Adamant Blood 435

Mark sat down in a plush VIP observation room alongside Isoko and others.

A massive picture window afforded them the view of everything, while screens to the sides would capture closer-imagery for those who needed that sort of thing. Most everyone from the settlent was either sitting down and waiting, or standing up in the back, near the standing tables, talking to so of the others. Tulo Khava was not here. He was a few boxes over with the other people from The People. The Grand Mage Rekaro Solari was sowhere, though Mark didn’t know where. A casual glance around the space confird that Tartu’s entire team was elsewhere, as well.

“Lenny and Shawn aren’t here, either?” Mark asked anyone who could answer.

He had known that Tartu wasn’t going to show, and that’s probably where his father was, too, but Mark had been pretty sure that Lenny and Shawn didn’t want to get near this specific problem of Tartu’s.

Addavein looked around, interrupting his conversation with Rylan Drakemore and Andria. “They aren’t? Where did they go?”

“They’re at so eting with Tartu about Okuana about the mana crystal vines,” Mark said, “Tartu said sothing about trying to keep them out of Okuana’s sights, too.”

Andria said, “Shawn got angry at Tartu for trying to shield him.”

“Ah, yeah,” Mark said, and then he grinned, thinking about Sally, Isoko, and Eliot. “I suppose so.”

Derek was eating a big bowl of fries, but another Derek stepped out from him and said, “Empress Cataclysm showed up to that eting.”

Everyone turned his way.

“Really?!” Mark asked, surprised.

Derek said, “Tartu and the guys and his dad were at that Okuana plant eting, but the Empress showed up about 10 minutes ago. She just left. Walaria swore to secrecy about the movent of royals during any such events, otherwise I would have told you as it was happening.”

“How did it go?” Isoko asked.

Derek waved an arm, kinda h’ing, saying, “She ca in, told Okuana to quit their shit, and then left. I’m still there with Tartu and his guys. The lawyers from Okuana are talking about farming rights and profit giving, now. He’s not going to make it to the exhibition match, and he says not to wait for him.”

Looking at the crowds on the bleachers below, Mark was pretty sure that ‘waiting for Tartu’ was sothing that was not feasibly possible, but Mark didn’t say that. Mark had other concerns about what he had just heard.

Andria scoffed, and with vitriol in her voice, said, “I toldhim he shouldn’t have gone.”

“ ‘Profit giving’?” Mark asked.

Andria said, “It’s where Tartu makes money and he gives most of it to Okuana to prevent legal action.”

Mark muttered, “Gods.”

Tartu had even asked Mark to help him with his vine legality problem, but today Tartu had told him not to, because if Mark got involved then Mark would have got to slicing. Probably. Mark truly had no idea how he would have reacted if a delegation from Okuana started making demands of him, in any real way, which is probably why they hadn’t actually gone after him at all. Dominant had even proclaid that public letter of thanks for Mark’s ‘donation’ of adamantium.

That’s probably why Tartu had decided to go it alone, with his own team.

That wasn’t going to work anymore.

Mark stood up, saying, “I should go.”

Isoko grunted with disappointnt, but she stood. Sally humd and stood. Eliot sighed and got up, too.

But Derek shrugged, saying, “Tartu still doesn’t want you there, and Empress Cataclysm was there, too, and…” Derek paused. “Now that I’m thinking about it, I think he knewshe was going to show up, which is probably why he didn’t want you there at all.”

Mark paused. “… Does he stillnot want there?”

Derek looked away.

Mark waited, and as he waited, he looked beyond the glass of the viewing room.

Walaria was not here, but she was putting on a Swords of Empire display for him, and also for anyone else who wanted to see, and since Swords of Empire tended to have kaiju-sized effects, the arena today was a special one. There was only one set of bleachers, located down below the VIP rooms, and the VIP rooms were all large things suitable for parties of 20 to 40 people, with open bars and food served to all guests.

A vast, open plain stretched out beyond this single, kiloter-wide set of ‘bleachers’, which was really an entire complex of rooms of all sorts, kitchens, anities, and a whole lot of space for a whole lot of people.

The open space was an old dragon stomping ground, about 20 kiloters from Domal’Takela. The jumbled stones of the Capital of Aluatha were not visible on the horizon, but only because they were covered by the glass pyramid, with a giant floating death crystal above that pyramid.

All of the land between here and there was a tumble of rock and stone and grasses and brush. It was a shrubland stage, suitable for people with big Powers and big presentations.

A screen held to the side of the VIP room, indicating that the first of four matches was about 10 minutes from start. Mark really did want to see it all, too. Walaria and Mark both originally hoped that he could so day make Swords of Empire, but recently Mark had kinda fallen out of love with that idea. The problems facing him were bigger than any sword could handle.

Walaria was determined to prove Mark wrong—

“Tartu does not want you there,” Derek said, and then that Derek vanished and the Derek eating fries and sitting in the viewing seats said, “And Blazing Heaven and Sundering Faith are here today. These are swords that everyone should see at least once.”

“Yes! Let’s stay,” Isoko said.

Mark did want to see the swords… Ugh. He sat down, and told Derek, “Please tell Tartu that if he needs help that I will be there.”

