression I was facing from the Coalition, I was testing the airships' various functions.

Of course, I had already run these tests. Of course, that was before a boulder smashed through the side of it. So, of course, I had to test the heating, impact enchantments, steering, blah, blah, blah.

All. Over. Again.

Ugh.

It wasn’t that bad of an issue, but the ever-present knot of worry in my gut and emptiness in my bed aggravated what would have otherwise been a passing annoyance. Then at the end of that second day, I got the response to my letter to Gula with my tray of steak and beer from the dwarf stall. When I got back home, I quickly scanned over the letter on the couch between the kitchen table and the fireplace on the left side of my tower's main room.

‘Dear friend,

We have a situation with the new visitors to our lands.

I will have more details in two days but your assistance with this matter will guarantee my support.’

A sigh of relief escaped my lips as I mentally prepared a list of potential supplies. Then I read over the letter again.

With speculation on my mind as to what could have happened, I left my warm abode and walked down the dirt path until I hit the stone road leading to the central market. With snow still everywhere, the temperature was something between cold and lukewarm as the packed masses of peasants and carts shuffled about on whatever daily jobs kept food in their bellies. Heading back out to the dwarf’s stall, I asked the head chef, who insisted on being the one taking and delivering my orders, about the dwarf diplomat.

“Would you ask if Gigan is available? I’ll take a lighter beer while I wait.” I asked politely. The portly dwarf with wild black hair nodded and went back into the tent. Gigan was good enough of a diplomat to know that words had a limit and consistently moved between the remaining businesses or several inns to make sure that an assassin wouldn’t have a routine to go on.

After a few more minutes, the copper-haired dwarf came down the road. With the usual treasure trove of gold bands and jewels about his hair, those emerald eyes looked at me with a question as he pulled his purple robe up to stay out of the dirt.

“I’m going to be helping Gula out with something. How long will it take to finish whatever it is you need help with?”

He nodded, seemingly conflicted about the two statements.

“Not long at all,” He said with the deep base typical of his kind. “We need your elements more than we need your time or labor. I’ll send word to make ready when you’re good to leave.”

I nodded with a deep drink of my beer before turning back to him.

“I’ll pack my clothes and head out immediately. It’s probably better to do this before they send a replacement for the last two representatives they just buried… Let’s just leave in an obvious manner this time. I can feel the eyes of spies and minders wherever I go, and I doubt there is anything I could do that would stop them from figuring out if I left or not.”

“Aye, but you visiting to be with Salamede is going to be the first thing they think of when you come to our halls. It’ll probably create tension between us and the Coalition when they think we’re hiding a traitor from them.”

I sighed as I strummed my fingers on the bar as I took in the sights and smells of everyday life here.

“No matter what, they’ll still think you’re responsible. I don’t know anyone in the swamps, remember? This way they’ll know that I went willingly, as opposed to you kidnapping the quad mage and potentially killing me. Not painless, but complaints are better than potential declarations of war. Besides, if it isn’t you lot, then it’s going to be the Kelton’s they go after and they are in a far worse position to take on that kind of pressure.”

He reluctantly nodded and we shook on it.

Heading back home, I purchased another chest from one of the local furniture shops who was rather enjoying their reputation for supplying the quad mage his tools to work his magical wonders. It was a brisk affair of getting the clothes, armor, smaller wooden crafts, and sacks of food together into the chest. Molding a thick slab of stone over the cover of my door, I looked up at the tall tower of black marble with streaks of white. The flat slab of stone on the top wasn’t the best looking, but something about seeing your work was always enthralling.

It was a few minutes before one of the metal carriages pulled by a spherical golem was coming down the dirt path. Wide with windows and steel bars on all sides, the tall metal carriage had a double door on the right side which I patiently waited in front of. The dwarf sitting on top of the golem’s chest flipped open a metal cover behind him and pushed a button. Pushing open, I walked through the doors while carrying the chest in front of me. The floor plan was two rows of leather benches on either side of an empty corridor in the middle. Walking over the sturdy oak floor, I saw a ladder in the back but was content to sit three seats down from the front, giving me enough reaction time if someone busted the door down.

After placing the chest beside my seat, I went back inside to get my armor on but as I came out in full metal regalia and was just to the right of the large metal sphere of the golem's body, Tansen and Agatha were walking down the path to my house, with a furious looking Harold coming up right behind them.

“Eli!” Agatha yelled even as she was still sprinting forward to get closer to me. “Wh-What are you doing?”

“I’m heading to the dwarves for a quick visit. I’ll be back in several days.” I said calmly as I turned back towards the door.

“The fuck you are. Do you have any idea of the… When the committee hears…” Harold spat as the ability of speech failed him, the muscular man getting a wild expression with the blond just going pale. Tansen, however, just looked calm and accepted my words with a nod.

“And you will do, what, exactly?” I demanded with a raised eyebrow over my smiling mask.

Harold’s deep green eyes turned to Tansen, but the academy head just folded his hands into his sleeves and gave me a slight bow.

“I wish you comfort on your long journey.” That was all he said before he turned around with a dramatic flurry of his black kimono.

“What?!” Harold exploded with a stomp on the snow-covered stone lawn.

“I can’t stop him now, Harold,” Tansen said gently as he raised his hands in defeat. “He’s no longer under my jurisdiction. Our papers say he is under the authority of the committee. You’ll need an official denial from one of the committee members or their affiliates if you want to stop him, otherwise he is free to go where he pleases.”

Harold's strong jaw came up as red tinted his skin.

“But the ones who came here are dead!”

Tansen nodded and puckered his lips in mock sympathy.

