210, 2/2

There were more meetings, including a sudden meeting with Goldie about party arrangements, which led to a deep dive into housing arrangements. Erick spent all of twenty minutes sorting the rooms in the Shade Tower for the various Shades who would be coming.

He would have done more for that effort, but Zolan interrupted him with an urgent concern. Erick suspected it was an early meeting with Kirginatharp, but nope!

It was something much more directly awful.

And now, inside Erick’s office, with Zolan standing across from him, Erick sat in front of a dangerous looking letter. It had arrived via army courier, from the Sovereign Cities, handed over by a man in formal blue fatigues. The envelope itself was affixed with five official seals, each done in a different color of wax. Killtree, North Curio, South Curio, Charme, and Pearl; all the major self-named ‘Sovereign Cities’, though, in the case of this letter they acted like a republic, or something.

The letter held the same seals as the envelope, but these ones had little tassels and were covered in foil to make them stand out even more. The words on the letter were rather simple, and written with ease of comprehension in mind; there was no calligraphy here.

– –

To Erick Flatt, Wizard of Darkness, Pawn of Ar’Kendrithyst, Consort of Necromancy, Purveyor of Dark Particle Magic, Spawner of the False World Tree Yggdrasil, and Future-Killer-of-Veird.

We will be coming for you, and for the people of your Gambler’s Rest, with fire and death.

Spare most of your people your own fate.

Submit to our rule. Kill the rebels of Gambler’s Rest. Kill all the shadelings you have allowed to live. Kill all the corrupted souls you have placed into new bodies. Then, you must turn your Gate Network over to the True Rulers of Veird.

When those tasks are done, for the good of the world, for the memory of the person you might once have been, clasp yourself in chains of hardest adamantium and antirhine, and report to Charme, or Pearl, or North Curio, or South Curio, or Killtree.

Once there, you will be Sundered as a Wizard should be Sundered.

Fail to do any of our requests, and we will be forced to annihilate you in ways that you will never see coming. We will bring death to ‘Weald’, and then to Ar’Cosmos, who is yet another enemy of the world. We will fully destroy Candlepoint.

We have methods you cannot imagine.

Spare your good people, Erick Flatt, by executing those who are evil.

Do as we demand and prepare for your End, Wizard.

Otherwise, this is war.

– –

Erick had read the letter ten times in as many seconds. And then he went slower, and more methodical. Based on the look on Zolan’s face…

… Yes, this was a real letter.

… Yes, the Sovereign Cities were officially, really and truly, declaring war.

Erick looked up to Zolan. And yup, Zolan was still of the mind that this letter was real. He did not look too concerned, but that was only because he was hiding it well. Despite Erick’s vast powers, as both a dragon and a Wizard, despite Erick’s allies and magic, despite all of the power at Erick’s disposal, this here was a real declaration of war.

And despite the various levels of shitery and idiocy that characterized most citizens and especially the rulers of the Sovereign Cities, those rulers were world powers, because you had to be a world power in order to control any part of this world… Which was a bit self evident, Erick thought. But there it was.

Zolan asked, “What shall we do about this?”

Erick had managed to keep his all-consuming anger at bay until Zolan asked that question.

Some of that anger escaped him.

“The easiest solution is that I, personally, am going to murder every single person in power over there and dismantle everything that makes the Sovereign Cities ‘sovereign’. Reinstating a cooperative and better kind of government will be a pain that I cannot actually do right now, nor can I ask my overseers or the people of Candlepoint or otherwise to take up that burden, so that would be a problem that I cannot accept. And so, I will need to look to lesser solutions. Perhaps the best solution is to ask around at Gambler’s Rest for whoever wants to control that place, and then give them the Cities.” Erick said, “But I don’t really know all the people of Gambler’s Rest, and they’re all the second string revolutionaries, because the Sovereign Cities killed all the first string when they went into peace talks.

“So one thing I will not be doing is attempting peace talks, for the Cities killed the Dicers who had been attempting peace, and I will not have a repeat of the Chelation War.” Erick added, “But, I admit, that that is my anger talking. Do you have any better ideas?”

