The Fire and the Storm - Metric Pro Edition: Fiction, Dragons, Elves, Unicorns, Magic (73 page)

“Though this forest is artificial, and all of the citizens of The Hidden Nation who are here are only attending as Sendings or Simulacrums, you must still understand that for many of us, the need to remain hidden is instinctual and undeniable.  Within are also representations of our homes, and for some of us, keeping our homes hidden is even more primal than hiding ourselves.  Therefore, very few outsiders are allowed within, and they must agree to and be able to follow our conditions, which are these;  You may not enter physically, and the Projection or Simulacrum you use must be smaller than myself.  Also, you must allow me to place a Compulsion upon you that will never allow you to speak of what you will see within, in any way.”

“We agree, and thank you for the privilege.”
Fire said with a big smile as she assumed a ten centimeter high Simulacrum while Sending her body home.  The rest of their group did the same in the next moment.

“Then enter, and be welcome.”
Bitbitta bid them as she turned and led the way.

When the group emerged from the trees and assumed their normal manifestations, they all wore the same bemused and introspective little smile.  They just stopped and smiled at each other for a long moment, then Mark said; “Let’s go home.”, and brought them to their private beach at Hilia.

It was a wonderful tropical night, so Talia Summoned blankets and pillows for those that wanted them.  After some quiet conversation, they all slept cuddled up together on the beach.

Ever the hostess, Talia woke first the next morning and ordered breakfast for everyone as she lay cuddled in Mark and Alilia’s embrace.  She remained there and returned to dozing until four attendants from The Atoned appeared with a well-laden table that filled the air with delicious scents, which soon roused everyone.

After rising and self-cleaning, and exchanging hugs and good-mornings, they made their selections from the many breakfast choices available and the attendants served them up.

Alilia was the first to open a conversation after they’d eaten enough to slake the immediacy of their hunger.  “So Fire, I never got around to congratulating you on becoming Princess of The Sylvan Nation yesterday.  Congratulations.

“Does this mean you’re assuming the leadership of your quartette from Six?”

Fire shrugged and smiled as she finished chewing and swallowed.  “Maybe.  Six is probably a bit better at leadership than me when it comes to any other race, but with Sylvan, I think I’m a bit more effective.  Besides, it was just spontaneous.  And since we do almost everything together, it doesn’t make much difference anyway.

“It’ll sure make things easier implementing our training program.” Six commented between bites.

“Yup.  Now after all the Sylvan volunteers have joined, I can just order any holdouts to get with the program.  Literally.”

To their surprise, they were joined by Gvetwa, First God of The Sylvan, who joined the conversation as if he’d been part of it from the beginning.  “Many of us are concerned about the effect your program will have on my people.” he stated.  “When the Sylvan first appeared on this world, we were nothing more than hunters, killers, and raiders.  We took what we needed, and produced nothing.  After the Segregation we were concentrated in Serminak, and after the continent was hunted-out we  were forced to become productive and co-operative to survive.  We became farmers, ranchers, fishers, manufacturers, builders, and traders.  And everyone including us agrees that this was very good for the Sylvan people.

“Now, thanks to you irritating children, The Sylvan are about to become nothing more than killers again.  The Sylvan on Hiliani don’t even hunt, fish, or gather anymore, all they do is fight, fornicate, and engage in simulated warfare.

“Now, I will admit that thanks to your efforts, my people will be better prepared to face the demons.  But you might want to consider that they will be very difficult to live with after the war, and transitioning them back to a peacetime existence will prove to be very difficult, if not impossible.”

“Perhaps.” Fire nodded.  “But they’ll be alive at least.  We’ll deal with what happens after the war, after the war.

“Personally, I’d be in favor of re-stocking Serminak with prey animals after the war, and limiting the Sylvan population to the number that can sustain themselves there with traditional hunting and gathering methods, like the Sylvan on Hiliani were doing before we set up there.  I think it’s more natural for Sylvan that way, and that they’re happier when they can live like that.”

