The Simulacrum - Chapter 120 - Part 1 (Patreon)

Despite the very ominous super-secret conspiracy of the Celestial top brass brewing in the background, the next couple of days were fairly uneventful. While I would've liked to uproot them ASAP, there was still a lot of groundwork to be done, and I had no idea how the Narrative would react to any attempt to overthrow the three scheming faction heads. In the best-case scenario, it would've led to general chaos and a new plot development sucker-punching me in the gut for my trouble. In the worst-case scenario, it was exactly what the Narrative was angling for, and I would've been playing into its plans.

I wasn't happy with either of those possibilities, so I focused on strengthening my power base and bid my time. At this point, my life in the Elysium became a routine. Daily interrogation sessions with Mountain Girl and Jaakobah in the morning, mingling with the more agreeable segments of the Directorate in the afternoon, and then spending the evenings sharing progress reports with the girls and then tinkering in the base until morning.

Things weren't any more eventful on Critias either.

The little stunt I pulled during the big Draconic Federation meeting had the expected effects. More or less. Beyond causing an outrage, my appearance also led to a few dissenting voices to question my allegiances, but thanks to Naoren and Dad-in-law firmly standing on my side, those never got louder than a few whispered grumbles. More importantly, the diplomatic faux pas committed by the Assembly arch-mages was quickly swept under the rug in the name of 'standing united against a common foe'. That common foe was, naturally, Bel of the Abyss.

As such, the potential conflict between the two sides was currently put on hold, and if anything, it opened a few new diplomatic channels. All in all, that particular corner ended up being much tidier than expected, no small part thanks to Lord Grandpa actively lobbying for our case. He was working so hard to smooth things over, it almost made me feel bad for all those times I messed with his head. Almost.

As for our prisoner… oh, excuse me, that's pluralnow.

So, our prisoners were receiving polar opposite treatment. Our dear Sir Percival was still locked up in the secondary hideout, and while his lodgings were made a bit more accommodating due to his surface-level cooperation, he was a wily old fox, and kept his cards close to his chest, slowly drip-feeding us what he knew. Anyone could tell that he was stalling for time and trying to extend his usefulness as far as he could, and all of that while under Snowy's influence. Nevertheless, we had gained a few names and a bit of insight into the Unorthodox faction's ongoing plans for the Draconic Federation, and after Judy cross-referenced them with the Celestial Hub, now we knew on whom to keep a watchful eye in the future.

As for the other captive, her treatment was much different. Tajana Sukkal, the young spymaster of House Inanna, was under house arrest in my home, constantly watched by at least one Faun and half a dozen Kage ninjas at all times. She was treated more like a guest than anything else, and Snowy regarded her as an old friend. Which she was, now that I thought about it. While she never said it out loud, I had a feeling my Abyssal sister was doing her best to turn her over to our side, but so far, Tajana remained stubborn. Only time would tell how she would turn out in the future, but for the time being, I let Snowy and Penny handle her.

And just like that, four whole days passed in the blink of an eye, without any new grand incident or sudden twist. It was also the weekend, but that meant very little to me anymore, considering the Celestials I interacted with on a daily basis had no concept of the five-day workweek. Nor did I, really, as without Blue Cherry High anchoring me to the normal side of the world, I was slowly losing touch with what a weekly rhythm was supposed to be like.

It wasn't the only thing I lost either, as despite fighting tooth and nail against it, I somehow still ended up with a parade.

"Lord Archon. Please try to smile," Jaakobah advised me, which was rich, coming from him of all people.

"I'm not in the mood."

My flat answer gave him a pause, but he didn't relent.

"In that case, at least wave to the masses. They have flocked from all around Elysium just to see you."

My first instinct was to argue back, but I held it down and swept my eyes across the thousands of Celestials around me.

Let's put everything into context, shall we?

At this very moment, I was sitting on top of a huge, white-and-gold chariot drawn by four fully barded horses. I was seated on an elevated platform, shaped like a small throne carved from white wood, with Jaakobah standing on my left and Rinne on my right. We were the spear-tip of a long procession moving through the hilly landscape of the Elysium at a walking pace. The wide road under us was paved with uniform, square white stones, and its sides were occupied by throngs of onlookers held at bay by uniformed men and women forming a cordon.

