The Messiah was heavily escorted upon exiting the bullet train-like vehicle that had stopped at an underground trainyard. It was a place where transportation machines like the one they had just exited were halted, assembled, disassembled, loaded, and unloaded by different mechanical constructs that effortlessly charged, lifted, and moved goods of all kinds, though most of the cargo consisted of boxes.
For the most part these mechanical constructs were not unmanned. They were overseen by workers. Those workers belonged to several races. Humans, elves, therianthropes, and dwarves all moved among the machinery. When they saw the Messiah being escorted by so many guards, many of them stopped to watch in curiosity. For someone who had only known the Land of Men, such a sight would have been surprising, but here it appeared completely normal.
The guards escorting them belonged to the same four races. The dwarves were short but broadly built, as dwarves usually were. The humans possessed facial features that resembled those common in the eastern regions of the Land of Men, particularly the Evermere Kingdom.
The elves had jet black hair similar to that of the elves once known as the Noctil elves, though their faces were different. Instead of the typical Noctil traits, their features resembled those of the humans they worked alongside.
As for the therianthropes, they were of a single distinct kind. They appeared mostly human but carried various animal traits associated with foxes. Sometimes it was whiskers, sometimes ears, sometimes unusual eye colors, and in certain cases even full tails. Every feature traced back to the fox.
Leaving the unsettlingly futuristic trainyard behind, unsettling both by the standards of this world and the one he originally came from, they were led into a room that the Messiah realized a moment later was an elevator. It carried them upward for nearly ten minutes before the doors finally opened.
They stepped into a vast hall. The ceiling was so high that someone with the ability to fly would have had more than enough space to maneuver freely in battle. The reason became clear immediately. Along tall pillars along which were engraved a sigil made of three distinct sigils stood a long line of massive machines.
Calling them machines did not truly capture what they were. They were giant robots. Each one was a different model. Some varied only slightly while others looked completely different. The lineup resembled a museum display of ancient armor. They passed hundreds of them before reaching the people the guards had been escorting them toward.
The leader of the guards, a giant nearly three meters tall in full futuristic armor, removed his helmet. He dropped to one knee and slammed his gauntlet against his chest plate, his arm remaining parallel to his chest.
“Overlords, I have brought to you the intruders.”
The Messiah and his two followers were violently forced down to their knees. Their heads were pushed downward, slamming them to the ground.
“Pay your respect to the Iron Overlords, rulers of the Iron Continent, monarchs of all four races.”
Once the guards judged that their respect had been displayed well enough, they were allowed to raise their heads and look upon the Iron Overlords.
They stood beside what at first glance looked like an altar, perhaps one meant to honor the towering statues behind them. Yet a closer look revealed the truth. It was not an altar at all but a massive laboratory assembly table.
There were three figures before it. Each was tall, each more imposing than the last.
One of them was a therianthrope, more precisely a Vulpanthrope. Strangely, he possessed few obvious foxlike traits. Only the unnaturally bright orange color of his hair and his beastlike eyes hinted at it. Those eyes resembled the ones carved into the giant statue behind him, a statue of a female therianthrope whose fox traits were far more pronounced, with clear ears and tail. He shared only the eyes. A fox with an unnatural number of tails rested calmly on his shoulder. He was one of the three Overlords, the Vulpan Primogenitor.
The second figure was an elf. A perfect one. His appearance clearly served as the inspiration for the statue behind him. He had black hair and a strict face that seemed to look down upon everything and everyone. He was one of the three Overlords and one of the two surviving members of the Triumvirate. Patriarch of most elves on this side of the world, he was the Immortal Emperor, Chai ii Lihn.
The third man resembled the towering statue behind him just as closely. He was tall, unnaturally so. He looked like a man in his fifties, yet every dwarf on this side of the world knew the truth. This monster was at least as old as their enslavement. Those who had followed him even longer knew he was far older still. He was one of the three Overlords, one of the rulers who once formed the Triumvirate that had dominated half the Land of Men. Monarch of all men on this side of the world, and the man whose technomagia alongside Chai ii Lihn had brought the dwarven monarchs to their knees. He was the Strength Emperor, Huey.
“I expected you to return soon, but you are back even sooner than expected,” the Vulpan monarch mocked.
“Sooner than you said you would be,” added Emperor Cleon. “Can I assume things did not go as you wished, Messiah?”
The Messiah grimaced. Considering what had happened, the failure that had set them back even worse than the blow Arianna had dealt them before, he had expected such a welcome. Even so, faced with such open condescension and scorn, he could not help but frown.
“Take your time, but you better tell us how it happened.”
The Strength Emperor approached.
“Tell us how you wasted our precious angel constructs that you so brazenly stole from us, even though we told you they would not be nearly enough for whatever project you had for them.”