“A loophole of their own making. Have fun, Eli,” Tansen said sagely, before turning around and heading back to the tall academy walls. As I moved into the carriage, I saw Agatha and Harold crowd around Tansen as he walked off. When I was in my seat, the golem started lumbering its arms and legs to move its burden forward. It was a rather smooths ride as we zipped past the three and onto the main street proper.

We only stopped when we got up to the blacksmith shop and picked up four heavily armored dwarves in plated armor and axes, crossbows, and shields on their backs. As we moved through the crowded main street that provided a straight shot from the academy to the bridge, I was worried we would be stuck in traffic but once we came up to the bridge and the pyres, the real problem showed up. Harold got ahead of us with some of his men in black vests, pants, and white undershirts typical of Central Enforcement and surrounded the carriage. Tagging along were several of the regular guards who looked like they were considering dropping their weapons.

“Eli, I don’t know what you’re thinking, but whatever it is, it isn’t happening,” Harold yelled as he approached the door of the carriage.

Sighing, I got up from my seat and walked to the carriage door.

“Harold, I have every right to leave. You cannot legally detain me.” I half yelled through the door.

Harold turned around. One of the guards behind the burly man nodded, which only enraged Harold as he kicked the metal door.

“You selfish cunt! Think about someone else for five minutes of your high and mighty life.” Harold raved, his deep green eyes flaring.

Now that hit me wrong. Grabbing the doors handle, I undid the lock and swung it open. Harold seemed genuinely surprised as I stepped out onto the stone road, but the guards only pulled further back, as did his men.

“I’ve done more for the poor and needy than you ever could. Now, get out of my way.”

Harold huffed looking my armor up and down with a measuring gaze before crossing his arms.

“Whatever good you did isn’t a drop in the lake of the pain your presence is causing. Despite everything everyone in the military, towns, villages of the south, and the government is suffering and will suffer, on your behalf, you just ignore your responsibilities as a mage because of some emotional shit.

And now you’re taking off on some vacation with your mountain-dwelling friends, leaving us to pick up the pieces. You’re not acting like the hero of our age.”

I took a deep breath before taking a few steps forward and walking right up into his face. Despite our difference in power, he still held his ground while bringing up his square jaw.

“I’m a burden, am I? All right, then let me leave. Let me get on a ship with a few trusted people and head off to the phoenix empire, the Central continent, or even take a nice trip past the phoenix empire out to the lands beyond. Tell me, Harold, would the government let me do that? Would the government not squeeze the Kelton’s to get me to come back?”

He bit his lip before shaking his head.

“I thought so,” I said before taking a deep breath in through my nose and drawing myself up to my full height. “Don’t assault my ears with your whining about the burden of my presence if you won’t let me fuck off to other lands.

Now, I do have the authority to leave, do I not?” I asked the guard in leather armor with metal breast and shoulder plates.

“Y-Yes, most grand mage.”

“Good. Get your men out of the way.” I said, turning back to Harold.

“The committee will need to discuss-“

I leaned forward, my patience for this delay now at an end.

“Keeping me here is an act of kidnapping, in my eyes and I’m willing to bet in the eyes of the law. And as such I will protect my person from illegal detainment. When the rats and dogs are done shitting out whatever remains of those who try to stop me, do you think the committee and legal experts will be done with their deliberations?”

Harold bit his lip for a few moments longer before motioning for his men to get away from the front of the carriage.

Huffing, I turned back around and went through the metal door, slamming it shut behind me. Sitting back on my right side bench, the golem promptly took off. Looking up, I could see the carriage only cleared the stone arch above by a few inches as we fled the stain of civilization. Then we were off with the golem stomping into the soil with an exaggerated sprint.

“I heard you were an ultimate mage,” One of the younger dwarves to my left said, his thinner beard and lack of braids portraying his age nicely.

“Indeed,” I said mildly.

“And a scion besides,” Another middle-aged dwarf with brown hair and sapphire eyes said.

“Guilty on all accounts,” I said lightheartedly as the two dwarves on the bench to my left and one on my front all turned to look at me.

“Damn, ultimate quad scion mage. That’s a long introduction all by itself.” One middle-aged dwarf with black hair looking back at me said with the snow-covered countryside whipping by as the golem got up to its full speed.

“Which should you put first? Quad, scion, or ultimate.” The younger dwarf asked me.

“Hmm,” I pondered for a moment. “I would think quad first since I am the first to receive such a title, then ultimate, and finishing with scion.”

There were nods all around but the older dwarf with black and grey hair looking out the window just huffed.

“Ladies, we’re here to keep him alive, not help him decide his title.” He grumbled, wiping some dust off his window using his red cloth-covered hand. As he did so, I saw he was missing his second finger on that hand.

“What happened?” I asked as I leaned forward.

“Oh, this?” He said with a shift of his emerald eyes to the missing digit. “Accident from my youth. Used a hammer to work out a dent in a breastplate, only for the finger to slip under the sharp edge of the freshly made steel when I brought the hammer down.”

“How long do we have on this trip?” I asked them both.

“A good day. We’ve set up a special tunnel along the outskirts of our territory that will lead you to the needed chamber.” The younger one to my left said eagerly.

“Well then, I think I have enough time to fix this,” I said cheerfully as I started working off my armor.

“Really?” The older dwarf said, his voice betraying his attempt to hide the hope in it.

“Sure. From what I remember, healing potions and caster level spells can’t restore lost limbs, but scion level healing spells can, and I have the time to do it.”

“That’s why those bloody healing beds didn’t work?” The older dwarf asked with dawning comprehension.

