Chapter 478

Mark and Isoko landed on the big balcony at the top of the tower. It felt truly strange and kinda scary to be here, even though yesterday had been yesterday. Mark didn’t feel worthy of being here. From Isoko’s vector and wide-eyed expression, she was having similar emotions. But Aleph One had told Quark to tell Mark to come through this way, and so this was their destination.

Mark gazed inward, past the archway at the end of the balcony, to the big hallway they had walked down yesterday, to the round room and the Innards of Crystal Tower. The ice-white crystal, blue/gold coloring, and soft lighting all spoke of superheroing in a fundamental way that made Mark feel giddy. And then there were the superheroes. Today was a day of mourning and cheering, for they had won the battle and defended the city, but people had died.

Mark did not know who had died, yet, but while everyone had on their dress uniforms, some had little black ribbons pinned to that webweave—

Aeri came out from inside, relief coloring her features as she spotted Isoko. She looked at her granddaughter and took her hand into her own, softly saying, “I was about to be worried.”

“Sorry, Grandmother,” Isoko said.

No other words needed to be said; Aeri was just glad Isoko was here now, and that’s all that mattered.

“I needed to organize Powers from yesterday,” Mark explained, because other people were listening and he needed to get the ball rolling on that and also to show that the delay was not Isoko’s fault.

Aeri nodded and moved on, “There’s breakfast, and then the Overview, by Justicar. Timeweaver asked to give the Overview, so maybe they’ll let him.”

Mark asked the dreadful question, “Who died?”

“Seraph and Synapse are the big names, but it was a devastation to any and all Chosen of Freyala, which was a lot of our younger crowd,” Aeri said, walking inward.

Mark nodded a little. He had guessed that a lot had happened to the Chosen of Freyala, but to hear big names like Seraph and Synapse died, too… It had been a bad day.

Isoko hadn’t heard any of that, though. She gasped.

Aeri gripped Isoko’s hand tighter. “I’m glad Platinum Princess was not among their number.”

“Oh Freyala… Oh Grandma,” Isoko softly said, holding Aeri—

Timeweaver stepped into the air, saying, “Battle’s over for now. We have some time to prepare for what comes next, but not a whole lot of time.”

Aeri muttered small curses. She was not alone in her thoughts. Timeweaver’s words had carried to everyone within earshot, which happened to be most of the superheroes of Crystal Tower and quite a few interns.

Mark tensed. “How much time?”

“As much as we can get. Months, maybe. These things are very difficult to gauge since the first battle to happen is one of prognostication and information. Boots on the ground is a failure of one side or another to properly counter the other, but since this morning we’ve been countering Okuana hard, as long as we don’t actually encroach on their territory…” Timeweaver paused, looked to the side, and said, “And that’s all I’m going to say on that.” He told Mark, “Aleph One has your orichalcum. I’m eager to see if you can actually do whatever you want with it.”

Mark paused. Timeweaver didn’t actually blip anywhere, so… Mark guessed that Timeweaver didn’t look himself? Mark asked, “… You don’t know yourself?”

Timeweaver grinned and then ignored Mark’s question as he continued, “I have promised that I will stop the ‘Resurrection Ghost’ from befalling any traps, but I haven’t seen any traps yet, because this is the end-game timeline right now. That’s the only thing I’m caring about for the next week. Congrats for getting us here, Mark. Couldn’t have done it without you.”

Mark asked Timeweaver, “How long were you in that battle?”

Timeweaver shrugged and played it off like a man who just hit retirement, saying, “Long enough.” He walked into Crystal Tower proper, under the shadow of the archway overhead. “Come on! Let’s get you that orichalcum!”

Mark looked to Isoko, who was holding hands with her grandmother and who didn’t want to leave her, and Mark didn’t want to leave Isoko. But Isoko knew that teammates stuck together—

“I need to talk to you about some small things, Isoko,” Aeri said.

And so Mark said, “I’ll be back.”

Isoko nodded a little and held Aeri’s hand tighter.

