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2024-10-29 19:42:56“Where am I?”
Mindy wandered in endless mist, aimlessly, the fog around her seemingly in harmony and one with the fog in her mind.
She came across something cute and funny. There was this big wolfcat, bigger than a horse, and it was carrying a wolfcat cub by the scruff of his neck.
Wait. I know that wolfcat. That’s Carrie. And the cub dangling awkwardly in her mouth is Vigil…
But such strange ideas faded and swirled around as Mindy giggled and stumbled in the bog. She called into the fog. “Helloooooooo!”
“Chirp!” a bird’s voice answered her from far, far away. Meanwhile, the wolfcats right in front of her wandered off to the right and completely disappeared in the mist.
“Aeyrie?” Mindy called.
“Chirp!” a big bird came flapping over, a chubby eaglet as big as Mindy herself.
“Aeyrie! You can fly!” Mindy remarked in surprise. “Oh, but then, you could already fly a bit for quite a while now. Sorry. I forgot.”
She gi
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Kingdom of the Weak 179. At the Foot of Mount Roc
“Oh, no, you don’t!” Mindy had set one foot on the mountain trail before trouble came by to stop her. Darian was there, with the red crystal firmly grasped in one hand, a fireball taking form in the other. “Back off, Mindy. Stop this search already. The Source of Magic is evil. You can’t use it.” “That’s only what Doom tells you. Have you even seen it? Do you even know what it is, yourself?” Mindy shot back. “We can’t give up! We have a chance to stop the war before it happens, save countless lives… and we’ve already come this far! We can’t stop now!” “The war has already begun. Haven’t you heard? Even I’ve heard of it, and I’m basically a hermit’s apprentice.” Darian informed her. “It’s already too late to stop the war.” “It’s… already started?!” Mindy gasped. “Then we have to stop it! We have to find the Source and tell them they don’t need to fight any more…” “What makes you think that the Source would be of any help in ending the w
Kingdom of the Weak 180. Beyond Mount Roc
When Mindy opened her eyes, she had a dinner of grilled fish already waiting for her. Seriously, that was the first thing she noticed. It smelled delicious and she was hungry. How long had it been since she ate? It felt like a whole day. Glancing up at the sky, Mindy figured that most of the day had in fact already passed… She sat up, looked around for the food… and then her head spun. “Ugh…” Mindy shut her eyes tight. Pain throbbed. “My head…” “Yeah, Ivan tells us that you and that boy went head-to-head in a literal sense.” Father Petrov came over with grilled fish-on-a-stick. “Here.” “He’s still here…?” Mindy took the fish, took a bite, and glanced around. “Tied to that tree.” Father Petrov pointed. There he was, lying on his side, his hands bound behind his back with a few feet of rope leading to the tree. Darian wasn’t the only one tied to it. Vigil was too. They were both currently asleep, the wolfcat cub serving a
Kingdom of the Weak 181. Chirpy (1)
Aeyrie had to drop her visit to her Gramps and rush to Mindy’s aid. Since it was urgent, she had to ask her Gramps to help her get there faster. [That area is the territory of the Flame Emperor. I shouldn’t enter uninvited.] the Roc King hesitated. [Gramps! My friend is in danger! She needs me!] Aeyrie was half-frantic. [Fine. I will take you there… but I will not linger.] the great Roc decided. So it was that Aeyrie was rushed over, in mere minutes covering the distance the expedition took a day to sneak through. She was unceremoniously dropped off in mid-air and left to her own wings as her Gramps casually returned as if his intrusion upon the Flame Emperor’s domain was nothing more than a slip of the wind and the wing… Aeyrie meanwhile found Mindy in a queer sort of sneaking tug-of-war with Darian, a rope, a wolfcat cub, and a tree. [Uh… should I come back later?] Aeyrie asked, undecided. [HELP!!] Mindy struggled. [He’s tryi
Kingdom of the Weak 182. Chirpy (2)
For quite a while now, Mindy had speculated about what it would be like when she finally explored the deep Wildlands. She imagined a great expedition, hundreds of adventurers, Remian and Tim and George at her side, and a whole fleet of airships at her command… Well, since seeing the Roc King, Mindy began to realize that bringing an airship or ten would have been a very bad idea. That one bird alone could easily have wiped out her entire fleet before breakfast and still need more exercise to work up a sweat. Roc aside, just the dragons at Dragon Lake were enough to ensure a fleet of airships never got past them. Har’es-dras proved that easily enough. But even so…! Compared with her dreams and expectations, this reality was just... Mindy shook her head and shook off that train of thoughts before she rode it right into the pits of despair. With a fluffy red chick in one hand and a compass in the other, she sneaked her way through every bit of tree cover she coul
