Chapter 1442 (1/2)

With a stubborn bullishness that refused to stop in the face of delays, Randidly led the Order Ducis in pushing through two more rounds of the tournament and reached the final sixty-four teams. These, in Randidly’s mind, were the true elites. He then announced that a two-day break would occur, so that the Orchard could clean up the event area and reinforce the actual arena for the following battles.

There had been quite a few incidents in the last round where the careful schedule Wolfram created had to be discarded because an arena was thoroughly demolished by a prior fight. Specialty marble was being shipped in from the Donnyton mine in order to construct a surface that could withstand a significant beating without shattering. Hopefully, that would be enough to keep things on schedule for the rest of the tournament.

Of course, Randidly didn’t have much of a break-even when the tournament was paused. A majority of those two days was devoured by the bloated schedule of meetings and planning sessions that Tatiana insisted on in order to prepare Kharon for the up-coming governmental change. So Randidly was running between meetings with Gertrude and Sam talking about the function and purpose of Keystones and then listening to Wolfram carefully explaining the predicted issues for Kharon’s growth in the next two years, all the while feeling like he should have dedicated a Skill or two to management.

But realistically, this might be the last chance he had to deal with such issues for a while, so he didn’t take the time to learn one.

After much contemplation and reflection, Randidly approved the proposal to recruit more contractors and specialists into Kharon and streamline the probationary process for entering the city. His original fear was that his image would be too deeply ingrained in the city and therefore it was best to keep Kharon’s population small, but Randidly was gradually realizing that his original premise was not true.

Because with the tournament giving him a sense of perspective, Randidly realized that the people of Kharon didn’t necessarily internalize his image. Rather than teaching them his image directly, it was indeed true that Randidly had been setting himself up in an antagonistic role with the Eidolon Crucible. If anything, Kharon’s image more closely resembled the remnants of the Redemption Battlefield than Randidly himself. It was chaotic and heterogeneous with an oddly pure determination serving as his base.

Sensing the waves of those images mixing and mingling in the city, Randidly felt oddly lonely. He stood at the edge of his island and pushed the surrounding moonlight spirits away so he could look down at the city he had made.

Somehow, I can understand why Shal took me on as an apprentice, even though I was a stranger in that Dungeon. With that thought, Randidly began to chuckle. The steady laughs continued until finally escalating to a knee-slapping guffaw.

After all the effort I put into creating a place that could inspire the world and not infect it with my images… seems like it didn’t end up mattering… Gradually, Randidly’s smile disappeared. Instead, he became solemn as he looked more deeply at the bubbling metropolis below. People flowed freely from Kharon into the Orchard and vice versa. The many merchants of Kharon were ecstatic, finally able to reliably sell off their stock of specialty products. Some even were pushing for Kharon to set up a permanent location and settle down.

And after learning that Randidly’s worry that his city would closely carry his image wasn’t an issue, he was slightly tempted to allow that permanence. Randidly pivoted slightly, his gaze sliding across the construction for the reinforced arena to the temporary restaurants and food stalls, to the new construction where the Orchard was erecting a suburb around the base of Kharon. There was something… reassuring about human settlements. More than personal strength, these edifices were a physical representation of humanity’s strength.

Randidly raised his gaze higher and looked toward the Northeast. The tall buildings of the Orchard were fingers reached up to the sky. Cities were the hands with a thousand fingers that allowed humanity to grip the vital levers of the world.

Despite the power of the monsters that had come to Earth, the people have adapted. We have reaffirmed our place on this planet.

Looking at the eaves, gutters, glass windows, the hundreds of electric lights, the ornate wooden doors, and level paving on all the roads leading into the city, Randidly gradually shook his head. As he did so, Yggdrasil, the Grim Chimera, and the Stillborn Phoenix stood with him. “This… isn’t enough. Being reassured misses the point. There are four Calamities coming. This… I suspect this amount of strength is only enough to defeat the first one…”

Randidly stood there and looked down. As he let his eyes unfocus from the details, it was only image that spiraled before his vision. The images of so many people, even when several people were present that possessed about 100x as much potency as others, was a confusing mixture of so many influences that the resulting sensation was neutral. It was a landscape of greys and softened edges. The images robbed each other of their dangerous cravings and pure beliefs. This was a humanity that didn’t know its future.

And although it was a hard truth, oftentimes people couldn’t find the correct Path forward without a concrete threat to whip them away from complacency. But once the Earth was named in the eyes of the Nexus… things would begin accelerating forward. The System would come to collect the interest it was owed.

Congratulations! Your Skill Conviction of the Smiling Horror (L) has grown to Level 345!

Randidly stood at the edge of his island and monitored the images below until Tatiana approached him. She glanced around to make sure there was no one else present and then took several sharp steps forward to stand on Randidly’s left. Her amber eyes were bright as she scrutinized the ground below. But then she turned to Randidly and tilted her head to the side. “Penny for your thoughts?”

“Have I done enough?” Randidly asked lightly. He entwined the metal fingers of his left hand with the fleshy ones of his right. Purple-black flames ignited in his eyes as he attempted to peer forward into the future and couldn’t seem to glean any clues from the inert mass of images before him.

On the plus side, at least humanity’s current position is stable… Randidly mused.

Tatiana chuckled. “You know, those sorts of questions can only be answered in retrospect. We’ve done our best to predict the issues, but it’s the most likely the problems that we haven’t considered that will make or break our efforts. We can only prepare and stay vigilant.”

Our efforts. That’s true. It’s not just me… I came with the vision, but I could never have accomplished this alone. Randidly rolled his shoulders and then nodded slowly to Tatiana. “...so, what am I late for now?”

Sensing the change in Randidly’s mood, Tatiana produced a clipboard and made several lightning-fast notes. “Technically? You are exactly on time. But I want to make sure you stay that way. Oh, and I wanted to confirm that after this, the Order Ducis will spend one day administering a round and then one day off until the championship. So the final will be in 10 days.”

Randidly stretched his arms upward. He had been doing this with Tatiana for several weeks; he wasn’t going to allow her to lull him into agreeing to something tiresome without good reason. “Don’t try and hide it; what’s up?”

“I know it isn’t something that you would usually do, but since you would be leaving Earth soon anyway, I have scheduled something special for you.” Tatiana’s eyes were glittering. “Don’t you want a wider audience? This would be your chance.”

Inwardly, Randidly sighed.