Christopher recovers from his brief shock, stands up, and bows. “Your Highness,” he says, and so do the rest of the members of the Council in turn. Mercuria, he notices, bows a little more theatrically than the rest, and chuckles to herself silently.

“Oh, enough of that,” Prince Frank says lightheartedly.”I am, after all, only 14th in line to inherit my brother’s throne.”

Elric and Mason chuckle politely. Christopher doesn’t really get it, but he maintains his strained smile.

“Well, I’d hate to keep you from important Stave business any longer, so, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll just be continuing the tour,” Frank says.

“Actually, we were just concluding,” Mason Kuridin says, and then shoots a quick look at Christopher for reassurance. Christopher becomes tactically inscrutable, and Kuridin takes the plunge. “I’d be happy to accompany you on this tour, if you’ll have me. Mason Kuridin, Leader of the Guard.”

“I’d be grateful to have a man with your volume of expertise along,” replies Frank, and Kuridin beams through his fat face. Oliver Rednav joins in, and Christopher can see the way the winds are blowing. Soon enough, the entire Council, including he and Mercuria are accompanying Prince Frank and his entourage through a tour of the Magentu Tree. Just as well, Christopher thinks, because it allows him time and evidence to discover Frank’s game, whatever it is.

The meeting is adjourned again, officially this time, just to be safe. Christopher, Mercuria, Alexander, Oliver, and Mason depart the room with the Prince and the Liaison to find the Prince had stowed a whole entourage outside the room. Introductions are made, again. Prince Frank’s group, or at least those who tagged along to crash the Council meeting, is composed of two men and a woman. The woman is introduced as Frank’s sworn knight, and the two men as sworn swords. One of the men, though, middle aged and with a stern face, bears some sort of Vimitech projectile weapon in addition to his sheathed sword. A sharp pain in his side interrupts his efforts to hear their names, and he looks to the side in annoyance. Mercuria rarely refused to insist on physical violence as her primary way of “subtly” getting his attention.

Mercuria withdraws her elbow and grins at his irritation, and leans in to whisper something. “The man, the one without the rifle you’re ogling, look at his eyes.”

Christopher does so. The man’s hawkish face bears two deep-set orange eyes. He looks back at Mercuria expectantly, as idle chatter masks their exchange, hopefully.

“Either he’s using some form of Vim right now, or he’s an Edrilian. My money’s on Edrilian,” she drawls.

“Don’t do anything rash,” Christopher says hushedly.

“Duh. Duhhhhh. Obviously.” Mercuria sneers back. Christoperher hopes she isn’t lying. The Edrilians are an ancient subdivision of Reillynd’s genetic history, bearing distinctive orange eyes and unique Vim abilities. They also sported a bloody historical feud with Mercuria’s own clan, the Deonids, with their silver eyes. Christopher knew that enough atrocities were committed by both sides - and sometimes still are - to ensure lasting bad blood between the two groups, despite currently being united under the current government of Reillynd. He already dreaded some sort of honor duel between the two. He kept most of his own distinctive facial features, save his proud moustache, beneath his Vimitech visor for this very reason. Also because he personally thinks it looks cool.

Introductions wrap up and the tour begins. Elric does most of the talking. The Liaison’s duties involve deal-making, salesmanship, and effectively, being a tour guide. Gathering support from sources of resources outside the Staves of Man themselves. Christopher must admit, Elric Watanabe certainly nails the showmanship aspect. Somehow, with his sweeping gestures, theatrical declarations, and decisively chosen “fun facts”, he makes the place sound interesting, and seems to keep their guests engaged. Though, perhaps, Christopher is biased, as he chose this position. Perhaps, though, in gauging Frank’s reaction, he can ascertain what game is afoot here. Frank didn’t strike him as an academic, but only a simpleton would come to the Depleted Lands seeking “glory and death”.

“The Channeling Room, and everything directly above it, are the oldest and sturdiest structures here in the Depleted Land nowadays. The superstructure was built above the tree when it was just a sapling, and the tree grew around it, insulating it. With the Channeling Room, the Staves can power, conceivably, any magical array not outlawed under the Fracture Accords,” Elric says, gesturing through an arched metal doorway into a cavernous bunker filled with elaborate, twisting works of crystal and metal.

“Not that they’d need it,” one of the members of Frank’s entourage murmurs slyly, just loud enough to hear. It’s the one with the Edrilian eyes, and Christopher can practically taste the enmity radiating from Mercuria beside him when he speaks, though she would probably snicker at the sentiment coming from anyone else. Frank shoots the man a quieting look. Strange, Christopher thinks. Was Frank just as aware of the potential conflict between the two?

“What do you use all this Vim for?” another member of team Frank asks, repairing the moment. The man with the Vimitech rifle.

“Well, the Vimitech here in the Depleted Lands never runs out of juice, that’s for sure!” Elric says.

“There’s enough overflow for me to work on plenty of pet projects with impunity,” Alexander offers. “Our Warden here is a big help on that. Prodigy.”

“I think that term is usually best applied to young men and children, Alexander,” Christopher chuckles. “Though, we’d be honored to introduce you to these ‘pet projects’, Your Highness,” he offers, following Elric’s lead up a flight of wooden stairs.

“The honor would be mine, Warden,” Frank simply says, as the procession nears its next checkpoint. Christopher dissects that. He’s piecing the evidence together as quickly as he can, but besides the general situation just being very unusual, (they very rarely get visitors, and then never royals) there’s nothing obvious being thrown at him. The actors keep revealing more aspects of their characters that muddle his calculations. He hates ‘people problems’. He can never solve them nearly as fast as he can mechanical ones.