The giant barbarian monarch stopped in front of the Messiah.
“What was it again? Peacefully conquer the land of men through your authority by acquiring powerful vessels. Among which was… whose corpse was it again?”
“Arianna,” the Eternal Emperor reminded him.
“Right. Arianna. That is the name. It was to acquire her that you stole from us.”
“I was not able to acquire her vessel. I met unexpected developments,” he admitted.
“One which came in the form of?”
“Cleon the One and Only.”
“Cleon? Not the Seraphims?”
They all frowned at the illogicality of the claim.
“Isn’t he dead? Killed by that Arianna?”
“He is. But from his corpse an undead was made. One held in the facility we stormed. One that lashed upon me and caused the downfall of my men and your constructs,” he explained.
They exchanged a look before asking, “Who made a monarch into an undead? This cannot be the Seraphims.”
He let out a sarcastic smile.
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“You overlords hold the Seraphim in high regard. Understandably so. But the land of men is not the land it was over one thousand years ago. There are not only the Seraphims as monarchs now. There are many more powerhouses.”
“So who is responsible for the undeadification of Cleon? Creating such an undead is not a feat that can be achieved by any necromancer. It has to be someone within the same tier of power as the corpse, or a superior tier. The corpse was that of a near thousand year old monarch.”
“I suspect Arianna herself before she died or her elven ally. It was she who wanted the corpse of Cleon secured. At first I assumed it was to foil me from getting my hands on it, but now that I think of it, it makes sense. She is the kind to do that to her enemies.”
“Arianna,” the three Overlords echoed.
“The more you talk about her, the more I understand your obsession with her. But if I understand it right, you miserably failed to acquire her corpse.”
“Yes.”
“So what now?” the Strength Emperor asked.
“You willingly came back to us. I assume it is because you have something to expect from us. What is it?” the Eternal Emperor also asked.
Faced with that question, he looked at the two who accompanied him. He had come with two followers. One was Aurel, the other was Megan, two of his oldest and most loyal followers.
Then he answered.
“I have underestimated the land of men. A mistake that resulted in the loss of your precious angelic constructs,” he admitted with shame. “But it also resulted in the death of many of my loyal followers… I have come here to make amends.”
“Make amends? How?”
“To make sure you do not make the same mistake as me. Underestimating the land of men. It is a different place now. As of now they have three Seraphims far too well established as monarchs. Two emperors. They are new monarchs, but they already had preexisting backing factions that they immediately took control of the moment they ascended to the rank, so they are already established as well.”
“There are also two elven monarchs confirmed to be in the land of men. Plus from my intel, after our attack news of an imminent arrival of monarchs from Quel’thalas reached me. Among these monarchs are the elven Queen Aquaflora and the Ferron Patriarch.”
From what he knew, the elven queen was far more impressive than the latter. But for the three overlords, it was the Ferron Patriarch whose name brought the most reaction. It was a name they had long been aware of and one that had reason to antagonize them.
“The diplomatic reason for their arrival is to check on the elven Queen Theta whose citadel has been under attack. But with so many monarchs gathered in one place, the subject of discussion that is the existence of all of this is bound to be mentioned,” he said, glancing around at their mechanical constructs.
He knew they’d get exactly what he meant.
“So what?” the Therianthrope monarch sneered. “You’re saying we should fear that they collaborate together to launch an attack on us?”
“You have an emperor, two patriarchs, one of whom controls only half his main affinity’s subaffinities, a therianthrope monarch, and seven dwarven lords. Sure, you can beat them with these numbers, but not without them dealing a major blow to you.”
“You seem to be forgetting something, Messiah,” The Strength Emperor said.
“I have not. If you are talking about your technomagia, which gave you a tremendous advantage, that advantage will not last for long.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“That the secret of your art will not remain a secret for much longer.”
“Are you saying that they are trying to understand our techn—”
“Oh, they already have,” he cut in. “They even have a name for it. Scriptforging they call it.”
“Bullshit!” barked the Strength Emperor.
The reaction was unexpected, but when the Messiah considered what he knew of this monarch, he realized it was in character. The emperor had zealously gatekept the art of technomagia for himself. He was so possessive that most of the products they manufactured came with a self-destruct protocol that ensured their art could not be studied by anyone.
“This is a bluff,” said the Eternal Emperor, whose appearance remained collected even if he was clearly annoyed by the statement.
“I wish I was lying. I wish it was a bluff. But I tell the truth. For the past hundred years they have been studying your craft. They deciphered your alphabet. They…”
“Who is this ‘they’ you are talking about?”
“The Citadel of Magecraft.”
“The Citadel of Magecraft,” they echoed as they looked at each other. “This Arianna again.”
“Yes. Unfortunately.”
