Universe's End

Chapter 193: Coordination: Max. Falls: Zero.

"Nervous?"

"If I said no, would you believe me?"

"Not at all," Rory laughed, thumping Apostolos on the back, his armor ringing out from the impact.

"Well, between the two of us, part of me is shitting bricks," Apostolos sighed, before chuckling a moment later. "Stupid, I know. You're here now, we've got some upgrades since last time, and well-"

"Stop," Rory held up a finger, shaking his head. "It's only human of you to still be nervous. You nearly lost everything a year ago."

"Technically speaking, not human."

"Way to ruin the moment," Rory sighed. "Where is the rest of the team?"

"Making a few last rounds, talking to some of the new tier sixes, checking up with tier sevens, and reassuring the tier fives that they're just on standby as observer or long-range support and will have no active role in the upcoming fight."

"Honestly," Rory tapped his chin as he thought. "I'm surprised you never busted out the old railgun last year when things turned dire."

"Oh, that thing? It broke down long ago, and no one understood its mechanics. The runes weren't that complicated, but there was an insight into physical mechanics that were lacking, and without those-"

"No ability to properly direct the runes if you don't actually know what they're replicating," Rory sighed. "Yeah, makes sense. Hmm…"

"What?" Apostolos asked, noticing Rory's expression.

"Well, tier eight has always been the sort of benchmark in my head before I'd be allowed to use those old bad boys. Now that I'm on the cusp, I can honestly say…. Not really worth it. Burns up resources like an absolute animal, and once I cross tier eight, I should be able to replicate that level of firepower without using a bunch of resources."

"But?" Apostolos asked, clearly aware there was something more on his mind.

"But doesn't mean I still don't want to fuck around with once again, shits cool." Rory finally huffed, chuckling as he did.

"Idiot," Apostolos muttered, although there was mirth in his eyes as he did. "Oh, seems like the team is back."

From below, a hatch was opened as four figures clambered up into the primary watchtower, glancing at Apostolos and Rory. One figure in particular was rather fidgety, Kai Rong nervously tucking at her robes.

"How's it goin', folks?" Rory asked nonchalantly, observing their expressions. Marcie's face was lit up like a Christmas tree, a child told she could play at the biggest, best amusement park around.

Violet looked north of bored, but south of outright on edge, straddling the line between the two.

Edward, the relatively quiet man Rory had barely gotten to speak more than a few sentences to, was devoid of much emotion in general; he seemed to treat the world more like a math problem to be clinically solved.

And then there was Kai Rong, the aforementioned fidgety mess. Just by seeing her eyes shift between everyone gathered, it was apparent the woman felt overwhelmed, fighting back a hint of hero worship toward her new 'compatriots.'

"Well, people feel a hell of a lot better going into the wave this year than they did last year," Violet said. Not counting when Rory was around, Violet was generally the accepted number three on the Ehkorrus power-pecking order.

Say that ten times fast.

While she wasn't as directly powerful as Marcie, she was the closest Ehkorrus had to a battlefield commander, interacting with the regular adventurers and teams far more frequently than Apostolos. Marcie was a given; her chosen interactions with them were almost entirely limited to beatdown brawls when she was bored.

"Good to hear," Rory said with a nod.

"Instructions were relayed to keep people away from the points of interest," Edward said. "The…. Goods are in place."

Yeah, I really don't need people stumbling upon Tsarina and her mini nests that I helped her dig into the walls during a wave; they might get the wrong idea.

"The ritual sites have been quintuple-checked as you instructed," Kai Rong said, her voice hitching for a moment.

"Good," Rory said. Knowing that the Blight Khan was aware of the wave schedule, a paranoid part of Rory's mind had considered whether some sneaky saboteur-type monster could sneak in and cause internal damage. It shouldn't have been possible; the walls existed not just physically but also conceptually. Monsters couldn't simply enter Ehkorrus, but rules were made to be broken, and he could see a world where a saboteur-class monster could infiltrate and ignore those rules.

"On the matter of the Blight Khan," Apostolos said, almost as if he were reading Rory's mind. "What are the chances it mobilizes forces timed to coincide with the wave once more?"

"Doubtful," Rory said. "Unable to leave the maw itself, it should well understand that as long as I'm here, it would just be wasting troops that it needs to deal with other khans down in the Maw."

That was still a matter of interest to Rory, finding the four-way battleground that the Blight Khan was locked in against three other khans, but until he was tier eight, that would be a risky decision even for him.

"Damn," Marcie scuffed her foot on the floor of the watchtower like an annoyed child. "I wanted to have my get back for the bullshit they pulled last year. Cheap fuckers purposely waited until we tired ourselves out to hit us with their real troops. Had they come while we were fresh? Pow-" Marcie threw a punch, the speed of the strike displacing the air so that a small shockwave pulsed out. "Would have knocked them on their nasty blight asses. Right, 'Los?"