“… Those peace talks between the Dicers and the Cities failed because they didn’t use a [Zone of Peace], because every power at that meeting had a Domain and they could push back against that magic enough to kill. But that is only one thought on why that talk failed. Personally, I am rather certain that both sides chose to go into those talks without a [Zone of Peace] and oversight from Koyabez’s clergy because they were both preparing to kill the other side. The Cities just struck first.”

Erick stood up from his seat, saying, “Possibly correct. I shall go ask them about all that. Would you like to join me?”

“No, I will not. This is not because I do not want to, but because I should be seen as a softer side to you.” Zolan said, “Take Burhendurur, though. But I would say, in confidence, that this declaration of war could be a trick. If it is not a trick, then opting to murder all of the leaders of the Sovereign Cities is something that should not be done. It lets people know that you are willing to assassinate your way to victory, and then they’ll send assassins after you.”

“… Your words are heard and understood. And yet… I really want to murder all the leaders over there, all of their army, turn their weapons into slag and—” Erick stopped himself.

He breathed for a little bit, as lightning trickled out of his fingertips like crawling, skittering spider legs, leaving trails of black upon the white surface of his desk. Erick controlled his flooding anger, beating it down into submission, trying not to think about how he had sought to give Terror Peaks a chance to surrender, and how they had thrown that chance back in his face and killed over 4 million people. Maybe a lot more. Who knew how many people, exactly, had died to supply lines failing and oozes birthing in unmaintained sewer systems and monsters coming in from the plains, without armies to stop them…

Erick breathed.

Erick said, “I won’t be making the same mistake again.” He looked down to the letter as though it had personally murdered a thousand people already. “I will contain my anger until it is no longer a benefit to contain my anger.”

Zolan was terrified, but only a small part of that was about Erick.

War was not a lightly-declared thing on Veird.

Erick almost wanted to laugh at the ridiculousness of the Sovereign Cities declaring war on him, on House Benevolence and on Candlepoint. But…

War was not a lightly-declared thing on Veird. Or anywhere, really.

Erick said to him, “Ophiel will protect you.” He had an Ophiel fly down to turn tiny and rest on Zolan’s shoulder. Zolan glanced at the little guy, and the little guy, who was a single eye and a tiny pair of hummingbird wings, looked up at him. And then Ophiel plinked with magic, and he suddenly held a shield of silver spikes; an [Animadversion]. Erick said, “Please make wartime preparations and alert Ophiel if you wish for more time to make those plans. Alert Burhendurur. I need to go and pick up some people from home and… We’re probably going to have a big meeting.”

Zolan bowed, and then he turned and left.

Erick called out to the shadows of the room, “Goldie. Are you there?”

The shadows flickered, then stilled.

It was a full 15 seconds before Goldie appeared in her full black battle leathers, with her black plank of a sword hovering behind her. She took a knee, saying, “Sir!”

“Counter assassination protocols. The fucking Sovereign Cities —of all the fucking places!— have just declared war. Do what you have to do to ensure no one dies.” Erick said, “I know Mox’s people are around here, too, so enlist whoever you have to enlist.”

Goldie’s eyes pinched a little. “Uh. Yes sir! But. Uh… The Sovereign Cities?” She frowned. “Really?”

“Maybe they are no longer fond of ruling over their piles of shit, and wish to pass on from this world. I do not know at the moment, but I am going to find out.”

Goldie gave a small joyous laugh, then said, “Sir!” right before vanishing.

– – – –

Erick went to Burhendurur, first. After collecting the Overseer of Enforcement for a fast meeting, Erick’s circle of collection rapidly grew to include Aisha and Poi and Teressa. Tasar joined because she could, and soon, the news of what was happening had spread far, far outside of House Benevolence. Mephistopheles, Justine, and Slip, from Candlepoint attended the meeting, along with a few people from Weald who Erick knew of, but whom he didn’t really know beyond their names. A few people from the Stratagold embassy, the Wayfarer’s embassy, and Portal’s embassy, were also roped into attending, for the Sovereign City’s declaration affected them, as well.

Erick truly had no idea what the fuck the nobility of the Sovereign Cities were thinking, and from the small comments of others, they didn’t understand the motivation of the Sovereign Cities either.

