The Pantheon Moves

by Michael Chatfield

  The citadels had a number of people moving around them and aerial patrols were out watching over the area.

  “The Goblin flying citadel group will undergo their upgrade in a few days, with the Gudalo flying citadel group changing over in a week or two. We are unsure what these upgrades will bring, so seven of the Goblin Mountain flying citadels will be grounded as the upgrades happen. Seeing the results, we will either ground or keep the other citadels in the air,” Lucy said.

  “All of them are fully stocked and ready for action,” Florence added. Her Exdar’s Traders had taken over the supply chain for the Terra Alliance, using the other forces within it and making sure that those on the front lines had everything that they needed.

  “What about the new items that the Initiative has been working on?” Josh asked.

  “We have shipments of orbs coming in daily. We are pushing them out to the citadels and there are training modules within the Mirror of Communication that the drop forces and fighting forces that are in Terra are undergoing,” Florence reported. “Also, the ono network is nearing completion. In just five days, we should have onos or teleport pads in every single city across Emerilia, as well as different locations of interest.”

  “Be good to have that defensive network in place,” Dwayne said.

  “Will they have enough power?” Kim asked.

  “Someone in the Initiative worried about the same thing, so they will be sending out automatons with charged soul gems to charge up the different onos. The ones in the cities are actually holding a massive charge since we changed the cost of using the ono from money to soul gems. All of that power has been absorbed and used, increasing the soul gem capacity under the ono. Once the network is complete within the population centers, regional onos will be put down to provide complete coverage for all of Emerilia. These regional ones will be the focus of the automatons and charged soul gems. They’re hidden away from the population centers so they won’t be able to see how much power is being placed into the ono,” Florence said.

  “We need to play for time as much as possible,” Cassie said.

  “It’s a hard balance: we want to have enough time for all of our preparations to be laid down, for us to have a fleet that is capable of defending Emerilia, but we don’t want to give the leaders of the Pantheon time to build up their own strength,” Dwayne said.

  “More and more of the players are being woken up every day. With their numbers and the resources that they’re pulling in, and the fact that Suzy has been opening up Austin Zane’s accounts more and more, fueling both ours and the Grahslagg Corporation’s needs for resources, we have all the parts except for time,” Lucy said.

  They looked at the different screens. The flying citadels hovered in the air. The Dark Lord’s people built their massive metal platform and the Earth Lord’s forces grew an island piece by piece.

  “Lucy, I think it’s time that we started to tell our own people,” Josh said.

  The room was quiet as they all seemed to hold their breath at Josh’s words. The Stone Raiders Guild was one of the biggest powers in all of Emerilia. Their guild had nearly five thousand members at the time and was growing constantly. They didn’t take many people in at once, so that they wouldn’t lose the core of what the Stone Raiders were.

  However, each and every person, once they joined, had been tempered by multiple battles, trained by some of the greatest experts and had earned their powerful gear. When they went on the battlefield, they dominated. Whether they were POE or player, they all had the same status and their power exceeded that of their overall level multiple times. They were wholly loyal to one another and instead of lording over other people, they had taken on the stance of working with others. Those who were filled with arrogance and pride that blinded them to the plights of others were quickly dealt with and removed from the Stone Raiders. It was rare but it did happen.

  It had come to make a guild that was incredibly hard to gain entry to, but all of the people who were a part of it were highly respected by all of the different forces on Emerilia.

  “I think that you’re right,” Dwayne agreed.

  “I wonder what impact it will have, but I believe it is for the best,” Kim agreed.

  “I believe it’s time,” Cassie agreed.

  “Hopefully they can help us in dealing with this oncoming war,” Florence said.

  “I will contact Air. She will have a good idea of what to do with them to show them the truth,” Lucy said.

  The air in the room felt heavy with the decisions they had just made.

  The decisions we made here today—I hope they were the right ones, Josh thought.

  ***

  Dave, Malsour, and Suzy were all in the asteroid base, overlooking the different slips. Along each of them, superstructures were expanding at an alarming rate. Soul gem constructs and the different parts of the ship being built were slotted into place by automatons.

  This was not the only slip that was filled with activity, either.

  Many of the slips that hadn’t been used before now had people swarming all over them, creating the structure for the warships.

  The refinery was going full blast and the materials were coming in from “Austin’s” donation to the Stone Raiders and the money he’d put in Dave’s account. Suzy also had siphoned off money into her account as well. Most of the Stone Raiders leadership were also pitching in money from the Earth simulation.

  The resources draw was incredible but it was only with all of this that they were able to keep up with the demands of the Terra Alliance as well as the Pandora’s Box Initiative.

