Explorer of Edregon

"Of course they can come here," Spur sighed, the Commander rubbing his weary eyes as he lazily waved the issue away. "I can't say I'm looking forward to the added work that will give us, but that's a problem for future us, and we hate those guys."

"Wait, seriously?" Vin asked, looking around the council in shock. He'd expected Alice to be for the idea, but he thought he was going to have to work to convince the rest of the council.

"This isn't like the Bands, Vin," Spur drawled, looking at him like he was an idiot. "The only reason there were issues there was because they were a bunch of former prisoners. Arguably the worst of the worst from their fragment, even if they did end up changing their classes and starting over. But a village's fragment getting completely deleted? That's more like a natural disaster. If we don't respond and help, how could we live with ourselves?"

"Spur's right," Witherson nodded, the Architect in charge of the crafters agreeing with him for a change. "It's no different from a neighboring country getting hit by a category five hurricane, or massive flooding. If we have the ability to aid them, and choose not to, what kind of precedent would that be setting?"

"Not to mention your point about their ritual magic," Phil added. As per usual, the Challenger in charge of overseeing the combat classes was focused on one thing and one thing only. "If we can improve our defenses, we'll be one step ahead of whatever the battle for the fifth wave throws at us."

"While I'm obviously on board with bringing the infernals here just as much as the rest of you, I feel as if we aren't paying enough attention to the root of this problem," Alice added, looking around the table. "Their fragment was erased, right out from under them. Don't you think we should be a bit more worried?"

"Do you know of anyone else who has prestiged multiple times and has the knowledge and capabilities required to rip open a hole stretching who knows how many light years away?" Spur asked, earning a scowl from Alice. "Yeah, me neither. Chalk this one up to a freak accident. Something we might need to worry about down the line, but not a problem for us at the moment. I'm sure future us can handle it just fine."

"You're putting a lot of weight on future us' shoulders," Alice warned.

"They'll be a higher level, I'm sure they can handle it," Spur said, waving away her concern. "For now, it sounds like we're all in agreement, and I'm way too tired after everything that happened today to even call for a vote. Go ahead and lead them over to the area we set up for the members of the third wave. We'll figure out how to move forward from there over the next few days."

"Okay. Will do," Vin said, still shocked at how simple that was. "While I'm here, what ended up happening with the fourth wavers? How many were missing?"

"Two hundred and thirty seven of them didn't make the trip," Spur said, his lips forming a hard line at the number. "Including Colonel Pates, the man who was supposed to be leading their group. Naturally, we have no way of knowing if they remained back on Earth, or if they ended up… somewhere else."

"Two hundred and thirty seven… That's nearly a quarter of them!"

"Yeah, not exactly ideal," Spur nodded. "On top of which, Myers is still hard at work collecting information like names and classes, but this was the wave that was supposed to have a number of VIPs. Renowned scientists, engineers, people like that. We didn't lose all of them, but from what we've already gathered, many of those VIPs were among the ones that didn't make it."

"Do you think it was connected?" Alice asked before Vin could get that chance. "We know the Gods take away our tech and even erase passages from our texts that they don't want us to have. Would they do the same with people, too?"

"Your guess is as good as mine," Spur shrugged. "Though seeing as some of them still made the trip, I don't think that's the case. My gut tells me this was something else entirely. Possibly related to the reason why the waves are coming faster than we were originally told. Golrim's still running the numbers, but based on what I've heard so far, it sounds like he's confirmed that the time we're supposed to have between waves is going to continue shrinking. We're supposed to have forty days between now and wave five, but at this point, it's anyone's guess as to when the monsters will actually hit. Fingers crossed Golrim can get us a more accurate prediction before long."

"While we're all here, I finally heard back from Frank not long ago," Phil butted in, drawing everyone's eyes toward him. "There's still plenty of healing to be done, but he's confident anyone who was critical has either passed or been stabilized by now. Today's earlier battle, the battle for wave four, officially resulted in seventy-two dead Earthers, and twelve dead Bands. Most of those being from the third wave on the Earthers' side."

"Compared to the massacre that was the battle for wave three, seventy-two dead is a remarkable improvement," Witherson pointed out. Though her hard expression didn't match her words in the slightest.

"While it is a far cry from the four hundred and sixty three people we lost to that surprise attack, I think we can all agree that seventy-two dead is still a tragedy," Spur said solemnly, getting nods from all around the table. "I know we're all tired, but let's hold a ceremony for them tonight. Witherson, can your crafters put something together?"

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"Most of them were hiding during the battle, so they should have plenty of energy for something like that," she nodded.

"There's one other thing I thought I should bring to everyone's attention," Phil continued. "On top of the seventy-two dead, there's the matter of Tiffany. She's one of Alka's Slayers who ended up getting partially caught in that final monster's grasp. Frank says he has no idea what's wrong with her, but his healing magic isn't having any effect on her legs. She's the only one who survived getting touched by the thing, other than Vin and his prosthetic arm, of course."