“Yeah, those will just restore the lost blood and mend the skin over the bloody stump. It doesn’t come up too much with what I’ve dealt with, but I’ve seen soldiers with missing fingers that I know have used my healing enchantments. Now, let’s get to work.”

It took a good hour, having to use healing magic to reform the bones followed by the flesh. The younger one looked queasy but the rest were veterans and looked more fascinated than anything else when the new finger started moving as the body pumped blood into the new flesh.

After using my mana generation to make sure the golem didn’t run out of ambient mana, I had gathered a light sweat before the task was finished.

“Th-thanks, most grand mage.” The older dwarf said with a strong chin as he made sure not to cry as he continued moving the finger back and forth.

For the rest of the day, we didn’t even stop for a meal. The driver ate a quick granola bar while we munched on hard nuts and jerky. Getting sidetracked for a single bathroom break, we eventually came upon a small camp of dwarves as we moved into what I was certain was a good three miles into their territory. While I looked at the cook fires and small stone huts, we quickly passed by them and into a small tunnel.

The change was so sudden that I had a moment where I wondered where the stars had gone before realizing that it was stone zipping by. The driver activated two mana lamps on the front of the metal carriage. The sudden burst of golden light only illuminated the sides of the wall though, as our destination was so far ahead that only the black void of nothingness could be seen for as far as the eye could care to look.

This was my entire world for what seemed like hours, just the constant stomping of the golem and a sky of passing stone laying out beyond the windows as we traveled down the slight incline into the depths of this world. I was worried about an earthquake when there was a slight shake along the way, but then I remembered that the dwarf’s lands had a constant rumbling to them and they were no doubt used to working around that fact when building.

It took a few hours, with the world giving an occasional heave from whatever torture the dwarves were putting it through before the destination came into view. Coming out of the tunnel, the place we came into was a tall stone tunnel with doors of wide stone the size of a house on both sides. The stone brickwork of the hallway was of the finest grey with mana lamps dotted along the jutting walls. As we shuffled out of the carriage door, I looked up to see the wide jutting arches of the ceiling before a cough to my left caught my attention.

The left door of the huge entrance was slightly ajar and, in the crack, peeked out a dwarf with wild brown hair and glasses. His eyes were darker emeralds in the otherwise normal eyes and his attire was a brown scarf and grey robe as he looked at me with an expectant look.

“Come! Time cannot be bought with money or magic.” He called impatiently before ducking back behind the door.

“Pff,” The older dwarf said, “Baxton. Same old grouch as always.”

I nodded but quickly followed the group towards the door, all of our metal shoes clanking across the stone floor as we did so. Coming through the door, I saw a great field of dead trees with mana lamps above them to my left. Above each tree was a patch of leather that spewed mana above the furnace-like heat around the rotting corpses of nature. On my right was a large set up of tables, furnaces, and papers with dwarves scattered about. Turning back to the trees, I saw that the trees weren’t dead.

What I had first thought was the sickly complexion of death was actually the silver tint of what I would swear was metal, though it was clearer and glossier than any metal I had seen in this word. When I got as close as the heat would allow me, I looked over the texture of the trees. Whatever they were, they weren’t artificial either. Barring an obsessive who had gotten far too much free time and metal, the intricate patterns of bark on the leafless branches and trunks were too close to the real thing.

“This way, quad mage.” The voice of the dwarf from before called.

Turning away from the trees, I went back towards the nearest table that the dwarf from earlier and several of his similarly clothed associates were waiting at. Coughing into a wrinkly, pale hand, Baxton quickly spoke for his entire group.

“These are Metellens. Or Metal trees for the average man. Despite the name, appearance, and roots about the ground, these are worms gifted in plant magic. While I would have advised against me telling you this, circumstances demand I divulge these secrets.”

I lifted an eyebrow and gave him my undivided attention, something that seemed to please him as he continued speaking.

“Being the more nurturing member of its family, this worm is given the seed of a fire element plant from its parent and uses its plant magic to deform and mold its inheritance into a root system. It uses those roots to convert the rich soil into sap for it to feed on. What this means for you is we need some crafts with the healing, plant, and metal elements to extract the exterior.”

“Why those three elements?” I asked like a fresh student approaching his mentor.

“Ah,” Baxton said as he motioned me to a table on the left. The glow of the mana lamps above put a soft golden light over the mess of papers scattered about. Baxton scanned over the piles before pulling out one long piece of paper with a drawing of one of the metal trees with a dissection in the middle. It showed the outer shell of metal with a plant’s roots on the bottom but a worm with multiple heads filling out the ‘branches’ and most of the trunk of the tree.

“The problem, lad, is that plant and metal magic don’t affect that hard-outer shell. Only the simultaneous use of both elements will manipulate it. That high heat is another defense borne from the plant's magic and is used in the process of making the outer shell. Which leads to the last obstacle to the manipulation phase. Healing also has to be used because when the worm is cut from the procedure, its blood mixes with the slimy inner wall of its home and causes a small explosion, sending shards of the hardest substance we know of to shoot out in a hail of blades.”

There was another one of those rumbles as I took in this fascinating creature.

“A mighty deadly thing.”

A lot of the surrounding researchers snorted with Baxton getting a light smile.

“Believe it or not, this is the gentler cousin of the family. It has is a relative in the Central continent that uses its plant magic for camouflage, and it takes a far more proactive approach in getting its nutrients.”

I nodded before stretching my arms.

“All right then. Anything else I need to know before we get started?” I asked as my eyes rested on some graphite prongs on the table to my right. As I took in the place, I started taking off my armor for what would be a hard session of magical work.

