In a few quick strides, Erick had made his way to Mira's side.
Behind him, the doors were already sliding shut. The train had already begun its slow rolling motion as it made its lumbering way to the tunnel that would take it away from the bustle and brightly lit Diamond Depot.
"I am truly sorry I am so late. I got waylaid along the way." He reached out and touched Mira's arm. "I came as soon as I could."
"What???" Raphael yelled where he was sitting. "Did you get attacked?"
Erick looked over at Raphael and nodded.
Mira stood up and began inspecting him. "Are you hurt anywhere?"
Erick gave her a grateful smile and gently pushed her back down onto the chair. "I'm fine Mira. Don't worry about me."
Raphael threw up his hands. "Who would dare touch the Crown Prince of Jade!!!"
"Well, it would seem to be the BROTHER of the Crown Prince of Jade." Erick gave a dry hacking cough.
"Wait, are you talking about Alastaire?" Mira turned to him, frowning. "I thought Emperor Roy Rashak had already neutralized him."
"Hardly. He is alive and well, and guess what." He paused for effect. "It wasn't the Mage Elites that turned my brother against me. It was my brother who did a hostile takeover of the Mage Elites!"
"W--what? How???" Alfric Hobart stuttered.
Erick shook his head and blew a strand of teal blue hair from his bright aquamarine eyes. "He changed his name to Alastaire Mocchus so Royal Father wouldn't catch onto his ploy and now he's using that faction to terrorize every mage realm that he can reach."
He sank down onto the chair next to Mira and buried his head in his palms.
"He promises each realm he wants to take over that he will solve every single issue they face, big or small. In return, all they have to do is hand over their ENTIRE military fighting force to him."
"And they believe that?" Mira patted Erick on the back and waved a hand for one of the serving maids to bring him a cup of hot coffee.
Erick looked up. "He is very charismatic and these people are not just gullible, they're also desperate. They would rather hand everything over to him than to face up to whatever challenges that they are currently facing."
Erick paused as a serving dwarf filled up his silver cup with a dark brew of something that smelled like coffee.
"Thank you sweetheart." He said to Mira and took a sip of the dark brew.
"He tells them that he needs the forces in order to enact the changes. Those mage realms that are desperate and on the brink of failure simply hand over to him lock stock and barrel everything they have and then those territories become his simply for the asking."
"And those that don't?" She cut dumplings into small sections and slid them over towards Erick.
"If the votes don't go his way, he simply takes it by force. He does not care what he destroys as long as he gets what he wants." Erick tossed a piece of dumpling into his mouth. "It was one of the Primate Warrior military forces that came after me today."
"Prince Erick, what of the twenty men who left with you?" Alfric asked.
Erick looked grim. "They were all ambushed. I was the only one left alive. None of the black-furred gorillas had the guts to face the demon I conjured so I was able to escape."
Daran Duluth sighed, rubbing his head. "How many of them came after you? Do you have a rough idea?"
He shook his head wearily. "There were at least two squadrons of fifty primate warriors each. And just like what happened with Jana, I was also ambushed as I was emerging from somewhere."
Jana clacked her long carmine fingernails. "It's hard to see all of them jumping at you if you're trying to crawl out of a tiny opening, especially if they come through portals that just open up in front of you."
Beside her, Theo bared his fangs and tossed the remainder of his cocktail down his throat.
"One moment there was nothing there and the next moment, half my men had been cut down." Erick shook his head as the events replayed in his head.
"Your Royal Highness, how did you manage to get away?" Raphael Summer interrupted Erick's dolorous train of thought.
The Crown Prince waved a dismissive hand, throwing the last piece of dumpling into his mouth. "They had two Overlord mages with them who knew my fighting styles, my strengths, my weaknesses. I had to release a demon I'd been keeping captive just to get away."
"You lost one of your warrior demons?" Raphael Summer covered his mouth with both hands.
Erick nodded, his eyes bleak. "I'll have to find a way to retrieve it before it terrorizes the neighborhood."
His eyes grew hard. "I hope Alastaire's head gets gnawed off."
"We could have one of our necromancers go and--"
"No!" Erick slammed his hand on the table, sending the plates and goblets bouncing.
Raphael jumped at the loud bang, his hands fluttering to his bony chest.
"That demon is a fierce one. I do not want another mage's blood on my hands. I'll go after him myself when I get back to Jade."
"How will you find him?" Mira retrieved the empty dumpling plate that had been knocked over by his sudden bout of table violence.