Mark followed Timeweaver to a hallway, thinking about his time at Citadel Freyala, and how Isoko had talked about ‘Wandering Sage’ with love, and how she had never mentioned her parents aside from small comments. At the time, Mark had assumed that was because Isoko didn’t want to rub the fact that her parents were alive in Mark’s face, but now… Now, Mark had a very different opinion. Aeri Kanno had visited Isoko Kanno at Citadel Freyala, at a party of Freyalan nobility with the Cybersongs and with Justicar there, too. Sure, Aeri had visited because Isoko had been moving in on Mark, and they all wanted what Mark had, but. That was the important part.

Isoko’s mother, Chimiko, had a deep pain in her heart and soul since the loss of Riku, their eldest child, only a few years ago.

… It was perhaps selfish of Mark to think this next thought, but he thought it anyway: Maybe if Healthy Body helped Chimiko heal her heart, then maybe it would help Lola, too… if Lola would ever consent to being Healthy Body’d— Wait. Was Lola in one of those groups for survivors of Resurrection—

Oh gods.

Mark maintained his composure as much as he could, until he had gotten out of direct sight of Isoko, because… because… Had Isoko been in Freyala’s heaven? Like Lola had been with Freyala? Had Mark ripped her out of it? Freyala had handed Mark the Bindings for Platinum Body and Union, and neither of those were common at all—

Oh gods.

Mark had ended up in some kinda side room, far enough from the main party. He almost stumbled, a massive guilt slamming into him like a kaiju stomp. He righted himself, though everyone had seen. Mark tried not to look at everyone, at Glorious Man over there, or at Justicar, or at Specter and Tempest and Melanie Moore— Mark tried, saying, “Uh… It’s just… It never gets easier? Even if…” Mark looked to Timeweaver. “Even if Jessie might be coming?”

A lot of sudden hopeful emotions swirled around the room as eyes turned toward Timeweaver, while a few truly empathic people, like Justicar over there, looked upon Mark with sympathy and real understanding.

Moore looked to Timeweaver, and said, “Well?”

Timeweaver sighed greatly, and then he said, “FIIIIIINE. I’ll fucking ” Timeweaver blinked, and then came back, and he stood a bit straighter. He lied, “Well that was a relaxing few days.” He told Mark, “You’re gonna call me ‘Zaid’ and we’re gonna be best work friends, and then we’re going to go get you that orichalcum.”

“… Uh? Yeah sure, Zaid.”

Zaid nodded. “Good!” He pointed to a hallway. “Down that way. Aleph Two is over there and— And you can figure out the rest.” Zaid ‘confided’ with a stage whisper, “There is no end to the work at a certain level, and so boundaries are necessary. I’m going golfing.”

And then Zaid flickered and vanished.

Moore stepped in line with Mark, walking with him wherever he was supposed to go, saying, “So? Orichalcum?”

Mark got to walking, and soon he was down a hallway and around a few corners—

A shipment of orichalcum sat in the middle of a normal room, on a metal hovertray on the ground, like someone had robbed a bank and decided to use their ill gotten gains as a centerpiece. The ‘robber’ might have been Aleph Two, standing to the side, looking like a happy blue person with an extra set of arms. Aleph One’s son seemed to be doing okay with the Powers Mark had given him, of Web Control, Technopath, and Technosis Body. Mark would get to him in a moment, though, because this was a lot of orichalcum, and he needed it.

The shipment was a stack of reddish-gold bars, each one weighing 25 kilos. At 5 across, 2 deep, and 5 tall, that meant 2,500 kilos. Bands of steel strapped it to the hovercart. A few more bars sat on top of the main shipment, bringing the total size up to 3,000 kilos.

Mark said, “Aleph One said you guys had 3 extra tons laying around. I guess this is it?”

A screen flickered on to the side, and Aleph One materialized on that screen looking like an old Japanese guy with blue lines on his face. Aleph One said, “This is nothing compared to the gift of the adamantium you left in the bay, but unlike your capabilities, orichalcum production is rather limited. We have an extra 2,000 kilos beyond this measure, but 1,000 of it is slated for the rebuild of New Tokyo.”