“He knows,” Derek said, and then another one of him ca by with more fries, and the Derek sitting down vanished and the other Derek sat down, continuing to eat on so fries. “Tartu says, and I quote: ‘When I need to kill these people then I will call you, but until then it’s utterly insulting that you think you need to be here, Mark.’ But between you and , he said that in frontof the delegation, so it was probably a negotiation tactic… and the lawyers from Okuana seem to be reevaluating a few things, so the tactic worked.”

Derek went back to eating his fries.

Isoko told Mark, “You make less of an impression if you’re there, anyway. Better to let them think you’re a killer.”

Sally snorted.

Mark could not disagree, so he sort of stared into the middle distance, his sight curving to the side, out the window and down to the stone bleachers below, as he tried to understand what he would do if Tartu did actually call him over to kill so people. Would he go? Tartu would never ask for such a thing without aning it, so Mark would probably go—

Isoko asked Derek, “You know? I don’t think I've ever seen you eat anything.”

“I eat all the ti!” Derek said, “But only when it’s good, and these fries are amazing.”

Sally said, “Did you try the little sausages?”

“All of the food is great,” Mark said, sitting back down, stabbing a little sausage with a fork and then eating it.

The clock showed 4 minutes to showti, but then air crackled with speakers turning on anyway, the ti screen paused, and Amy of the Witches on the Wall spoke over the air, “Welco to the arena of Domal’Takela! As everyone is here, we’re going to start slightly early.”

Mark huh’d, as he felt Amy upstairs, at the announcer’s box, alongside another two people who had to be Pearl and Uva. Mark hadn’t realized that the Witches of Domal’Takela would be announcing this event, and he hadn’t even noticed their vectors as vectors that he should notice. Usually Mark kept track of people who he knew about. But, Mark supposed, he had only known the three witches for a few days now, and there were about 550 people in the kiloter-sized arena complex, with an easy 65% of them being staff.

There was a lotof staff here for the Winter Ball. About 2 people for every 1 noble, according to so statistics on so paperwork delivered this morning.

So far, no one around Mark felt vengeful or angry or directed at him in a dangerous way, at all, but then again the best assassins were the ones you didn’t see coming. Mark kept his eyes and vector open, anyway.

Amy said, “We have three exhibition matches for your pleasure and recognition. All 6 participants are ranked as Imperial Kaiju Squad, and all 6 are from different parts of the Empire. What is truly on display today are their weapons, all of them unique, all of them Swords of Empire, though only 4 of the weapons are swords. One is a dagger, and another is a staff.

“I will be calling the exhibitors by their weapon nas.

“We start off today with the holders of Lancing Needle and Flowering Wail, and a competition for mini-kaiju kills.”

A light shot out overhead, visible even in the dayti, to strike the brushlands far ahead. The beam flickered on and off as it moved, striking 11 other locations in the distance. The light was just for show, to let people know where to look out there, because out there in the field so people were summoning stone mini-kaiju.

From what Quark could zoom in on, it appeared like so people were flying on a disk, fast across the land, and a trio of mages were releasing spell after spell at about where the line of light had lingered. Those spells sunk into the ground, raising the mini-kaiju.

Stone beings 50 ters tall began unfurling from the ground, each of them Calling out for vengeance.

“Oh,” Mark found himself saying, as his heart beat hard, “They’re using real monsters, huh.”

“Elentals,” Addavein said, standing at the table behind the seating, behind Mark. “Summoned, and short-lived. Lethargic things, really. When the dragons did this they summoned real kaiju-sized elentals. All of this used to be their training yard for younglings…” Addavein humd, then added, “Part of it, anyway. A small part.”

One woman floated out from sowhere down below the bleacher area wearing a solid neon-green webweave and a full helt of the sa color. She held a thin, long sword in her right hand and emotions heavy in her vector. Mark recognized her particular ss of emotions as the tumble before violence and a subtle worry about failing to impress. She was particularly worried about the VIP areas, her vector of attention swinging this way, scattering across the VIP boxes, even as she flew out toward the stone elentals. She couldn’t focus on any of the VIP areas in particular because she didn’t know where she needed to look, and that was both annoying and a blessing for her.

Mark assud that she was looking for… well. Maybe him? Or maybe Mark was being narcissistic and the woman was looking for soone else.

Whatever her Powers were, Mark wasn’t sure. Her vector seed to be self-contained. So a brawny with a flight Power? …But? No. The thin sword in her hand seed to have a vector, too. So, yeah. She was carrying a Sword of Empire. The sword could be letting her fly.

Mark hadn’t realized that the Swords had vectors, but… No.

Mark asked, “It’s not a living weapon, is it? I thought those were illegal as fuck?”

Andria was almost breathless as she answered, “They’re not alive; no. They’re a secondary existence of the user. Like having an additional Binding.”

“More like having a spell that will never betray you,” Rylan said. “It slots into your own Binding and joins with you giving you a permanent spell, among other things. A higher Power Level is chief among those other things.”

Amy was announcing, “Lancing Needle is one of our oldest Swords of Empire, and one of our most reliable. The wielder has changed many tis over the centuries, and currently it is held by a person who is similar to all other wielders, but who brings fresh honor to Aluatha with her Skills of Quick Body and Natural Flight.”