Kingdom of the Weak 183. Encountering the Source of Magic
Ten days after the expedition to the south began, three bedraggled figures emerged from the steam and smoke of the Flame Emperor’s domain. One of them was limping along with the help of some makeshift crutches. One more had his arm in a sling. The third one was stumbling about in broken pieces of armor hastily cobbled together and on the verge of falling apart at any moment. Father Petrov, Professor Alexei and Sir Ivan had finally made it through the mountainous region. And before them… was a land of death. “What… what happened here?” Father Petrov stared, stunned. The land was black. Actually, more than half of it looked semi-liquid. There were blackened bones everywhere, skeletons of beasts that would take thousands of words to describe for no other reason than to increase this chapter’s word count. Suffice to say the variety was very wide, and even looking at the bones, these three men felt they had been fierce beasts. The important
Kingdom of the Weak 184. Regarding the Source of Magic
“This…” Alexei stared in disbelief. “How are we supposed to take this back with us?!” Mindy barked a low laugh. “You can’t. There’s no taking it away.” Father Petrov eyed her. “You don’t seem surprised.” “I made friends with a bird who told me about it. I just had to see it for myself. And so did you.” Mindy admitted. “So… what do we do?” Sir Ivan asked. Alexei was inspecting it. “This crack… it seems to be a leak in some sort of seal. The mana we have now is just what’s leaking out from the seal.” “Or its what came out before the seal was put in place.” Father Petrov mused. “Well, you can’t do anything with it.” Mindy shrugged. “I guess this brings our trip to its conclusion.” “Not exactly. If mana is what it takes to stop the war, then…” Father Petrov hesitated. “Then if there were a way to remove the seal, mana would pour into the world undeterred and everyone would have so much mana, we wouldn’t need to fight for crystals.” Sir Ivan said. “Something like that?” “That soun
Kingdom of the Weak 185. The Burning South
FWOOM! The land had turned to fire. Black smoke covered the skies. Sir Ivan was running with Father Petrov dangling over his shoulder. He must have been using some sort of emergency speed boost technique; they covered ground much, much faster than Petrov dared to hope, faster than had ever seen him run before in his life. But it wasn’t fast enough. In no time, the conflagration caught up to the pair. "Light!" Father Petrov summoned a protective cloak around both of them just a moment too late to avoid harm entirely, but in time to save them from anything worse than blisters by the fires that instantly spread through the entire death zone. Still, he urged Ivan. “Go! It won’t hold for long!” Also, there was another problem. While they were protected from the heat, that sort of protection allowed air through so that people could breathe and talk and all that good stuff. In other words… it didn’t keep out the smoke. Father Petrov only mana
Kingdom of the Weak 186. Survivors
Twelve days had passed after the expedition began. George was looking over some new design drawings for Kara-Goth, designs for shafts sporting mirrors and windows capped by glass domes for streaming sunlight in from the top of the hill, proper airship docking facilities atop Kara-02 rather than barebones mooring atop the clear space of Kara-01, massive balconies with glass sliding door access to the outside of the higher floors of the hill... Those designs came from a professional architect based in Ecclesia who had been called upon by Sir Ivan’s wife. Using them would certainly improve the quality of life in Kara-Goth. They looked downright luxurious. The problem was security. A fierce Beast Wave from flying Wilds, like the Eagle Lord’s, and they’d be hard pressed to defend the place. “I like the sunlight shafts idea, but those clear domes on top have to be made with some tough transparent material, like hardened decaquartz.” George told Sir Ivan’s wife. “We can cer
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523. Comms
