Ed struggled to hold in a sigh.

When he'd gone into politics, he knew that he'd signed up for a job that would involve long, boring meetings. Once he'd become the Secretary of Defense, he'd foolishly hoped that waiting for meetings to begin would become a thing of the past.

To a degree, it had been, at least when dealing with his own country. He'd discovered that when dealing with foreign governments, the waiting game was back in play.

"Mr. Secretary," Yorrick hurried into the room and offered him a handshake.

Shaking the Warlock's hand, Ed nodded. "Mr. Wrathsbane, it is my pleasure to visit your Empire on behalf of the American people and the United States Government."

"I was rather hoping to enjoy the company of your president, Mr. Secretary," Yorrick said, gesturing for him to follow him out of the antechamber the King of Greenwold had allocated for his wait. "I do understand your government's reticence, having her in another dimension on foreign soil likely causes many sleepless nights." He turned his head and smiled brightly at Ed. "I imagine a visit to an Empire that admits its allegiance to a Dark Pantheon failed to cast."

"Honestly, yeah," Ed agreed. "The fact that you're so much more powerful than we are shot that down right away. We don't have anyone who could protect her, not really. Also," he sighed, "this is going to be a long week if you keep calling me Mr. Secretary. Outside of official introductions, let's just stick with Ed."

"Gladly, Ed," Yorrick grinned, "and you must call me Yorrick, as whenever I hear Mr. Wrathsbane, I look over my shoulder for my father."

Ed nodded as he followed the warlock through the massive hallways of the King's Palace. The fact-finding mission had been convened in haste, as thousands of Americans had taken the Empire up on its offer to let them level up in their Dungeons. He'd been voluntold to assess the Empire with an eye towards its laws and the treatment of its citizens.

He'd had been rather surprised to see that the laws of the Empire were incredibly simple, and effectively boiled down to six of seven of the ten commandments. The entire legal code was twelve pages long, although there was an addendum in the back that additional laws applied to each of the five pillars.

Ed was about to ask where they were going when Yorrick opened a door and entered what was, for someone around eight-foot-tall, a normal-sized room. Given that most of the palace was designed with a dragon in mind, the size was unusual. What was even more so, were the incredibly intricate designs on the floor, all done in silver and gold. Ed recognized it as a ritual circle, although he wasn't quite sure what for.

"The Palace is warded against teleportation magic," Yorrick explained as he pulled out a fistful of mana crystals, "with the exception of this room. I'll be opening a portal to the seventh of seven central markets in Karce, the capital of the Empire."

Yorrick glanced at him from the corner of his eye as the pattern on the floor began to glow. "Keep in mind we're a much larger, more cosmopolitan nation than Greenwold," Yorrick said. "You'll likely see a number of species you've not encountered before, and I implore you not to rush to judgment or make a scene."

Ed nodded slowly. He'd met drakonians, draconians (he'd learned the difference), animal aspect species, and a bunch of people with a wild variety of elemental attunements. And, of course, a Dragon. He knew that Yorrick had to know that, and he couldn't help but wonder just exactly what it was that was supposed to surprise him at this point.

A portal appeared, and Yorrick turned to face him, smiling. "Step into my parlor," the Warlock chuckled before turning back to the portal and stepping through.

Ed grimaced as he followed.

Yorrick waited for Ed to step through the portal. He'd really wanted the President for this, but he'd have to try and make do with what he had. Several of the other governments of Earth had taken a more pragmatic approach and simply sent their leaders over.

Ed stepped out of the portal, and Yorrick gestured for him to join him.

"Best to move out of the portal point quickly," Yorrick advised, "as you will get flattened by a twenty-ton crate moving through."

Ed looked around the plaza, and Yorrick could see his eyes widening.

"Ok," Ed said slowly. "Yeah, some of the people here are definitely new."

Yorrick grinned. Although a bit dour, the Secretary of Defense had seemed open-minded, and it pleased him to see it borne out in practice.