The wielder floated about 500 ters out from the main stage, and she waited there, nerves settling. Mark thought that she was maybe 25, maybe 20, but it was hard to tell with the webweave and helt in the way.

Another woman with settled emotions and in bright pink webweave and a helt flew out of sowhere further down the way, taking to the sky on a web of light that she stretched out from all of her body. Her Power was instantly recognizable. That was Light Shaper, for sure, and this woman was older, maybe in her 60s, based on her vector.

Mark asked, “Why the full coverage webweave? Surely everyone knows who the weapon holders really are.”

“Yes, but they still don’t want people to have an easy ti figuring out where the swords are kept in downti,” Addavein supplied.

Lancing Needle’s vector locked on Flowering Wail, and Mark stopped thinking that the woman had been looking for him. She had been looking for the wielder of Flowering Wail, and now that Flowering Wail was here, Lancing Needle was secured.

The woman holding Flowering Wail lazily swooped into the sky like she was the only solid part of a moving lightning bolt, settling into the air about 200 ters away from Lancing Needle. She regarded Lancing Needle with a bit of hope in her heart, and so motherly-adjacent type of love.

Amy was announcing, “Flowering Wail was born 83 years ago, as one of the last Swords of Empire forged before the Reveal tore Aluatha apart. This particular Sword of Empire has only been held by three people over the years. Each person has had Light Shaper as their primary Skill.”

Mark rapidly made so probably-correct assumptions, saying, “They’re family, and the person who wields Lancing Needle dies a lot? And the sword needs to be handed over to soone else?”

Addavein said, “Lancing Needle burns out the user, but it usually doesn’t kill them, so it changes hands a lot. It used to be a well-made Sword of Empire, but it broke about 200 years back, and now you can only wield it for about 2 years before it breaks your Binding and you need serious healing.”

Mark asked, “It burns the wielder out because of Secondary Binding friction on the soul?”

“Yes,” Addavein said, smirking a little bit in the corners of Mark’s eyes. “But it’s worth it for many people. I know the wielder, and she only has a 10x Speed modifier. Watch what she can do with a Sword of Empire.”

Mark kept his vision on the field ahead—

“Start,” Amy announced, alongside of a loud buzzer—

Lancing Needle shot forward, so much faster than 10x Speed. Mark’s breath stopped as he guessed her top speed at sothing like 25x; that was True Speedster levels—

Lancing Needle shot right through one of the 50-ter-tall elentals before Mark had even ford his first coherent thought about what he was seeing. In and out! Like a needle, straight through the core of the elental. But it was a bad hit. Stone sprayed out of the backside of the hole she had made, and the elental sagged, but the elental ripped at the air, slamming stone back into its body, Calling out a roar of hate at the thing that had hit it.

The elental remained, stone flying through the air, refilling the hole that Lancing Needle had carved.

Lancing Needle went through the elental again, and then a third ti, each ti blasting away stone, moving faster than a blink. The third pass did it. The elental sagged and kept sagging, and then it fell to the ground, ‘mortally’ wounded. It was not dead at all. It would get back up eventually.

Lancing Needle had done enough with that one, for now. She moved on to the next one, because Flowering Wail was killing her target a lot better.

Flowering Wail’s sword was like a normal sword; a ter long, silver, and with a bit of a stylish flower motif all down the center of the blade. It was not used as a sword, though. Flowering Wail pointed her Sword of Empire at the elental and a cord of soft lightning arced from her body, from the light she had Shaped all around herself like a spiderweb, into the stone of the elental.

Nothing happened at first.

Flowering Wail played keep-away with her target as she kept her soft light connected to the stone elental, while the elental charged at the pink-wearing flier. Great stone arms swung like temple pillars and crashed against nothing, turning to dust and stone that swept back up into the elental. The elental kept the pressure on, trying to kill Flowering Wail again and again. Flowering Wail kept her tether of white light strong, and she stayed out of range.

Nothing continued to happen, but as the elental continued to swipe at her, as she continued to back away, as the light stayed strong, small bits of greenery spread on the surface of the elental. Slow, at first, and then rapidly growing much stronger, much faster.

Trees suddenly started spilling off of the surface of the elental, taking dirt with them, fully killing the elental like a mossy rainstorm would kill a sand castle. It was strangely beautiful, Mark thought. The elental practically lted into a massive pile of greenery and colorful flowers.

It took Flowering Wail 2 minutes to kill 1 elental.

Lancing Needle had already bored through 7 of them, though she hadn’t actually killed a single one.

Mark knew that Flowering Wail had it in the bag.

10 minutes later, Lancing Needle had taken out all 20 standing elentals, but each and every one of them were getting back up. Flowering Wail flew over to the one that was most-together and began channeling her soft light into that elental. Greenery spread much easier on the mostly-dead target, eventually putting it down for good.

All the while, Amy explained so of what was happening over the speakers, “The exact natures of the Swords of Empire are closely guarded secrets, but the general effects are known to all who study the kaiju battles in and around the territory of Aluatha.

“Lancing Needle empowers the Body of the user with a trajectory-based personal reality that cuts clean through anything the user targets. You can see this happening right now, as the current user zips straight through golem after golem. Adjusting flight paths while in the flow is not possible, but the user can control how long of a dash they do. When the targets are actual kaiju then those flight paths can get rather long.