"The Blight Commander would have still been a dangerous foe, even if I were fresh," Apostolos said, trying not to feed into Marcie's delusions.

"Hah, well, now that we all have our spiffy gear upgrades?" Marcie grinned wickedly, showing off her gauntlets. "I bet I could smash that stupid commander's head in now. You could probably trounce two or three, eh?" Marcie gave Apostolos a poke in the side, which didn't get very far considering the golden armor.

"Potentially," Apostolos finally sighed. Their old gear had been rated as uncommon, except for his personal weapon. After Rory had gone done with them? They were decked out in rare-grade gear.

"I do have one question," Kai Rong said, respectfully raising her hand.

"Yeah?" Rory nodded toward the woman, still not a massive fan of the overly formal attitude she had toward him.

"The gear is amazing," Kai Rong bowed her head as if going through a ritual to prevent offense. "But I noticed that, it feels like the rate at which I gain ascension energy has… slowed."

"Well, duh," Marcie rolled her eyes. "Same reason we can't just bring in hog-tied tier six monsters for our low tiers to kill and gain easy ascension energy. E.O.N. recognizes the assistance gained from stronger gear, so you gotta kill stronger shit. I honestly think it's a blessing; it lets me punch up sooner than I would normally. Isn't that the most fun? Don't have to waste time with weaker shit."

"You might be the only one that feels that way," Violet sighed. "I'd much prefer if we could get our tier ones to jump straight to tier four or five."

"Oh," Kai Rong lowered her head once more. "I apologize for not recognizing what should have been obvious."

"Don't be," Apostolos said. "Aside from Edward there, the rest of us have firsthand experience with using gear directly made by Rory versus otherwise 'equal' gear, so we understand how drastic the difference can be. The only one who doesn't see that reduction is Rory himself, and that's because it's gear that he made himself; he isn't being 'carried' in any fashion. But if he bought gear that was better than his own to use, he'd see it as well."

"Yeah, as if that would ever happen," Rory said, rolling his eyes. "Who the hell is making better gear than me?"

In the past, as in decades past, Rory was more accepting of the idea that other artisans might be better than him, but that had changed: his pride had grown, and with it, his ego.

I blame Zoey.

Rory wasn't oblivious; he knew he'd grown more arrogant after decades in the volcanic region, but was it arrogance when it was earned?

Spoken like a humble man, Rory. The humblest alive. No one has ever been humbler than I. In fact, I'm the king of humble.

Pulling attention away from his internal jest, he saw Apostolos sigh and shake his head.

"It was just for the sake of argument. Anyway, I think we're starting to get off topic. We all ready?"

"Yeppers!" Marcie threw another punch, excited.

"Yes," Edward said plainly.

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"Our people are as ready as they can be," Violet added.

Eyes turning to Kai Rong, she wilted for a split second before a single quick breath steadied her. "Yes."

"Good, then we're-"

"Hey, that's kind rude," Rory interjected as Apostolos rolled his eyes. "You don't care about my feelings, and if I'm ready?"

Apostolos stared at him blankly for a pause, before turning to continue where he left off. "-then we're ready to get this show on the road."

Pulling an interface up for them all to see, Rory instantly recognized it as the sovereign system interface, with a new 'button' appearing: a timer and a 'ready now' button next to it.

Ooo, fancy.

Tapping it, a single horn call went out across the city.

"Alright, Violet, Edward, Marcie, Kai, head to your wall assignments. I will remain in the watchtower and act as needed."

"And I'll be twiddling my thumbs," Rory said with a snort.

Rolling his eyes once more, Apostolos addressed the other four. "Dismissed,"

Instantly, the four took off, jumping, sprinting, and hurdling obstacles as they headed to their assigned locations.

"Now that it's the two of us, want me to begin?" Rory asked.

"If you wouldn't mind," Apostolos answered.

Closing his eyes for a moment, Rory mentally locked onto the familiar signatures of the scattered ritual sites throughout Ehkorrus. Connected with the city far more intimately than anyone else could ever think of rivaling, it was as simple as pushing his intent through the pneuma flowing through the town as if it were his own for the rituals to lock onto him. Magic radiating outward, just beyond the furthest walls, pillars began to rise, emerging from the ground and floating upward until, surrounding the soon-to-be-battlefields, blood-red crystal obelisks dominated the sky.

"Looks different than my version," Apostolos noted.

"Are you surprised? I don't have an affinity for sunlight and, to a lesser extent, starlight like you. So rather than an overhang of stars, you get something more… me themed."

"I won't lie; they're imposing. Not going to help much with the 'The Lord Founder is a godling descended to guide us into the future' stuff."

"It is what it is," Rory sighed. "The solution is just to avoid people as much as I can, and then I don't have to deal with it myself."

