After the conference, Vaazha and Mariss led me through The Bastion into a room filled with what I could only presume were magic circles.

The yellow-robed guard at the entrance checked all of our badges with the Badgenment spell and let us in.

The room itself was large enough to be a house all on its own, and in the center was a pillar of concrete. Scattered through the room were dozens of magical circles. The ground was littered with dust and rocks that simply hadn’t been swept in the past few weeks.

“What is this place?” I asked. “And how do you have so many giant rooms carved into stone like its nothing?”

“Oh, it doesn’t take much,” Vaazha said. “Some signature magics let the user mold or even annihilate stone, and even if they weren’t available, spells like Mold Earth, Avalanche, Carve, or Liquefy makes the process easy for anyone with lots of elementia potential.” He scratched his chin. “Unfortunately, being able to make rooms so quickly has made a lot of architects hasty, so quite a few rooms need to undergo trial and error.”

“That doesn’t sound too safe,” I said. Nor did the rooms look good. Most rooms in the bastion I’d seen, save my room, went without any interior design, like unfinished products.

“No, it isn’t.”

I walked atop one of the circles. “And what is this place?”

“The teleportation room.” He began walking to the other side of the pillar. “Traveling across the surface is quite dangerous, so to go from city to city, we try to use teleportation.”

I mean, if they had access to teleportation, it’d be ridiculous if they didn’t use it.

“They don’t just lead to other cities and villages, but our secure facilities, too,” Mariss said.

“Right...isn’t that, like, a security problem?” I asked.

“How so?” Vaazha asked.

“Well, what if The Bastion were infiltrated? Or any of the places they lead to? Couldn’t the monsters just teleport in or out through the circles?”

“These circles can only be used by a select few casters. I doubt they could be used against us in any way.” [Not unless they already knew how to.]

Zerith probably knew what he was doing with the security, so I didn’t press the topic.

“We will be teleporting in just a moment,” Vaazha said. He picked up a metal disc of sorts from the magic circle he had walked to, which looked almost like the cap to a bottle of pepper or spice, then placed it on another circle and began to shift the triangular opening between the 7 runes inscribed in the circle. [Red, green, yellow, red, yellow, red.] After he moved it to the right runes, he said, “Transport: Ace.” The circle began to glow from below the disc. “Alright, I’ve activated the circle,” he said. “Step in.”

I did so but asked, “Just how, exactly, do the circles work?”

“That’s a secret,” he said. “You can’t open them unless you know how to.”

So...it was a color-coded password.

Once I stepped on with Mariss, he said, “Transport: Base.”

My vision was briefly enveloped in a violet light.

I appeared in a much smaller room. It looked of a better make than the last one, and draped in the proceeding hallway were red flags and banners.

I clapped a little at the small performance, causing confetti to shower on us three representatives, accompanied by popping sounds.

Mariss looked at me with fallen confetti stuck in her hair, annoyed. “Just...why?”

“What, I thought the teleportation was cool!” I said.

“Suure...anyway, I’ll show you two the artillery, and you can tell me if you can move them.”

She led us through the hall and into a larger room that looked to be a reception area. A blue-robed guard who had been speaking to a violet-robed guy checked our badges briefly, then let us pass into a set of double doors.

Outside the doors was what seemed to be a desert, and not far away were a few buildings, mostly small dorms connected by stone pathways. Outside of them were massive cauldrons of water next to a few stone benches, where a few workers were soliciting on, under the cauldrons’ shade. Standing on scaffolding above one, a worker cast Aqua Create, causing water to sploosh into it.

What stood in the middle of the buildings were three massive steel cannons that dwarfed the nearby buildings. They pointed up at a 45-degree angle, and the vintage, black steel color really caught my eye.

“Holy mackerel!” I yelled. “The size of those things! Can I fly up there?”

Mariss nodded. “Indeed, they are incredibly large. It took quite a bit of preparation for each of us to engineer them then link all the parts and set them up, but they are quite portable. Oh, and as for your question...you should conserve your mana for when the king’s forces attack.”

“I don’t use mana,” I said. I tapped my head, smiling. “I use my brain power.”

She shrugged. “Then fly all you want with that brain of yours.” [I suppose it will help me understand-]

I immediately blasted to the top of a cannon and looked inside. The barrel was fairly narrow, and otherwise, nothing too interesting. I couldn’t tell if anything was tucked inside, either, since the moonlight wasn’t bright enough for me to see.

I flew to its base, startling some girl who was busy affixing a floating steel bar to a mechanism near the base, then quickly found the important external components. I couldn’t easily figure out how it all worked, so the two representatives made it to me while I looked at everything.

“You sure don’t hold back,” Mariss said.

“Ahh, sorry,” I said instinctively.

“No need to worry,” she insisted. She motioned her head to one of the mechanisms. “And since you seem to be interested, I could give you two an overview of how these work?”

“Please do!” I said, “They look super cool.”

She pointed to a few of the mechanisms and tanks nearby. “Over there is where we refine the materials needed to make the artillery function. We combine a substance we call Code: Blue with gunpowder, then light them up inside of a pressurized chamber. Then, what comes out is what we refer to as Code: Red.” [to simplify it all. No need to tell them everything.]