"I have a tracker on him. I know exactly where he is."
Alfric raised a hand. "I know this may come at an inopportune moment but what about postponing this trip until you can get that demon under control?"
"No. My cousin's welfare is far more important than an overgrown turd ball that goes around throwing stinky dirt everywhere."
"What???" Mira's eyes widened. She gently slid a plate of tomatoes towards Erick's fingertips resting on the table.
"It's the nature of the beast. It spits out mud from Tourmaline Bog and chokes everyone around it. I have it mostly shackled so it doesn't get free reign but I had to give it enough freedom to asphyxiate the Primate Warriors so I let a portion of it loose. It's probably run out of steam for now and won't be able to do any more damage for a while."
Raphael shook his head. "You can't just leave it running amok amongst the citizens, Your Royal Highness. I will go collect it if you give me the amulet."
Erick shot Raphael a look and suddenly threw something at him. The metallic object arched across the space between them, catching the dull light of the dolmian spheres. As it hit Raphael's outstretched hand, it made a clinking sound and disappeared into his sleeve.
"Before you do anything, go talk to Elsa. She will show you what you need to do."
Raphael stood up stretching his thin frail frame languidly, almost as if he was starting to wake up from a deep sleep. He yawned and rubbed a hand through his loose blue hair. "Well folks, it's been fun, but I gotta run. I have a demon to chase."
"Hey. Pretty boy," Erick scowled as he chewed on the tomato slices. "Be careful."
Raphael aimed a big silly grin at Erick. "Try to save a bit of fun for me will ya? I'll be rejoining you in no time flat."
He threw out his hands with a flourish. In seconds, Raphael had slipped into an impromptu portal and disappeared from sight.
Erick snorted. "Show off."
Mira tapped him on the arm and handed him a skewer of grilled meatballs. "Erick, these magikally-enhanced apes---are they in widespread use?"
"They used to be." Erick chomped down on the meatballs. "There were the Gardening Primates, the Kitchen Primates, the Farming Primates and the Construction Primates. They used to be everywhere and did everything that no one wanted to do.
"So what happened?"
"Greed. That's what happened." Alfric sighed, shaking his head. "Everything was fine until the mages decided that it wasn't enough that the great apes had to do all the work that they did not want to do. The mages began to use them in their petty little border skirmishes and personal grudge duels. They eventually got turned into the perfect killing machines."
Erick nodded. He threw down the empty skewer and picked up the thick slice of buttered toast Mira placed in front of him. "Once the primates had been converted into proxy fighting assets, there arose a class of great apes that were called the Guardian Primates. These are what Alfric called the primate killing machines. A huge advantage to using apes is their speed of maturity."
"Sorry?" Mira began buttering another slice.
"Since apes reproduce like rabbits and reach maturity in about a dozen years, the mages have found that they are able to build up vast armies in half the amount of time it would take for humans to grow to maturity."
"Wait a moment," she paused her buttering chore. "I thought you said the mages don't have Guardian Primates anymore. Where are these apes being created?"
"Andalusia," Alfric and Erick both spoke at the same time.
Mira reached into her memories trying to recall the map of Ashrya. There was no such place that she had seen. She shook her head and finished buttering the slice of bread. "How come I've never seen Andalusia on the Ashryan map before?"
"Andalusia is not part of this world. It is another world altogether. It is linked to this world via one of the train tunnels that the dwarves built. But if I'm not mistaken, that train tunnel has been destroyed." Erick turned to Alfric for confirmation but the dwarf did not meet his eyes.
"That train tunnel got destroyed, right Alfric?" He shoved the bread slice into his mouth.
"Alfric." Erick's eyes grew dangerous.
"Your Royal Highness."
Erick licked the butter from his fingers. "Don't tell me you dwarves did not destroy that train tunnel."
"I will not tell you, Your Royal Highness."
"Alfric. Don't mess with me." He threw a napkin at the old dwarf. "What happened to that train tunnel?"
Alfric held out helpless hands. "Your Royal Highness, as far as I'm aware, that train tunnel is still in existence although that track has not been used in recent memory."
"Why was it not destroyed?"
"That track is part of a three-way junction, Your Royal Highness. If you destabilize one side, the other two tracks will also be severely weakened and could collapse. There is no good way to destroy that tunnel."
Erick turned back to face Mira. "Well, there you have it. That's where the Primate Warriors are coming from."