Zane had about four hundred hungry, ill, weak, leaderless, poorly clothed, desperate prisoners on his hands. And no clue what to do with them.
So he went to his tried-and-true trick whenever a complex interpersonal issue came up.
He sic'd Reina on it.
It took her three hours to sort the group out and make a plan. First she poured a chest full of essence stones into the Beacon, and brought out a massive feast. It was the first real meal the prisoners had eaten in days. It breathed some life into them. That night they had to sleep outside.
The next morning Reina went through them one by one and sorted them into their new roles by class — as healers, scouts, light or heavy warriors, support warriors, instructors, and a few miscellaneous support roles like builders, cooks, and guards. She traded for cartfuls of building materials and set most able-bodied folk to building. By the third day they had enough temporary housing to fit everyone.
For their permanent homes, she decided to spread them all out. Fifty or Sixty to a settlement, all across the various Safe Zones the Luminous Faction had claimed. They'd be like neighborhoods. Each neighborhood had a community-elected leader who reported to Reina. It took her just a week to put the plans fully in motion. She had a whole hierarchy mapped out and everything.
Nominally, Zane was at the top. He didn't really do anything, nor did he want to. He'd only step in when things got hairy. Reina usually didn't need his help anyway, but he could still be useful as something Reina could threaten people with if necessary.
Reina and Cale were both second-in-commands. But Cale was little more than a friendly public face. He was clueless about the goings-on of the faction. He was just happy to go along. Reina was really in charge. Below her were various councils and sub-leaders, all the way down to the grunts. Her schema accounted for everyone.
She decided the branch settlements would be semi-autonomous. From the main branch, they'd get defenses, resources, and information. In return they'd share treasures from their treasure areas. Their representatives would check in at weekly intervals in the Headquarter's town hall. The first few weeks Reina was very hands-on.
There were also dozens of other little things Reina handled on his behalf, things he wouldn't have had a clue how to handle, like childcare systems and plumbing. She had this knack for finding the best people for a task and putting them exactly where they were needed. She was a born leader, a born manager. She'd only been in her mid-20s, but she'd already been overseeing the warehouse before the Change. Her work ethic was frightening at times.
If the Change never happened, she would've probably risen far higher than just warehouse manager. It was a stroke of luck getting her. She freed him to work on more interesting things.
Like clearing dungeons and fighting monsters, which was how he spent most of the next couple weeks. He only came back to Headquarters for dinner and sleep.
***
In that time, the Luminous Faction Headquarters changed drastically. The central hub was still in the Crystal Back Highlands: a huge open plaza around the Faction Beacon. Quaint little houses of stone and wood clustered around. Their roofs were designed bowed in to collect rainwater, so they didn't need waste essence stones getting freshwater from the Beacon.
The Beacon itself was housed in the town hall, the most architecturally impressive building in the place. You wouldn't spare a second glance at it before the change, but here it was like one of Michelangelo's sculptures.
There were also guard towers and healing wards scattered about.
Walls ringed all of it. They were made out of 'spirit steel'—a shimmering metal that could stand up to some serious punishment. One of Zane's punches could barely dent it. You could see the slight schisms in the wall where they used Zane's fires to weld the steel together.
Zane also found his fires took forever to go out. Once they were burning, even he had a hard time stopping them. New rule: no fire on friendly ground.
Outside the walls was an open field for mock battles with straw dummies strung up, and targets for the archers to shoot at. They'd set up obstacle courses for the rogues to run through.
Then there was the outpost in the Emerald Forest: a bunch of treehouses strung together. You could go from many points to any other without touching the ground. Folk lived here, sure, but they were mostly here because Reina found out the treasure areas kept replenishing. The Moon Trees ripened once a month. You could walk this path to reach all the groves, and harvest them when they did. Reina had thought to assign four people the sole task of being 'Moon Tree caretakers'—they were in charge of the picking and the nurturing.