Oddly enough, not only was the ground covered in Celestials, but so was the sky. Due to this being a 'once in a lifetime' occasion, as one of the organizers put it, the restriction on flight within the Elysium was lifted for the day to allow all the 'commoner' Celestials to attend. I could see thousands of civilians dressed in simple garbs flying overhead. Most of them were guided by more uniformed Celestials, but there were also the organizers of the event, the members of the Praetorian Guard running security, and even those young girls with the baskets made a reappearance, periodically showering us with flower petals as they made the rounds around our procession.

Despite the season, the temperature was fairly cozy, and the breeze carried a fresh scent, along with the sound of marching band music coming from the direction of our destination. When the military branch of the directorate invited me to attend their army's exercise, I wasn't expecting anything like this. To be fair, I should've; the Elysium was the same size as Critias. In other words, it was a country, if a small one, and it made perfect sense that its military would match its size.

That said, while I didn't expect the event to be held inside the tower, I also didn't think an entire plain would be dedicated to it. Once we reached the top of a hill, I could take a good look at the venue, and I could see thousands of Celestial soldiers in the distance. They were all clustered on the grassy flatlands and surrounded by more hills on the other side. Those parts were covered with benches facing the grassland, giving the impression of a natural Greek theatre, though between all the Celestials swarming the area, it reminded me more of an anthill than anything else.

The lively noise of the crowds, the music, the huge flags fluttering about… I had no idea if they were overdoing it because of my presence, but the more I looked, the more it felt like I was attending the Olympics instead of a military exercise.

"Are such events always so excessive?" I asked in a low voice while grudgingly waving to the excited masses.

"No. This level of exhilaration is rather atypical," Jaakobah noted on my left, and when I didn't say anything else, he adopted his poker face again and stared into the distance as our chariot, followed by the military parade behind us, slowly rolled up to the lookout tower visible from a distance.

It was a simple building that kind of reminded me of a lighthouse, made of the familiar white material of the Migdál. Its circular body towered over the rows of elevated seats at its base, and it was capped by a rectangular platform, no doubt serving as the VIP area, providing an unobstructed view over the grassy field at the foot of the hills.

Once we reached the hilltop, the rest of the procession was left behind, and our charioteer, a gruff middle-aged man sitting at the front, drove us behind the building, where we were welcomed by a crowd filled with familiar faces.

"Welcome, O Archon," Tsephanyah greeted me the moment I stepped off the vehicle. He was flanked by Savir and Mensah, plus practically all of the major directors and their direct subordinates. All in all, there were about a hundred of them in total, and thanks to our daily interrogations, I was vaguely familiar with most of them already.

"The Malakim were truly graced by your presence," the Unorthodox chief director noted with a smile and adjusted the doodad over his ear, earning himself a scoff in return.

"Graced or not, this was the last time I would do anything like this," I told him with a frown and straightened my outfit. "The next person who utters the word 'parade' in my presence can expect a…"

"Don't worry, O Archon," Director Savir cut my grumbled short and smiled amicably. "Such public appearances are no longer going to be necessary."

I was looking for some kind of hidden barb under her words, but her tone remained perfectly friendly. The same applied to the other two faction heads as well. If I didn't know that they were plotting something, it would've been easy to believe they put away their differences to rally behind me. Unfortunately for them, I knew better.

After catching them red-handed with their initial meeting, the rest of their plans were plotted out through literal, ink-and-paper letters, and while I could catch a few of those in the writing, I couldn't figure out what they were scheming beyond how it was centered on this event. As such, this turned out to be one of those 'the devil you know' kind of situations, where I would've rather played along with them and be prepared for something, even if I didn't exactly know what it would be, than to shut them down early, and risk getting blind-sided by another ploy later down the line.

