Nero Walker, Book 3 Ch.85 (200) (Patreon)

It had taken some careful maneuvering, but King Oliver Oglivarch’s entire day was free. What meetings he couldn’t reschedule, he’d arranged to be canceled by the party he would have been meeting. Simple plots, all of them, but amusing nonetheless. Lately, all too often, events hadn’t quite progressed in the manner he thought they would. So, it was nice to play some simple games that played out as expected.

He was currently on the highest floor of his tower, spending some time in meditation. As usual, he sat hovering above the floor, cross-legged with his eyes closed, utterly and completely still. If it weren’t for his clothes billowing in the harsh wind, one would think he was a statue. He was the very picture of serenity. Yet, despite how he appeared, his mind and soul were anything but tranquil.

His presence stretched itself out through the ether across the horizon. His incredibly high level, along with his ‘observation’ pillar, allowed him to watch over his entire kingdom. All it took was a little effort, and some time away from distractions.

One of the situations he was checking in on was the recent upheaval going on in the Kuchali Kingdom. Or more accurately, how his cities were dealing with it. From what he could tell, the increased raiding along the coast was a result of an internal civil war between the kingdom’s islands. It was disappointing that despite all the trade going on, his cities still hadn’t figured out what was happening. Hopefully, the situation would resolve itself without him having to step in.

He was also swiftly addressing the paperwork he was constantly being inundated with. Through his direct connection to several Though Hubs, he was able to bypass privacy protections, process vast amounts of data, and maintain the all-knowing mystique he’d become known for. While he could pay attention to almost everything in the city, abusing the systems he had in place was much easier.

Several other parts of his mind were updating him on other situations he needed to be aware of. One was checking in on the Centaur situation. Others were updating him on the various noble wars going on in Blaskentor, Eatornis, Lannis, and Restorbach. One was even watching his wife and their consorts so he could take their ‘help’ into consideration when furthering his plans with the Tower of Fate.

He, along with almost everyone else, knew that they were the ones actually running the kingdom, but he still found it annoying how they constantly took over his personal projects. Where he would have preferred subtlety and guile, they tended to be very direct. He wasn’t surprised, as his queen was their leader, and she was anything but subtle. A trait that was obvious when he looked at their progress with his plans to dismantle the Tower of Fate.

In many ways, it was annoying how good they were at what they did. Already his statistical model concerning the gradual weakening of the Tower influence was months ahead of schedule. And if the current trend continued, his clever manipulations in Dorchester would end up being completely pointless. But, considering there was nothing he could do about it, he simply watched it happen and tried his best to adapt. They really did take all the fun out of his games.

While all that was happening in the back of his mind, the central portion of his consciousness was watching the conflict between the exiled Mountain Lord of Nemoria and the city’s current hero, Jancy O’Breen. This one he wanted to watch in real time, rather than look into the ethereal streams to learn what happened. Observing things currently happening felt infinitely more real than when he just absorbed the information from the ether. As for this particular moment in time, he’d been looking forward to it for a while, and he was excited to see the situation resolve itself. The story between them was a good one, and he wanted to see how it would end.

Unfortunately, right as Jancy O’Breen and her party kicked in the Mountain Lord’s throne room door, his consciousness was distracted by someone coming up the stairs in his tower. He could sense that they were hiding themselves under a powerful illusion, bypassing the checkpoints and hurrying up the stairs.

Frowning in annoyance, he switched out his main perspective for one of his mental subprocesses. Although his iron will was enough to stop him from audibly cursing, he still felt like chastising whoever it was that was trying and failing to sneak up on him. Of course, that feeling only lasted about a moment, as he immediately broke through their illusionary protections and recognized who was coming.

Sighing in acceptance that he wouldn’t get to enjoy seeing his efforts to subvert another prophecy come to fruition, he braced himself for what he expected to be another ‘conversation’ about him keeping unnecessary secrets. ‘Why can’t my wife and her… I mean MY hells be damned harem just let me plot in peace,’ he complained to himself in frustration.