“This is, of course, the Transit Station. The Vimworks here allow us to transport intelligence, supplies, and personnel to other Stave holdfasts. Ours was recently appraised as the fastest in the country, believe it or not!”

“Impressive,” says the Edrilian that quipped earlier. Christopher wonders if he’s being straight about that. He doubts it.

“Indeed. In fact, some Warden outposts find it more convenient to route their two or three step logistical chains through our facility here, rather than locations closer to them,” Watanabe boasts.

The group moves on, up another flight of stairs, passing some general armories and dormitories along the way, which Elric briefly commented on but didn’t stop for. The next floor the tour arrives on contains the War Room, built into the same metal chrysalis the Channeling Room utilizes. The room sports arrays of Vimitech monitoring equipment and controls. Should, if the Hells freeze over, they ever get attacked out here, this is how the Warden and his subordinates could coordinate the defense remotely, utilizing various fixed weapons and automated defenses and communicating with their boots on the ground. The setup here in the Depleted Lands was sophisticated and well maintained, but never used. Elric mentions something about how the information gathering network functions via replicating the form and function of human nerves using Vimitech to transmit and translate audio and visual data to the War Room. Christopher’s design. Christopher is fairly sure that the Depleted Lands lead in the internal and external intelligence gathering department, too, thanks to that - the rest rely on manual scrying relays and messengers.

After the War Room, they visit a scenic balcony near the Tech Lab that overlooks the training grounds that stand more or outside the more fortified areas of the facility. Dozens of Staves spar and train with swords, shields, and other traditional melee weapons as you’d expect to see in such a place, but dedicated mages practice their arts as well. Down range, repeated clattering rings out, as a squad of special soldiers Christopher commissioned for practices with their Vimitech rifles. He’s done much to try to push the technological innovations this place produces to the rest of Reillynd, but as far as he knows, yeah, here in the DL region they have the best rifles too. They have the innate advantages of plenty of free time, his personal presence, and basically unlimited Vim from the Magentu Tree and its infrastructure. Frank’s man with the Vimitech rifle seems keenly interested in comparing notes after that.

Finally, they wind up at the Tech Lab. Christopher is unsure if Elric planned this so that they could show off their “pet projects” as he overheard, or because that was simply how he structured his tours. Regardless, the result distracted Christopher slightly from the dilemma at hand, because he got to show off his cool stuff.

“This is,” he said, mostly addressing the man with the Vimitech rifle, “Our latest prototype. I’ve been experimenting with the idea of ‘recoil recycling’, where the knockback from the previous shot, instead of, you know, knocking the rifle back, is redirected magitechnically to boost the force of the subsequent shot. This is the result. It’s a bit too bulky to be field practical at the moment, and it usually comes apart after it’s fired too many times subsequently, but that’s the process.” In his hands he holds an unwieldy tube with two grips welded on in addition to the handle, and several bulbous growths of metal spouting off of it. The whole thing is inlaid with glowing blue and purple veins that channel Vim throughout its various components.

“That is definitely something,” says the rifleman, scratching his scraggly chin. “What’s that?” He points to a mass of cables and wires sprawled across a workbench, headed by a translucent orb. Christopher is pleasantly surprised.

“That’s part of the facility’s internal intelligence gathering system, the one we use for the War Room. That crystal ball absorbs light and sound, and the cables transmit the data to the War Room where they’re converted into something comprehensible to animate eyes and displayed on a screen.

“Remarkable. I’ve never seen anything like it,” the man says. “How did you come up with this stuff?”

“Thank you. I was blessed by the Gods, is the only answer I can honestly give.” Christopher replies. It’s actually the only thing he can say without seeming too boastful, or risking incriminating or ostracizing himself. The truth was that he had a quantifiable mechanical advantage in this realm. But that would be treacherous to explain. The asker seems satisfied, regardless.

“Indeed!” cries the Edrilian. Christopher should really learn their names, but at this point its gonna be awkward. Ick. He’ll ask Elric later. “Blessed by the Gods,” he continues, “To languish about in a wasteland fiddling with shiny rocks. Bwahahahhaha! It’s a bit sad to see how far the Staves have fallen.” he jeers.

Christopher sighs. Better the man try to provoke him than Mercuria. Prince Frank looks like he’s about to chastise his charge when someone speaks up.

“How about you say that to my face?” Mercuria challenges. The room, already tense at the outburst, grows cold. Chief Vimitechnician Geist looks on with a face full of apprehensive glee. Christopher’s own heart chills.

“Enough of this,” he begins to say, but the Edrilian smells blood.

“How far you’ve fallen. Would even one man in this room be worth his weight in a hunt for a Northern Beetlebear? Have you ever even seen one?”

Oliver has, Christopher thinks, and is saddened for it.

“Saying all that must mean you’re so far above us, right, Edrilian? How about you prove it?” Mercuria challenges.

“How would I go about doing that, Deonid?” the Edrilian replies, sporting a savage grin. What an asshole, thinks Christopher. He knows what Mercuria is going for, though, and he can’t let it happen. This is monumentally stupid. This is historically stupid. This is really fucking stupid.

“Mercuria, that’s enou-” he snaps, but he’s interrupted, because of course even his supposed-to-be-more-rational-than-most group of Staves devolves into savage, tribalistic animals when insulted by some outsider.

“Duel. In 15 minutes. To the maiming,” Mercuria simply states.

“I cannot allow this,” Christopher and Frank say simultaneously. Christopher, relieved, looks to Frank and motions for him to continue. Perhaps cooler heads can prevail. Then Prince Frank keeps talking. “Warden Nakeem, Miss Deonith, I deeply apologize for my man’s unruly behavior. Please allow me to take his place in the duel you’ve proposed.”

Christopher nearly faints. He wonders what he did to anger the Gods enough to sic this pack of fools on him.