“Huh...” I squinted at the machine. It was actually a fairly primitive mechanism, just a steel chamber with a few valves.

“Also, up there...” She pointed to some scaffolding near the base of the cannon. “...we load the Code: Red into the explosive shell, then we use a much smaller amount of Code: Red to launch it. Since the pressure is so high, and the cannons need to be precise, we, of course, made the barrels very long and narrow.”

“Cool...so do they make an explosion or something?” I asked.

“No, not quite. What is important is the Magic Stems.”

She led us to a shed, which she opened to reveal sticks that resembled guns. There was a trigger and a handle and what appeared to be a barrel, but otherwise, the sticks were carved from wood and nothing more.

Mariss picked up one of the ‘stems’ and then threw it into my hands. “How good is your magic?” she asked.

“Basically nonexistent,” I responded sheepishly. “It’s a long story.”

“Good! It means you’re the perfect example to show how well the technology has proceeded. Go ahead and point that at a rock or something. Not a person, obviously.”

I looked down the ‘sights’ and then shot it at a rock. When I pulled the trigger, I heard, “Heat Jet”, then a plume of flame erupted from the ‘barrel’, wreathing it with fire for a few seconds before stopping. Once the spell finished, I blinked a few times, taken aback.

“And that is a Civilian Cast Stem,” Mariss said. “It can cast lesser spells with the help of a material from another universe simply known as arcanite. Arcanite is a leftover of a fallen past, where the monsters once abused it to wreak havoc on the world, but the gods sealed away a lot of its power. Anway, Code: Red amplifies cast stems, which is why we use them in the cannon shells.”

“‘fallen past’? Destroy the world? You’re confusing me...” I said, a hand on my forehead, hoping she’d elaborate. There was a lot I didn’t understand, to say the least.

Mariss tapped her chin thoughtfully. “I guess your dimension doesn’t need to deal with monsters?”

I nodded. “No, not really.”

“Right...well, when it comes to our world, with the monsters, something is bound to go awry eventually. None of us really know what the monsters want, aside from genocide, but we do know what they’ve historically done time and time again. They are creatures of chaos and fight to eliminate humanity. Usually, that means that they will abuse anything they can get their hands on to exploit natural law and gain an advantage in warfare.”

“R-right...”

“So...when I say ‘fallen past’ I’m referring to the other times humanity died to the monsters. In this case, due to arcanite, which they probably brought from another world.”

She said all of this casually, as though it were common knowledge...and I had to ask, “How many times has this happened?”

“I dunno, maybe a couple hundred? Thousands? Not much more than that? Humanity’s lived pretty long, all things considered. What, we’re at year one-o’-eight, so...we lived twice as long as normal?”

I knew that the universe has been destroyed at least a few times, but...the implications of...of a world being destroyed over and over again... “I...” I began, feeling at a loss of words. I didn’t quite know what to think about it.

“And there you have it,” Mariss said as if it meant nothing to her. “Anyway, Arcanite could be revolutionary if we had the time to build technology with it. Taali’s consistently researched it, so I can only hope in her.” [but who knows if we will even make it till’ next year. All we can do is record the info for the next world.] She began walking away, not noticing my concern.

Reluctantly, I followed her to our next destination.

That destination, apparently, was the worker I had startled earlier. Mariss put her hands on her shoulder and pointed her towards me. “This is Stacey. Say hello to Psychi. She’s the new Representative of Green or something like that.” She pronounced the name weirdly, like stay-say.

Stacey waved at me shyly. “Hi?” she croaked out. [I forgot that was a position. And why isn’t she in green, then?]

“Good.” Mariss clapped the girl’s back playfully. “Why don’t you get yourself a drink from the cauldrons, Stacey?”

The girl nodded and scampered off, the steel bar she was affixing to the machinery remaining midair.

“Stacey is important to the artillery operations, as one of these three cannons are somewhat experimental. With a mix of her ability and Jozzah’s, they can reinforce a barrel to be strong enough to withstand intense pressures.” [Unfortunately, we’re making no progress on finding a wind-resistance magic.] “I’m trying to make the best use of signature magics, but even though the Research Company looks into thousands of abilities, it can be difficult to find anything helpful.”

“Then what abilities do those two have?” I asked.

“Stacey can affix objects to place, which also happens to make them resistant to breaking. Jozzah’s ability is object reinforcement, and it essentially does the same thing, making them stronger. Combined, they keep the thin barrel from exploding by pressure.” Mariss pointed to the barrel she had been referring to, the only of the three cannons that was significantly different in structure -much thinner. “Anyway, with all of that mostly unneeded information in tow, can you two still transport these cannons into the living continent?”

“Living continent?” I asked. “Is this place the...dead continent?”

She swayed her head back and forth uncertainly. “The Southern Continent, more specifically. The only Central Continent isn’t dead.”

“You said they were portable, right?” Jaazha asked before I could question why a whole continent was dead. “How so?”

“We can disassemble them into parts for teleportation, buut, of course, the barrels are the heavy part. It’s up to you two to figure out how you’ll move those.”