Somewhere along the line, he’d lost consciousness. George only realized it when he woke up to a splitting headache. “Ow.” He groaned. “What... where...?” “We’re on the way back to Sorrel.” Grace told him, appearing by his bedside. And it was a bedside, he realized. He seemed to be in the Kara’s Medical Bay. “I’m sorry. We had to retreat.” “Our... people?” George managed. “The HAC Troopers made it back. The Mechs... did not.” Grace paused. “We have the refugees though. And the Robotic Assembly Plant for Mining Drones. That’s all they managed to grab.” George slurred. “Mech pilots?” “Alive, if battered.” “Good. Alive is good.” George sighed. “This... didn’t go so well.” “Hey, at least we got the guys we were trying to save, and some machinery on top of that. You might say it was a success. A costly one, but a success.” “Casualties?” George asked. “Plenty of injuries to go around, but no deaths. So far.” Grace paused. “Some of the really badly injured might change that before lo
- Kingdom of the Weak
522. Second Aid Mission
“Were these really the best you could do?” George asked, eyeing the six hulking figures in front of him hesitantly. “Mmm.” Juni grunted. In front of them were six brand new Mechs. 2nd Generation products, they were armored weapons platforms on legs, with jumpjets for the signature ‘jumps’ that earned their generation the nickname, ‘Jumpers’. Or were they? George wasn’t entirely sure. When he looked at them, they really looked more like 1st Generation Walker-types. Those Jump Jets seemed to be an afterthought, an added equipment haphazardly strapped to their backs. “Would they really work right?” Juni shrugged. Given the time and materials he had to work with, George supposed he couldn’t expect better. He had only just received 2nd Gen tech. Until now, he’d been working with 1st Gen expectations and schematics. One of these Mechs seemed a bit worn, evidence that it had been built quite some time ago, and only recently been modified for George’s requests. “Fusion Cell for power, Pu
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521. Next Step
It turned out that they also needed to acquire salvage rights to haul away ‘scrap metal’. Fortunately, that was a simple affair now that they had local currency. 50 USD and the matter was done. Grant, being the nearest specialist on matters of scrap to their location, graciously offered to transport their ‘scrap’ directly to their vessel out of sheer goodwill. Finally Benny and Sam went to try out the barbecued skewers. At Grant’s recommendation, though, they didn’t go to the Starport roadside stall. They ended up at another roadside stall run by a ‘foreign refugee’ someplace downtown not too far from Grant’s workshop. There, each skewer was loaded with rows of thick, juicy beef sausages, and only cost 20 USD for 10. Benny stretched. “Not bad for our first day. We’ve got three days here, don’t we? But we’ve already got half of what we wanted.” “What’s the other half?” Sam asked. “Technical manuals on engineering, power and propulsion. Tech, basically.” Benny yawned. However, whe
- Kingdom of the Weak
520. Uber States Colony
“Black Fang, you are cleared for docking. Follow the designated path and welcome to Trifer, colony of the Uber States.” Benny stood on the observation deck of the Black Fang below the bridge, listening to the conversation between the comms officer and the dock authorities. He eyed the massive sprawl of structures and smoke emitted below and wondered. “This is what they call a ‘small’ colony?” The colony was bigger than Craggy Falls, Kara-Goth and Nightshade City put together. “Just how many people live here?” Benny asked next. “According to our sensors, about half a million.” The bridge crew told him. Okay, that was less than the human population of the Sorrelian Migration, which, after including the Cumin survivors, was over 800,000. They shared the sensor feed with Benny, Sam and Foxy. Looking at the scope, Benny realized that most of the colony below consisted of machinery and robots. Furthermore, what he saw on the surface wasn’t even half the colony. The entire complex went
- Kingdom of the Weak
519. Scoop
That evening, Benny and Sam left with Tim’s battle group, headed for the nearest Uber States outpost with medicine in the cargo holds. This left only one freight galleon to ferry materials and regretful space miners from the surface to Sky Haven. “It’s going too slow.” Remian decided. “I need to call Raven.” With Mindy busy trading across star systems, Raven had inherited (bought over) her airship fleet and company on the surface. They built more gunships and scout ships than freighters these days, mainly focused on providing recon and fire support to ground forces fighting Undead. But it was those freighters Remian needed now, the bigger the better. “We need them refitted for extreme high altitudes, as high as they can go.” Remian explained. “Also we need them spaceworthy, at least up to low orbit.” “You want our airship freighters to fly into space?!” Raven spluttered. “Yes, but not on their own. I want them to haul cargo and passengers as high up as they can. Around 30km woul