“Ha!  The hunter-gatherer lifestyle is the most natural for all of our races!” Gvetwa retorted.  “It’s how all of our peoples lived before we started using agriculture, which led to civilization as we know it now.  But I don’t think any of them would be happy about being forced to go back to it!  Sure, hunting is fun, but gathering is boring and monotonous, and few will be happy with giving up the luxuries and comforts we’ve all become accustomed to!”

Fire shrugged and grinned.  “Sorry Gvetwa, but that’s not really our problem right now.  Our self-imposed responsibility only extends as far as beating the demons with as few losses to Kellaran as possible.  We’ll help clean up the mess afterwards as much as we can, but it’s so impossible to predict what conditions will be like then that it’s not even worth trying to plan for it.  We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.”

“As I suggested before,” Six interjected, “After the war we should have another tournament to decide our peacetime leadership.  Whoever wins it can deal with reconstruction and the transition to peacetime life.

“But we won’t be competing in it, because we’ll probably be leaving with the Triax to hunt demons out in the void, and to find the demon homeworld and exterminate them all.  I expect a lot of Sylvan will choose to come with us.  After that we’ll come back and start building new livable worlds around our sun.  All that should keep us busy for the foreseeable future.”

“If any of that sounds like fun to you, you’re welcome to join us, Eldest of The Sylvan Gods.”

“Fun?!” Gvetwa scowled.  “Mortals were more fun when they were awe-struck and submissive!  Your whole cursed family is so damned irritating!”

And he was gone.

After a moment of silence, many on the beach couldn’t help but chuckle a bit at his frustration.

Fire turned to her parents.  “We realize that supervising our activities is still pretty instinctive for you, considering our ages.  And the Sylvan re-structuring will be the biggest thing happening on Kellaran for the next few days.  So, would you all like to continue helping us with it?  It sure led to a lot of unexpected benefits yesterday!”

“It did, and yes we would.” Mark grinned.

“With your permission, I’d like to invite a few volunteers from the other races to join your training program as well.” Yazadril mused.  “I think it’s likely that the younger and more aggressive especially will advance more quickly there.  If it shows promise, we may set up modified versions of your program amongst all the other races.”

“Certainly, we’d considered that as well.” Six nodded around a mouthful of fruit.  “We’ll get going on it right after breakfast.”

Two days later, the residents of Hiliani who planned to return to the time-bubble decided that they would wait until after the next meeting of The Assembly before having the bubble re-cast.  Many of them, particularly Yazadril, planned on attending that meeting, and they all wanted to know the results before they withdrew from the world again.  Within two more days the new Sylvan training system was completely emplaced, and variations of it were starting up all over Kellaran.

On the day before the next meeting of the Assembly, as Mark and Kragorram’s families were enjoying lunch in their backyard vale on Hiliani, Amirgath and Somonik appeared.

Somonik addressed Val.  “It’s obvious that there is enough demand for the new training programs all over Kellaran that we cannot meet the demand without using your automated Work spells to get everything else done.  Though the full Assembly have not met on the issue, we’ve personally asked all the ruling members and the pantheon, and the result was unanimously favorable.  We therefore ask you to use your Work spells to do the work of any who wish to join the new training programs full-time, and that you cast The Healing of Valentia on those people.  If you find that it’s too big a job to do by yourselves in a reasonable amount of time, we’ll be glad to assist you.

“However, we want to stress that this is a wartime measure only.  We share your concerns about the long-term effect that perpetually perfect healing and the lack of physical work will have on the character and culture of our peoples, and the issue will be extensively debated again immediately following the war.”

“Okay.” Val simply responded as she ate.

“Amirgath, could you become a human, or an elf?” Mark suddenly asked.

“Hmph.” Amirgath rumbled as he considered the question.  “I could certainly take the form of a human or an elf, though I have never contemplated doing so.  But nothing of my basic nature would be changed.  I would still be a Draconian god, with all that implies.”

“Could you become like me?” Fire asked.  “A half-elven, half-human warlock who could use the second Source?”

“No.  I could not use the second Source, nor have I used the Source or the power of wizard’s rock since I became a god.  I believe that my power now comes from the Translocation medium, or from the fabric of reality itself, even if I took Elven form.  I’m not sure.  I’ve never been very analytical in my use of power.  No doubt there are other gods who would give you different answers, but I am what I am.”

