The new decade began with the budget of a century being put to use in years.
For only a short period of time would the
Imperial Optimatoi have the freedom to
act freely, to advance their own agenda rather than react to those of others. To control the flow of Spirit Stones was to be kingmaker in the Great War--and where Nascent Souls were too preoccupied to fly into the sands and dictate terms, there were always bandits, spies, and other informants to disrupt matters. The Righteous wouldn't like being beholden to outsiders, and the Demonic would like for their foes to be incapable of pressing their advantage.
So it was that the spoils of the Clan were put to use ensuring they could not be so easily taken away. New Legionnaires were recruited en-masse to replace losses from the 11 Year War, drawing from the newly seized territories and the disaffected of the Jingshen lands and funded by the fruits of the new holdings. Admittedly, many of these Legionnaires would then be put to work on resource extraction duties--but that too was an honorable task, if not a glamorous one.
Rina had her own connections by this point--a war hero and the Single Pillar King with the greatest cultivation of the small cadre that had risen in the past century, she had heard even more about the ambitions of the Clan. Volunteers from the Old Houses that could trace their descent from the days of the Conquest were being offered tremendous rewards to assist with some great project--the details of which were kept at eyes-only.
Project Amphora was the only thing her Legate rank could learn. Sealed by the
Archgetes crest and shrouded by his magic--when one also considers that the lion's share of the Jingshen plunder was being earmarked for it…
Rina shook her head, she supposed that she'd hear about it when the time was right. She had a job to take care of in the meantime.
The Blood Rage had rocked the Desert just as it did the rest of the Virtuous Flipper Region. That the Clan shrugged the worst of the effect off--with the majority of those who succumbed being those weak in the Bronze or with unsteady wills--didn't mean that no harm was done at all. There were many minor powers that were protected under the Bronze Aegis, who lacked the Clan's advantages.
Which means that until the Clan had fully determined its strategic goals, many of its best and brightest were involving themselves in damage control.
Rina sat down at the height of a great spire, a ruin from some old civilization predating the Battle Blood Cannibal Sect's rise in the Desert. Her eyes were closed and her hair unbound, clad in a great cloak, a clasp with her Legion's emblem holding it closed. Both billowed as coils of wind streamed in to her.
Janus Squad, three Foundation bandits encountered, no difficulty anticipated
Ren Squad, one dozen Condensation cultists worshipping a Scarlet Scarab Beast, risk of casualties if we engage, please advise
Rina's nose wrinkled, and she raised one hand from where it was shrouded in her cloak--it held a baton of fine Myia brass. The winds shifted, gathering inside the tool.
She opened her eyes, and brought the baton up to her lips. "Nyx Squad, reinforce Ren Squad, Yu Squad, move from reserve to take up patrol duties in Sigma Sector"
She slashed outwards. Once, twice, ripples of power bolted off into the distance as the winds of the Desert bent the knee to Rina's desire. Responses arrived moments later.
Nyx Squad, Acknowledged, one hour to arrival
Yu Squad, Acknowledged, en-route
The Silverine Bracers weren't particularly adept at front line warfare. While just as well drilled at the Three--soon to be Four--Great Formations as any other children of the
Imperial Optimatoi, at the end of the day, they were never intended as the tip of the spear, or the mailed fist that drove it.
They were what protected that fist and allowed it to plunge into the hearts of the wicked without fear of reprisal.
They had initially been trained to be adept at making decisions on the spot, operating on loose orders in relatively small squads to suppress threats. Bandits, Blood Cultists, and monsters that sought to take advantage of these dark times to slake their thirst for human flesh.
As Rina became increasingly adept with her magic however--she began to realize the potential of her Wind Aspect to improve on her Legion's design. It took no small amount of points to nag Aretaphila enough to get this little device constructed, but it served as a potent receiver and transmitter for the sound waves the Wind could carry.
From a single high point, she could coordinate patrols and assaults across hundreds of leagues, no need for runners or expensive relays. There was an expense of course--one could not walk the Single Pillar Path without having an
intimate understanding of how hungry their cultivation base was, especially as one crossed from the second stage into the third and beyond.