“Yes. The reason we’re telling you this and not just handing you the leather patches to fill out in some dark corner is that we need a caster who can use both plant and metal magic to make sure that in case the tree does blow up, it doesn’t have its flying blades set off the other trees.

In the wild, these would be much farther apart, and before we would typically have a shell of the tree metal done up with enchantments to make sure that didn’t happen. But that was damaged and we can’t safely get more without this procedure. Suffice it to say we’ll be keeping several in stock in the future to make sure this self-causing problem doesn’t happen again.

For right now, though, we need the speed and precision of a caster more than a craft to make sure this doesn’t blow up the whole field.” Baxton said as he motioned a younger assistant forward. From below the table, several leather patches were taken from a chest below the table. They had a red tint to them and were more than the size of my head.

“The tanned hides of fire lizards,” Baxton noted as he started getting other papers from the stack. “Now, here is the most important part.”

Far from the do-what-you-want method that I had seen in the Coalition; these enchantments were standardized. The main triangle of the enchantment was to be put on the bit of leather that covered the flat circle at the end of the graphite pole. The mana circles and direction squares also had their designated points to be put at certain distances on the square of leather. Aside from that, it was a straightforward affair of putting the healing and plant mana constructs into the triangles.

As the gold triangle fit itself into the last enchantment of the stack of leather squares I had spent a good hour working on, I did a thumbs up to the rest of the group.

“Excellent!” Baxton cried as a round of claps resounded and echoed off the stone walls.

It took a bit for the dwarves to get the long prongs in place, but when they did, I was treated to a front and center view of the procedure as we all stood six feet from one large specimen three times the size of a man with various contours and bits sticking out. It gave off heat worse than a furnace as pale blue flames played across the surface and in the various knots of the wood, even with some coverings on me. I was a bit distracted making my own set of spells to stop the shrapnel in case something went wrong, but curiosity demanded I see what all the fuss over this thing was about.

The process was something between forge work and surgery. When the outer shell of what looked like a finished chest was extracted with one of the long graphite tongs from the upper left of the main trunk, the writhing black worm inside was cut with a blade at the end of the graphite pole cutting off the last near hair-thin strand attaching it to the tree. After a second of back and forth sawing, the strand broke and the blade fell unto the writhing black flesh below. It left a long cut that was quickly healed before even a drop of blood could leak out from the slimy flesh.

Looking at the worm and several other extrusions on the trees, it looks like they gradually mold the general shape of the items from the growth of the worm and use the plant and fire magic to fine-tune the details. Something Baxton and the researchers confirmed after they were satisfied with our work and pulled back to the main preparation area.

As we sweaty workers were enjoying a cold beer, alcohol on the worksite not breaking any rules here, I leaned against the table with a mug in my hand and pulled my mask down.

“Tell, me Baxton,” I said after downing a swig, “What is this all for? I could imagine a great many applications for this, yet I’ve not seen this material in any of your weapons or vehicles.”

Baxton and the other researchers looked between each other before turning back to me.

“Sorry, Eli,” Baxton said as he wiped a bit of ale off his unkempt red beard. “Not our place to say, aside from the obvious household items for some absurdly rich oil beards.”

I nodded and took another drink, still not willing to give up the hunt for clues.

“What about when I’m not here? While you have the metal affinity, where do you get the healing and plant enchantments from?”

“Ah, that is something I can’t tell you either, but more so because we don’t know. No need to tell us where it’s from, the higher-ups just give it to us. Suffice it to say, wherever they get it from, the source is either gone or been too busy elsewhere.”

“Too right!” One fatter dwarf to my right moaned, his black hair playing across his grey robe as his ruby eyes looked flustered “May a mountain fall on their head for their lack of consideration. Came damn close to losing a year’s work to overgrowth because of that delay.”

I raised my mug to the group.

“Well, here’s to getting the job done, at long last.”

That broke smiles across all their faces as we put our mugs together in a circle with a solid smack.

“To getting it done!” They all intoned, followed by gulping from everyone taking another swig.

As we continued talking about smaller aspects of their work, the older dwarf whose finger I healed came back, his black and grey hair swaying over his shining steel plates as he came out of the door.

“Master mage! There’s been a complication.” He called, motioning me to follow him to the hall as a team of dwarves moved to pick up my armor for me. Waving goodbye to Baxton and his team, I followed my escort until I came back to where the carriage had been. In its place was the same portly golem with a spherical body, but its payload was a far sleeker single-story carriage of steel that looked more like a raindrop than the beast of burden I arrived in. The top was bands of steel between thick panes of glass while the bottom was slick and shiny. Both top and bottom had two sets of chains and poles hooking it up to the golem’s hips.

“What happened?” I asked.

“Not what, who.” He said as we continued walking up to the new transport. “How friendly are you with the elf Dior?”

I raised an eyebrow and looked at him for a moment before answering.

“It started out rough, what with the home invasion and near-death experiences, but the lack of elven assassins tells me we ended on a good note. Why?”

“He’s here and wants to speak with you. There was some talk of having him come down to meet you in one of the lower levels, but he insisted on meeting with you on the field on your way to the swamps.”

What an interesting phrase, ‘come down to meet you in one of the lower levels’. That may just be a loose turn of the tongue, but it implied Dior was in one of the high levels of the dwarf city.

“Tell me Baxton, if I wanted to get to the trade depot from here, would there be a direct route from our present location, or will I have to endure another dreadful slog up this slope?” I asked with a wave to the hole leading out of the hall.