“I doubt I’ll need any more than this so I won’t ask for more, yet,” Mark said, thinking...

Mark did some quick math.

Each 5 kilo orb of orichalcum he absorbed, which took about 2 days each to absorb, gave him about 2-3 points of Utilized. He was now at a Utilized cap of 199. A thousand new kilos of orichalcum would give him 500 Utilized. So this stuff here represented 1,500 Utilized. If his Union of Dream and Reality method of absorption worked, then he’d shoot up to something like 1,700 Utilized.

Mark said, “I can’t imagine needing more than this for a little while. Thank you… Crystal Tower?”

Melanie Moore stepped forward, saying, “New Tokyo has granted you this request, but Crystal Tower has added their own reserves to this request, and we are all delighted to assist you as you ask. Would you like privacy?”

Mark smiled a little. There was no real privacy to be had here, but he was thankful for the ‘fig leaf’ of propriety because Moore truly meant it when she offered it. And sure, she was the Commander of Crystal Tower, and she surely had some great political abilities of her own, but her offer seemed genuine.

Mark said, “That’s not necessary. Thank you, though.”

Mark lifted a hand and adamantium spilled out in ribbons, allowing Mark to grab the first bar and hold it aloft. It was comparably soft as it whined in Mark’s grip, as he tested its strength. Orichalcum came from orichalcum-mana-possessing entities crystallizing their orichalcum around seed crystals of gold, platinum, and osmium inside of the entities’ bodies. Mostly gold, though. Adamantium, by contrast, was focused on osmium. Mithril was focused on platinum.

Orichalcum was more malleable than gold, for it was the stuff of dreams manifested into reality, so Mark knew that this stuff was absolutely orichalcum.

Mark completely wrapped the bar in adamantium, in a part of himself, and then he focused on that wrapped piece of god metal, Unioning softly with Dream and Reality—

Black veins pulsed out of Mark’s chest, into the air, down the ribbons, to the enveloped bar, where black veins beat in time to Mark’s heart around the enclosed metal. The dream lay beyond those black veins, in the colors leaking into reality from the dream. With every beat of Mark’s heart he gently closed his grip around the orichalcum bar, feeling it crumble and melt inward, into Mark’s soulhouse, like drops of water into a puddle, making the puddle larger.

Soon, Mark released the space where the orichalcum had been, and it was gone.

“It really worked. I was worried it was going to spill over everywhere.” Mark asked the people in the room, “Figure anything out about soulhouses yet?”

Moore had no response, for she was trying to pretend they weren’t spying on him just as much as everyone else.

Aleph One kept his mouth shut, too.

Aleph Two, however, said, “You’re piercing into a demiplane that we can’t fully see, but we do recognize that it’s a divine demiplane.”

“That’s about all I know about it, too.” Mark started absorbing the next brick. “How much information do you guys share with Aluatha?”

Moore explained, “Information on top global threats, various international warnings, kaiju kill information that allows us to better train people. And yet, when it comes down to it, we share almost nothing at all. Our cultures and governments are almost inherently incompatible, for they’re monarchists and we’re a democracy, and they attempt to subvert our democracy now and again to better suit their needs. A year ago, I would have said Aluatha and Okuana have that in common, but things have changed. We still don’t trust Aluatha as we would an ally, but they’re certainly no enemy.”

Mark nodded a little, feeling a deep kinship with all of New Tokyo in that moment.

And then he half-lidded his eyes as he checked on his Status. With two bricks absorbed —and they did absorb, so this was — his Utilized had gone from 199 max to 227. Ah… this was awesome.

Mark came back to reality and began absorbing the third brick, asking, “I have a lot of Powers from the people of the blockade. Walaria said she is going to send me a list of things that she requires, and that she will try to get Jessie Stills here tomorrow, or as soon as possible. Maybe today? So I’m going to help you guys make some more big powers, if you got people who you trust to handle that.”

Aleph Two breathed out, whispering, “Fractal.”

‘Fractal’ seemed like slang, and like a good thing.

Aleph One bowed on the screen.

Melanie Moore seriously asked, “Has anyone figured out how to counteract the memory loss of resurrection?”