"That… you know what, not the time for this discussion," Apostolos muttered. "And you're certain the Khan doesn't have any tricks to fuck us over this time? Not that I doubt your strength, obviously not, but you're behaving as the cornerstone of this entire thing, a living battery."

"Oh, relax, we've been over this. Just because I improved the ritual to allow for greater power transfer doesn't mean I've turned it up enough to suck my dry."

"It's just that it wore me out pretty badly last year, and I reckon I have more pneuma investment than you."

"Sure, but you're a wide hose; your output doesn't have the same pressure that my output has. That's a matter of skill and practice, not just investment."

"I'm pretty sure you used that analogy the other direction when I was young," Apostolos countered.

"Meh, analogies are like grains of rice: they're hard to keep track of, and they all look the same. My point is that while your internal reserves might be better than my own on paper, it doesn't matter if you use them ten times less efficiently."

"I'm not that inefficient." Apostolos countered, before sighing. "But alright, whatever you say," Apostolos said before pointing outward. "First arrivals."

Squinting, Rory's eyesight zoomed outward as he activated his eye skill, opening his ocular releases to another level.

"A lot of level sixty-fives through sixty-nine, maybe eighty, eighty-five percent of the collected monsters," Rory reported. "Another ten percent or so are level seventy, with the last few percent a hodge podge of monsters in the level seventy-one to seventy-two range."

"Yeah, sounds about right," Apostolos muttered. "The average level of the 'powerful' monsters should be around seventy-two now. Every three or four years, it increases by one, though it's a steady rate, so it's hard to tell the difference from one year to the next."

"Yeah, I could guess," Rory huffed. "Just because I haven't been around for most of these, doesn't mean I don't understand the general mechanics. Remember, I am the forefather of Siege Waves," Rory said proudly, before noticing Apostolos's glare.

"Yeah, yeah, get over it," Rory muttered. "You guys survived, and honestly, could Ehkorrus have grown like this with the sheer degree of rewards you receive after a siege wave?"

"No," Apostolos admitted.

"Then you can save your thanks for later," Rory laughed, purposely needling his adopted brother.

"Let's just get this over with," Apostolos sighed.

"That's the attitude," Rory said with a grin before pointing far ahead. "By the way, looks like you're needed."

Shooting out of the watchtower like a streak of sunlight, Rory watched, arms crossed.

Yeah, they've got this.

In the end, while tense, the wave was cleared without issue. The single casualty was a man who had tripped and impaled himself on his own sword, though it appeared he would survive after his team had made quick work of getting him back to safety.

The reason for the success was evident to anyone who participated: The Lord Founder.

With the red crystal obelisks floating in the sky, those who fought beneath their watchful presence were stronger, faster, and even more aware of their surroundings. On its own, it wouldn't have been enough to change the tide, but even their magic felt different, heavier, and denser.

Finally, there was the Elite Four and the Chief Protector himself. Armed with new armaments, they were like entirely new people, tearing through monsters that generally would have slowed their rampage in the past as if they were wet tissue paper.

Be it Edward and his new spear, a remaking of the Lord Founder's that allowed him to appear as if he were a one-man parade of illusions with a spear tip that would not be stopped.

Violet and her Dawn Fire power suit, blue embers coursing through vein-like channels throughout, allowing her to tap into All Monarchs Burn without completely immolating herself.

Marcie and her Ego Gauntlets, the thrill of each punch thrown etching itself into her fists, doubling up the intensity of her fighting spirit with each strike.

Or Kai Rong and her rings of devastation. No longer were they merely extensions of herself capable of only simple impacts and kinetic echoes. A ring would swing through the air, condensing and hardening the air around it until a nearly invisible saw blade of sharp air sliced through monsters like a chainsaw through a soft tree, or another ring, which, when peered through like a monocle, could lock a monster down with a temporary conceptual binding.

But most impressive of all was the Chief Protector. Some would even claim that he had unlocked the ability to take on an incorporeal form, a golden blur that could not be stopped. Every swing of his scythe, a deadly blade of sunlight, every time he pointed his finger, a beam that instantly killed several monsters at once.

When the boss of the wave appeared, an oversized flying moray eel with seven heads, the honor of facing it in battle was awarded to Kai Rong, the newest member of the Elite Four.

When the titanic clash between the newest member of the Elite Four and the boss of the wave came to an end, Kai Rong stood tall, having ended the battle with a downward-echoed strike from above, blowing a hole through its heart and ending the endless regeneration of the Hydra-Headed Eel.

As for the Lord Founder himself?

When the Chief Protector went to locate him, what he found was the legendary man, sitting cross-legged in the tower.

Playing patty cake with his alien-looking daughter.

"What?" Rory asked after a moment, eyeing Apostolos, whose mirth was only somewhat bemused by the sight in front of him. "I was keeping an eye on things, don't worry."