He smirked and shook his head as the team of dwarves took my armor in bundles and laid it in the open door of the carriage with my chest under the right bench.

“Sorry, quad ultimate scion mage. All trade is conducted in a big surface market that is enclosed in a tall stone dome. There would be too many people trying to sneak in if it was a part of the city proper.”

Now my interest was piqued, but I made sure to look towards the ceiling like I was thinking about visiting the dome while I pondered over those bits. Dior could travel through the dwarf’s holdings. Then I shook my head as I realized I had been getting too used to the petty games and tricky words of the Coalition.

“How is Dior here and among the dwarves? I thought you were a private lot?”

“Ah,” He said as the driver in the golem pushed a button by his right foot, and part of the teardrop-shaped carriage slid open. “He’s a special case. Diplomatic necessity with the elves and all that. Let’s just say he’s a lot more… amicable than the rest of his kind.”

Diplomatic necessity? The dwarves showed no interest in diplomacy with the humans, yet they allow the elves entry? Well, life was full of little twists like that.

Shaking off the questions, I shuffled into the carriage. It had a steel frame with thick beams along the sides, an oak floor, and a dual set of red cushioned benches. Sitting on the bench opposite of me, the dwarf sat down as he lifted his foot over one of the steel shoulder pads littering the floor. Using the time given to me, I slept on my bench dead to the world.

A shake of my shoulder and I roused back to life with an exaggerated yawn.

“We’ve arrived,” The older dwarf said.

Picking myself off the bench, I looked up at the sky through the windows between the steel frame. There were faint wisps of light playing across the sky as the stars fled the approach of the sun. Picking up my armor, I was dressed and ready to leave after another stretch.

Stepping out into the nippy cold, I saw Dior in the distance. Walking over the scars of bark scattered about the land, he approached the carriage with an eager stride. Dior was unique amongst his kind for his plain green eyes and human-like skin, though his sharp ears, green cloak, brown pants and vest left no doubt as to his species. This time, however, he also had a small leather knapsack on his left side.

“Eli, how has the life of being an ultimate quad mage been treating you?” He called with a slight smile as he approached.

“Very poorly. They don’t know I’m an ultimate mage but they’re still giving me hell over trying to get me to breed. But I know you didn’t come here to reminisce about the good old days.” I said with a faint smile under my metal mask.

“Indeed,” Dior said as he pulled a wooden disk slightly larger than my fist out of his pack. It had a diamond-shaped depression in the middle and whatever it was, Dior was treating it like a newborn that would be killed if discovered. “This is the key to finishing the conflict with my father. He’s survived this catastrophe better than I hoped but not as well as I had feared. I’ve got a gut feeling he suspects my ‘incompetence’ was not true stupidity and I intend to strike first. Sadly, it needs a full mana crystal to finish out the design, and my excursions out in the wild or with the dwarves aren’t going to give me enough time to soak up the mana I need in the time that I need it.”

I took the wooden disk and looked it over for a moment before looking back to Dior.

“Not ever getting involved in government is something I always held to. Especially because it turns family get-togethers into prison fights.” I took a moment, thinking about Salamede for a moment before picking back up where I left off, “What exactly are the dimensions we’re talking about?”

He moved forward and produced a piece of paper showing the outline of a diamond nearly the size of my fist molded into the half diamond outline. I gave a slight whistle as I rubbed my thumb against the edge of the hardwood.

“A tall order, Dior. Is there some payment in this exchange, or has charity entered into the equation?” I asked mildly.

Dior pursed his lips as he looked skywards for a moment, weighing some great debate in his mind before sighing and turning back to me.

“How important is finding out more about your arrival to our world, in the grand scheme of things?” He asked, not quite meeting my eyes.

My ears perked up as I took a deep breath and stood a bit straighter.

“Considering it’s the only way I’m going to get back to my family in my old universe, extremely important.”

Dior nodded before taking a deep breath and spitting out his bargain.

“I can’t give you all the procedures involved with Master’s stone, because I don’t know them. But I have seen who the Master’s stone is coming from on some letters in my father’s private abode. Help me with this, and I’ll tell you who is sending it to us. Even so, I cannot guarantee that they will have the knowledge you seek or be in reach of you.”

I got a strained smile under my toothy, metal mask.

“You seemed to promise me a painting,” I grumbled irritably, “But that would barely qualify as having mixed the paints.”

“Yet, even a rough sketch of this much detail would see my head placed atop the court hall as a warning to others.”

“And what of my head?” I demanded, “The entire point of our little theater performance was to keep me out of the elves' sights.”

Dior huffed a bit of mist as he licked his lips with the cold morning air gripping us both.

“These wooden keys are supposed to be filled with mana. If people find out that I have one, the questions they are going to ask won’t involve where I got the mana from. Besides, they’ll just assume I got it from the dwarves if the question of where the mana came from even comes up.”

“Really? I’ve left in the most obvious manner towards the dwarves while you’re visiting, and they won’t think we met up to make this happen?”

“Please,” Dior said with a dismissive handwave filled with frenetic energy, “We’ve already been informed about the tunnel leading in and out of their territory, as well as your immediate withdrawal from the dwarves' holdings. The diplomats who keep tabs on me think I’m at the bar at my usual inn and the dwarves know that letting you out into their main city would lead us elves to-“

He faltered, realizing his slip-up. But I saw his lips form the word before he squelched it at the last second.

War.

The elves would go to war… because I was in the dwarves' territory.

