Runt of the Litter - Tales from Alirast

"Ash. This might be a problem." Geo set a stack of parchment down on the General's desk, plopping down on the floor next to the desk to wait.

"What now, Geo?" A heavy sigh from the General as he lifted the papers and began to read through them.

"Are our scouts sure? They've only had a few hours to gather information."

"They are sure. The Queen, who is resting right now, is the highest level mortal that doesn't belong to the lesser primordial class or the Eternals."

"Well. She is quite a high level. I wouldn't panic just yet; the young godlings who are here also seem promising. Have we found a way to shatter this debuff that is afflicting the realm?"

"No. That comes straight from Lady Dawn herself."

"Well...that's no good. We can seal the [Primordials] without divine intervention, but the cost in life is high. If these reports are true, then the average level in this empire is just barely hitting the one-hundred range. That's not enough bodies."

Geo nodded and reached into the bag of holding at his side, fishing around for a moment before pulling out a few of the spheres he had gathered. "Seems like these are a new addition to this realm as well."

"Monster cores? We've had this for years."

"They haven't. It's something that has started to appear in the past year or so. Almost none of their equipment utilizes cores in any way."

Geo wished that Ash was something other than a serpent. It was difficult to read the man's face and understand his thoughts.

"Why would Lady Dawn and his lordship hamper the mortals so badly? I don't understand."

The troll shrugged and began picking at a loose thread on his clothes.

"Maybe our guests can shed some light on things when they wake up." Ash continued.

"Are we going to assume that this Queen that is betrothed to our Lordship is taking the place of the Shade?"

"Tch." Ash stood and ran a hand over his head. "I don't know, Geo. Noristo was not one to suffer weakness or fools. Have we gathered any information on her?"

Geo lifted a hand and teetered it back and forth. "Just that she's been alive a long time...rather, what mortals now consider a long time. They call her one of the Great Beast Generals, from the last time the [Primordials] were awake. Evidently, she and some of the others of that era fought long and hard to seal them."

"Oh, good. She's a veteran of the [Primordial] resurgence. So we at least know she isn't helpless. Send the scouts out again, specifically get all the information we can on Beast Generals, Alliyah, Kadessa, and our Lordship's children. Ask them to double-time it, I'll be going to speak to our guests in another...ten hours or so? I'd like something by then."

"Do you think it wise to use transmission artifacts?"

"Sparingly. I'm still not sure how Lady Dawn plans to deal with our artifacts that don't quite fit the system anymore. I'd rather not incur her wrath and lose out on an edge we may be able to bring to bear on the [Primordials]."

Geo stood as he nodded. "I'll get on that."

-=====-

Their little group rested easily enough. With three deities in close proximity, Trillia wasn't really worried about the Eternals trying anything.

Truth be told, she wasn't really worried about them anyway. It was the same familiar feeling that Lotan had given her.

The three god children stood in unison and started walking towards the door, just as a knock sounded against it.

Once the door was opened, Ashkru stood there with the same slight smile that all the Eternals seemed to have. "May I come in?"

They stepped to the side and motioned for him to enter. Alliyah was curled up in a blanket. Half her body was covered in bruises, but she was awake. "Thank you for letting me rest. My children tell me that you are the Eternal General and the leader of this place?"

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Ash bowed but shook his head. "Almost. I am the Eternal General, I am the leader of the Council. In times of war and battle, I am the absolute commander. In times of peace, Hope and Geo are above me in the chain of command. Though they often look to me for advice, especially when concerning matters of foreign diplomacy. We lean on each other, you could say."

"I see. I have no doubt both sides have questions. Would you like to start?" Alliyah stood with the bundle of blankets and shuffled over to sit at the table with a groan.

"Are you certain you don't wish for our healers to take a look at that?"

"I'll be fine. Letting my body naturally heal after pulling on that title is safer. Magical healing tends to cause a lot of curses and debuffs."

Ash glanced around the room, but said nothing. Slithering over to the table and curling his tail up under him. "As you wish. My first question is, what is the average level of your combat caste?"

"That's difficult to answer. The realm of Alirast is not united under a single banner. In Kadessa, if you exclude myself and the Beast Generals, then our highest levels would be in the low five hundreds. With our lowest being in the mid-fifties."