Vin shuddered at the memory of the epic monster, its white mask staring with empty sockets at people before sweeping over them with its rolling mass of black energy and turning them into dried out husks. He'd never seen a monster capable of killing people with but a touch before, and he could only hope they never encountered anything like it ever again.

"While that's certainly devastating news, why do you feel the need to bring it up?" Spur asked. "In the least dickish way, we've got bigger things to worry about at the moment. We can have someone make her a wheelchair like we did for Chance when he had part of his spine severed during the battle for wave two."

"Chance was one of the first wavers who got hit in the back by a flying monster's quill way back when," Alice whispered in his ear, no doubt having seen the confused expression on his face. "He pretty much just stays inside all day, I'm not surprised you don't know him."

"Thanks," he said, appreciating the quick recap. As much as he hated to admit it, other than the council and a few select Earthers, due to his frequent travels he really didn't know many of the first wavers.

"Well this might turn into a rather 'big thing,'" Phil said, continuing with a frown. "Alka visited Tiffany in the hospital, and apparently, when she learned that Frank didn't think she'd ever be able to walk again, told the girl all about the meriders and their merger that they offer people. Tiffany is demanding for some combat classes to escort her over to the Aernae forest in order to undergo the merger."

Through his explanation, Phil stared at Vin with a hard look on his face, as if this was all his fault. And seeing as he'd been the one to bring back news of the meriders, he supposed it kinda was.

"That's just what we need, a giant half-human, half-spider wandering around scaring people," Spur groaned, putting his face in his hands. "Has Chance caught wind of this yet?"

"Somehow, despite having barely left his room since the accident, he has," Phil nodded. "He's demanding to go along with them as well. We've tried to reassure him that we might be able to heal him in a few months or years with magic, but it's no guarantee, and he refuses to wait. Shia informed us that something as delicate as the spine would almost certainly require an even more advanced version of Regeneration, potentially a tier 5 spell."

"Fantastic," Spur drawled, taking in a deep breath. "Alright, I suppose getting one of our few Slayers back on their feet is more important than the headache them being half-spider is going to cause us. Hell, with the addition of the Bands and now the infernals, everyone's probably getting pretty used to seeing different races by now, I'd hope."

"Dwarves, orcs, and beastkin are one thing, but half-spiders and literal demons?" Witherson asked, raising an eyebrow. "We might have some problems on our hands."

"I'll discuss with Abby and ensure the guards are prepared to handle it," Phil stated, as if that solved the problem in its entirety.

"It might not even be a problem at all, actually," Vin decided to interject. "I don't know too much about the meriders just yet, but from what I saw, the merger isn't just taking a human torso and planting it on top of a giant spider. It changes their very biology, making them something more than they used to be. I know at the very least it makes them unnaturally happy, which is a lot creepier than it sounds. Tiffany and Chance may very well end up remaining in Pendet after the merger rather than come back here to Terra."

"Well that will certainly be a blow, losing one of our six Slayers, but I suppose she's already useless on that front without the use of her legs anyway," Spur said, blinking at his own comment. "Wow, that was a lot more harsh than I intended. Obviously, what's most important is that she gains the ability to walk again."

"I think we've all had a rather long day and could use some rest," Alice said, looking around the table. "We survived the battle for wave four, I think we can survive putting anything else off until tomorrow."

"Tell that to the fourth wavers who are currently freaking out about the System and piles of dead monsters and everything," Witherson frowned. "We've got a lot of work ahead of us. Vin, can you ask Shia for her assistance in getting all the monsters shunted over to the Sacred Forest again? Once they're out of the way, we can focus on repairing the minor amounts of damage that was inflicted and start building more permanent housing for the infernals if they decide they want to stay."

"I can do that," he nodded. "Spur, do you need any help running the fourth wavers through the truth-detecting process? Now that I have the spell, maybe I can take a bit off Myers' plate and help with that."

Not to mention if the fourth wavers meet with me now and see I'm just a regular person, they won't start thinking of me as some mystical entity called The Roamer like everyone else.

The fact that he'd somehow become some sort of icon to the Earthers still felt strange to him, and despite his best efforts to reinforce the fact that he was just a regular guy, most of the Earthers continued to look up to him like he was a local legend.

"That would be a huge help, thank you," Spur said, looking relieved at his offer. "Losing a quarter of the fourth wave should have made that process simpler, but the addition of the infernals ended up doubling the whole thing instead. If you do this for us, I won't even complain the next time you vanish into thin air for a few days."

"I'll hold you to that," Vin chuckled. "I spent the last week waiting around town for the fourth wave to spawn. While I managed to learn a good number of spells I'd been meaning to pick up, I desperately want to get out and stretch my legs a bit."

"Oh, thanks for the reminder," Spur said, lighting up as if he'd almost forgotten something. "Don't worry about it for now, but you and I need to have another chat sooner than later about other Earthers learning magic. It's not a talk for tonight, but find me before you run off, if you wouldn't mind. I finally have some actual candidates for you."

"Can do," Vin said, too tired to even complain at this point.

"In that case, everyone get the hell out of here and go to bed," Spur said, getting up and yawning as if to emphasize the point. "And yes, that's an order!"