In any case, as part of a compromise, I managed to rope them into viewing the exercise with me in exchange for being a good little Archon and showing my face to the crowds. At least this way I could make sure they wouldn't try to blow me up along with the building or something, lest they were ready to martyr themselves in the process.

While I was considering these things, the three head directors guided me into the lookout tower, and one relatively short elevator ride later, I was sitting on yet another throne elevated above the rest of the seats. Aside from the waist-high railing, the side of the outlook facing the exercise field was completely open, providing a full view of the grounds below.

For the next ten or so minutes, we waited for the rest of the guests to arrive and take their seats, and once everyone was ready, Director Savir stood up and took a step forward. She, along with the rest of the faction leaders, was sitting in the first row, and after a long beat, a young Celestial flew by, carrying a strange item hanging from his neck. At first glance, it could be best described as a large, oval crystal ball, about the size of his head, socketed into a cradle made of golden branches and stylized leaves.

The glow around it told me it was some kind of artifact, and it didn't take long to reveal its purpose, as after Savir cleared her throat, it let out a beam of light in her direction. In the following seconds, the air over the exercise grounds began to ripple, like the surface of a lake when someone was skipping stones on it. From the middle of these ripples, five separate holes full of strange twisting shapes and colours opened up, and as they got bigger, they formed five oval apertures, each of them about twenty meters wide, and individually facing the most crowded parts of the hills.

"May the blessing of Deus be with you all!" Savir spoke in a solemn voice, and her words were echoed by the fissures hovering in the air. Over time, the swirling shapes in the holes calmed down, and as the image came into focus, I could see that each one of them had the face and upper body of the director in them.

So that artifact was a fancy camera, I surmised as I continued to watch her speech unfold.

"I welcome you all on this glorious day of…"

Okay, so maybe I wasn't paying full attention after all, because when I noticed that some of the screens floating in the air were showing me, I focused on those and trying to figure out who was filming me. As such, I only listened to Savir with one ear. I didn't miss much. It was a speech about Deus, the return of Polemos, and Celestial supremacy, all of it filled with religious undertones and generously peppered with the liberal usage of the words 'bless', 'grace', and 'holy'.

Thankfully she didn't speak for long, and once she got all the platitudes out of the way, she sat down… and gave her pulpit over to the Director of Military Affairs (his name was Gideon, if my memory served right). His speech was followed by another, this time delivered by Kane, and then even Jaakobah spoke a few words in the name of the Praetorian Guard. All in all, it was an absurdly boring spectacle, but I had to play my role, so I pretended to listen intently and occasionally nod along to whatever was said.

All of that took a solid forty minutes, and I had no idea why any of that was necessary. Who even listened to speeches like this? Why did we, as a species (putting human and Celestial differences aside) decide that any of this was a good use of our time?

My grumblings aside, I was half-expecting that someone would ask me if I also wanted to speak up, but fortunately, nobody was foolish enough to try. As such, after that painful intro, it was finally time for the military exercise to be underway.

Now, there were three things that definitely needed mentioning. Number one: everyone was wearing those hoplite uniforms I've ragged on before. Number two: while their numbers were relatively small compared to an 'actual' army, I was still looking at over ten thousand soldiers there. I figured it was probably because the Malakim, aka the Celestials comprising a solid ninety percent of the Elysium's population, weren't allowed to serve as soldiers. Probably because Deus said so or something. Most of them were on foot, while others were flying around in circles, demonstrating aerial manoeuvres. Number three: all of this was also being broadcasted on the floating magical screens overhead, giving the onlookers close-up glimpses into the fray.

The exercise could be divided into three segments. First, the flying Celestials showcased their dogfighting skills, which included aerial melee, archery, and throwing homing javelins at each other. In the second half, the soldiers on the ground formed two tidy lines, and then charged each other, creating a huge melee flustercuck in the middle of the field. Then, at last, it was an all-out battle, with units manoeuvring around, support teams singing arias to create magical balls of light and throwing them at the other side, acting like artillery, all the while being harassed by flying squads.

If not for their Barriers protecting them, I was sure there would've been at least a couple of casualties, but even so, the number of injured could be counted in the hundreds by the time the third round of the exercise ended. I summed all of that up very succinctly, but in reality, all of that took a solid five hours, including a short break before the last round, and I was getting tired of it all.