“The exact history of Lancing Needle is lost to ti, for it is a very, very old Sword of Empire.

“Flowering Wail’s story is well-known.

“Flowering Wail was the last sword created by Gedahowla the Bright, the forr administrator of Aluatha, before we humans took our nation back from our draconic overlords. Flowering Wail was crafted as a specific counter against dryads and other strong plant-based monsters. It cos from a long line of similar swords, kept in reserve should old wars re-ignite. Flowering Wail remains in the public eye, though, because it is still quite effective against all targets, though against non-plants the ti-to-kill is rather extended. Against a dryad, Flowering Wail fully embodies its na.”

Mark was focused, saying, “Neat.”

“There are lots of those Flowering Wails?” Isoko asked.

Andria excitedly said, “Oh yes! It’s one of the few Swords of Empire that’s really known, since Gedahowla made so many of them. Kind of an open secret, though I had never heard it so openly statedbefore today.”

“No one has managed to make them quite like Gedahowla,” Addavein said.

“What’s the main issue with making more?” Mark asked.

Andria and Rylan were highly interested in the answer.

“A whole host of issues, and only so of which could be solved with money,” Addavein answered, tail wagging a little, as he looked at Andria and Rylan. “As I am sure you know, the largest problem with making Swords of Empire is one of power. A group of smiths, joined in strength through any number of thodologies, could theoreticallymake a Flowering Wail, but in practicality it has never been done. Gedahowla the Bright was among the strongest of the Light Dragons, as well, with a great deal of knowledge about that sort of thing, so her swords have yet to be matched.”

Rylan’s vector did a little tumble when hearing Addavein praise Gedahowla. He was a dragonist, of course, so that explained that.

Addavein added, “Most of the Swords of Empire were made by dragons, long ago, but there are a few that were made by human hand. I believe Sundering Faith was made by the Drakemore family 70 years ago, yes, Rylan?”

Mark perked up, seeing the Guildmaster of the Builder’s Guild at the settlent in a new light.

Rylan smiled faintly as he said, “Quite right, sir. Much of our House’s interests are in supplying infrastructure and materials for all aspects of fighting kaiju, but a few of us, like my late great grandfather, were smiths of such capability that they managed to create true works of art in mithril, adamantium, and orichalcum, of which Sundering Faith is all three.” Rylan told Mark, “And it did take a great working of many people to make that weapon. Burned out the forr Grand Forge at the house, too!”

Mark went, “Huh!” And then he asked, “I thought the kaiju squad’s stuff ca from the Artificer’s Guild? But the Builder’s Guild does it, too? Like… in a serious way, I an.”

Rylan bowed just a little to Mark, saying, “The delineation between mundane weaponry and enchanted weaponry is a large one, but there has always been a fair amount of overlap in our guilds. Much of our supplies go through the Artificer’s Guild first before reaching the Kaiju Squad of the settlent, so when I say the Builder’s Guild is a big supplier of the settlent, I an it in that way. Personally, though, we’re all colleagues when it cos to things like Swords of Empire; we’re all trying, and no one is succeeding.”

Mark felt like he had a lot of sudden questions to ask Rylan, as Andria looked on happily and Addavein’s tail wagged slightly, slowly. But now wasn’t the ti. Mark said, “I would love to talk later about how to use orichalcum in enchanting. I’ve been using a lot of it recently, but I have no idea what to do with it on an anvil, or what makes orichalcum different from other mana tals—” Mark didn’t want to look like an idiot, so he rapidly added, “I do know that it’s the faith-tal.”

Rylan said, “Orichalcum takes most readily to intent-based magic, filling in the gaps between desire and reality and making a desire into reality. Or at least that’s the ideal. In reality, it’s crumbly, weak, it turns molten long before you think it should turn molten and thus making a ss, or else it’s bouncy, and when you hit it the tal reforms back into the ingot it had been.

“Mithril is all about flow and grace.

“Adamantium is solid and unyielding.

“Orichalcum is sothing you can either work with, or you can’t. They call it the faith-tal because the gods of the Pantheon can help a crafter handle orichalcum in ways that a normal person cannot handle orichalcum.” Rylan finished with, “It has always been basically useless except as decoration —it is a rather beautiful gold/red, and it is still gold— unless you had solid divine backing guiding your hands.”

Addavein nodded.

Mark almost pursued that discussion further, but the next set of people were coming out, and Derek, Sally, and Addavein were having a weird reaction to whatever they were seeing out there, so Mark said to Rylan, “Thanks.”

“I’m always available for discussions, though I do know that Tulo wishes you would consult with him more. When you made that poison dagger we had a nice discussion about it afterward, and—”

“On our left,” Amy said, voice booming out across the arena, “We have the staff-shaped Sword of Empire known as Pillar Of God, and on the right, we have the dagger-shaped Sword of Empire, Thousand Cuts.”

Mark turned back toward the window to see a man in yellow holding a dagger and a man in red holding a black staff, and now that he was looking, now that Quark was looking, he realized what Addavein, Sally, and Derek were seeing. Recognizing.

Addavein curiously said, “I was hoping they would agree to bring that one out, and it looks like they did. Does that staff, Pillar of God, look like that staff that the elf Eria of the Central Spire was wielding in the elven lands? I suppose I am asking Quark, too, for specific dinsions, but can you dreamsight it as well, Mark?”