He nodded. “That is good. They would be even more difficult to move if you hadn’t designed them with that in mind, so I applaud the foresight. But I also must ask: just how far are we talking? To move these, I need to know exactly where I’m going. If you set all of this up on the other side of the world...” Vaazha motioned to the barrel. “Well, I can’t teleport that.”

“We are roughly a half-thousand kilometers from the Central Continent...” Mariss said, trailing off.

I raised my hand.

“What?”

“How big is the continent, in total?”

“Three-thousand kilometers, roughly?”

“Oh, that’s pretty small.”

“Really, now?” Mariss said with a challenging tone. “Are you implying my cylindrical war buddies are so light you can move them across the continent easily?”

I nodded. “I think so. Do you know how heavy the cannons are?”

Mariss looked to Vaazha.

“Yes, yes, I’ll measure it...” he said, moving to the base of the cannon. After a moment, a menu similar to my percentile-measuring menu popped up in front of him. He walked back to me. “In total, it weighs about five-hundred thousand kilograms. A little more.”

“I can...” I began before reassessing my next words. “Well, I can comfortably hold over a million...though if I do much more than that, I’m not super fast.”

“A million?” Vaazha asked. “How quickly?”

“Uhh...I don’t really know...” I said, trying to recall a time I had stressed my powers so much. “It’s got less to do with speed and more to do with how long I can actually hold it, but if I had to give a number...”

Calculation time!...Yay.

Well, I had once held off an avalanche to save a few people who’d been stranded on a mountain, and the avalanche was moving at about a hundred kilometers an hour...it took about half a second for me to stop everything I could, which made the acceleration coefficient of my maximum capacity about 200 kilometers an hour per second, meaning that...

“Are you alr-” Vaazha began.

“Trying to think, man...” I grumbled.

Ahem* that considering the cannons’ narrow frame and applying my acceleration, the terminal velocity of my telekinesis would have to be...

“I’d say roughly 150 meters a second,” I said. “A little less.”

Mariss whispered, [How fast is that, again?] to a stunned Vaazha.

[About a kilometer every ten seconds, or half a thousand each hour,] he responded. He looked to me. “So...you can move it...really quickly, huh?”

“Yeah,” I said.

“Mind demonstrating?”

“On the cannon? Can I move it, or is that not safe?”

Mariss shook her head. “Oh...no! My cannons need to be treated delicately! They haven’t been disassembled yet.”

“Then something...else.” I looked about the place, trying to find something to move. Dorms...uhh...not much else. “What should I demonstrate with?”

Mariss pointed to a large wooden crane that I had mistaken for a building earlier. “You could try moving that if you’re confident in how gentle you can be. It weighs a lot less than the cannons, too.”

I flew to the crane. It looked a bit different than modern ones, but now that I had a good look, the pulley system was familiar. After using Recognition to ensure nobody was near it, I pulled the crane off the ground, then slowly flew it to the two representatives. “Is this ok?” I asked.

“Yes, I think so,” Mariss said, looking up at it with a mix of intrigue and surprise. “But we’re low on time, so make it good and quick.”

I smirked. “Oh, I can do it quickly. This hardly weighs a thing.”

“Then, please, prove it.”

As quickly as I could, I flew over the buildings, dragging the crane with me, then focused on it. I got a grip on the mass distribution of it all, ensuring my telekinesis was precise and efficient, then ripped it through the air, accelerating it to its terminal velocity in a matter of seconds. I followed it for a good few kilometers.

Looking over the land, it really was devoid of life. Nothing lived here at all, and only matted dirt and sand spread across the barren place.

Once I was satisfied, I turned back, sending the crane flying with me.

I slowed as I reached the grounds once more and gently set the crane down. In total, I had traveled for a little more than a minute.

“Is that fast enough?” I asked, taking a few deep breaths to clear my mind.

Mariss, wide-eyed, slowly nodded. “Y-yes, it most certainly is. You were many times faster than Greater Levitate.” [I’m absolutely envious of that. If her kinetic powers are as wide-reaching as they appear...]

“I’ll admit you’ve surprised me,” Vaazha said. “How long can you keep that up, though?”

I shrugged. “With just one cannon? I guess...at half that speed for quite a while before I need a break. I don’t know my limitations that well, though...and two really is stretching it.”

“You know...” Mariss began before pausing sadly, pursing her lips. “If you aren’t good to fight on the frontline, you can always join the construction corps.”

Her thought process made sense, but...

Vaazha was scratching his chin, his thought process paralleling Mariss’s. “Same here. If you could focus on helping us transport or build, that sort of power would do more than ‘come in handy’.”

“Uhh...” I held my arm. “I don’t really...I need to fight him.”

“The Monster King, you mean?” Mariss asked.

I nodded. “He’s from my world and...I wasn’t there to fight him when he...” I sighed. “When he went on a rampage.”

“But-” Mariss began, leaning towards me...

Vaazha placed a hand on her shoulder, jerking her back. “We each have our duties. Still, is it safe to assume we can secure your help in the future when you aren’t needed elsewhere?”

I slowly nodded. “Unless circumstances change.”