“Not to my knowledge,” Mark said.

Aleph Two said, “We expect months of lost memories, if Jessie can get here and actually do a real Resurrection Day within the next hour.”

Moore seemed cautiously optimistic.

Mark wasn’t about to ruin whatever Witchery Aluatha was probably doing to make Jessie Stills the Resurrection Ghost, for real, so he just told them all, “Don’t plan on that happening. Have him prioritize people.”

“Gods, that’s a political nightmare,” Moore muttered, but she seemed reassured, almost, that Mark had cut her hopes down to nothing.

“Have you guys cracked the memory loss numbers?” Mark admitted, “Isoko was only out for something like 20 minutes. She lost maybe 3 hours.”

Aleph Two said, “Based on records from the Battle For Memphi, we believe there’s several levels to memory loss. A death of 5 minutes or less means almost no memory loss at all for most people. Anything past 5 minutes means 10 to 20 minutes lost per minute dead. Anything over an hour dead means 30 to 48 hours lost per hour gone.”

Mark nodded a little.

He was on his 6th bar and so far he had gotten no popups from System Prime. Mark began absorbing 3 at a time. It was barely slower than doing 1 at a time, as he said, “The ‘prime’ goblins —if you want to call them that— die and are reborn all the time, though they fully lose their memory between deaths. Grax, the Light Titan, leaves for hundreds of years and comes back completely different each time, but he reads books in his library that remind him who he is, and his memories resurface from those books, in his dreams. The Grax out there today is closer to the one from the history books than the one he originally was when he was born again. All of the goblins do that.”

Aleph Two asked, “Where did you hear that?”

Mark said, “Goofy Goblin talked about it in his interviews—”

For one horrific moment, Mark flinched.

Oh gods.

Goofy Goblin wore that Glorious Man costume all the time, and Mark had even had one printed up for him to wear better. Oh gods. Was the real Glorious Man going to say something about that? Oh fuck… Oh fuc—

No no!

Play it cool.

Move on, Mark.

Mark, uh, shrugged. “I don’t think reading about oneself works for humans, uh, otherwise I would have, uh, heard about it.”

Moore, Aleph One, and Aleph Two both gave Mark a small Look.

They ignored Mark’s moment.

Aleph Two nodded a little, his eyes suddenly flickering with blue light, and then going back to normal blue. “I haven’t found anything that would suggest humans reading memories of themselves would regain themselves.”

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Aleph One said, “It is an experiment we can attempt.”

Mark shrugged. With a shearing flick of adamantium, Mark clipped off the metal strap holding down the rest of the orichalcum and then he grabbed up ten bricks and started absorbing them into his soulhouse. Dream and Reality pulsed, and reality became a part of the dream.

Mark continued to absorb the bricks as he asked Aleph Two, “How did your Powers work out there?”

“I was able to take command of the nuclear weapons, strike Chiba with them, and empower them enough to kill the hole between the Two Worlds and a majority of the infiltration,” Aleph Two said, “My actions resulted in the elimination of 2 dragons and 1 Living Kill spell, before they adapted.”

Mark hadn’t known that AIs were the ones responsible for making high-Power-Level nukes, but that made a lot of sense… They didn’t sacrifice themselves, though?

Mark asked, “I’m suddenly reminded of how they used to put people into city walls to empower them against kaiju. You guys don’t do that with AIs and bombs, do you?”

Aleph One was quiet. Moore said nothing. If either of them were surprised that Mark knew that secret, they didn’t show it.

Aleph Two grinned a little, saying, “Un-awakened AIs can do bombs just fine, but we didn’t need that; I did it myself.”

“Neat.” Mark asked, “Were you in the big blue cubes, too?”

“Nah,” Aleph Two said, shaking his head.

Aleph One said, “Each cube is a world for our kind, with United Sapients’ main offices split between two of them, though the individual cubes are all contracted out to larger groups. Those groups fired those weapons.”

“Oh wow!” Mark said, surprised. “I didn’t know that there were AI in there? Virtual, I assume?” He added, “But who really knows, actually.”

