“Shall we try again, dear Emperor?”
Encrodecro passively gazes at Bonpricha, his external countenance and microexpressions betraying nothing about his internal thoughts. However, that rigid level of self-control was itself telling, for Bonpricha maintained a slight smirk that only partially concealed the smugness in her voice. Said smugness was not solely due to present circumstances or their repeated failures, but rather due to a seemingly perpetual state of being privy to a joke or secret that no one else knew about. And for the now-eldest Emperor, being at a disadvantage to any relevant knowledge caused irritation.
Bonpricha had been old when he had first come into the world. She had never been antagonistic, and in the perspective of dragons and how they perceive the world and how they conduct themselves, one would not need to be charitable when describing her efforts towards him and his flight as benevolent. Often through indirect means, she had taught him much that he would have likely never discovered on his own, and such knowledge had been a boon to his advancement and a bulwark against calamity time and time again.
To say that he owed her a debt of gratitude is perhaps an understatement. He knows her better than most, and he knows that she rarely does anything on a whim. To reduce herself to a mere Princess of another Emperor came as a shock, and yet, somehow in character with how she operated. It chafed that he could not see the larger picture, for Bonpricha surely only doggedly pursued this course of action after careful deliberation.
What was her plan? Did she know of a way to usurp an Emperor and thus how to take over The Crossroad Wayfinders? Such would run counter to everything she had ever said or done, for she always advocated that the flights should strive to work together to protect this world. Could that in itself be the longest of cons? He would not put such a level of duplicity beyond her means to pull off, but it would be a betrayal of her character to be so underhanded. What would she even gain by that, for she had already established herself as the strongest Empress of their age.
Clearly, she could see which way the wind was blowing when none of them could. It would be too crass to ask her directly, and she would undoubtedly only respond with cryptic half-truths and infuriating riddles that would send him on a wild goose chase. No, it would be best to observe for now to see if he could glean any of her secrets.
The snag in that plan is that she knows that he knows to do just that, and she knows that he knows that she… well, you get the idea.
“Indeed, dear Bonpricha. I believe we unveiled a few mysteries of how this dungeon works during our latest attempt. Let the other Emperors chase their tails for a while longer in their fruitless efforts to cooperate with one another long enough to destroy those larger elementals concurrently. Too many Emperors and not enough whelps, as the saying goes.”
Bonpricha’s smile widened as her eyes twinkled with a knowing look. The longer the Emperors took to complete Phase 3, the longer they had to… adjust, Phase 4.
With his Greater Focus of [Ancestromancy], Encrodecro reached out into the Flow, as he called it. As one wave forms another, and the eddies of one current contribute to the next, so too are lives connected to one another. While some consider this the magic of ancestors, biological relations between individuals would be more of a concern to fringe uses of [Biomancy]. [Ancestromancy] concerned itself with connections between individuals, about friendships and rivalries, about fame and infamy both. It is the friend-of-a-friend connection that goes as deep as the strength of those bonds, in addition to one’s own familiarity and connection with that bond.
Most practitioners of [Ancestromancy] use it to summon instances of an incarnation of an individual from the past. If you have the ingredients for a fine meal but don’t know how to cook, just summon the incarnation of your brother’s best friend’s cousin’s nanny’s former roommate, since he was a skilled [Chef], and it works, provided everyone in the chain had strong feelings about their neighboring links. There may also be the requirement that said [Chef] will not heed your summoning unless you can demonstrate even basic cooking skills, but those are just details.
However, for Encrodecro, he has found other interesting uses for it. Given that the Focus is Greater, it allows for one to explore options that may conventionally be outside of scope. For instance, instead of looking to the past, why not look towards the future and the bonds that may some day exist? Conveniently, that perk is what clued him in to how the Emperor of The Crossroad Wayfinders would some day have a strong, positive, and important relationship with himself, which necessitated early and cordial interactions that would help develop that relationship. It was a poor man’s abstract version of divination that certainly created a chicken and egg scenario, but ignoring it in the past had been an inexhaustible source of painful lessons.
However, for a more salient use of it in the here and now, Encrodecro sought a connection to the dungeon and the elementals that spawned within it. Many scholars have debated whether or not dungeon-spawned creatures are truly sentient, sapient, alive, and so forth, but [Ancestromancy] really doesn’t depend on such things. A particularly popular vending machine, beloved by its community, could just as easily serve as a link in a chain as a person. Given the sheer amount of people within the dungeon and the multitude of connections that exist between them and the dungeon, there should be no lack of avenues to find a way to connect with the dungeon. And, given how impactful this raid is in the lives of many and for future encounters for this raid, there is no lack of weight to the meaning each person has upon reality.
An errant smile cracked the stern visage that Encrodecro had crafted for himself as he strained his Skills to their limits.
“Okay, I’m in. I leave the rest to you.”
“Impressive and delightful as always, dear Encrodecro. Be a peach and maintain the connection while I attempt to replicate your level of success.”