Erick spared a second to ask Poi if his sister was fine, and Poi rapidly assured him that this was more important right now. From what Erick was picking up from the sapphirescale man, he was not lying, but he was stretching his personal truth. Which was fine.

And then Erick went and collected others for the war preparation.

The main meeting room of House Benevolence had gone unused until now. Placed right below the throne room, the main room was the second largest room in the whole House, being an amphitheater-like, United-Nations-adjacent, sort of space. It was like any sort of political debate stage. The only real difference was the large angular and stylized relief of Yggdrasil at the back of the large room, behind where the speakers would talk on their podiums.

It had taken about 30 minutes to organize this meeting, but in that short amount of time, Erick and others managed to grab about 60 people. Some outliers included a few people from Stratagold city (and not just the embassy) who Tasar had rapidly coordinated, and a few Elites from Oceanside, here on behalf of Kirginatharp. Erick had spoken briefly to the Second to Rozeta, and while Kirginatharp had been expecting to talk about Quilatalap and reprimand Erick for that foolishness (which he did a little, anyway) he had not been expecting any talk of war between House Benevolence and anyone else in the world. The Headmaster had been caught off guard, but he reoriented his complaints about Quilatalap to a more productive path; he had no idea what the fuck the Cities were doing either, and that was much more important than who Erick decided to fuck. And so, while Kirginatharp had sent a few of his Elites here to personally report back to him, he had also told Erick that he would be sending word to the Sovereign Cities, too, to try to get to the bottom of that stupidity.

Kirginatharp sent to Erick, ‘The Cities are not the best place to live in this world, but they are not deserving of annihilation.’

‘Maybe not the people, but the nobility? I think they might be exactly that deserving.’

‘… Give me some time on my end, please, Erick.’

Erick abided by that request, for now.

And anyway, the first thing Erick had decided on doing in response to this newest crisis was to talk to the refugees of Gambler’s Rest, to understand this conflict that House Benevolence had been dragged into.

Hence, the auditorium meeting.

Now that everyone was present, Erick stood at the side of the podium and cast magic as he spoke, “I’m filling the room with my newer spell, [Expandable Hasted Shelter]. As you can see, multiple casts overlap and greatly expand the range of this magic.” The entire room filled with multiple casts. “We’re going to take our time with this conversation, for the people of Gambler’s Rest are going to inform us of everything they know of their conflict.” As magic settled into the room, Erick turned to the three people who had previously been rebels. “Harridon, in the red armor, the new mayor of Gambler’s Rest. Glorida in the yellow, and working on trade concerns. And Bobbi, with the enchanted glass headgear, who I believe is working with Mox on the dungeons. They’re all pretty good with dungeoneering due to their rapid need to learn all about that, because they needed all that extra essence to force-Matriculate people, since Registrars were illegal over in the Sovereign Cities. They have a Registrar now, though, over at the Rest, and it is my understanding that Candlepoint and Weald also have registrars.

“The previous leaders of the Dicers were assassinated in an attempted peace talk with the Sovereign Cities, thus ending their rebellion. And now the Sovereign Cities have openly declared war on House Benevolence, though technically they are only targeting ‘all the evil people’, according to their letter. They want me to murder all of the former Dicers and a bunch of others before handing myself over to them for summary Sundering execution after—” Erick almost wanted to laugh. “—after I somehow ‘give them’ the Gate Network.” He forced a small smile, saying, “I’m leaning toward murdering them all and attempting to install a puppet government over there, because I know how trying peace talks with similar people went before. I will not have a repeat of Terror Peaks.” He yielded the floor to the former Dicers, saying, “If anyone has a better idea than murdering them all, let me know! That’s what this meeting is about— Oh!

“And to get this out of the way:

“I have looked into the lightning sky of Benevolence, and this right here is not even a shadow of a tangle. My two Seers of Benevolence —working title— agree that whatever this shit the Sovereign Cities is trying to pull, it probably won’t kill a whole lot of people, or it will only be killing the bad people. Or something. I don’t know.” Erick shrugged. “Futures change on the whims of the present, so… Anyway: The Dicers.”

To stunned silence, Erick stepped off the stage and went to the front row, where he sat down to the left, next to Poi.