“They don’t feel virtual when you’re in them,” Aleph Two said. “If you want to send Quark to visit, we’d welcome him anytime. He can just pop in. would have to use a headset if you want to visit. There are any number of places that can do that.”

“I’ll have to consider—”

Mark crossed a threshold.

A notification appeared.



Foundation surpassed.

Level One achieved.

Numbers condensed.



And then Mark’s Status popped up.



Mark Careed, Age 19, human (Elf, as per System) [Inheritor]

Physicality set to: Weak, [Variable], Full

Mana Type: True Adamantium

House: Level One

Extra Lives: Secure

Utilized: 17/100

Cohort: 1/3

Bindings: 4/4

Active Ritual: Clean House

Body, Adamantine Immortal: 099

Shaper, Adamantium: 099

Mind: 99 (Unusable; Familiar Detected)

Natural, Union: 099

Soul, Necromancer: 099

Arch: 99 (Empty)

Archived Abilities: [Expand]



What?

He only had 17 out of 100 Utilize—

Oh.

Mark had gone from basically 200 max Utilized, soaring all the way to 1,000, and then System Prime had chopped off a 0 and rounded off other numbers, and now Mark was at 17/100 instead of 174/1,000.

By the time Mark finished, he was going to hit something close to ‘1720’ max Utilized (or actually 172 Utilized, according to the new numbering system) and he had not reached ‘Level Two’ at all. Where were the lines between Foundation, Level One, and whatever lay beyond? Mark imagined that he would need to reach 10,000 total Utilized before System Prime condensed the numbers again, and thus allow for a fourth Cohort slot… or whatever else might happen.

It used to be that 1 kilo of orichalcum gave Mark something like half of a point of Utilized, but while it was still giving him the same amount, now that amount barely moved the meter.

Mark was super rich, but the worldwide production of orichalcum was a limited thing. How limited? Mark wasn’t sure. He never really considered that angle. Mark might have turned adamantium into a ‘common’ item, theoretically, but he had turned orichalcum into a rarity, and everyone used orichalcum to make things. Mark was planning on making things with orichalcum, too. It was pretty much the perfect union of dream and reality, allowing one to impart weirdness to artifacts that could not be imparted with more standardized methodologies.

Just like how Natural Powers operated on personal beliefs, orichalcum could be molded by personal beliefs… which is probably why it was the god metal, and why it was so useful for building soul houses.

Neat—

OH!

His Cohort max had gone to 3!

Pure joy thrummed from Mark, the black veins in the air briefly flickering to glowing white as he realized that he could keep all of his friends safe now. His Cohort number had gone up to a max of 3! He just needed to put them into his Status after they died... Ah… fuck. So maybe there was an issue with the current methodology Mark used to revive his friends, so Mark would need to figure out how to ‘copy’ them while they were alive and healthy.

But…

But Eliot and Sally would be okay, now.

Aleph Two asked, “What happened?”

Mark said, “I hit ‘Level One’ on my Status and now I can rescue my other two teammates from death, if they should die… though there are some heavy caveats to that. I would prefer not to say more on the subject right now.”

“… Fractal!” Aleph Two said, eyes wide and curious.

Aleph One huffed at his son, saying, “Slang is inappropriate, Son.”

Melanie Moore said/asked, “Am I correct in assuming you hit a higher level of ‘Utilized’, as well, and now you can contain a great many more Powers?”

“Yes!” Mark grabbed all of the rest of the orichalcum, tens of bricks floating in the air before he swallowed them with absolute black, and then he started to beat Dream and Reality through them, swallowing them for real. He told Moore, “There’s this thing I did with some cows back at Dawncoast, with Impregnate, Meaty, and Healthy Body, but I think New Tokyo could improve upon that a hundred fold…”

Mark explained about cow breeding and Moore’s vector got serious and interested. She had heard about all of this before, because of course she did. She was the Commander of Recruitment and Training for Crystal Tower. Aleph One and his son had heard of this, too, and soon, Moore told Mark that she would have a Healthy Body setup ready for him, if he wished to support Crystal Tower in this crisis of the Two Worlds.