My mind tried to comprehend the weirdness of the situation I was bumbling into. The dwarves were a friendly people and the best I had come across in this world aside from the Keltons, but that constant rumbling and now this… odd interest from another supposedly insular group raised a lot of warning signs. Politics produced plenty of strange things in my experience and whatever this muck of mutual agreements and interests I was getting sucked into was, I had too many problems to get in between the two biggest factions on the continent that weren’t, currently, adversarial to me.

Thinking it through, I decided that if war was on the table and there was any risk of the elves finding out, the dwarves would not have set up this meeting. They had to know what Dior was proposing before they would let him see me. Since I was here under their guard, pleading ignorance to my involvement would do them no good and they would have strangled this deal from the start if they thought it could in any way be tied back to me.

More than that, Dior was the only elf in existence with this knowledge that would let me acquire it at such relatively low risk. He had certainly baited his hook with a treat too tasty to turn away from.

“Fine,” I said curtly, “Is this associate another elf?”

“No,”

“Are they likely to die in the next few years?”

“Every one can,” Dior replied serenely.

“Indeed,” I replied, “But generally a god-like specimen in his prime and an elderly, emaciated, plague victim have two different time frames of likely death.”

Dior gave a light snort.

“Yes, but this one has got enough support that they’ll live a good long while yet.”

I pretended to ponder on the decision for a while before nodding.

“All right, let’s get this over with.”

From there I removed my armor and proceeded to push as much mana out of my body and into strands as I could. Dior, while more human-looking than his fellows, still had an element of that elven grace that allowed him to use his left hand to grab the forming strands of glittering mana crystal and put them against the wood. Carefully forming a crystal diamond in the outline of the disk, it was near mid-day when tired and sweaty old me finally put out the last mana strand that Dior swiped out the air and put against the forming diamond.

With a slight smile, Dior nodded in satisfaction.

“I do believe that will do.”

“Great,” I said with a tired heave as I put my hands to my knees and panted. My shirt and pants were drenched despite the bitter cold and snow everywhere. The open sky showed a sun on the wane as the day started its retreat. “Now about my end of the agreement.”

“The Advisor. You won’t hear about her outside of certain circles. Those that do know of her do not say the name lightly. She was a member of the original Rodring gang and has survived through the use of healing spells, obviously. What’s less obvious is where she gets the resources for their use. I know of several times where we tried to squeeze her, but she kept her healing up with a deep well of resources until we finally gave in. Killing her would be pretty easy considering she’s a human, but in his letters to the king in our forests of the central continent, my father expressed frustration that our various infiltrations into her southern estate produced no mentions about how the Master’s stone was made or acquired.

As much as we hate her, her business is too good to cut out totally. She also does some trade with the dwarves as well, though we aren’t told in what.”

While it was likely that she was the source of the metal trees and plant and healing crafts the dwarves needed, I sighed as I put away all that information. Whatever this person did or was involved in, she might as well be galaxies away for all the good it would do me in the coming days. Putting out a sweaty hand, Dior took it with a firm grasp.

“A pleasure as always, Ultimate mage.” Dior said with a haughty smile.

“No one died this time,” I agreed, picking up my armor and putting it back on after a few minutes as the cold air did away with all of my sweat.

Getting back in the carriage, my dwarf guard just looked at me with a nod before I laid down on my bench. It took a few more hours of riding, often through the empty countryside and some underground mountain tunnels that lead under the artificial mountain passes. The undead bothered us a few times, but a crunch against the tear-shaped carriage or the hard steel of the outer golem usually announced a decisive end to such distractions.

Near the end of the day, we finally came to the midpoint of the upper swamplands. The navigator told me we were between the Coalition and the Phoenix empire but there hadn’t been too many patrols through this area from either government or the denizens of the swamps.

Getting out of the carriage, I looked around to take in my new surroundings. The sky was now a fading orange playing out over the water of the swamplands before me. With scars of bark around a lot of the humps of land sticking out of the seemingly endless streams, ponds, and grottos in front of me and the solid land behind me, I had a wide-ranging view that even my time swinging up in the trees hadn’t afforded me.

And others a view of me.

Reaching back into the carriage, I took a long brown cloak and covered the shiny steel of my armor from any immediate onlookers. Taking care to cover the metal in a light brown stone, I looked back towards the driver and my guard, the former of whom seemed unconcerned.

“They’ll be here soon, so relax. We got the scouting division swarming over this area. Believe me, you’re safer in this part of the swamp than you would be in the Bulwark.” The driver said, leaning back atop the golem and putting his hands behind his head before closing his eyes. Nodding, I sat down for another ten minutes before I saw six figures coming out of the water a good dozen or so feet in front of me.

I had a moment of tension before I recognized three of the shapes. Gula, a bigger Green frog named Baloo, and Salamede. My wife had a sopping wet leather vest and pants but didn’t seem to notice as she took off towards me.

I followed her example, my heart bursting with anticipation. Our collision resounded with a wet smack as we entangled each other in our limbs as she climbed on top of me. Before any words could be exchanged, she tore my mask down and kissed me with red hot passion. Her grey fur was dry, but our bodies made squishing sounds as our hands scoured every inch of each other and her sweetness played across my tongue.

“Mmm”

“Hmm”

Our soft moans played across the empty landscape for another moment before we pulled away. Her white eyes looked at me with love while I rubbed my nose against her snout, at the same time making sure to hold her tightly against me.

Looking behind her white horns, I saw the group that accompanied her.

The four frojan were coolly standing around, the older ones nodding in understanding while the younger awkwardly shuffled around. Gula, on the other hand, had deep green over her face, ears, and neck while she bit her lower lip above her sharp chin. Even her golden irises in the black orbs were wide, stretching the vertical scar over her left eye and a horizontal one on the ridge of her nose. She seemed at a loss for words as her hands shuffled over her black leather armor aimlessly.