  The refinery was expanding faster and faster, directly using thirty percent of the materials that it produced to grow. They had a massive stockpile of unrefined materials that would take weeks for them to complete, so all of it was being stuffed into the refinery as fast as possible.

  Fifty percent of the materials that came from the refinery were then used directly for the different warships. The twenty destroyers were supposed to be finished in just three weeks.

  They would have four complete battleships by that time as well.

  Another ten destroyers had already been started, with another two battleships.

  Resources were flowing to the moonbase as well, speeding up their ongoing projects. The nearly sixty missile boats were coming together quickly; all of the systems and parts had been laid out a long time ago. In just the space of a few weeks, with the power and the resources, they would gain four fleets.

  There would be one battleship, five missile boats, five destroyers, and two arks per fleet. The battleships and missile boats wouldn’t be able to enter atmosphere, but they could cross truly massive distances. The destroyer would be able to enter atmosphere and jump long distances as they had been upgraded. However, they didn’t have the pure destructive power of the missile boats, nor the armor of the battleships. The ark would have a teleportation ability to move in and assist after a battle, acting as a resupply and repair ship. However, moving system to system, it would need to make many smaller jumps or pass through a portal.

  “We’re up to nearly four hundred thousand players awake.” Dave looked at the people below.

  “We’ve slowed down the number that we’re waking up so as to not alert the AI running the Earth simulation. But based on our simulations, we can get nearly three million people out of the simulation in two to three weeks. That will leave only two, nearly three million people in the simulation,” Suzy said.

  “Councilmember Lisdel is returning to wherever they come from and Sato has started up a training center over the Mirrors of Communication. It should be enough to cover the basics for the players in just a few days. We’re going to be using the compression and insertion technology that Air has developed to take the information from those in the first trainees and then pass it onto the second group; they add in their own learnings and they pass the information around until they all understand what is going on. We take an imprint of that and in
just a few hours, we can take a player with no prior knowledge and familiarize them with the different systems of the ships they will be fighting on. We’re also going to be doing the same with the different techs, so that the people who are on the ships will know how to deal with everything on the ship. We should actually be getting the first imprint crystals ready this afternoon. Once we have them, then we will probably see an increase in production speed,” Malsour said.

  “We need to be careful, though. Even with all of this information, they haven’t done anything with it before so we will have to make sure that they have all the correct skills, test them and make sure that they will be okay,” Dave said.

  The ability to push information into other people’s minds like how it was done with spell books and other learning scrolls was an invaluable ability. However, Dave wanted to make sure that no matter whether they had the information he needed to make sure that their skill was up to his standards. It didn’t matter whether they had all the plans for the battleship in their head when they didn’t know how to make a single rune or control a soul gem construct.

  “Don’t worry—they’ll be properly tested ahead of time,” Suzy reassured Dave.

  They watched over the complex goings-on in front of them. It looked like utter chaos around the different ships. However, even under that chaos, the ships were taking shape, the different parts being added together.

  Everything that looked to be chaos added to the growth of the ships.

  “We’ve come pretty far,” Dave said as they watched their fleet grow before their eyes.

  A notification appeared in Dave’s vision. He opened it up. A relieved look on his face quickly turned to shock as he started to scroll down the notifications.

  Quest: Friend of the Grey God Level 7

  Distribute Band-Aid across Emerilia

  Rewards: Unlock Level 8 Quest

  +10 to stats (stacks with previous class levels)

  +700,000 EXP

  Quest: Friend of the Grey God Level 8

  End the: Of Myths and Legends Event

  Rewards: Unlock Level 9 Quest

  Increase to stats

  Class: Friend of the Grey God

  Status:

  Level 7

  Effects:

  +70 to all stats

  Access to hidden quests.

  Access to the Imperial Carrier Datskun

  Quest Completed: Bleeder Level 5

  Create transportation network across Emerilia

  Rewards: Unlock Level 6 Quest

  +10 increase to stats (stacks with previous class levels)

  +500,000 EXP

  Your understanding of the Jukal Link has greatly increased. You can not only cut the Jukal Link but now use it. Now what you going to do? Make unicorns?

  Dave snorted to himself. It had been some time since he had heard from the snarky AI that wrote the skill descriptions and updated the skill boxes.

  Class: Bleeder

  Status:

  Level 5

  Effects:

  +10 to all stats

  Ability to use Jukal Link

  Quest: Bleeder Level 6

  End the: Of Myths and Legends Event

  Rewards: Unlock Level 7 Quest

  Increase to stats

  Level 241

  You have reached Level 243; you have 15 stat points to use.

  Dave looked at the level. He had seen it after Anna and Jekoni died; he’d become Level 204. At the time, he’d closed the notifications and tried to deal with his grief.