Mark, of course, was going to help them in that way, but he went quiet when she said ‘crisis’.

The red-gold godmetal was almost all gone, too.

Fuck…

Too many crises.

“How bad is the retaliation by Dominant going to be?” Mark asked, absorbing the last of the orichalcum in one big ball of black. “I’m worried about Citadel Freyala now, especially with these new Living Kill spells that target Union users.”

Aleph One and Two both looked serious, and worried.

Moore kept her cards close to her chest, but she did say, “It will either be something that will blow over and fester for another decade to deal with, or it will blow up now, and in a way none of us can predict—” Her phone buzzed in her pocket, so she took it out and said to Mark, “If you will excuse me, Mister Careed, I have things to take care of, and one of those is to create and finalize a deal with one of New Tokyo’s meat producers in order to meet the needs of your generous offer of Skilling. I will have news about that soon. Thank you again for your help with the blockade. We will speak again later.” She turned and answered the phone, walking away as she said, “Speak.”

Mark asked Aleph One and Two, “I didn’t get a chance to tell her, but I want to try putting True Brawny and Telekinesis into some cows to get more of those, but those would be kaiju killing cows, so that seems highly dangerous. Perhaps New Tokyo can solve this issue? I would, of course, Skill whoever you want with this combo while I’m here.”

Aleph Two’s eyes went wide and then flickered blue as his vector turned distant and inward at the same time.

Aleph One flickered as well. He came, saying, “Unfortunately, all of our small scenarios indicate this option would be exactly as much of a disaster as you imagine it could be.”

Aleph Two said to his father, “Splitting the Powers between multiple herds might do alright.” He told Mark, “It’s possible, but it would not be easy.”

Mark nodded, finishing off the orichalcum. “I’m sure Aluatha has been working in similar directions, though I have not been privy to those talks and machinations. Perhaps there is something to figure out with them?” Mark changed the subject, asking, “How is the rest of this day going to go?”

“We’re still rooting out problems in the districts,” Aleph One said, “But the majority of the issues are done. Jessie Stills is coming into Yokosuka in an hour, where one of the Living Kill spells manifested after an archmage sped through a portal, into the city, and got himself killed…”

Mark spent another 5 minutes talking with Aleph One and Two about general things.

The Overview was coming up next, and Justicar was going to give it. That was the big thing happening next.

Soon, Mark returned to Isoko up top, to eat from the large buffet provided for heroes who wanted to stop and take a break as they moved from one small crisis to another. Justicar was no longer at the helm, because Aleph One and the people in the Innards had taken over coordinating the rest of the fallout of the battle. Instead, Justicar, Serge Garin, the son of the Holy Mother of Freyala Julia Garin, had been talking with individual superheroes and healing people who came to the Crystal Tower, as a matter of course.

Mark sought him out to ask about Citadel Freyala’s response to the Union-Targeting of the Living Kill spells, with regard to Okuana.

Serge boiled it all down to, “The Faith only guides the general direction of the Church of Freyala and Her Chosen, so we believe that paladins are going to paladin, meaning full resignations across the board all across Okuana, in all the major governmental halls and otherwise. But we expect individual teams with a paladin to retain those paladins, unless the teams are truly devout toward the False Godking. A lot of hard feelings are gonna happen soon. We have no idea where this will all lead.”

Mark nodded a little.

Isoko and Aeri joined them.

Mark asked, “Is that what we’re calling him now? ‘False Godking’?”

“Among other, less polite names, yes.”

“I want to help Citadel Freyala make some true powerhouses.” Mark asked, “Can you get that happening?”

Serge smiled a little bit, a golden halo seeming to flicker into faint light around him as a golden hand touched his shoulder. With quiet joy, Serge said, “Citadel Freyala will gladly take that offer. Not at the Citadel, though. Most of us are evacuating here, to New Tokyo.”

Mark and the others gasped. “Seriously?”

“Seriously,” Serge said, gravitas in his voice and vector.

Isoko demanded to know, “Surely we’re not… the Citadel?”