"Let's get to it," Yorrick offered, stepping into the plaza. "This is the seventh marketplace in Karce. It's the closest to the wall and the furthest from the citadel and thus serves the least prosperous of the city's denizens."

He guided Ed along the broad street, allowing the man to stop and stare at the variety of goods offered at the stalls that lined each side.

"No one seems all that destitute, although I admit that some of these people could be starving, and I wouldn't be able to tell," Ed replied after a few moments.

"That would be due to our tax policy," Yorrick replied, stepping up to a stall and picking up a pair of oranges. He handed the vendor, a middle-aged woman who looked entirely human, what appeared to be a badge of some sort. She tapped it to the delicately carved wooden try in front of her, and when a beautiful pattern of purple light erupted from it, she handed the badge back and smiled.

"Every citizen of the Empire, of age of course, is required to deliver their level in mana crystals each month," Yorrick explained as he handed one of the oranges to Ed before peeling the skin off his own. "That means that every single person in our Empire delves our Dungeons for crystals." Yorrick finished peeling his orange and looked Ed straight in the eyes. "Which is why I brought you here," he said seriously. "I would have preferred to entreat your president, but as you are here, I'll entreat you instead. Do not follow the example of Greenwold." Yorrick shook his head. "The single most identifiable cause of Greenwold's continued dance with extinction can be found in their policy of allowing their citizens to remain weak."

Ed shook his head. "I'm not sure that sort of policy would fly with our people."

"Let me show something else," Yorrick began walking again. "One of the things you have to understand about your new reality is that while individual strength will play quite heavily in all aspects of your daily life, communal strength is necessary to survive, or better yet, to thrive."

Ed nodded as he obediently followed.

"Greenwold regularly suffers devastating losses during a Tide because while they may have a few people with above-average levels, the vast majority of their population is either unpathed or freshly pathed. The King and I disagree rather strongly on that point. He feels that if you have enough individuals who are overwhelmingly powerful, you'll be able to protect everyone." Yorrick shook his head again. "Which, while technically true, doesn't take into account eventualities. At some point, the protectors will need a damned break. Or they'll want to spend time with their family. Or they'll want to tier up or reincarnate, or any number of other things. And when that time comes, you suddenly have a populace that isn't ready to replace them."

They were walking down a residential street, neat stone buildings three stories tall. "The people who live in this district," Yorrick waved to each side of the street, "are either young or calmed." Catching a questioning look from Ed, Yorrick clarified. "Calmed is what we call people who have reached a level and tier that they aren't willing to advance past. Sometimes they'll pull out of it and pick back up, but for quite a few, it's the end."

"Doesn't everyone reach that point, eventually?" Ed asked.

"To a degree," Yorrick admitted. "I've been stuck for a decade, but as soon as there is someone to take my place, I'll be reincarnating the same day. Don't get me wrong, over almost eight hundred years, I have at times gotten more than a little bored, but at no point have I ever considered just calling it quits."

"Eight hundred years?" Ed sounded startled.

"Close to it," Yorrick grinned. "I look good for my age, right?" He chuckled.

"How many monsters have you killed over eight hundred years?" Ed asked.

"I have no idea," Yorrick admitted. "I couldn't even tell you how many I've killed this year. The numbers just sort of run together." He sighed. "You stop thinking about it after a while. Honestly, I think the people who love those video games are going to do really well."

"We've noticed that trend," Ed agreed.

"Here it is," Yorrick gestured. They had reached the end of the road, so to speak. The street dead-ended into a wide boulevard that separated the houses from a massive wall.

Ed looked up at the wall. It was massive in the same way that pyramids were massive. It gave you that same feeling of insignificance.

The wall was clearly constructed of blocks of stone. He judged they were likely fifty feet wide and the same length, although he didn't know how deep they were. The wall itself was comprised of these massive blocks of stone stacked ten high, resulting in a wall that was five hundred feet tall.

"Come on, let's head up," Yorrick said, pulling him away from contemplating the wall's construction. The Warlock began to slowly move up, clearly using a flight spell.