It wasn't just because I was bored by the spectacle, though to be fair, the 'all out joint forces battle' was much less exciting than it sounded on paper due to all of the participants being low-autonomy placeholders going through the motions. Their individual prowess was nothing to write home about, and while whatever buffs they received from singing their arias in the middle of the battle probably made them fight better, I could barely see any of that due to all the swirling and clashing magical lights they produced in the process.

More importantly though, I was getting mentally tired from keeping my guard up for so long. I knew that Savir and company had something planned, and I'd been on alert, but maintaining that for five whole hours was getting tedious. On the flip side, I was also getting a bit anxious too. Why didn't they make a move yet, I wondered? Did the plan change? Was I looking forward to one of those 'the devil you don't' scenarios instead?

My worries reached a crescendo with the ending of the third round, and all the soldiers leaving the exercise grounds, surrounded by a cheering crowd. Was this the end of it?

"Fellow Celestials in the Grace of Deus!" Well, it apparently wasn't, as attested by Savir standing up and her face showing up on the enormous magical screens floating above us. "Our brave warriors of Deus have proven their valor in front of your eyes, but the day is far from over! The Praetorian Guard, chosen by our Second True Archon, Lord Polemos himself, have come forth to prove themselves as well!"

Blinking, I turned to the man on my left.

"Jaakobah? What is this about?"

"I'm not entirely sure either," he admitted, sounding unusually uncertain of himself.

My eyes jumped over to Mike's father, but Kane seemed just as stumped by the development. In the meantime, eight distinct people flew into the middle of the pock-marked grounds, and for a moment, two of the overhead screens focused on them as they waved at the still-cheering crowd. By the looks of it, even some of the soldiers who participated in the previous exercise have spread out around the edges of the field in anticipation of the next spectacle.

"Dedicated to the protection of our Second True Archon against the greatest of threats and most powerful of foes, the Praetorian Guard will now prove their mettle in sacred combat!"

As Savir continued to rile up the crowd, a group of about twenty Celestials flew into the airspace. They wore harnesses attached by thick ropes to a large statue of a man on a square pedestal. It was about four meters tall and depicted a classical Greek soldier wearing a face-covering helmet, light armour, and carrying a short sword and a large round shield in each hand. It was snow-white save for the mirror-shined golden equipment on it, and while it stood on a pedestal, its pose wasn't very heroic; akin to a marionette with its strings cut.

At last, the statue landed on the grassy ground with a loud thud audible even at our vantage point, and the carriers hastily threw off their harnesses and flew away as if their lives depended on it.

Running out of people to ask, and seeing that she finally stopped giving her speech and all the magic apertures were focused on the eight idiots on the grounds, I turned to Savir and picked a suitably clichéd question from my repertoire.

"What is the meaning of this?"

"Don't be alarmed, O Archon. It is but a small surprise your subordinates requested," she told me with just the barest hint of a smile. "After all, their duty is to protect you from powerful enemies, such as Abyssal Lords, is it not? They simply wished to prove their worth to you by facing a mighty foe. Of course, we had no way to ask a Lord of the Abyss for a favor, so we had to settle on the next most suitable—"

Her words were cut short by a war cry coming from the grounds. The statue, expectedly enough, stepped off its pedestal, its body swelling and shrinking until it settled down into a roughly three meters tall, exceedingly muscular form, and it let loose another animalistic roar that made Rinne twitch on my right. Before I could ask what that was about, Jaakobah let out a displeased grunt on my other side.

"Is that a Colossus from the Old War? How come this is the first time I've heard about any of this?"

"They requested it," Savir answered with barely hidden glee as she studied my face, and then faced Jaakobah again. "There is no reason for you to worry, Praetor. After all, the Archonhad personally approved of his honor guard. If they couldn't even deal with a single Colossus…" She paused to glance at the battle unfolding beneath us and then turned back to me with an innocent smile. "Why, that would be preposterous, wouldn't it?"