***
For Zane, all this went on in the background; he just saw more and more of it as he came back every day or a couple of days. Sure, he'd engage with the community. He'd make himself seen. He'd drop into a training session and do an hour of guest instruction, or spar with some of the warriors, who all treated him like some kind of demigod. At this point, he'd given up telling them off about it. He became a kind of figurehead for the faction, which was neat because that was pretty much what he'd been aiming for all along.
***
He stomped dungeon after dungeon after dungeon. He must have gone through dozens of F-ranks by now, by now. And he'd pretty much crushed all the nearby E-ranks. It was fairly trivial to solo them now. He could barely get himself excited to go out and clear them anymore. As for more F-rank… he just couldn't be bothered. Luckily, with the influx of new warriors, his people were fully capable of clearing them themselves.
Something else he noticed: Safe Zones didn't always stay Safe. When he checked the Beacon map one day, a Zone due north of here which he swore was Cascadia territory had reverted to being a dungeon. A week later he caught another instance of it happening.
Soon the Cascadia folk flipped it back—when he asked Tom about it Tom confirmed. There seemed to be some small chance for dungeons to respawn. Luckily it hadn't happened to the Luminous Faction yet, but he passed the info on to Reina. Good timing too, because not two days later one of the former Mad Dog safe Zones flipped. It was only F-rank, though. The branch settlements took care of it pretty easy.
***
One day Reina found him lying face down on the floor of his cabin, unmoving.
"No…" She gasped. "No—Zane!" She flipped him over. "Stay with me!"
"I'm not dying," he said. "I'm just… bored as hell."
"…" she looked ready to slap him. "Don't you scare me like that."
"Sorry." He sat up.
That morning he tried getting out of bed. He couldn't do it. All the nearby E-ranks were gone, and he just couldn't get excited at the thought of beating down yet another re-spawned F-rank. All the interesting dungeons for hundreds miles around were wiped out.
He felt like he did in that down phase after he got in his injury. He was slowly dissolving into the grayness, a horrible nothing. He always imagined it gray—gray was the color of entropy. He imagined this was what death felt like. He kept trying to think of a reason to go—a reason to do anything really—and was failing utterly. And so he lay down and waited for the world to happen to him.
Last time this happened it'd lasted months. It had been incredibly difficult to get up, and go get that warehouse job; he'd had to force himself second by second step by step. It had been excruciating, but he'd done it, and though he still had down bursts, things had gotten much better. He knew how to fix this—he had to get back in motion again.
When he said this all to Reina she gave him the oddest look. "Oh Zane…" he got the strange sense she wanted to hug him, but she held herself back. "Is there anything I could do to help?" She said softly.
He thought about it.
"I think," he said slowly. "I need something stronger. Something bigger."
He stood, blinking—he had an idea. The first thing all morning that got him to move, that got him excited. He walked out the door.
"Where are you going?"
"The Beacon map," he said. She followed right after.
He scanned the place, looking over all the reds and greens… there.
A chain of 13 F- and E- rank dungeons away was a different letter.
D-rank.
"Mount Saint Helens," he breathed. Caden, that mage in Tom's party, had said C- and D- ranks were on a totally different level than F- and E-ranks. Figuratively and literally—they had multiple layers. Often at least 4 bosses.
He could imagine a mountain with layers upon layers, sure—and what kind of nasty monsters lived there? What kind of wild treasures?! Now this he could get up for.
He pointed it out to Reina. 'This," he said. 'This is exactly what I need.'
A flash of disappointment crossed her face.
"What is it?"
"Nothing," she said quickly. "It's just…isn't it D-rank? That's a bit…"
"E-ranks don't do it for me anymore," he said. "I need this, Reina."
She looked like she wanted to protest, but she just sighed. "I get it. And I guess you don't want me there either."
He felt a twinge of guilt. "You're needed here, Reina—"
She smiled weakly. "No. I get it, really."
He wasn't sure why he was justifying himself to her. This was pretty much the terms they'd agreed on. He wouldn't have bothered with anyone else, but with her it felt different.
"I'll be back before the week's out. Promise," he said. "There's no hostile Factions nearby anymore, right?"