  Now he thought back on Anna and Jekoni—his friends. He thought of the good times, when he’d first met them, when he’d gifted Anna her sword, or when Jekoni and he had worked late into the night on projects together. The way he could make complex ideas simple and they had been able to talk Magical Circuits and running all day and night long. As he reminisced, his smile grew brighter, knowing that he was a better person for knowing them.

  “There is no way to go backwards, only forwards,” Dave sighed.

  He looked through the Classes, reading them as he went. If he got back the mine manager class then he would need to spend an astronomical amount of gold on it once again to earn back it’s levels and the material output.

  He paused over the class The Few the Mighty.

  Class: The Few the Mighty

  Fight against a numerically superior force and win time and time again. The larger the force you are fighting, the stronger your allies become.

  Required: Master Leadership skill.

  Master one weapon skill.

  Fight 200 battles where your force is numerically weaker.

  Effects: 5% increase to allies stats when facing a numerically superior force.

  Well the mining drills are pulling out a lot of materials, sure its easier to have the materials just show up in my bank, but we’re expanding a lot. If I was to get this class, then the party even the fighting force I’m with could get a boost. Dave thought to himself.

  He paused for a few moments before clicking on the class.

  You have gained a Class: The Few the Mighty

  You again! Alright, well here’s another class! Seems you lot are always fighting off waves of enemies so this should at least help out a bit. Don’t get blood on my dammed carpet! I foresee rivers of experience for you and your fellows in the future. Mysterious and profound, that’s me!

  Status: Level 1

  Effects: +5% to base stats to you and your allies when fighting a numerically superior force.

  Dave rolled his eyes after reading the description. He opened up his character sheet and dumped all of the stat points he’d earned into intelligence and looked over it, accepting the changes.

  Character Sheet

  Name:

  David Grahslagg

  Gender:

  Male

  Level:

  204

  Class:

  Dwarven Master Smith, Friend of the Grey God, Bleeder, Librarian, Skill Creator, Aleph Engineer, Weapons Master, Champion Slayer, Master of Space and Time, Master of Gravitational Anomalies, The Few the Mighty

  Race:

  Human/Dwarf

  Alignment:

  Chaotic Neutral

  Unspent points: 0

  Health:

  4,550

  Regen:

  24.62 /s

  Mana:

  16,280

  Regen:

  59.45 /s

  Stamina:

  5,620

  Regen:

  51.90 /s

  Vitality:

  455

  Endurance:

  1,231

  Intelligence:

  1,628

  Willpower:

  1,189

  Strength:

  562

  Agility:

  1,038

  “It happened again guys,” Dave said in an almost depressed tone, all around him mana fluctuated wildly, showing that he was growing stronger.

  “Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me.” Suzy waved her arms in the air.

  “I think we need to get you a training bib, the kind that stops you from dumping points into your stats.” Malsour sighed heavily as he moved to Dave, grabbing him and moving toward the portal that was connected to Ice City.

  “Whoops?” Dave said with a sheepish smile, not moving for fear that his new stats would be more of a pain than a help and he would hurl himself out into the middle of the thoroughfare.

  ***

  Frank listened to the man called Commander Sato, who stood in front of the classroom. With every sentence, he opened up the minds of those listening. He ran through scenarios, getting the people who wanted to man the ships of the Initiative to open their eyes wider.

  He accepted questions, using them to create new scenarios.

  He didn’t simply lecture at them, telling them more about terms they didn’t need to know; he dealt with the basic actions of each of the people in front of him, talking through their roles, how they would affect the
ship, what they were needed to do, what they needed to focus on to make sure that the ship was running in optimal condition. It sounded as though it should have been boring but as he talked, it became clear how on a ship, every single person was needed. Only together could they tame the beast that was a warship in space. And going from that to how they would fight in space—all of those things were vastly more complicated.

  When the lecture ended, he didn’t let them go free. Instead, he started them out on training and test scenarios. These didn’t deal with the specifics of their job but it was a general overview.

  Their ships and the ones that Sato was working with were totally different. Sato worked with ships that were based off technology being assisted by the magical tech that they had been given and shared. However, the ships and systems that the players were working with were a fusion of magic and technology.

  The people who had built the different systems were their testers. They would watch over them, doing every operation while Sato would watch their actions. He would listen to their communication and watch an interface that showed that the different areas were working.

  The testers who had built the components reported to Sato, his questions pulling out and exacting information on each of the trainees’ abilities and strengths.

  After every single working run, they would again reappear in front of Sato. He would work through the different sections, talking to the people in there. They would talk about their own actions and the actions of others. This created some tension but with a few words from Sato, this tension fell away. Instead of people challenging one another, saying that the other was worse, they looked to improve their ability individually and as a team. This pulled them all together and made them much stronger as a team.