“We are,” Serge said, not liking it either. “The alternative is waiting for his dryads to open portals right on top of the Citadel and then having Living Kill spells murder every single Freyalan in a single crushing moment. But in a smaller, more insidious way, we need to move on before the true deviousness of this new problem is made portable. We have no doubt that Okuana can refine their Living Kill spells into items that the Godking will give to all of his troops. Once that happens, no Chosen of Freyala will be able to escape what happened to you, Miss Kanno.”

Isoko paled.

Aeri held her hand tightly.

The room seemed silent.

Mark asked, “Someone is working on countermeasures?”

“Of course,” Serge said, “But everyone in the Citadel is mostly packing up, and moving fast. I expect the next attack to come soon, and it will either be there, or at Dawncoast. New Tokyo is shored up, now, and we have all of that adamantium you left us. We will make good use of it, I promise you that.”

Mark said, “I was already planning on making big superheroes for New Tokyo and Dawncoast, and for Citadel Freyala…” In a room full of people of New Tokyo, with Mark, Aeri, Isoko, and a few others standing nearby, listening or being a part of the conversation, Mark asked, “Would Citadel Freyala want to relocate to Dawncoast, instead?”

A lot of people were very interested in this conversation happening right now.

Serge was quietly happy to confide, “I will never abandon New Tokyo, but Dawncoast is new, and anyone who goes there will be the foundation for a new world power. I imagine that many in Citadel Freyala will take up this offer, especially if the Cybersongs can build them a new Citadel, and if you’re there, forming the basis of a true world power, Mark.”

Mark felt like he was standing taller than usual.

Everyone was looking at him; his childhood heroes, Isoko, Isoko’s grandmother, and others.

Mark told everyone who was listening, “Empire Aluatha, all free thinking people, and I, as the Inheritor of Xerkona, will stand with the Pantheon and with New Tokyo and Crystal Tower to tear down that Evil Tree, and prevent him from murdering all the world all over again.”

A lot of people had a lot of reactions to that.

But Tempest, standing there beside Justicar, had the largest reaction of all, gasping loudly and demanding to know, “What do you mean the Godking murdered the world?!”

Isoko stood up with Mark, saying, “When the Dragon King fell defending the Two Worlds from the Others 11,000 years ago, Godking Dominant created the goblins out of elves he plucked from the sky, from Endless Daihoon, and he set them upon the 11 other Empires of the Two Worlds. Dominant captured Xerkona as his own vassal Empire and destroyed the rest. Aluatha only came back 350 years ago.”

Mark smiled a little at Isoko, loving this, loving her.

But everyone had questions, and some people outright disagreed with Isoko and Mark’s words, but the blockade had just happened. Those people only disagreed because they still didn’t believe in the horror of yesterday. Mark didn’t begrudge those people their feelings.

One guy, the hero Technomage, did say, “But they still have an empire’s worth of contracts open and flowing between nations, between worlds. Whatever is happening at the top is not happening at the ground at all.”

Mark said, “Sure. And that’s why we should focus on assassinating Dominant and all of the dryads, and then figuring out how to turn over Okuana to an interim government. Hopefully Okuana doesn’t purge most of its dissenters during that time, like how they purged the Executioners and the Church of Drakarok.”

No one was truly comfortable with any of that. Some were closer than others, but in the end, these were all heroes. Moore, standing to the side, might be the only one who truly understood the world-wide scale of the direction of this conflict.

That was fine.

Mark was more than comfortable enough with that whole idea. They had tried to kill him a few times with assassinations and tricks and otherwise, so of course Mark should return the favor—

Timeweaver, Zaid, blinked into the room and stepped up toward Mark, putting himself in the center of the room as he raised his voice, “Please come to the main room to begin the Overview, though you’ve already heard most of it from Mark.” And then he told Mark, “New Tokyo and Crystal Tower stand with Aluatha and with you, the Inheritor of Xerkona.”

Mark did not bow; it would be unbecoming of an Inheritor to bow to anyone, even his childhood heroes. Instead, Mark said, “I look forward to a future of more superheroes and less war.”

Zaid grinned.