176 Prologue II - Aid (1/2)

Daedalus, Flying Dreadnought of the Republic

The skies above the Republic were sunny and blue, the outlines of every fluffy white cloud clearly visible. Yet close observers watching the sky might have noticed the occasional misshapen cloud, warped and curled at their edges or parted down the center like some enormous mass had passed through them.

And yet, the skies were clear. Such was the marvelous cloaking of Daedalus, the flying ship of the Elven Republic and widely considered its true capitol with how much time the Imperator Lucius Vindicus III spent on it.

Few would blame Lucius.

The Daedalus was likely the most formidable weapon of war in the world, and it made sense for its origins hailed from another world entirely, one where the marvels of technology had reached fantastical peaks that far overshadowed magic, greatly outpacing even the technology that the Republic itself currently relied on.

It was not a stretch to say that there was no safer place on the world than atop the Daedalus.

Lucius stood with his hands behind his back in the front of the circular command room. He was perched atop an elevated metal platform at the center where he had a view of the room around him. Monitors mimicking windows formed the walls of the room, showing a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree view outside the aircraft.

Lucius's one good eye flitted from side to side, the golden pupil shining against black sclera.

Nothing of much note worth. The western ranges of the Republic were yet safe, the airspace unclouded aside from a thin layer of grey smog that had risen from the industrial centers further east and north.

But of course, Lucius was not here to merely scout. That was the job of the command crew, and for them, underneath every window-like monitor, were control panels as well as a plethora of glowing buttons and switches.

Right now, however, the Daedalus flew on autopilot, with Lucius having sent the command crew temporarily away for his real purpose. He kept an eye on the monitor directly in front of him, the one that showed what stood right in front of the ship, and soon enough, through a veil of thick fog, the towering stone face of mount Torr Valeris appeared.

Lucius could understand why, when the superstition of rabble still held strong clutch over the wills of the elves, many believed the mountain to be a link between the earth and the heavens.

Torr Valeries was massive. Far, far larger than any mountain.

Simply the face of the mountain was so wide that it was impossible to tell where it began and ended, stretching endless into the horizon. In the monitor, it appeared to be like an impossibly tall wall of rock. Its peak escaped normal eyesight even from this elevation where the Daedalus flew side by side with clouds.

Lucius's elven ears twitched, their tips almost vibrating as they felt the intense surge of magical energy congregate behind him. It was a crushing feeling, this magic, a heavy, suffocating sensation that crawled from his ears to his head down to his chest, but he did not turn around.

”A pleasure to meet you, too, Valerikynthimos,” said Lucius, his voice gruff and grating.

”Please, my surname is far too unwieldy when spoken in your crude language. Call me Aenshei. And it is no pleasure to reduce myself to listening to the prattling of inferior beings, but in my boundless generosity, I do.”

Lucius felt the presence behind him circle around until it floated just in front of him. The figure of an Elven child, her lengthy blonde hair tied into two tails that hung below her shoulders. She was dressed in typical Elven garb. White tunic and robes wrapped with a sky-blue sash that indicated she was Puriter, of full Elven blood – a first class citizen.

”This form again?” said Lucius, a hint of distaste laden in his tone.

”I thought you'd like it,” said Aenshei as she floated up to Lucius's platform, taking a seat atop his own control panel. ”It always does seem that the older and sterner your kind becomes, the more perverse their generation grows, and you, little one, are nearing 170 – the twilight of your existence draws near, and that is when your kind become ever more desperate, ever more depraved.”

Lucius maintained a stony expression, his striking black eye never widening, never showing emotion, only ever shooting a piercing stare forwards. ”Halt this nonsense.”

”Or perhaps, you would prefer this?” A sparkling sheen of white covered Aenshei's form, and when it dissipated, she had become entirely different. She now had the form of a young elven woman.

Typically attractive in the way Elves were. Tall and slender with elegant features. Curly locks of red hair – the same shade as that which flowed down from Lucius's own head – spilling down her forehead and just barely covering her gold and black eyes.

”I see that dragonkin have no respect for the dead,” said Lucius as he gazed at the spitting image of his daughter, back when she was alive, when times were far less tumultuous, far less chaotic.

”The dead of lesser creatures amuses me not, but I should stop squandering time.” Aenshei yawned before the same white sheen covered her again, this time transforming her into yet another elven woman, but this time, it was the regular avatar she adopted when interacting with elves.