“!!!” The people of Rul almost all stood up with their faces red from anger. They glared at the other side with growing aggression.

It has to be said that the Families that existed in this world almost always retained their own bloodline, hence the name Family, but it isn’t done through inbreeding. When a Family first starts, they spread out to marry and have kids with others, bring them into the Family, increase the number of members, and increase their holdings. Once it reached a certain point, they would then stay within their holdings, allowing outsiders to enter, but not one of their Family members could leave. Over a lengthy period of time, this caused certain traits to appear and spread within the Family that became its own kind of flag or representation. Those who exhibited such traits with the appropriate talent would land in leader positions.

In the Family itself, there were universal rules that stated that actual inbreeding was not acceptable, as the consequences of such actions would lead to immediate repercussions in the next generation. However, the term ‘inbreeding’ was still used loosely to signify the fact of the dominate traits appearing that would be recessive in the general populace. The Countries and occasionally, Organizations, would use it as a derogatory term which the different Families eventually started treating as a grave offense.

“Milthan! If you start another pointless argument, then your position here will be dissolved!” Astar warned the congressman with internal energy appearing in his eyes.

The man shivered as he sat down, not speaking another word. The Rul Family, upon seeing this, had their anger dissolved by a large degree, but the residual resentment made the outcome of the meeting even less likely to be productive.

“Those soldiers used to live in your lands, so they might have had the impulse to intrude for nostalgia. We’re still working through our own systems…” Usually in these meetings, the vice-president would act as the mediator, directing the flow of the conversation, but not actually joining. The intrusion of Milthan obstructed and reduced the confidence in a civil conversation regarding the topic, so Astar took charge of that part for the moment. The Rul family calmed and sat back down.

The three groups then went onto several topics over similar issues, with the Erkshem Country being the quietest, and Confines elected officials being the loudest. Tus considered to be boring and ‘going nowhere’. He then had a strange feeling when the discussions suddenly halted. He looked around wondering why everyone was silent when he saw them gazing in a direction when, in that direction, the doors were pushed opened.

The one who opened the door was a man who appeared to be in their thirties followed by another man who appeared to be in their early forties. They didn’t appear to be like the Ruls’ with their physical traits, or the Confines’ and Erkshems’ with their gold-silver and black attires, respectively. Both of them were completely different, from the way they dressed, their apparent attitudes, and their vastly different body builds.

The last one to enter was an older looking male who was chubby, wearing a gown reminiscent of metal with no other forms of personalization, besides the lack of clothing that didn’t cover the arms or anywhere beneath the shin. He appeared to be mentally abrasive and looked upon everyone in the room with a high and mighty arrogance with his chin raised. His footsteps made the floor tremble with an exaggerated weight as well as causing the fat on his body to move like gelatin.

The younger looking man could be defined as skinny and bad health with his sunken eyes and his cheekbones that almost seemed like they wanted rip through the skin like two blades. The rest of his body was covered in what looked like a blue blanket which was dragged along the floor.

Tus watched them enter, feeling apprehensive, ‘Do these two actually exist? Why are they so… mismatched? And where is this foreboding feeling coming from?’

The skinny man walked forward, just beyond the door, and spoke in a high pitched voice that could shatter rock, “I’m Velfor and this is my excellent colleague Drel. It is good that all of you are here in one place as we from the alliance need to make an announcement.”

The fat man, Drel, also walked forward, and the doors behind him shut with a bang. Still keeping his arrogant posture, he talked as if he was the avatar of an earthquake that had a hint of joyful expectation, “Within this city, there is suspected to be a denizen of Oblivion that is not a monster, but perhaps a demon or a devil. None of you may know this, but demons and devils can take the forms of anything, including us, making them awfully hard to track. The most characteristic aspect is that demons want destruction while devils want to conspire. If we don’t find it in this city, then all of you should prepare for your deaths as we can’t allow any form of corruption to sprout.”

Those of the alliance, including Erkshem and Rul, are a number of forces that exceed 100. It expands all across the continent hoping to prevent catastrophes like those in the past. When dealing with situations where the risk of another continent wide threat appears, the alliance would decide immediately who to send. They chose to send these two, who were not originally from the area so they could be detached, and had them come here to ‘scout’ out the threat. If they did find it, and couldn’t deal with it, then the consequences for the area would be awful to unimaginable proportions as the alliance would take drastic action to wipe it clean, to ensure it doesn’t escape and become something else. The same process would occur if the threat couldn’t be found, then it would be better to cleanse the area, then leave roots unturned. They thought as long as they could get to the threat before it establishes itself, nullify it, then the sacrifice would be worth it.

At least those of the higher standings knew this policy and if they had known in advance that the alliance would come, then most of these people wouldn’t be here right now. The alliance didn’t care about two measly forces and another force that wasn’t part of it, as they weren’t even the secondary dominant forces. The loss of such would prove to be inconsequential to the greater picture.

The room was deathly silent with fear bursting within every person. It made their minds stand still and their hearts stop for a beat. The power of those nurtured within the alliance, those who weren’t tied to any of the forces, were individuals strong enough to take on any of the countries single handedly. Even if their fear turned into ferocious anger, they would immediately die without leaving anything behind.

“None of you have to worry too much. The thing could be weak as an ant for all we know and we might be able to find it and kill it. If we do kill it, then your city will be exempted from the annihilation status. You can go about your business as per usual now, but not any of you are allowed to leave the city or else we will kill you. If we don’t find anything for a few days, then we’ll check amongst you. We know you all have your pride and such, so we won’t spoil anything. Have a good day.” Velfor reassured everyone before he and Drel left, each one of their steps shattering everyone’s’ mind to pieces, making them not return to their senses for a while.