Even though Bonpricha was now beneath him in status and power, her praise still stroked his ego just the right way to please him. Her choice of words had been no accident, for it is the purview of dragons to always manage their own vainglory. She knew exactly what impact her words would have, and yet, his fondness of her both forgives her manipulation and revels in the positive emotions it elicits.
If one were to liken their activities to a heist, he is the one that gets them access to the vault. Bonpricha, on the other hand, is modifying the contents of the vault so that the owners of its treasures will believe that nothing is amiss.
Bonpricha’s Greater Focus of [Illusions] has all manner of uses. Conventionally, it summons forth imaginary beings (with elaborate backstories) into reality to fight on her behalf. At the more mundane level, it creates beautiful displays and sensations or obfuscates things best left hidden, such as an entrance to a secret lair. Fundamentally, any illusion is a lie, one that is so believable as to be an accepted and unquestioned truth to someone. Convincing reality itself to believe your lie is what separates the men from the boys. Convincing the dungeon that your roster for Phase 4 is true and reasonable is what separates a master from a legend.
And Bonpricha is anything but a mere master of her craft.
With all his senses and many of his minds focused on what Bonpricha is doing, Encrodecro keenly watches her work. Her craft is abstract, her techniques are insightful, and her casual disregard for impossible limitations is inspiring. It is paramount to asking a door, which is usually an inanimate object, to kindly let you in, and expecting it to unlock itself and swing wide for you. Half-truths, misdirection, unkept promises, manipulation of references and axioms, and mercilessly and quietly smothering any alarms that attempt to give her away are all done with casual indifference as she hums a little tune to herself.
Perhaps, Bonpricha is more than capable and willing of such duplicity in regards to her ultimate plan with her new flight. Although he remained stalwart in expression, Encrodecro discovered a newfound level of respect, admiration, and fear of Bonpricha as she casually disassembled reality and put it back together in a manner to her own liking. Rarely had his own attempts at such undertakings been so direct and egregious, for mistakes rarely lead to opportunities to correct oneself.
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Mehczeczi (may he remain dead forever) could attest to that were he still alive. The only lesson to be learned from his failed dabbling in the fabric of reality is from what a smoking and magically toxic crater can offer. Considering how difficult and merely theoretical in nature it had been to academics at the time to concentrate raw mana so much that it became toxic, that is saying something.
Encrodecro, now the eldest Emperor, still has much to learn. Perhaps Bonpricha’s most recent gambit had been the best development of the millennia. Perhaps it would doom them all. Either way, he found himself delighted by the change of pace that should help to shake off stagnation.
For most masterminds that dare to manipulate people like pawns on a gameboard, rarely do they find themselves with an overabundance of said pawns. For Nabonidus, the seemingly infinite possibilities brought on by so many pawns led to terrible compromises. Hubris was not his vice, and a belief that he could or should strive to save everyone would be naive and immature at best.
Some would live, some would die. All that would change was how many would die and which selected pieces would survive until the next game. While he understood the dehumanizing tendencies that came with framing this view of people as mere pawns in a game, such a mindset did also help shield him from the moral horrors and the quagmire of culpability when playing god.
While Nabonidus may seem indifferent to the cascade of emotions that his actions will cause, he is not deliberately cruel. Well, he is not deliberately cruel in actual reality, as he often finds succor in viewing the hypothetical futures where annoying people are on the rack. That being said, he does strive to ensure that the greatest number of people survive this raid.
That is not to say that he doesn’t have favorites, both those of his own and of his Emperor’s. Far from it, for he does enjoy living vicariously through others and their possible futures. There is joy to be found in pulling strings behind the scenes to ensure that promising individuals seemingly have the stars align for their success, or in problematic individuals having no end of coincidental misfortunes plague ambition.
In the sense of keeping everything straight, he stratifies people into tier lists of importance. At the top of his list is his Emperor and best friend (which are one and the same). Below that resides Nabonidus and the other companions of his Emperor. Below that are the children of the Emperor, which gets more than a few asterisks considering that death would only be a minor setback for them. Beyond them lie the masses of VIPs and loved ones of the higher tiers. All else is beneath those levels, and stratifying them is a nebulous and often shifting prospect that follows whims as often as it does practicality.
By his Emperor’s orders, Nabonidus has been focusing on keeping people alive rather than on finding a path to victory for this raid. There are 112 Diamond Adventurers to keep track of, which was an unprecedented number of them gathered in one place. Their egos are too large to allow ideal levels of cooperation, and so they have to be managed in such a way that hubris or betrayal doesn’t get them killed, for all are VIPs. And one in particular is proving to be rather vexing to keep alive.
Erethel Starweaver, Star of Final Night, had died hundreds of times already in the futures he had witnessed. Each and every glimpse of the future costs him mana and strains his mind, and that cost slowly compounds over time. While he had long since mastered the technique of offloading that burden to future versions of himself, even that technique had reached certain hard limits.