But it was an affordable expense, to do much good with. Ever since she began to implement the method, casualties in her Legion had sharply declined, and from time to time, she could even risk deploying them against harder targets without too great of a risk.
Maybe these long patrols lacked glory--but glory was a transient thing, rising and falling with the tides of fate.
Every soul preserved that would otherwise be snuffed out by the wicked was one more spark of potential in the world--one more chance for something wonderful to happen.
Admittedly, there was a chance for horrible things too, but that was fine, it was her job to deal with those things.
Alarm! Squad Bellum in dire need of assistance!
"Found you" Rina whispered, then pushed herself off of the lip of the spire. Her cloak flapped wildly as the Winds gathered around her.
From the tips of her hair, a transformation began to spread--the golden strands of her mane fading out, leaving nothing but a shining mass of radiant metal in its wake, brighter than silver, more regal than gold.
The
[Halo] flashed into view behind her as her descent accelerated, and the transformation expanded, the bronze tone of her skin taking on the same saintly aura. Power compounded again and again, power beyond reason replacing every flake of skin, every drop of blood, and every particle of her being with something sublime.
The power of the Fourth Step of the Single Pillar Foundation Establishment.
[The Dao Body].
She had perhaps been inspired by her gaze upon the Effigy, in the days leading up to the Eleven Year War. For when her body and Dao became one through the mysteries of the Single Pillar, she set aside the Blood of Bronze for a time, even the echoes of the Blood of Gold that she bore.
Instead, a vessel of the will, cast in god-metal and granted power beyond all but the mightiest of peers. Power enough to challenge even the firmament should it prove unjust.
This was the
[Paragon Warbody!]
The void rippled around Rina as her speed grew, the air distorting as the
[Astral Voidguard] asserts itself in full. Stepping one foot out from base reality, a dividing line between imagination and cruel truth.
She kicked off of the spire then, shattering the construct of Stone to divert her velocity. Where once she sailed down, now she soared forward, a wake of rippling space left in her wake.
She did not descend--instead, her supernal will saw her speed continue to compound. Again, and again. Where the laws of the sky would resist her, they found themselves stymied--for the Void removed Rina from their jurisdiction.
'Second only to a Nascent Soul' was the assessment when she had given her report on her capabilities. The only difference between her own flight and theirs being the need to
accelerate.
Leagues fell away--faster and faster. Speed enough to race the Sun to the horizon over time, then faster still.
It was mere minutes from the receipt of the report when Rina's awareness detected the clash of powers. A flow of power held in concert, standing against a slavering, drooling beastly maw.
Perfect.
She adjusted her posture, twisting to angle her feet
just so
And the blow that would have shattered the Bellum Hoplite was instead met by two dainty feet, shod in combat boots, and bearing the weight of a mountain behind them.
Sky shattered, sand and stone blasted apart as the kinetic force and friction held in abeyance by the Void caught up in one moment. The Bellum Hoplite was blasted backwards, dispersing back into its component soldiers as they landed like rain in the village they had been protecting.
Rina's cloak billowed backwards, her posture unchanged as she held her position against her target. Third of the Five Great Bandits, Judicious Coyote.
He bore a grimace on his face, a great bruise forming where Rina had struck him. He snarls and lashes out with the arm as Rina backflips away, landing on the opposite lip of the new impact crater where the two Legate level combattants first intersected one another.
"Really? It's barely been two minutes!" He complains, waving his arm to try and get the sting out of it. "Just can't let a man catch a break, can you?"
Rina was unamused at this. "You were approaching a training creche of the Fecundity Storks." She explains. "I think what you were planning was obvious."
"That obvious?" He rubs his forearm, where a rapidly expanding bruise was already visible. "Tch, was hoping some of the other distractions would be enough for a smash and grab."
"They're
literal children" Rina retorted, pushing her glasses up with one finger. "Not even past their third decade yet. You couldn't have believed I would let you get away with decimating them."