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518. We should call Remian
“Relax, I’m not asking you to build them from scratch. You’ll need to remodel a Galleon and a trio of our current Dropships. We do want proper Mech Carriers in the future, but for now, we need to deploy urgently, so we’ll just remodel what we have.” Ermine brought up some projections. “The Mechs in question are going to be Light Walkers, designed and built by J-Armory. Juni’s had a workable prototype for a long time, but it’s never been needed until now. Live testing is scheduled to start in three days. They’re powered by Fusion Cells, the kind that looks like dustbins, so you won’t need to worry about fuel lines, just cell-swapping. You won’t need to worry about replacing the He3 in the Fusion Cells either; spent cells will be sent back to J-Armory for recycling or refueling or whatever it is they do. Same goes for the weapons; Jamie’s J-Arsenal will handle maintenance and replacement and all that. The ship only needs to carry the Mechs, deploy them, and run basic maintenance. Repai
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517. Objectives and Objections
They met online the next day. Remian opted out, letting them handle it. Upon bringing up the subject of the Woofers’ request for more aid across different planets… Ermine snorted. “I refuse.” “What?” George stared. “I refuse to help them.” Ermine said stoutly. “I know that you guys all have some sort of savior syndrome, and it’s something that Remian seemed to have passed down from the very beginning, the sort of meddlesome hero complex that has you all trying to save the world at personal cost, but I’m no hero. I’m Tau, and we’re practical survivalists. We simply can’t afford to go around saving everybody. We need all our strength and resources to save ourselves. As for the Woofers, as a collective, they are a Class 5 Star Civilization, a whole class more advanced and stronger than us. They have their own governments and their own fleets. Let the Woofers help the Woofers.” Xiao Yan cut in. “As you say, they are a Class 5 Star Civilization. Since you’re talking about praticality, t
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516. Changing Gear
“Go, go, go!” green light flared in the bay of the Dropship as the floor fell away. George and twelve other figures were unceremoniously dumped on the ground nine feet below. They landed with heavy impacts. George staggered, realizing the gravity on this world was at least twice what he was accumstomed to back home. For a moment, he regretted leaving his Frame back on the ship, but they were here to clear the bandits out from a city center, meaning tight spaces, narrow access points, and needing to take care to avoid civilian casualties. Or at least, that was the plan. George and his squad had been deposited on the outskirts of the city, at the very border of a suburban district. “Incoming!” someone yelled. George crouched as something exploded; the ground shook and chunks of dirt flew through the air. “Get to cover! Return fire!” George called, even though he wasn’t entirely sure where the attackers were, exactly. The guys diving behind nearby garages and a public toilet clued hi
- Kingdom of the Weak
514. Out there
Quite predictably, the first of those calls to reach Sorrel II was from their dear friends, the Woofers. Three Paws explained it. [This is from Kelso III. It’s an agrarian world, roughly eighty hours’ flight from here for our fleet. Local gang bosses have titled themselves warlords and suppressed the citizenry with brute force. They take whatever they want, and demand whatever payment they like, on pain of death or torture. Local law enforcement has been completely overrun and even planetary militia couldn’t save the settlements under their control. The best our local paws could do is contain the situation and prevent it from getting worse.] Remian sipped hot coffee. Eighty hours flight for the Woofers Fleet should mean a bit less than seventy for the Tau fleet. “That’s rough. But what’s the point of calling us here to tell us this?” [We can help them. Just one division of your fleet could make a huge difference against these local gangs.] At the moment, the Sorrelian fleet consist