Mark was already ahead of him, eyes half-lidded, sight shifting into the dream. The world mushed like pastel smudges, but the staff in that guy’s hand, about 700 ters ahead, was a solidity in the world that held the world still. Everything flowed around that staff, and the staff was immovable.

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Mark ca back, saying, “Holy shit, it’s the sa… sa kindof staff? Quark?”

Quark spoke up, “It is the sa hexagonal pillar-shape as Eria’s staff, and it is of similar size. It could be the sa size. I am using caras for asurents, and according to my sights, it is at least 99% the sa.”

Addavein humd, thinking and not speaking because Amy was probably saying much of what Addavein would have been saying anyway, though Amy had started explaining the less-impressive weapon first.

Amy was announcing, “Thousand Cuts was retrieved from an ancient burial ground in the far, far south of Daihoon, back before the Reveal, when the interior of the Southern Continent was accessible, before it beca the Southern Crossing.”

Okay,Mark thought, Maybe Thousand Cuts was interesting, too.

Isoko asked, “There really were buildings inside the prismatic Crossing? Civilization?”

Addavein said, “Those places were death zones, and I’m glad the Crossings stripped them from Daihoon. If they’re actually gone then that will forever be a good thing.”

Amy continued, “We’ll summon two golems for this demonstration.”

Those people on the flying disk were out there again, joined in casting elental spells, reaching out to the magic they had already put out there and which had been put down.

Lines of light zapped out across the land, impacting dirt.

Stone elental mini-kaiju stretched up and out from the ground from where the light had indicated, like a bunch of stone had suddenly rembered that it was alive. The pair of elentals were larger than the previous golems, standing at a lithe 75 ters, each.

The guy holding Thousand Cuts flew toward his target first—

And then he started dragging the blade across the air, and Mark heard sothing crack, like an air pressure change popping his ears, but that hadn’t happened in a while, and whatever Thousand Cuts was doing was a lot deeper than a pressure shift. He cut the world with his blade, dragging tal through the fabric of reality, sending a well-known magic crackling hard, splashes of near-invisible crystalline force shattering all around.

That shape of spellform, that spreading clearness; that was Force Magic, for sure.

With one final swipe and shove, Thousand Cuts cut the world, and a shower of piercing force sprayed into and through his 75-ter-tall target. Stone cracked. Force crunched and expanded inside of the many holes it had drilled through the elental’s body—

Suddenly, the elental froze.

Force magic crawled up its body, through its stone. In a great flashing the elental turned completely to force; near-invisible, glass-like. And then the force began to fade, and the elental crashed into breaking mana that dispersed into the air like so much glitter and then nothing at all.

“Holy fuck,” Mark muttered.

“Holy shit,” Sally said.

“My Goddess,” Lola said, staring at what had once been a whole lot of enemy, and was now nothing at all.

Isoko said, “That’s fucking ridiculous.”

“Now imagine invading a dead city,” Addavein said, “And there are force monsters that do that to everyone.”

“Did youretrieve that dagger?” Mark found himself asking.

“Not alone, but by the end of it I wasn’t much better than… alone…” Addavein looked away. He humd. There was a lot more to that story, but his tail had stopped swaying.

Mark didn’t ask any followups, but he was really wondering about the ‘force poison’ that had just killed that elental. Force magic always vanished in that sa way, after all; when the force was done it just crackled and dissipated, because force was nothing at all when it stopped being forceful.

Amy was reporting, “The prowess of Thousand Cuts cannot be denied! And because it cleans up the corpse, our many kaiju cleaning teams both love and hate this particular Sword of Empire, but since Thousand Cuts is mostly used against kaiju with undesirable corpses the detractors of this Sword of Empire usually say nothing.”

The guy flying around with Thousand Cuts ca back, flying down and out of sight of the VIP box, and the guy holding the Pillar of God began to move.

Addavein said, “Inheritor Jamasani got and nad Pillar of God himself. He never told anyone where he got it, and he never let touch it at all. I tried to rip it apart twice before, but you’ll be able to guess how that worked out once you see it in action, and after the announcer talks about it. They always ntion— Ah! There. She ntioned it.”

Amy was saying, “Pillar of God is a very simple weapon, with only one requirent of its wielder; Adamantiumkinesis.”

A lot of people focused on Mark, either directly or out of the corners of their eyes. Others turned toward Addavein.

Mark was looking at the guy in red, holding the weapon as he flew forward—

It happened in a blink.

The guy lifted the pillar, and the pillar expanded to a kiloter-long and 40-ters-wide adamantine pillar, and then the wielder slamd it down onto the elental, flattening the elental completely.

“HA!” Sally exclaid.

“Yes,” Addavein said, “It’s redundant for you with your specific capabilities, Sally, but it’s still useful in a big way.”

Mark had a theory about the sword and Adamantiumkinesis and what might have happened to Addavein when he tried pulling it apart, so Mark asked, “Trying to rip it apart just makes it bigger?”