"Psh, the Storks have plenty at the low end, nobody's going to miss it" Coyote shrugged. "Still, the famous Rina Callista, I see the reputation of the 'Little Nascent' is well deserved." He licks his chops, and settles into a combat stance. "I wonder how much you'll be worth?"
Rina smirked, darkly. "You can't afford it." She snaps back. "Judicious Coyote, you are guilty of Blood Path practices, with at least ten thousand confirmed victims of your foul hungers." She flicked her wrist, embers of Flame igniting around her hand. "It's a shame, really--if you were really interested in survival, you should have stuck to spirit stone theft."
Coyote's face darkened. "I didn't exactly have a choice, when the skies turned red."
"There is
always a choice." Rina stated. "You succumbed to the Blood Mist--yes, but you
continued even after its influence faded"
Coyote bore his teeth. "You don't know shit princess. What was I supposed to do? Just lie down and die? Let my Dao be destroyed right as I hit the peak?"
"If you think your Dao would be destroyed because you got a little weaker? Then it was never worth anything to begin with." Rina rebutted him without a trace of pity. "You could have taken up a new identity, you could have found another way, even if it was harder. You didn't,
even,
try"
Coyote snarled, and bone-claws erupted from his fingertips. "Fuck this, I'm not going to get preached at by a Princess who's never known suffering!" His form blurs as he springs forward, closing the distance in the blink of an eye, his claws glowing red as power pumps into them.
[Bloody Coyote's Fangs!]
The power of a Core, a Dao made manifest from a full set of seven Pillars. Where Foundation Establishment relies on magical treasures and secret arts to shake the world, a Core level expert is one who has begun to touch on the power of Dao, and has begun to reap its benefits.
His claws form the projection of a starving Coyote, and a howl can be heard as he descends on the unmoving Legate.
"Honestly…" Rina sighs as the jaws extend around her. She shakes her head. "You had your chance."
The jaws snap shut--power streaming out of them as they find themselves caught within the
[Astral Voidguard]. Propelled with the strength of a Core, and empowered by a Dao that claimed that no meat between his jaws would go unclaimed.
The
[Astral Voidguard] fails, and the jaws sink shut, a diagonal angle that would have shorn her clean in half.
But the Coyote Projection's teeth shattered instead of sinking deep, god-forged metal matching against the fury of a starving beast and finding itself beyond even its hunger.
Before he had a chance to recover, Rina raised one of her hands, an open handed slap coated in golden flames crashing into Judicious Coyote's face. The weight of a mountain, dripping with volcanic magma, flung the bandit Core to the side.
"Maybe if you had fought me twenty years ago, I'd have something to fear." Rina explained as Coyote screamed, the brand on his face eating into semi-divine flesh. "I had my magic, but I couldn't stand up to a Core in a straight fight… But I'm not the same as I was twenty years ago."
Judicious Coyote, tears in his eyes, lashed out with one of his claws semi-blindly, the unfocused assault being rendered to nothing by the Void. Uncaring, unconcerned, Rina walked up to him, and crouched down, meeting the sprawled Coyote's eyes.
"So, Judicious Coyote. Keep this in mind, if you remember nothing else about this life when you reincarnate. Even if the Heavens don't care about wicked acts,
I still do, and I'm not alone in that feeling either. The price for evil always comes due in the end."
The earth shook--and yawned open, devouring Judicious Coyote, slamming shut. Rina then clapped her hands together--a shockwave filling the air as the earth before her churned violently. Licks of golden flame and sprays of steam spilling out from time to time as the elements lash out at the trapped enemy.
It takes ten minutes before the last signs of resistance fade, a small boulder of obsidian the final resting place of Judicious Coyote. Bandit Prince of the central deserts.
It was not the salvation of the desert, there were still powerful bandits lurking in the depths. Wicked men and women who lust for the wealth of others, be it through the Blood Path or more conventional wealth.
But things are a little better than they were when the day started. One less disaster that could happen upon the innocent.
It was a fine day's work for the Silverine Bracers.