The man in red armor, Harridon, was supremely flustered by Erick’s words. But he was also filled with a mirror of Erick’s own righteous indignation, and beaming hope. He stepped forward to the central podium, while Glorida and Bobbi followed closely. Glorida and Bobbi began casting lightwards into the air, but faltered after casting the first ones. Everyone looked to the woman in yellow and the fishbowl-head guy, as the two of them looked at their own hands, uncomprehending—

Erick spoke, “The time dilation of [Expanded Hasted Shelter] means you get one Script spell every 60 seconds; for every minute that passes in here, only one Script Second passes out there. All this really means is that we have ample time to talk, so do what you can, as you can. Feel free to learn aura control later, if you want to cast magic outside of the Script Second.”

A lot of people in the audience had no idea what the fuck Erick was talking about; ‘casting outside of the Script Second’. But Erick saw as they experimented with their own tiny spells to confirm his words; light flickered inside hands and under desks, and eyes went wide. Those people would be asking others about all of that later.

A lot of other people in the audience were slightly perturbed that Erick would even be spilling minor secrets like that. That section of people mostly included the wrought from Stratagold. The wrought of House Benevolence were unaffected by Erick’s casual release of important, yet semi-hidden information.

The people from Gambler’s Rest understood what Erick meant by his words; but the time dilation thing caught them off guard.

Glorida and Bobbi both changed tactics, with Bobbi’s clear-colored aura stretching out of his body and forming crude lightsculptures. Glorida frowned at that, but she attempted the same, using her slow, yellow aura to conjure a map in the air. It was a much worse attempt than Bobbi’s. She rapidly erased it.

Harridon, meanwhile, had been talking, “I have been asked to give an overview of the Dicers and our war effort against the nobility of the Sovereign Cities. As Wizard Flatt has said, our war ended when the nobles of the Sovereign Cities assassinated our leaders in peace talks—” Before he had spoken, he had been distracted by the severity of Erick’s own emotions, and that had caused him to falter slightly, but he caught up to himself in that moment. An endless rage began to shine through his calm voice, like a banked hearth given fuel for the fire, and stirred to life once more. “Wellwisher, our former leader, and his second, Soriila, were invited to a neutral location, outside of Killtree. The other side of that meeting was King Killtree, and King Charme, along with representatives for Queen Pearl, King Curio Sook, and King Curio Xaro. Our side had three more representatives, to make for an even meeting.

“We did not seek a [Zone of Peace] from the priests of Koyabez because it works at 75% effectiveness against Domain magics, and four people at that meeting had Domains active.

“They stayed on topic for two hours, as our demands were listened to and then modified by the nobility, and compromises were reached. After a few more hours of discussion, the war likely would have ended, and peace would have happened. We would have created a sixth Sovereign City on the coast between Killtree and Charme.

“And then, in the middle of talking about trade routes, King Charme and King Killtree decided that they had seen enough.” Harridon’s eyes flickered red as he tried to control his anger and mostly succeeded. “The both of them had been participating in the talks well enough. But for half an hour, they had gone disinterested. We didn’t know what we were looking at until they decided to stand up and kill our people. They locked down the space with Domain magic and overpowered our leaders. Killtree took Wellwisher’s head, and Charme took Sorilla’s heart. They murdered our people, and then handed out one head to each of the five Cities, along with lightsculptures of the other four. Those heads and magics are still on display at the kingdoms of the five Cities.

“That’s what they do over there. Thousands of Dicer heads are held on display in their grand mansions and palaces, as trophies of how many of our people they have killed. But not just our people. They do this for every powerful person they kill. Those heads will stay on display for a year.”

Had…

Had Erick heard that right?

Yes. He had.

Erick’s mind went blank with fury. All he could do was listen.

Harridon continued, “But the worst part were the lies.”