The floor opened and his consort, Lydia, shimmered into reality as she let go of the illusion she had been projecting. He watched as she waved her hand to stabilize the wind, before fixing her hair with another practiced gesture.

Before he could greet her, she pointedly asked, “How do you want me to handle the dwarven embassy’s request?”

The king kept his face blank of any emotion, while internally scrambling to determine what she was talking about. He swiftly went through the records of the recent meeting between the dwarves and his representatives, before finding what he was looking for in the pre-approved treaty they had surprisingly already submitted.

Slightly widening his eyes in shock, he quickly read through what they had decided on. His emotional control nearly slipped when he saw that they had accepted the agreement with minimal changes, none of which he be reasonably contested. Not only that, they had already chosen the companion city they’d be building near. Out of the list of 38 cities he’d offered, each with mountainous regions nearby and various levels of development, it was both alarming and expected that they had indeed chosen Dorchester.

However, the problem was that the city wasn’t nearly ready yet. The density shift had barely begun, and it was currently still at war with the kobalds. None of his projections had predicted the dwarves would make their choice this quickly. He’d carefully planned how the negotiations would go, and this was skipping too many steps for his liking.

‘Why… Or better yet, HOW did this happen?’ he wondered.

When he’d first charted this plan, the dwarves would have chosen Dorchester only after it had been abandoned. The density shift should have cleared the citizenry with beast wave after beast wave, which would have flattened everything and allowed him to rebuild the city for its new purpose. The dwarves would then have a prime high essence density surface to trade with. And when the kobalds were ‘discovered’, the dwarves’ choice would be practically forced by circumstance. They were a culture that reveled in fighting after all. Furthermore, by having them join in the battles with the returning citizens coming back after the evacuation, the bonds they built would redefine the region. Dorchester massive mountain mines would be taken over by the dwarves, and cooperative trade would built into the foundations of the political landscape during Dorchester’s reconstruction.

Yet, the plan had been altered considerably, not to mention expanded

First, he had moved up the timetable considerably as the predicted density shift had started earlier than expected. The Populator's enthusiastic destruction of the traitorous house Dorchen had seen to that. Also, due to the expected Noble War becoming exposed along with the aggressor's crimes becoming public knowledge, he’d had to compensate for the city’s ruling family not being replaced. Since the city’s army hadn’t suffered the losses he’d expected, he had to take into account that the city’s nobility would choose to ride out the density shift, but again, he’d compensated for that.

He’d even compensated for the kobalds being discovered earlier than expected. It was a simple logical deduction to assume they’d evacuate their citizens into the ancient mountain city they’d abandoned. Thereby finding the kobalds, and pre-emptively starting the predicted war.

All of that was already taken into account and incorporated into his projection models. So, why did the dwarves not wait the expected two years before making their decision?

‘Unless…?’ he thought to himself with some trepidation.

Hurriedly going back through the paperwork, he felt like groaning when he found the cause of the expected deviation from the plan. Someone had updated the profile packets to link with real-time data from the cities being offered for the dwarven embassy’s consideration. The carefully determined profiles he had prepared for the dwarves to see had been replaced with references to the city records authority. While it made for more efficient and elegant paperwork, it was NOT what he had intended for them to see.

As he was so focused on the plan to destabilize the Tower of Fate with the survival of Dorchester, he’d forgotten the part it played in his plans with the dwarves. He’d mistakenly forgotten to take into account the first principle of predicted analysis: ‘Every reaction results from an initial action’.

Internally groaning, he quickly updated the models he had been using on the private Thought Hub he had hidden away at the bottom of his personal tower. Barely stopping himself from frowning at the results, he realized he was out of time.

After five seconds of silence, he couldn’t stall for any longer without making it obvious. It was inconceivable to him to allow his consort’s faith in him to be shaken.