I was about to speak when I noticed Salamede shivering. Using a water spell to pull the water off her, I then encased the whole area in a heating spell. The frojan seemed better equipped to deal with the cold and Gula had already gotten the water off her. My task finished, I then got to the introductions.

“Hello. I am Eli and I gotta say, it’s nice to be meeting you all for the first time as myself.” I called as they reluctantly shuffled forward. Even with the frojan using their water magic to dry themselves and Gula off, they all gave a start when they crossed into the heated area before moving forward for their fellows.

“Now that’s nice,” One younger red frojan with deep blue eyes said as he stretched and swished his green robe around.

Gula just walked forward and nodded to us before getting right to business.

“Greetings, quad mage. I hope you’re ready for some action tomorrow.”

“Oh?” I asked as Salamede pulled away to stand at my side off to my right.

“Yes,” She said giving the dwarves a nod as well as they prepared to leave. My guard waved us all goodbye and shut the door as the driver put his hands back into the metal sides. Stirring to life, the golem quickly stomped off from where it came into the distance along the mountainside. I saw my chest laying on the ground and left the group to pick it up. Coming back with my prize, we all walked up to the water's edge, the coldness of the water now being emphasized with the dying light.

“So, what’s the mission? And where’s Cell?” I asked the group. That got a few raised eyebrows but Salamede answered the second question.

“He’s back at this wonderful little place we’ve been staying at with mother and this nice blue snake woman. But the reports Gula received are more important right now.”

They all nodded but looked back to the water.

“It’s going to get too cold soon.” The big frojan Baloo croaked in the deep base of his kind. He put a webbed hand down his darker green back as his large amber eyes scanned the muddy landscape. “We need to get back to the house. Some planning is in order.”

I nodded and set my chest down. Not wanting my stuff to be filled with water, I put a water-repelling enchantment around the edges and expanded the wood of the chest to make sure there were no openings besides the lip of the chest. All the while, I could feel the eyes of the frojan looking at me with intense interest. Sadly for them, my skin was still sore from having to make such a huge mana crystal out of nowhere like that, and I had to use the ambient mana.

My task finished, I slipped off my armor and put it in the chest. Everything now ready, we slipped into the freezing water as I gripped my treasure. It was more of a shock than a threat to my life as this more southern land wasn’t the near-constant frozen snowfield that the northern region was. That was when two of the burly frogmen came up beside me and encased my head in an air bubble with two tunnels running up to the surface as they pulled my shoulders forward. But as we moved along the muddy riverbed with Gula and Baloo in the front, Salamede, and the younger red Frojan in the back, I decided we didn’t need to be this uncomfortable.

Absorbing the mana with my throat muscles, I formed a fire spell construct that I could manipulate to cover us and those just a good foot behind and ahead of us. There was a slight jolt from everyone as the water warmed slightly, but it wasn’t warm enough to make steam or melt any ice that might be above us as our frog-like companions zipped us ahead. Around bends in the river, roots from bushes, and fish, our guides effortlessly moved around untold obstacles as my world quickly became nothing but poorly lit mud and the sensation of water pushing against my body.

It was after what felt like half an hour that we finally came up into a world of near nighttime. We landed in front of a huge bush with cattails as I unceremoniously tossed my chest onto land. Getting on the muddy embankment, I made sure to not stand right up as I used a water spell to dry myself off.

“Impressive,” Gula said, standing closer to the wide array of bushes and cattails with Baloo as she looked me up and down. “It usually takes people three or four tries before they learn to not start screaming or squirming.”

“Thanks,” I said. Frankly, it wasn’t anything worse than practicing the use of escape pods. I was always decent at those safety exercises, but my expertise lay more in making sure they stayed in their ejection tubes.

Turning my head, I looked around to the river behind me and the endless sea of tall grass and the patchwork of water working its way through the land.

“It’s fine.” Baloo said as he stretched, “The patrols never come through here. Even if they wanted to poke around the waters, they’re too busy out east now.”

Nodding, I got up off the muddy ground and worked the mud and water off me and my freshly emerged wife. After we were both proper, we made our way over to Gula. Her black leather and green skin made it hard to see exactly where she put her hand, but the sudden burst of candlelight and a good heat somewhere between decent and intense told me she grabbed a door handle.

After Gula and Baloo moved in, I followed Salamede into this home among the bushes.

Walking through the door, I walked onto a solid stone floor and saw cabinets on the right and left with a sink on the right and a furnace in the middle on the left. Gula motioned to some of the frojan in the back, who took off down the river, though I couldn’t make out where.

“And who is-s this?” A voice called from across the room.

The rest of the house was taken up by a single large seating area and lit with two mana lamps on the jutting ceiling. While the walls were hard red stone with the rough curves of a cave wall, the floor was stone smooth as marble colored with dark and light reds. In the middle was a low, seamless wooden table surrounded with purple and blue pillows. At the back-left side of the table sat a blue snake with the general form of a human woman while a small Kelton woman with brown fur and brown horns down the back of her neck knitted what looked like a grey and brown blanket.

Our host had a frill down both sides of her neck and up her head. The blue on that and down from her snout was lighter than the darker blue along the top half of her body. Though it was hard to tell considering her purple robe hid much of her body, reaching up near her neck and almost to her wrists.

“Ah, you must be the generous woman who took in my beloved. I wanted to ask if there is anything I could do to repay your generosity.”

She raised an eyebrow as her red, slitted eyes appraised me.