“And you said they deciphered our art. To what extent?”
From the way all three of them glared at him, it was clear that the answer to that question would determine whether he would be believed. After sorting the right words in his head, he explained.
“Sure, they might not in the next hundred, no, fifty years manage to advance it to the level you have reached after all these years. But as of now they have already deciphered all your elemental runes. They were experimenting on the rune of gravity when we interrupted them. As for the quintessence of your art, namely your mastery of cataclysmic detonation and your impenetrable barrier, they have already mastered the essence of it. As for how long it will take them to reach a level close to yours, I would say half a century, perhaps less, since you have already provided them with a template.”
That last sentence ignited wrath in their eyes. It was fueled by the possessiveness they felt over technomagia. To be fair, it was an art they had invented through their authority, but one they had developed on their own with their creativity into what it had become today.
“So if I understand you correctly,” the Strength Emperor said as he walked toward the Messiah, “what you suggest is that we put a stop to that. And by that you mean we march to the land of men. So by making amends you mean…”
“I meant holding my side of our initial bargain. I help you with my authority.”
As the Strength Emperor walked past him, his towering form casting a shadow, the Eternal Emperor spoke.
“You have already betrayed us once.”
“Twice, if we count the fact that you stole an ancestral tree from us.”
“You see, I do not believe in second chances. Much less in third chances,” said the Immortal Emperor.
“Me neither,” said the Strength Emperor.
He drew the sword of one of his guards and swung it effortlessly. The blade struck Aurel, who stood right next to the Messiah. The head of his loyal follower, one of his oldest companions, rolled on the ground, the gaze still very much alive for a moment before the headless corpse collapsed. He was killed just like that, like a mere peon.
“What are you—”
The strength Emperor cut him mid-sentence. “What if instead of working with you, I simply took the authority from you? A second authority, one so useful, would be in better hands, mine.”
He pointed the sword at the Messiah’s neck. His feet stood above the freshly decapitated head of Aurel, clearly taunting the messiah to use his authority to rescue the soul of his friend. He understood that with his authority time was of the essence. The longer a soul remained in a damaged vessel, the more damaged it would become.
The Messiah took a moment to gather himself, then declared, “you may kill me now, but doing so will not grant you my authority.”
“Do tell me why.”
“I have not brought it with me. I knew from the beginning that you would be tempted to kill me, so I made sure that in that instance the authority would at least be in better hands.”
“Better hands, huh.”
He glanced at Megan, who stood stiff to the side.
“Now that I think of it, your teleporting friend is not here. Is the authority with him?”
“I will not say. It might be. Perhaps it is in the hands of someone else.”
“Haha. You sure are cocky, especially for someone who just announced there is no use for me to keep him alive. At this moment I could just kill you and get her to tell me where it is.”
“She will not tell you anything.”
“Let us see if you hold the same discourse when I start tort—”
“I will say nothing,” declared the girl, cutting the monarch mid sentence, drew her fingers like a dagger, and ended her life right there and then.
At the sight of that, the monarch sneered, “you keep them on a tight leash. I will give you that,” he said as he lowered his sword.
Then he suddenly raised it again and took a swing.
In an instant the Messiah lost his left hand. As a scream escaped him, the emperor brought the blade down once more, tracing a path from the upper left side of his face to the opposite diagonal. Seething, the Messiah crumbled to his knees. His gaze, red with blood, met that of the Strength Emperor.
“I did not live this long believing that I could allow people to wrong me without suffering consequences.”
He seethed internally but kept the thought to himself. In that moment he understood that, twisted as the gesture was, this might be the emperor’s way of showing that he might consider his offer.
For now, however, the emperor had only one thing to say.
“Take him to a prison cell. Away from these corpses. Make sure he cannot heal any faster than naturally from these injuries.”
“Yes, Overlord!”
***
When the trio were left alone in the room, the Vulpan monarch turned to the two overlords.
“Grand Uncle, what are we going to do?”
“What are we going to do, huh,” the Strength Emperor echoed as he glanced at his fellow overlords. “What do you think about what he said, Charlie? Do you think it is that urgent?”
“I would say he must have exaggerated things for his own sake,” Charlie replied. “But if, as he said, they have managed to master the essence of technomagia, then it is only a matter of time. As much as it displeases me to accept his offer…”
“I see.”
The Strength Emperor looked ahead at the giant statues before them. One of himself, one of Charlie, and the last of her. The statue portrayed her far grander than she had ever been.
Then he looked at the boy. To be fair, he no longer looked like a boy, but in his eyes he still was.
“It seems that what we are going to do is this.”
“At last we will return to the land we were cast away from.”
“So you mean…”
“Yes,” he announced. “Summon the dwarven lords. Have Patriarch Hong ready our armada. We will march into the land of men.”