The words of the great philosopher Merrick Bellamy came to mind. ‘While a person’s identity is the result of self-determination, how a person is perceived by the world around them is determined by their actions.’ Or, as his father put it, ‘You can be whoever you want. A scholar, a warrior, a merchant, even a priest. But, if you want to be king, then the first thing you have to do is start acting like one.’

Instead of directly answering Lydia’s question, he replied, “The decision tree I developed for the negotiation still applies. You need to simply skip ahead to section 289 subsection 12. It’s the protocol for if the kobalds had initiated the war earlier than expected. The only alteration would be that you’re to coordinate with Dorchester’s leadership council while they are still in their city. I’ll take care of everything else.”

Nodding in relief, Lydia’s eyes darted around as she accessed her link. While looking through her personal notes, she replied, “Right. Of course. Good. Now that I’m looking at it, I see what you mean.” Without another word, she turned around and walked off to go deal with the unforeseen situation. Over her shoulder, she said, “Enjoy the rest of your day off, dear.”

The king watched her walk away, struggling to maintain his composure. When she finally closed off the entrance behind her, he couldn’t stop himself from audibly harumphing.

Turning away, he looked out over the city. He closed off several sections of his mind that were reporting to him on what was happening in his kingdom. As his core consciousness grew, he let himself get lost in his thoughts.

He was both annoyed and amused at the situation he found himself in. He couldn’t remember the last time a game had given him such trouble. The feeling of being continually caught off guard was both aggravating and more than a little exciting.

Relaxing his self-control, he felt a wide smile stretch across his face. ‘I haven’t felt this alive in centuries,’ he thought to himself, having completely forgotten about the various events he’d been watching.

—--

Nero was grinning like a madman as he continued firing his spells into the air. It had taken some time, but he now had his spell form hovering over his head like a crown. ‘No more shooting myself in the face,’ he thought to himself with a grin. While successful, his experiments had resulted in a few mistakes… alright more than a few. But, that was all behind him now. His turret was in place, and there was a solid stream of essence connecting it to his essence field.

Luckily, he managed to keep himself from laughing in joy at his achievement. The last he needed was to be labeled a lunatic by his ironically named wackos. With the kobald corpses underfoot, and the sounds of combat going on all around him, he knew this wasn’t the right place for levity.

Glancing over to the wacko he’d been fighting alongside, he couldn’t help but feel proud when he noticed the impressed look on the man’s face. Trying to remember, he thought to himself, ‘I think his name is Glen… or maybe Bill.’

Pausing the influx of essence to his ‘fireball’ spell form, Nero reached out through his essence field and destroyed another mud wall. It was tricky, but he managed to hold on to the condensed essence he’d collected, the spell form, and the mental probe he was using, all while keeping enough of his mind clear to pay attention to what his body was doing. There wasn’t much to see with his eyes while inside the formation, but he still needed to keep his feet under him to avoid being trampled.

As the seconds stretched into minutes, the battle progressed, and Nero watched as the melee fighters pushed closer and closer to the kobald’s tower. The fighting got more and more chaotic, and he could see some of the front-line fighters beginning to take injuries. Glancing blows, half-dead kobalds clawing at their heels after being put down, and an increased number of the larger kobalds made it obvious to him that it was only a matter of time until someone ended up dying.

So, it didn’t come as much of a surprise when he noticed a pair of wackos stumbling through the lines, looking to meet up with the healers in the back. The grin Nero didn’t know he was still wearing faded as he watched a woman prop up a man with his arm over her shoulder. He could see a vicious wound on her leg bleeding heavily while the man was trying and failing to stop his guts from spilling out.

Nero recognized both of them from the interviews he’d held. The woman was named Nora… something, and the guy was Oscar something or another. Both of them had caught his eye due to their histories.

Nora was a mother whose kids had already left home. Fed up with her life, she was looking to try and earn a few levels to stave off the age creep she felt breathing down her neck. He remembered noticing the regret in her voice when she talked about her wasted life and the subtle sense of hope she had when speaking about the future. If he recalled correctly, she was over seventy despite looking in her late thirties. But looking over thirty was proof enough that she was failing to level fast enough to stay young.