“Got it in one!” Addavein said. “Angrier, too, though I was never too sure about that. It makes the wielder very, very angry at the world when the wielder makes it bigger. Not sure what that’sabout. Other than that, its main power is actually positional stabilization of the wielder, so that they canwield instead of be wielded in turn. Based on your disclosure of elves and dreams, it likely has a great deal of powers that we just don’t know about.” Addavein added, “And Inheritors can use it without needing Adamantiumkinesis; but she didn’t ntion that. Jamasani was quite fond of swinging around his big stick when he needed to.”

“Witches have to be wary around it, though?” Mark asked.

Isoko snorted. A few other people had a bit of mirth in their vectors, and Mark had no idea why. Had he said sothing? Whatever.

Addavein smirked a little, his tail swaying, “It’s other na was Witch Pillar, though that was only during the Black Inquisition about 200 years ago… 220 years ago?” Addavein humd, thinking, his tail stopping. He was unsure. “We killed a lot of witches back then, and the Grand Inquisitor used the Witch Pillar quite a lot.”

Mark nodded a little, looking outward.

The Adamantiumkinetic wielding Pillar of God had left it on the ground for half a minute, but now he slowly retracted it. Why was he still letting it all hang out? Couldn’t he pull it back? Maybe… Maybe the guy was too angry to think straight, and the weapon wouldn’t shrink back down? Mark wasn’t sure what the guy was feeling, because he was too far away to sense, but—

The pillar expanded.

The pillar resud contracting.

Mark asked, “Is he having trouble controlling his rage?”

“Probably. It’s a known issue, but they wouldn’t give him the Pillar of God if he couldn’t control himself. He probably has a Mind Skill for— there he goes. Under control.”

Addavein’s voice had been unsure there in the middle.

But now the Pillar of God was back to being small and firmly in the hands of its Adamantiumkinetic controller. The guy in red was flying back to the stage, coming into Mark’s Unionsense range. The guy was still full of rage, but it was bleeding out of him. He’d be okay.

Mark asked, “What did Inheritor Jamasani say about the Pillar?”

“It was given to him by a wandering traveler,” Addavein said, shrugging. “That’s all he ever told anyone.”

And only Adamantiumkinetics or Inheritors could wield it, huh?

“Did it make Jamasani angry when he used it?” Mark asked.

Addavein smirked a little, saying, “Not at all. And I’m not sure what that ans!”

Mark nodded a little—

Amy said, “And for the last demonstration of the day, we have a return to swords.

“Blazing Heaven in the white on the left.

“And Sundering Faith in the gold on the right.”

The white guy’s Blazing Heaven was a length of mithril and fire in the shape of a scimitar, or a katana. Mark wasn’t sure what you’d call that kind of sword here on Daihoon, but ‘weird katana’ seed correct. When the wielder moved the sword in even the smallest of ways it was like seeing the fractured reflection of a hundred unseen suns, even from 500 ters away.

So guy in gold ‘held’ Sundering Faith, the 2-ter-long sword hovering beside him, almost looking like a tarnished mirror. It was black and silver and gold throughout, and the hilt was more of a bright white gem in a jewelry-type setting, rather than a real hilt. It was never ant to be held directly, and only ever used kinetically.

Rylan was happy to see Sundering Faith, and that joy bled into Mark’s opinion of that floating weirdness.

Rylan told Andria just as much as he told Mark, “It’s a telekinetic-based sword. Any Shaper can wield it like it’s a part of their astral body, too, which is sothing we’ve been able to replicate with other hiltless-swords, but Sundering Faith remains the pinnacle. If you believe that Skillers can do what Smiths can do, then you have a false belief and here is that proof.”

Addavein had an Opinion about Rylan’s opinion of Skillers and Smiths, but he didn’t interrupt the mont.

Amy was saying, “Blazing Heaven is the youngest Sword of Empire on display today, at only 15 years old. It has proven its power many tis over in the hurricanes of Storm Season and especially against a particularly nasty plant monster infection that ca up through Sototh 5 years ago, known as the Creeper Crawl. Blazing Heaven went out and burned those creepers to ash.”

A beam of light went out again, impacted the stone 3 kiloters out, right behind the actual people out there once again summoning giant stone elentals, and then so flickering shields went up around the bleachers and over the VIP box. It was like honeycomb layering fast and then turning invisible. Mark tensed instinctively to see protective spells go up—

“We turn on the shields for this fight,” Amy said.

Out in the far distance, that team of elental callers went to ground beside a red light. That red light stayed red for a mont longer, then it turned to green.

A 100 ter tall golem rose from the world like a very small kaiju, rumbling and roaring, Calling out for all enemies to try themselves against it, to break themselves on its fists and under its crushing self. The hairs on Mark’s arms stood up and he took a deep, calming breath. It wasn’t a kaiju, but it certainly sounded like one.

Addavein chuckled a little bit, saying nothing but also feeling a lot. He wanted to battle, too—

Blazing Heaven shot forward, sword trailing light, and then the wielder was a kiloter away from the not-kaiju, and the not-kaiju saw him and charged. Blazing Heaven went upward, glowing sword held aloft—

The sword released its vision of reality upon this reality.

Golden wind blew and stone caught fire in every direction, the sky turning red with flas, the land igniting.

A tornado of golden fire rushed against the mini-kaiju, burning, burning, burning.

The mini-kaiju reached out, to punch, to grip and rip, and its arm turned to molten slag that fell to the ground. The whole elental burned to a puddle of lted stone with twisted, wind-curled strears of black glass and stone still raised to the sky where the wind had taken the life of the monster.