"Dad was paying good attention," Roxy nodded along. She'd grown taller over the last year, and her horns were somewhat more pronounced.

"I just wasn't expecting this," Apostolos said after a moment. "I would ask if it was safe to have your daughter right by the front line, but that would have been a stupid question."

"Duh, of course it wasn't safe," Rory said. "I would never recommend anyone bring their kid out here."

"But I'm with dad!" Roxy said, puffing her chest out.

"See? The kid understands," Rory laughed.

"Oh, Roxy," Apostolos shook his head. "I worry for you, if he's the person you take after."

"Rude," Rory said.

"Rude!" Roxy echoed.

"That aside," Apostolos said, doing his best to hide his smile. His older brother had been alone all his life, so to Apostolos, who was quite the family man, it warmed his heart to see Rory spending time with Roxy, even if the poor girl was likely to end up taking after him. "Wave cleared, no one died, only one major injury, and that was because someone didn't lace their boots correctly and tripped."

"So, all good?"

"All good," A new voice said, as a figure followed after Apostolos, pushing up through the hatch.

"Oh, Irene," Rory said, sounding surprised.

"I don't know what that reaction is for," Irene sighed. "You were the one who said you wanted me to come here after the wave ended, were you not?"

"I meant 'here' in the general sense," Rory said before shaking his head. "But this works."

"I take it this is the matter of the ascension energy allocation?" Apostolos said.

"Bingo," Rory responded, giving him the finger guns. "Obviously, I put trust in your allocation demands; you've all managed for six decades now."

"But this year is different, given your wall project," Irene followed up.

"While it's not like I needed either of you two here for this," Rory said, glancing between the two. "Probably better for you to see exactly what I'm doing."

Pulling up the post-wave reward interface, Rory brought up the sovereign system next to it, the floating interfaces made visible to everyone present, Roxy included.

"Now, to recount, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here," Rory pointed at several spots through the inner wall. "Have all been hollowed out. Within, small monster nests have been established, a combined effort by me and Tsarina, our newest buggy friend. Tsarina's part was to establish small hives, from which a few worker drones live, effectively dormant for now. My part was taking a few offcuts from my home, and 'planting' them within each hive. Because of their recognition as 'Ehkorrian' bug monsters, they have an affinity for the concepts that abound within Ehkorrus, namely renewal affinity. Can anyone answer me why that's important?" Rory asked.

"Ooo, ooo, me!" Roxy raised her hand.

"Roxy, go ahead," Rory said, knowing he had purposely lobbed her an easy layup.

"So that they're recognized as compatible!"

"Bingo. Now, in stage two of my plan, I helped the roots of my home grow deeper into the earth, where they are currently woven throughout the core room. Given my home predates Ehkorrus itself, this part shouldn't be a problem at all."

Tapping the interface once and sliding the ascension energy slider nearly halfway, energy shifted to his home, specifically to the roots of his house. Watching the interface adjust in real time, the visual showed the roots interweaving throughout the core room, denser and thicker, before merging, the two becoming one and the same.

"Perfect," Rory said with a smile, a round of affirmative nods from Irene and Apostolos, and even Roxy, indicating they understood and approved.

"While I can't say precisely what the result of the fusion will be, I can at least predict that we will see an evolution to our favorite overly tall tree, connecting it to the very lifeblood of Ehkorrus itself. The tree will be the heart of Ehkorrus itself. Fused to Ehkorrus itself, the other fifty percent of the rewarded energy," Rory pointed at the slider. "Can then be used on the walls once the changes to the Star Blood Sequoia take hold."

"And because you have monster dens, filled with compatible monsters and fragments of the Star Blood Sequoia in the inner wall, you'll be able to connect them all afterward," Irene said. "Yes, I do recall reading your proposition."

"I don't remember writing it down," Rory frowned.

"No, but I did, so that I could reference it later," Irene continued.

"Oh… Smart, it's like you're in charge of runnin' a city or something," Rory chuckled as Irene's eye twitched.

"So…. Are we done here?" Apostolos asked after a moment.

"Yep, for now," Rory said. "We can't allocate the other fifty percent until after the first set of changes takes place. So, until then, go, have fun or whatever, you all earned it." Rory said, genuinely meaning it.

The city of Ehkorrus had come a long way, and while from time to time it would need his help, Rory was just glad to see it take on a life of its own.

"Then, to another successful year," Irene said, raising a glass she pulled from her own organic inventory skill.

"To another successful year," Rory said, raising a brew of…. Something he'd left in his inventory for God knew how long.

"No fair, I don't have an inventory," Apostolos muttered, raising his empty hand anyway. "To another successful year."

Enjoying the moment, Rory's thoughts turned inward a moment after.

Now that this entire wave debacle has been handled and should be settled for quite some time, I can finally go back to focusing on the bigger picture.

It was time to get serious about tier eight.