Ed cast the spell himself and, after a brief ascent, found himself standing next to Yorrick on top of the wall.

He'd been right about the depth of the blocks. They were perfect squares. The wall was also three squares across. He shook his head, then frowned as he looked down at the stone beneath his feet. The stone he'd stared at below had been a nearly uniform gray, but the top of the wall was the brownish red of rust.

"When we arrived on Thayland, we were ill-prepared for what we would face," Yorrick said softly. "Parceus operates much like Greenwold, only on a truly massive scale. That planet has been pacified, and over the centuries, and then millennia, the people there were able to rely on a vast number of titanic beings to protect them, forgetting that it was the constant struggle to survive that gave rise to those powers."

Yorrick turned towards the city and gestured for Ed to look, which he did.

The city was stretched out before them, and Ed could see that it was, to a degree, terraced and that the entire thing was built up against a massive mountain range.

"We landed here, although the older history books refer to it as a crash, not a landing," Yorrick continued. "With the fierce sea just over the mountains, we huddled against the stone and built our lives." He sighed and shook his head. "We weren't ready to face a tide so soon after arriving. We thought we'd have time to grow our own powerful protectors. Only one out of twenty survived the first tide, and most of those were pathless children."

Ed couldn't help but feel moved at the man's mournful tone.

"Even now, we still haven't fully recovered in terms of the knowledge that was lost," Yorrick went on. "One of the lessons we learned well was that the gentle, pacifistic ways of Parceus were suicide on Thayland. So we fought, and struggled, and bled, and died. This wall represents the true beginnings of the Karcerian Empire. It took a century for us to recover enough to even consider coming out of the caves we'd carved into the mountain and another for us to have the strength and numbers, but the wall was built over the course of a decade, and when the next tide came, it washed up against it."

Yorrick's voice turned fierce. "We stood on this wall, men and women, young and old, and screamed our defiance against the Tide. We paid in blood, but the wall held." He pointed down at the wall. "The stone you're standing on has been washed in the blood of our people for centuries. That blood has soaked into the stone and stained it, forever standing witness to their sacrifice and bravery."

Ed stared at the stone beneath his feet. He couldn't imagine how much blood would have to have been shed to stain stone like this.

"I don't want this for your people," Yorrick's voice was heavy now. "But I'm afraid that if you don't take the steps necessary to ensure you grow in power, that you'll eventually have your own blood-stained monument."

Monroe's tail swished as he stalked his prey.

He couched down, wiggling slightly to set his rear paws, making sure he had solid footing from which to pounce.

His prey twitched, and Monroe launched himself forward, wrapping his front paws around his prey and biting it while at the same time raking it with his rear claws, before bounding away.

"Ow!"

His human-servant sat up, the blankets sliding off him as he reached down and clutched his now uncovered toe.

Monroe sat primly and swished his tail. It was hardly his fault that his servant didn't have control over his own appendages. If his toes didn't twitch the same way a rat would, Monroe wouldn't have attacked them.

"Are you hungry buddy?" His servant made the mouth noises at him for a moment. Monroe recognized 'Hungry' and 'Buddy,' the former indicating an offering of food and the latter being a term of adoration.

He swished his tail again.

His human-servant stood up and moved unsteadily to the food-box.

Flowing gracefully, Monroe followed, padding softly alongside his poor clumsy human.

It took only seconds for a large bowl of steaming meat to be placed next to his water fountain. Accepting his rightful due, Monroe began to delicately devour his meal.

His human-servant was pulling more things out of the food-box, but none of them interested him until the thinly sliced meat came out. His nose twitched as he caught the delicious smell, and he paused his feast to steal a glance at the delightful treat.

Monroe's human servant often layered the sliced-bird-meat between other, tasteless or simply disgusting items, but Monroe had found that he could often extract it.

He resumed eating as his servant continued preparing his future meal, thoughtfully including a generous portion of the sliced meats for Monroe to devour.

Swishing his tail, Monroe wondered if he could convince his servant to go out in the sun today.