The fires faded, and then vanished, and Blazing Heaven lowered toward the ground, golden light flowing back into the blade, the blade once again shining brightly. Contained.

Isoko was focused, saying, “Sky Shaper and Fire Shaper at the sa ti.”

Eliot said, “Whatever that was, it was so pure-oxygen-based mana, too.”

“Likely correct,” Addavein said. “Blazing Heaven has had 3 wielders, and all three of them have been Wind Shapers.”

Mark asked Isoko, “Is that the kind of Sword of Empire you want?”

Isoko’s eyes went wide, her heart thumped hard, and she smiled, blushing…

Sally was wincing, though.

Isoko rapidly said, “No. Not fire. Can’t play well on a team with that sort of thing in my scabbard.”

Mark nodded—

“And finally,” Amy said, “We have Sundering Faith; one of the most versatile swords to ever be produced by the Aluatha Empire.”

The guy in gold flew forward, into the subtle flas and heat left behind by Blazing Heaven, Sundering Faith trailing at his side like a full-length tarnished mirror. It was more of a hunk of tal than a real sword, but it was still very much a sword, and the wielder proved as much as he rapidly reached the twisted pool of blackened glass and stone, and then he stabbed the sword into the stone.

Sothing cracked in the world.

And then Sundering Faith rose into the sky, and a blackened version of the previous mini-kaiju pulled out of the ground, the sword still stuck in the mini-kaiju’s head and the wielder telekinetically holding onto the sword, and himself. Within a minute, the monster that Blazing Heaven had put down was up again, and completely silent. It stood there, two stone arms hanging down almost to its stone feet, its body blackened with twisted spikes, the golden guy hovering just above and behind its head area.

The golden guy took a bow, and the puppeted dead kaiju took a bow with him.

And then the wielder started doing tricks with the elental; shadow boxing, jumping, kicking, throwing a straight, and then a roundhouse.

Rylan was proudly proclaiming, “Sundering Faith can singlehandedly swing an entire battle against multi-kaiju threats by removing one kaiju and adding it to the side of humanity. It’s the life’s work of at least one of my cousins to replicate Sundering Faith in full, though they’re occupied with actually-productive work most of the ti, and it’s not cheap to make a sword like that at all.”

Mark asked, “He can recycle the materials used for his attempts, though?”

“Only partially,” Rylan explained, “When you make a sword like that, the raw mithril, orichalcum, and especially adamantium are so twisted by the needs of the weapon that they don’t function as base materials anymore. Orichalcum specifically tends to lt into nothing when you try to reclaim it.”

“I want to have a big conversation about orichalcum with you later, Rylan, if you please,” Mark said.

Amy was announcing stuff in the background about the show being over.

Mark added, “I expect to need to talk to a lot of people soon, though.”

Rylan happily bowed just a little, saying, “It would be my pleasure to discuss tals later.”

Mark asked, “Could I fund your family to make more of them? Or is the bottleneck actually achieving success? You said sothing about a grand forge burning, too, right? Could I pay for a new one?”

“We’d welco your investnt in the house, but the issue with making more Sundering Faiths is actually managing to do it, though with a source of adamantium secured most of the costs are…” Rylan heard the announcents, too, so he rapidly finished, “With adamantium in hand, there goes 90% of the cost.”

Mark nodded—

Amy was saying, “And we especially want to thank the special guests in the audience, and we hope that at least one of you present will have been inspired to make Swords of Empire for Aluatha. Thank you for coming, Mark Careed. Do you have any words to share with us today?”

Mark rapidly got to a side door and stepped out onto a balcony above the audience, many of whom locked on to him with serious vectors the mont he appeared. The Russian lady was there, along with several people from the Virgin Social, and a few others whom Mark had had contact with online—

A particularly strong vector from a pair of people hit him all at once, and Mark’s heart tensed because he felt sothing like desperation in their vector. Mark looked down at those people. Quark noticed, so Quark identified those people as quickly as he could, figuring out they were liaisons to soplace called ‘D’Bolivia’, which Quark cross-referenced to the location of that place where Mark had spent 1.5 billion goldleaf in Sototh for a new water treatnt plant. It had originally been 200 million, but he was rich… Oh. Nothing to worry about. Those guys were just desperately thankful and they wanted to talk to him about sothing else very, very important, though Mark had no idea what it could be.

Mark settled his own worried emotions and Called out, “Amazing show! Thanks for the inspiration. I’m available for comnts in the lobby downstairs.”

He hadn’t planned on speaking to people, but that’s what he did for the rest of the evening and long into midnight. Most of his own people stuck around on the edges, and Eliot got a lot of people who wanted to talk to him, too, but when Pearl, Amy, and Uva showed up with catering and beer and wine, it turned into a real wheeling and dealing kind of night.

Andria stayed beside Mark’s side all night long, helping him to field the economic situations that people threw at him.

- -

Mark ended up spending 5.77 billion more goldleaf that night before it was over.

Tartu even ca to the party with his team, which was good. The eting with Okuana had gone poorly and Tartu eventually just fucked on out of there.

“Sorry it’s not going well,” Mark had said.