“You mus-s-t be Salamede’s husband. No other human would assume a generous stance when meeting an Enten. I am Lokan.

I would not accept any more generosity from you. Not just because your most generous gift would not take root in me. Your familiar is most generous-s and has made considerable improvements to my abode. These alone,” She said with a hand wave to the walls and kitchen, “Are more recompense than I could possibly deserve.”

Setting my chest to the left and moving forward, Salamede clung to my side as we moved closer to the table. Walking across the floor, I realized the heat was coming directly from the stone floor. Sitting down with our feet crisscrossed, I coughed into my hand and was about to talk when Cell came shooting out of my left vision. He weighed so little that he didn’t even hurt, due to the burst of air he sent out before slamming into my shoulder.

He sent me a bunch of mental images of him molding this abodes’ stone and wood. The item of a basement was also a matter of some great pride for him. With him rubbing his crystal sphere against my left shoulder and Salamede clinging to my right, I felt more at home here than I had at the tower in a long time.

“Aye,” Salamede’s mother interjected, “Those shower areas have been a godsend.”

“Indeed.” Lokan agreed while Gula came to sit down on by Salamede and Baloo by her mother. It was a few more minutes of idle chatter about local affairs before the other frojan came back. With them came a muscular orc woman with two brown braids, three cornrows on the left side of her scalp, and a long mane of hair running down past the shoulders of her white shirt. Her brown skirt ran past her knees but it did nothing to hide the muscular thighs.

While her red eyes scanned the home, her eyes fell on me. A snort from her ridged nose with a bone nose ring was her first response, though her hand running over her thick green lips with small tusks suggested deeper thoughts.

“So, you’re the man making all the fuss?” She asked.

“He’s also the man who’s going to help undo it,” Gula said mildly as the muscular orc moved to sit between her and Baloo.

I raised an eyebrow at Gula in question.

“Mother,” Gula answered.

“Durka,” Gula’s mother said with a snort as she stretched and took in the heat coming off the floor. “Gotta say, you're different from what I imagined.”

“Oh?” The rough voice of Salamede asked as she put a hand over my chest.

Durka bit her lips for a moment before turning to Gula. They were conducting a spirit conversation but whatever they finished talking about, Durka just shrugged her shoulders as the three other frojan finished getting the water out of their clothes and sat to my left as the now crowded table had all in attendance.

“All right, here is the short of it,” Baloo said, his deep voice carrying across the room. “The Phoenix empire has two ways of getting into the Coalition by our swamps. Through the rivers and streams are two long patches of land that would see them to their destination further north. The northward one is the shortest and will make it easier to get through our territory.

The southern one would be longer and bring them closer to here, which is the path we are trying to maneuver them on.”

“Is there any alternatives? What about hugging the mountains by the swamps.” I asked cautiously, leaning forward with my right hand strumming the table and my left around Salamede’s hip.

Baloo shook his head.

“No. The dwarves thought of that and had several of the rivers come out wide enough that they would need to use our swamplands to make a bridge. These are the only real paths such a large army could take. A much bigger problem than the north route being the shorter one, their current trajectory puts our human farms right in their path. We’re four or five days from losing almost all of our grain stores for the winter. That happens and hunger will kill more of us than the fighting ever could.”

I nodded and leaned back, resigning myself to the necessities of the situation.

“If we succeed, High Command has said they have the necessary measures in place to deal with them taking the southern route. Tomorrow they will be putting out a full report in the local market, then we will have a better idea of what we are dealing with.”

I nodded as used my vague mental map of the area to get an idea of the forces involved. As I did so, I found a question.

“So why do you need me? It seems like you’ve got plenty of advantages in the terrain,” I asked the group.

It was Gula who answered though her bitter scowl said she didn’t want to.

“We were caught overextended. All of our forces are out west and even with our light baggage, it will take two weeks before we can move any real resistance back here. Our squad and a few patrols out east are about the sum of our forces.”

“Hmm,” I said with a nod. My mind was thinking over all of the possibilities but the younger frojan interrupted my thoughts.

“Now that you’re here, they’ll be gone soon like the Coalition.” He said confidently.

“I appreciate the vote of confidence, but this situation is different. What I never did was charge into the forts without a plan or traps. The time frame to make this happen isn’t nearly as forgiving as my last excursion in these parts. On the other hand, the details often make the difference and there are a lot of dynamics that are different this time.

I’m assuming it will be easy for me to see the phoenix forces without either side finding me?”

The frojan and orcs nodded, with Durka putting her thoughts on the matter to the rest of us.

“Both are stretched too thin. You won’t have to worry about us spotting you and the enemy are doing at most one quick look over before they set up camp and supply chains. Typically, that would be suicide, but we don’t have the girls to punish it.”

Tapping my fingers on the table, I nodded before addressing the rest of the group.

“Sounds like there isn’t much to discuss before the report tomorrow. If there isn’t anything else, I’d like to turn in for the night.”

They all agreed to that with various nods and stretches. Our meeting finished, the frojan and orcs shuffled out. Salamede went over to the left side of the room while Cell helped her mother on the right side. It was a hatch design similar to our in the tower. Waving Lokan good night as she lounged on the pillows, I walked down the stone steps into a small room. In the left corner behind a corner in the wall was a wooden bed with a fluffy mattress filled with what I assumed was the content of the local cattails. In the center of a ceiling, the half diamond of a mana lamp basked everything in a soft glow.

“This is a nice little abode Cell-“

I felt Salamede cling to my backside as she put her hands around my pants and pulled them down. Eager to relieve the pent-up stress, the rest of the night quickly passed in kisses, struggles, sweat, and moans.