“Ah.  Thanks.” Fire nodded.

Mark was so deep in thought that he didn’t respond.

Amirgath nodded.  “If there’s nothing else, we’ll take our leave, and speak with you again soon.” he stated.

He and Somonik disappeared without waiting for an answer.

“Quewanak?” Talia asked the air, and he appeared.

“Yes?”

“The training in the kids’ new system is good, but it’s not near as good as what we were getting here before the time-bubble opened.” Talia thoughtfully stated.  “And as far as I can see, the difference is that you and Ria were running our exercises here; you set the scenarios and ran the demons, and the people running the exercises in Serminak just aren’t as good at it as you and Ria are. 

“I know a lot of the gods are busy maintaining the time-bubbles and training with the Triax gods and whatnot, but still, I think it would help a lot if you and some of the other gods started running as many of the exercises as possible.”

“As soon as we’ve finished setting up the systems, we’ll be running a lot more of them ourselves, like we did for the Sylvan here when we first started it.” Six mentioned.  “But there’s so much to do, we won’t be able to do that all the time.  We still need to get onto building the voidcraft and working them into the training, and we need to train for the tournament.”

“We should really start thinking about making preparations with the Triax as well.” Alilia volunteered.  “We plan to go to war at their side, but we’re not training with them at all, except for some of the gods.”

“I’d almost forgotten about our plan to talk to the Triax about void warfare, we’ve been so busy.” Kragorram said as he scratched his beard.  “But we’re almost ready for the meeting.  Six and I spent some time on it three nights ago; we’ve reviewed the first team’s experience, we’ve grasped the mathematics, and the spells that convert from one numerical system to another are simple and reliable.  We made some progress on translation from their language to ours, but it’s still very basic.  We’ll probably need some divine help with that.

“But when we meet with them, we should discuss large-scale training with them.  And it should be tonight or tomorrow morning, before the meeting of The Assembly, so that our leaders and the Triax leaders can co-ordinate.”

“Ah.  One moment.” Quewanak nodded.  He contemplated the surroundings for a few breaths, then nodded again.  “Within an hour I’ll have a list of qualified military strategists, both mortal and divine, who are willing and available to help with conducting training exercises.

“The Triax will meet with you at five hours to midnight tonight, Standard Time, at The Royal Beach on Hilia.”

“Most Excellent.” Six smiled.  “Thanks.”

“You are most welcome.” Quewanak nodded.  “I’ll go now, to familiarize those who will conduct exercises with what Ria and I have done in that regard here.”

With that he was gone before any farewells could be said.

“We have almost four hours to finish preparing to meet with the Triax.” Kragorram pointed out.  “Let’s get started.”

“We don’t have
that
much to do!” Six pointed out with a laugh.  “I’m gonna finish my lunch first!”

“Fine,
I’ll
get started!” Kragorram laughed as he Retrieved his notes on the subject, and the rest chuckled as he set to reviewing them with exaggerated studiousness.

As it turned out, all of them wanted to attend the meeting with The Triax, even if only as observers.

By the time the meeting began, hundreds had asked to observe the meeting, most of them military personnel and researchers from all over Kellaran.  Six politely refused them all except Quewanak, Falgaroth, Visinniria, Amirgath, Somonik, Tithian, and Emperor Osbald of Thon, citing the need to avoid excess distraction.  Those seven arrived a few minutes early, exchanged greetings, and took their places.  The rest who had asked were allowed to join an Observing Link that Six and Kragorram set up.

Only Six and Kragorram and their close family would directly participate in interacting with The Triax; including Mark, Talia, Alilia, Fire, Val, Karz, and Povon.  All of them were deeply Linked and waiting patiently at the appointed time.

A second later The Triax arrived, represented by First Mauve, another god of The Triax who was about three meters long and purple in color, and nineteen mortal Triax who swam about in a slightly-cloudy grayish liquid in a huge transparent sphere almost thirty meters high, which floated over the water just off the beach.  All of the Triax in it immediately swam over to the side of the sphere facing the beach and considered the Kellarani with their strangely-blinking three-eyed gazes.  They seemed to be of every color in the rainbow, and ranged in size from one to eight meters in length.