Tartu shook his head, not sure what to really say, so he said, “Thank you.”

By 11 PM the original grouping of 500-ish people had ballooned into 2,500 people.

At 1 AM, Mark sat tired on a bench in the tram headed back to Domal’Takela, the world passing by like shadows in the glittering dark. Most of the tram was empty. It was truly late, and most everyone was already at the Green House, sleeping or whatever, but Mark, Andria, Sally, and Eliot had remained. Isoko and Addavein were there, too, but they were both on the roof, both seeming to enjoy the wind flowing past them in different ways. They seed to be having a small conversation about sothing, too, though Mark wasn’t privy to whatever that was.

Mark was pretty sure Isoko was talking about Swords of Empire with Addavein right now, which Addavein seed to be enjoying, which was also great. Isoko had lots of new thoughts about her eventual Sword of Empire, and though Mark hadn’t gotten to talk to her about that, he was rather sure Isoko had gotten to talk to the guy who held Blazing Heaven.

Mark had not been privy to that conversation, either.

It had been a truly great evening for everyone, and now it was over.

Mark still felt really good.

“I think, tonight, I might have done the most good I have ever done in my life, Andria,” Mark said.

“Ha!” Andria said, smiling brightly. “No way.”

Andria was sitting on the bench across from him, and she hadn’t really stopped smiling since they had t with the people from Sototh, from D’Bolivia, and those people had turned out to be truly grateful, but they had also needed more, and Andria could see that with her Prosperity just as much as Mark could with his Unionsense. They had given those people more.

Andria’s smile was larger, right now.

With her shirt disheveled from the break they had taken to dance when that had started, and her brown hair a slight ss, she said, “It only seems like you’ve done more than ever tonight because this is new, and kinda tangible with people directly thanking you for one specific action, but you’ve been doing good for a long ti, Mark. Everyone here has. Eliot and his building, Isoko and Sally becoming kaiju killers. Every kaiju killed is a city saved…” Her words faded as emotion burbled hard, overwhelming everything about her before pouring out of her in a small chuckle and a few happy tears. “Ahhh… Sorry about coming down on you earlier today. Those people from Sototh really needed it. I’m not even sure why I freaked out so much when you paid for awater plant. That’s necessary shit!”

“We both did good today, Andria,” Mark said, and then he added, “But I do want to up the amount I spend per month. The money isn’t doing anyone any good in the bank.”

Andria nodded, like she was hearing sothing she had expected to hear. “I’ve already got a lot of ideas on how to expand our scope.”

“Thank you, Andria.”

Andria grinned… and then she paused, turned in her chair, and looked to the back of the tram.

Mark glanced backward, too.

In the very back of the tram Sally was snogging with the witch, Uva, hands under shirts, completely uncaring about the world around them. It was getting kinda loud, actually. Moaning was easily heard over the gentle rush of tal wheels on tal rails. The two girls were both very, very drunk, too, but they had been making eyes at each other for the last 5 hours, and now they were here.

Eliot sat directly behind Mark, and now Eliot’s eyes caught Mark’s, and he looked like a drowning man.

Mark asked Eliot, “You okay?”

“She expanded the rum inside of her stomach, and then she kept going,” Eliot said, not answering the question at all.

“Oh yeah,” Andria said, “That did happen.”

Mark repeated, “You okay?”

Eliot readily said, “I fumbled… I fumbled so much.”

Andria humd.

Mark said nothing else.

The tram rolled on, through the dark night, back to Domal’Takela—

“Oh! Shit.” Mark asked around, “Tartu t with the queen today? And all of that magical plant stuff, too. How was that, specifically? I never asked for the whole story. He was even right there! Dammit. Why didn’t I ask him… Blegh.”

Eliot waved a dismissive hand, saying, “Okuana wants us to stop production of mana crystals using vines. They have so bullshit excuse about pulling too much mana out of the air and how it’s environntally unsound for us to be selling them, but that’s just utter bullshit. Kaijushit, even.”

Andria’s face scrunched with disbelief, as she said, “The plants produce the mana. They don’t condense it… right?”

“Correct!” Eliot said, and then he added, “They were doing so bureaucracy shit, too, trying to move us with the power of ten thousand paperworks and regulations, but then the Queen ca in and yelled at them and told them to stuff their paperwork up their asses. Apparently it was quite descriptive. And then she left, and the lawyers from Okuana startedrepeating their complaintsand Tartu listened to them. That’s the part I don’t get. Why the fuck would he even subject himself to that? Just fucking walk away, man.”

Mark had a sudden, burning thought, “They were probably threatening him and everyone he knows, every way they could. They were probably threatening us, too, and Tartu didn’t want to tell us about that. That’s why he didn’t want there, or even volunteer information about it.”

Mark scowled, his good mood ruined slightly.

Eliot scrunched his face a little… then his face relaxed as looked outward, saying, “Huh. Yeah… Probably.”

Andria told them both, “Don’t let it bother you. Just kill them if they try it with you.”

Mark laughed once, in disbelief.

“I’m serious, though,” Andria said.

“Yeah! Yeah… I know,” Mark said.

And then Sally slurred out, “Death to all mooothahhhghah…”

Her voice was swallowed by Uva’s mouth.

Mark laughed again.

Eliot turned red in the face.