However, being [Vizier to the Draconic Emperor] has its perks. His Dual-Blessing allows him to interface with other loyal servants to his Emperor. Each person is unique, and thus, requires unique solutions to interface with them, which is a burden in itself. However, one person is multitude most of the time. And therein did he find the answer.
Jericho.
The female orc is a beauty amongst her kind, but Nabonidus looks beyond the exquisite features of the flesh and towards that of her mind. Specifically, and from his point of view, how little of it she used most of the time. While she isn’t stupid per se, she does tend to favor direct approaches that place little dependency on critical thinking. Again, that is a preference and not a limitation, which is an important distinction.
And it would be a shame if all that available brainpower of her legions of clones were to go to waste. Thought processes are generally simple when standing guard or in the midst of battle. Ruminations on the theoretical are subverted for more practical vigilance. And it is in that unused potential that Nabonidus finds a vast network of identical minds to facilitate his own efforts.
However, the tide raises all ships. Jericho is a willing participant, and while she doesn’t usually notice the impact Nabonidus has on her, she does reap the benefit of his [Oracle] Blessing bleeding into her. While her own Dual-Blessing, [Legions of the Draconic Emperor], allows her to create and control her army of clones, that precognition of the [Oracle] adds an extra layer of coordination and responsiveness that transcends the need for direct communication. She had been best pleased by her performance after indulging Nabonidus on his proposed coordination in the past, and so she found it more than agreeable that they continue their partnership.
As for Nabonidus, he found a continually renewing and almost inexhaustible pool of brainpower to fuel his divination. When one clone dies, another is created to take its place, all based on the pristine copies of Jericho that are secured all over the dungeon. If one clone’s mind cracks or cooks under the strain, another is almost immediately available to shoulder that burden. As an added benefit, it also strengthens Jericho against mind control and other subversive acts of her agency, which is a crucial benefit considering how many Jericho clones there are and her individual capacity for destruction.
The Emperor provides the mana to sustain all this, but overall, this partnership has contributed to a net reduction of the usage of his mana. Fewer clones die, and thus the mana needed to replace them is reduced. Likewise, both due to his contributions and Jericho’s own efforts (after a few reprimands from the Emperor), Jericho has learned to be more efficient in her actions. All parties are pleased by this arrangement, and so, more people will probably survive this raid because of it.
This time, Erethel Starweaver made it out of the room alive, albeit without a left arm and most of that side of her face. Gifted [Healers] can remedy that in time, but her injuries may complicate matters related to her continued survival, especially considering that there are other hidden traitors that will try to kill her. Either Captain Kant cannot be saved or his intervention inside the room itself overcomplicates Erethel’s extraction. Perhaps there is merit to pursuing that future where he meets her after the room bursts into chaos. But the triceratops he had selected to aid her escape across the arena isn’t in the right position if her escape is delayed because of Captain Kant’s lack of intervention.
This truly is a puzzle where one has as many or as few pieces at one’s disposal as one wants. Should he scrap this whole plan and try a completely different approach? He asks a future version of himself, and the answer is a resounding “no”.
The solitary ogre is clearly on the right track, but unfortunately, his future self cannot provide any reasoning as to how and why he reached his conclusion. In addition to that answer, he also sees tallies of different levels of people and how many die. Numbers go up and down with every approach, and so the problem is complicated by ensuring that secondary and tertiary impacts of his decisions do not get anyone else killed.
He had already found several ways to keep Erethel Starweaver alive, all at the expense of everyone else. Erethel Starweaver has an important job of maintaining certain shields and barriers throughout the arena that keep people safe, which is not something she can realistically accomplish while fighting for her life. The pieces of the puzzle that keep most of everyone else alive while she is on the run have mostly been solved, and so now the problem is in how to aid her survival without compromising any of those ventures.
It sure is a sticky situation, and while frustrating at times, the process is oddly soothing. The final reward of accomplishment after successfully pulling it off is the greatest ambrosia of all, and it is partially for that rush that he strives to succeed. While anything less than perfection may be unacceptable to some, Nabonidus has found that some losses can be palatable.
And so Nabonidus continues to be an arbiter of death, or at least an actuary of one. Some people will end up maimed, but that can be fixed later. Some of those who will die are good and honest people. Some who live are less deserving in accordance with such merits, but their competence or political value overrides such sentimentality. It isn’t beautiful or glorious, but it creates the best possible outcome that his fallible mind can concoct.
He has long since learned to accept his limitations in wrangling the ever-shifting and infinitely malleable future. Undoubtedly, it will create problems years down the line, especially since his existence and his powers as an [Oracle] are no secret to the masses by now. Inevitably, and perhaps even erroneously, someone somewhere is going to have a grudge when a relative dies anywhere near the only ogre around. However, Nabonidus will be watching and waiting for such days. The enemies of the Emperor may be many, but none will accomplish the statistically improbable but not impossible task of slaying his Emperor while he still draws breath.
Of that, the future is certain.