Like Harridon was lancing an infected wound he had never before gotten the chance to lance, Harridon ripped open his soul and bared all the evil that the Sovereign Cities had committed. He spoke of campaigns of hatred against the Dicers, with wanted posters plastered at every Adventurer’s Guild and Mage Guild and otherwise, listing crimes that they did not commit. Stories from bards in taverns. Stories yelled in town squares that were complete lies. He spoke of how the world knew the Dicers as ‘empowered by Darkness’, due to the Elemental Dice that Shade Toymaker had made, which started their whole rebellion. That initial Elemental Die story was true, but like anything that came from the Shades, it was how the magic was used that made it evil; not the magic itself.

And then Harridon spoke of truly evil acts of physical violence perpetrated by mayors and barons and guard captains against women, and men, and how all those acts of horror were shown to the world as ‘acts by the Dicers’.

It was hard to believe the depravity of the Sovereign Cities. And yet…

Erick easily believed every word out of Harridon’s mouth, for he could tell Harridon was not lying, and Erick had seen much of the squalor of the Cities himself. Main cities, with wooden slat-board houses everywhere! Unpaved roads. Stone noble mansions. The rich, high on the hills, and the poor living in the dirt, in the rain, and the mud. Jane had gotten a much more personal look at that place, long before Erick showed up and cleared out a ballooning spider horde before it descended upon Killtree. The stories Jane told painted the nobility as either complete idiots, or purposefully malicious, and it was hard to tell which one was more true.

But now, ‘purposefully malicious’ seemed to be the most correct version of events.

By the time Harridon was done talking, he had spoken of the Dicer’s entire rebellion against the Sovereign Cities and peppered that speech with specific examples of what the various cities were doing that the Dicers wanted changed. He had spoken of specific battles fought against conscripted soldiers, who were only there because that was the only way they could Matriculate and pull themselves out of the mud. He had spoken of assassinations attempted in order to circumvent the need for a war. Behind him, Glorida and Bobbi had conjured tens of images of maps, and horrors taken from memory, and examples of why the Sovereign Cities needed to end.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“— and why,” Harridon ended with, “You cannot trust them to honor a peace treaty, or to even come to a peace talk honestly. You can only end them, as we tried to do, and yet failed.”

A few people in the audience were fired up and ready for a war that was worth fighting, for all the right reasons. One of those people was Erick. Others included Teressa, and Kiri, and all the other Dicers in the audience, and all the Elites from Oceanside, and most of the people from Ar’Cosmos. The people from Ar’Cosmos was a weird addition, but Erick noticed that bloodlust in their eyes, for sure.

Others were more worried. That seemed to be the normal reaction.

Erick stood up, in the silence following Harridon’s speech. All eyes turned to him, as he said, “So I’m ready to kill them all.” He looked upon the suddenly worried, relieved, and resigned faces of the people of the Greater Candlepoint Area, asking, “But will someone speak for some lesser solution? Anyone at all? Multiple people are welcomed to speak to all of us here, and to start a dialogue. I will attempt peace if it is the best solution decided here, and then accepted by me.”

As though people had spoken outside of Erick’s Sight, which they had, a few eyes glanced toward one person in particular.

And Zolan stood up, saying, “I would speak for something smaller than unilateral genocide.”

Erick gestured to the podium.

Everyone watched as Zolan began walking forward.

Harridon and his people vacated the stage, looking rather joyful. They all knew that whatever Zolan was going to say would not change Erick’s mind. By the time this meeting was over, their failed revolution would reignite and sweep across the Sovereign Cities with all the wrath of a Wizard.

… Erick had some hope that Zolan could change that, though.

Erick did not want to go to war with the Sovereign Cities. He would, though, especially if they actually had threats they could back up. There were a few ways Erick considered that they could actually hurt him… But vanishingly few ways that Benevolence wouldn’t pick up on, first.

Such an attack would have to inherently be anti-prognostication, anti-Sightable, and anti… Well. Anti-magic. So lead was high on the list of possibilities. Some sort of lead dust dispersal in the air? Maybe. What… Like a thousand tons of the stuff, turned to dust, and scattered across… Yggdrasil and the Gate District and Candlepoint, and all the other Yggdrasil in every other part of the world? … Eh. Not likely.

Some sort of artifact from Ar’Kendrithyst’s Armory? Something taken from that place in the ransacking of the days following Last Shadow’s Feast? … More likely.

Something like the Amulet of Non-Presence? Fairy Moon still had that. But…