Oscar on the other hand reminded Nero of himself a bit. He was in his late twenties and had been kicked out of school or something. No, it was a preparatory academy for the military maybe? Either way, the guy had a problem with authority, and Nero could respect that. To Nero, hearing the guy’s story was like listening to any number of college dropouts he’d interviewed for sales positions at the store he used to work at. The wounded sense of pride he had was obvious to Nero.

Moving carefully to avoid interfering with the casters maintaining the shield, Nero made his way over to where the two wounded wackos would appear. Through his essence field, he kept track of them, marveling at their strength of will while they tried to make it to the healers before collapsing.

‘Damn. These sons of bitches are all heart. Rudy would be proud,’ he thought to himself with respect.

Slipping through the formation, he got to them just in time to catch Oscar as Nora collapsed. Despite how gruesome Oscar's wound was, Nora’s leg wound had caused her to bleed out.

“Just try and keep it together for a second. I got ya, man,” Nero said to Oscar encouragingly while helping him to his knees.

Noting Oscar’s nod, Nero awkwardly left the pale-faced man and approached Nora’s body. She had fallen face first into a kobald body. Grabbing her shoulder, he flipped her over as the surrounding troops moved on while doing their best to give him space.

Having forgotten to recover the center he’d injected into the ‘fireball’ spell he’d dismissed, Nero grimaced at the fact his reserves were below 70%. Taking a moment to collect himself, Nero closed his eyes and said to himself, ‘Focus asshole! Staying centered is more than a state of mind in this world.’

Opening his eyes, he placed his hands on Nora’s stomach and cast the resuscitation spell. He felt the spell form snap together, but the spell seemed to be fighting him. The essence was moving in response to his needs, but it was too slow for his liking. It was like it wanted to help, but was too busy at the moment. Growling in annoyance, he remembered that he was currently fighting the entirety of the army’s combined essence field for control of the ether.

He quickly tried to locate the input nodes of the spell so he could connect to his personal reservoir of essence he’d collected. The seconds stretched as he found more and more inputs requiring essence streams he didn’t recognize. ‘This isn’t working,’ he thought grimly. He either needed to get far enough away from the battle, or he needed to use more center in his spell. But, neither option was practical at the moment.

‘Fuck it,’ he said to himself before reaching out to the free-floating potential in the air. Firming up his spell form with the soul remnants in the ether, Nero felt the spell form start sucking in the surrounding essence like a fat kid hoovering a milkshake.

The moment the spell was completed, he felt his access to Nora’s inner world open. Just like before, there was an empty void with an invisible tether leading off into the distance. He’d gotten to her quickly, and he could see the tether was still thick enough to be called a cable. With his access to the potential in the ether, he didn’t hold back and flooded the tether with his presence. He felt like he was converting the soul stuff directly into his personal brand of essence, his center.

He felt her soul snap back into her body. For just a moment, his presence lingered. Considering how much Nero-infused essence he’d used, he felt like he dwarfed her despite it being her body. Smiling down at her, he was happy to see her filling out her soul space while looking up at him in thanks.

Retreating back into his own mind, he left her after giving her a gentle pat on the back. It all happened so quickly, that he was barely aware of what he’d done.

The moment he opened his eyes, he watched her gasp awake. Like someone coming out of a nightmare, she shot up and grabbed him in a hug. Awkwardly patting her back, he said, “It’s all right now. You’re safe. Let’s get you up and back into the fight. You’ve got some more kobalds to kill if you want. Otherwise, just head to the back and get yourself together, Nora.”

Nero felt her let go enough to look him in the eye while still gripping his shoulders in a death grip. She looked him directly in the eyes with tears streaming down her face, and said, “I saw you, my lord. You brought me back from the void. I’ve been resuscitated three times in my life, but I’ve never felt anything like that. You’re presence shines in the ether like a beacon. Thank you… Thank you…”

As she collapsed into him, he again patted her back. “OK. That’s enough now, I’ve got to go heal Oscar. Let’s see if we can hold off on him having to see my ‘soul beacon’,” he said, trying to cheer her up with some humor.