"I see. Are the dragons subservient?"

That drew a lot of surprised looks. Ash jotted something else down in his journal. "That's a no. This...uhhh what was the name?" He flipped through his journal a couple of pages. "Ahhh. Exardescere, is he a problem to the stability of the realm? Should we wipe him out as step one of ensuring the safety of Alirast?"

Riten tilted his head as he looked at Ash. Most of the gods seemed to be emanating some sort of power to peer deeper into him. To the best that Trillia could tell, they weren't having much luck.

"Do the Eternals often operate in such a manner?" Alliyah suddenly seemed more careful with her words when dealing with the serpent in front of her.

"If you are asking, if we often put down problematic mortals that would weaken the realm against the [Primordials] or eldritch, yes. That is one of our primary purposes is to safeguard mortal kind."

"Dragons and leviathans are mortals as well." Miah added.

"And? If I can kill a thousand mortals to save a million, I will. If this one dragon is going to be problematic and lead to the deaths of hundreds of thousands, we should eliminate it immediately so that it's one less thing to worry about."

"I think we're just not used to dealing with...people of your caliber, Lord Nullscale." Trillia spoke as she took her own seat at the table.

"That's a lie. The Queen is over level three thousand. If you count all the strands of her echoes, she is probably twice that. Lord..." More flipping. "Ahhh, Lord Banamaðr is pushing two thousand. They are on par with Geo and I."

Before anyone could say anything, Trillia spoke up. "Please refer to him as Lord Stas; that title doesn't sit well with him."

Ash pulled out a pencil and scribbled away. "Right. I have scouts out now surveying Alirast. If the other generals that are spoken of are on par with Queen Alliyah and Lord Stas, then you've dealt with people of my caliber before."

Stas gave a small nod to Trillia before speaking up. "It's more that we don't consider attacking the leader of a dragon clan lightly. It is not an easy battle. The dragons mostly keep to themselves; they barely fought in the Beast Wars."

"You believe that? Hmm...Hope was right, the networks of this world are woefully unprepared. Do you know how long it will be until the outer swarm hits?"

Seeing more confused looks, Ash pressed on. "The outer swarm is what we mortals will fight when the eldritch draws near. The guardian deities will fight the host, and we must survive the swarm long enough to either detach and destroy its core, or until the guardian deities can push the eldritch away."

"Sometime in the next fifty years, that'd be my guess. Lady Dawn has said we can't ascend for that long, my guess is that it's because there is a bet between her and Lord Darktone." Trillia once more spoke before the others. Most of the table had leaned back and were looking at her curiously, even Arlyss sat there with a little half smirk.

"Four years. Unless something big distracts it. Its current trajectory puts it here in four years."

Once more, the table was lost for words as they stared at the serpent man before them.

"I am not calling you a liar, but may I ask how you know?" Arlyss spoke softly as he stared into the creature's eyes.

"We looked? It's not very difficult to find an eldritch in the Aether. They always appear significantly closer than they are, and they are absurdly large creatures."

Alliyah groaned and rubbed her eyes. "Lord Nullscale. Not taking the deities into account, there are only a few thousand people on Alirast who can even glance into the Aether. Most Aetherian Mages are not capable of doing what you claim."

The more Ashkru spoke to them, the more the General seemed distraught and anxious. Trillia didn't think it was because he feared them.

"Our Lordship really does seek to drown us in endless trials... If what all of you are saying is true, I fear the Eternal Fortress may need to be more...severe in how we operate and train."

"Could you expand on that?" Alliyah's voice had lost a lot of the exhaustion and gained a much more threatening tone.

"Sure. If we have no primordial ranked deity, then most sealing magic is going to be beyond us, unless we can gather a few greater deities together to do it. That means we will need to overwhelm the beasts with mortal magic and mortal souls. The stronger the individual is, the fewer souls it takes to seal them."

"Three hundred million, in Providence Valley." As Trillia finished her sentence, it was Ash's turn to be caught off guard.

The others at the table stared at her, dumbfounded. "Three hundred million? In a single battle? Is that what you're saying?" Alliyah was in disbelief.

Ash stood and snapped his journal shut. "We should move this discussion into the control room. I'll have Hope and Geo join us. I get the distinct feeling this is going to be a long conversation."