“So have you calmed down?”, Hiro turned to Karen who was sitting down in his room quietly sipping a cup of tea.

“Not really.”

“Well then can you at least explain like...everything.”

Karen sighed, “This is all your fault you know.”

“Excuse me?”

“I’ve been doing my best to stick to the damn script, and you’re here just ad-libbing it.”

Hiro raised his brow, “What script? Nothing you say makes any sense.”

“Of course it doesn’t make sense! Why would it make sense?”

“Just calm down and drink your tea.”

Karen puffed up her cheeks and pouted as she raised her cup and took a sip of her tea, she muttered, “This is surprisingly delicious.”

Hiro nodded, as he poured himself a cup of tea, “They were good leaves.”

“I’m surprised you knew how to brew it though.”

“It’s important to maintain your health, both physically and mentally. And well...”, Hiro recalled a certain princess and female dwarf, “For one reason or another I came to learn how to properly make tea.”

“Heh”, Karen sipped her tea, and then began to explain, “This is going to get confusing, but in the end, these sort of things are always so convoluted so bear with me.”

“That’s fine.”

“Anyways I’ve seen the future of a single timeline that would likely occur if a certain set of events took place. As for how I saw this, I’m not entirely sure either, but from my own research everything that I saw is likely to occur.”

“And what exactly is going to take place? The destruction of Renton?”

Karen shook her head, “The destruction of Renton was prevented in the timeline I saw, the one to be destroyed is the Five Elements Alliance.”

“The Five Elements Alliance?”, Hiro thought back to the books he read and recalled that Lugh one of the countries bordering Renton to the north was part of the Five Elements Alliance and Tribole the other country bordering Renton was at war with Lugh as well as the rest of the Alliance.

According to the books, the Five Elements Alliance was established solely to defend against Tribole, and if it weren’t for the threat Tribole posed the Alliance would have long since splintered and each Kingdom would be at each other's throats.

Hiro asked, “Does Tribole conquer the Alliance?”

Karen shook her head, “No, the Alliance was destroyed due to internal issues, and Tribole at the time was too focused on its own issues to really take advantage of the scenario. The real problem comes after the alliance disbands…”

“What happened.”

Karen raised her head, “Hiro do you know why the Five Element Alliance is called the five element alliance or why they’re strong enough to contend with Tribole despite being maybe only a third it’s size?”

Hiro shook his head, and Karen continued, “It’s because the Alliance itself is a giant weapon. Lugh of Earth, Raizel of Lightning, Syl of Wind, Ifring of Fire, and Wales of Water, each country represents a certain element that their country is blessed with, but don’t you think it’s abnormal for five countries of such varying elements and climates to all be clustered together?”

Hiro’s eyes widened, “Don’t tell me they…”

Karen nodded her heads, “It’s probably close to what you think. Centuries ago these five Kingdoms gathered all their mages and forcibly changed the nature of their dragon veins.”

“That’s suicidal!”

“But it worked, they built channels connecting all five kingdoms acting as artificial ley lines, they created cities and temples to act as nodes and serve as focal points to guide the mana, and then they carved engravings across their cities splitting the mana into five parts in order to divide it across the five kingdoms. In a sense, the Five Elements Alliance is essentially a giant magic circle.”

“That’s insane…”

Karen nodded her head, “The range is quite limited, but at any given moment the Five Elements Alliance can cast a spell utilizing the mana of five dragon veins to cast a forbidden spell whose scale rivals a nuke or perhaps even surpasses it.”

“A nuke?”

“Ah my bad, that’s a bad analogy. To put it simply they could level mountains and destroy cities in an instant. No, given the scale of the spell it would likely even surpass that.”

“I see…”, Hiro thought about how frightening that would be, this meant as long as the five Kingdoms agreed upon it they could install call upon a level of strength previously only those absurd monsters and individuals could exhibit.

Hiro mumbled, “I wonder if I could apply this to the Holy Empire…”

If the Holy Empire could establish something like the Five Elements Alliance or even create two of such weapons the even without the Hero they could fend off the Demon King. But the Hiro suddenly realized something, “Wait then why are the Five Element Alliance at a standstill, even with the limited range of the forbidden spell there should naturally exist other benefits to controlling five dragon veins. Plus with such a powerful trump card, why are they still at war…”

The suddenly Hiro’s eyes widened, “No way, they really are insane.”

Karen nodded, “The Five Element Alliances trump card costs a steep price, after all, they weaponized dragon veins. Even a single use can cause an extreme shortage of mana for a decade within the alliance.”

“...”

“And here lies the problem, when the Five Elements Alliance turn against each other in the future this weapon of mass destruction will be fired. Perhaps this would have been alright in any other scenario, but the spell target the Alliance.”

“Was the alliance reduced to dust?”

Karen shook her head, “No, the Alliance’s forbidden spell is called Elemental Destroyer, it focuses a large quantity of mana into five points and shoots it out. As all five masses collide, they violent explode destroying everything. And in order to stop this the alliance altered the spell, instead of focusing the mana into a single point, all the mana gathered in the five dragon veins gushed outward.”

Then Karen gripped her cup of tea, “As a result not only did the five main dragon veins erupt releasing all the mana they built up but every other dragon vein within the alliance. Mana levels reached toxic levels, beasts experienced mutations, and the alliance became a desolate land.”

“So did a war break out?”

Karen nodded her head, “A war for survival. The alliance couldn’t trust each other anymore, Wales took to the ocean, Raizel charged northward into the adjacent kingdoms, Syl flew to the sky in their artificial floating islands, and Lugh sought refuge with their closest neighbors Renton. However the effects of the elemental tide were far-reaching, the beasts in the frontier grew active, new and more powerful monsters rose up, and finally Tribole with the alliance having vanished marched southward.”

Hiro looked down at his cup of tea which had gone cold by now and asked, “What happened to Renton? Also, what does any of this have to do with me?”

Karen looked up, “During the War Renton exhibit incredible martial prowess as they fought on two fronts. The Royal Family lead their armies to northward stopping Tribole’s armies, as for Quinn he along with a small army held off the countless beasts and monsters heading towards what remained of the Alliance. And the thing is…”

Karen stood up and slammed her hands on the table, “How is he going to do that when your presence caused Renton’s most powerful mage to remain a novice!”

Hiro sipped his cup of tea, “I fail to see how that’s my fault.”