“Of course, my lord!” she said, while shoving him away like he’d burned her.

Chuckling, he turned around and started healing the man clinging to life beside him. Not even bothering to try and connect his spell forms to his collected essence, Nero just flooded the spell form with the soul stuff from the ether. It wasn’t like there was a shortage of dead kobalds, so he figured it wouldn’t be a problem.

The abnormally powerful spells healed Oscar up startlingly fast. And in no time at all Oscar was back on his feet. Weirdly, Nero noticed that his center was back to full. Rather than contemplate the implications, he did what he did best and ignored it.

Standing up, Nero grinned at the two wackos he’d saved. “Like I told Nora here, if you don’t feel up to it, feel free to head to the back. You can leave your revenge to me if you want. I plan on paying the kobald’s back for what they did to you. After all, all this started because they invaded. Moral superiority for the win, am I right?” he said jovially.

Nora and Oscar stared down at him in astonishment, not knowing what to say.

Feeling a little awkward with the silence, Nero looked around to emotionally distance himself from the situation. He immediately noticed the troops moving past them had slowed down. Looking back at them, he said, “OK. Well, like I said, do what you like. I’m off to storm the castle. Stay safe.”

Turning away, he slipped through the troops, his small frame allowing him to brush past people before they even noticed him. ‘Now I understand why kids are always described as amazing pickpockets,’ he thought to himself with a smile. It was amazing how being almost a foot shorter than most people made him almost invisible in the crowd. Well, maybe not a foot, but most of the men were over six feet, and the women were probably 5’10” on average so it was close enough.

The heights were simply weird here. There was Cathleen who was at best 5’ 6” while Captain Angelton was like 6’ 6”. Everyone was relatively good-looking, and he’d yet to see a good ‘ole fat guy. It probably had something to do with a person’s belief informing their reality. ‘Where the hell did THAT thought come from,’ he wondered.

Regardless, he was soon back with the casters. Moving down the line, he slipped back into his spot in the formation and saw that the melee fighters were trying to force their way into a 10-foot wide open hallway at the base of the kobald’s tower. Looking up at the monstrosity, he felt he should call it a building rather than a tower. Now that he was close enough, he could see that despite how it looked from a distance, it was more like a really tall apartment building than a tower.

More and more melee fighters were retreating to the back for healing, and the troops seemed to be cycling faster than usual. However, he didn’t see anyone in danger of dying before they got there, so he held off on tracking them down and healing them himself.

Instead, he reached out and tried to figure out how the kobalds had built something this large so quickly. Running his mental probe over the surface of the black rock, he saw exactly what he’d expected to see. The entire thing was an essence construct, just like the mud walls. But, he had absolutely no idea how they’d actually built it. The idea that something this big came from a spell just seemed ludicrous to him. But, seeing was believing.

Using his essence field to take a good look at the towering construct, he noted that despite the obvious spell-formed uniformity, it looked almost like real rock. From what he could tell, it was both obviously not real, and also more real than anything else he could see. While he could destroy reality with a spell, he doubted he could do ANYTHING to the construct. The contradicting nature of the building in front of him was making his head hurt just by looking at it.

No matter how carefully he inspected it, he couldn’t find a weak spot. It was like one solid spell construct whose essence was so tightly packed he couldn’t find a way in.

Suddenly, he had an epiphany. They must have built this like they did the portal… by exploiting their dead. With all the soul stuff floating around, they’d built the damn thing with ‘kobald sacrifices’. Even though he knew for a fact that they weren’t actually using souls… it was still creepy as hell, not to mention gruesome to the point of being disgusting.

‘Yeah, no wonder I’ve been seeing these bastards in my nightmares,’ he thought to himself.

After shivering slightly at the memory of the kobald culture, he firmed his shoulders and put his mind toward trying to figure out how to end the bastards.