"No," Reina confirmed. "There are a handful of small Factions, but we've been communicating. They're friendly. They wouldn't dare attack anyway. The nearest big one is Cascadia, and we have a non-aggression pact. You're in the clear… go get 'em."
He couldn't make himself wait until next morning. That afternoon, jittering with excitement, he set off for Mount Saint Helens.
***
Something interesting happened on his way there. Day two of the journey, on his eighth dungeon—
He wrapped his chains around the head of the giant lion-spider, tightened the noose, and ripped. Fire gnawed through the chitin. The head came off easily after that.
𝕃𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕝 𝕦𝕡!
𝕃𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕝 𝟝𝟘 𝕣𝕖𝕒𝕔𝕙𝕖𝕕. 𝕊𝕖𝕔𝕠𝕟𝕕 𝕔𝕝𝕒𝕤𝕤 𝕖𝕧𝕠𝕝𝕦𝕥𝕚𝕠𝕟 𝕦𝕟𝕝𝕠𝕔𝕜𝕖𝕕.
𝕎𝕚𝕝𝕕𝕗𝕚𝕣𝕖 𝕎𝕒𝕣𝕕𝕖𝕟 [𝔼𝕡𝕚𝕔]
The Wildfire Warden is a master of control. It leverages its chains to bind and subdue itsenemies. Once chained down it ignites them, burying them in a fiery tomb. Its grappling capabilities are among the best of its tier, and its striking only augments this: once itsAnchor Form grazes flesh, it is nearly impossible to get it out. For the disciplined yet brutal fighter.
𝕊𝕠𝕦𝕝 𝕎𝕖𝕒𝕡𝕠𝕟 𝕌𝕡𝕘𝕣𝕒𝕕𝕖:
𝔼𝕟𝕕𝕝𝕖𝕤𝕤 𝕃𝕖𝕟𝕘𝕥𝕙: The Chains can now be shortened and lengthened at will, up to a mile long. The longer they get, the more difficult to control.
ℕ𝕖𝕨 𝕊𝕠𝕦𝕝 𝕎𝕖𝕒𝕡𝕠𝕟 𝔽𝕠𝕣𝕞: Anchor Form: The chain ends are outfitted with heavy, fireimbued anchor-like heads, which serve as grappling hooks. These anchors can latch ontosurfaces or pierce the flesh of enemies, locking them tight. The Warden needs only touchthe enemy to hook them.
𝕀𝕟𝕗𝕖𝕣𝕟𝕒𝕝 𝕄𝕒𝕦𝕝𝕖𝕣 [𝔼𝕡𝕚𝕔]
The Infernal Mauler is a master of slashing. It wields its Axe Form as missile and guillotine both, and its explosiveness makes it fiendish on the hunt. In ancient times theMauler was feared across the realm: its Axe makes a ghoulish shrieking sound as it swirls on the Chain, a sound which, in many civilizations, is now associated with the greatest devilry.
𝕊𝕠𝕦𝕝 𝕎𝕖𝕒𝕡𝕠𝕟 𝕌𝕡𝕘𝕣𝕒𝕕𝕖:
𝔼𝕟𝕕𝕝𝕖𝕤𝕤 𝕃𝕖𝕟𝕘𝕥𝕙: Can now be shortened and lengthened at will, up to a mile long. The longer they get, the more difficult to control.
ℕ𝕖𝕨 𝕊𝕠𝕦𝕝 𝕎𝕖𝕒𝕡𝕠𝕟 𝔽𝕠𝕣𝕞: Axe Form - The Chain's ends are equipped with giant axe heads burning at the edges with a perpetual flame whose heat scales with your level. The Axe is capable of cleaving through multiple enemies with ease. The heads are sharp to others, yet dull to the sage.
𝔼𝕞𝕓𝕖𝕣 𝕍𝕒𝕟𝕘𝕦𝕒𝕣𝕕 [𝔼𝕡𝕚𝕔]
The Ember Vanguard is a master of crushing. Its Flail Spears swing with huge concussive force, and their detonations upon impact are often enough to instantly pulverize fighters of the same level. A brutal, oppressive fighter, the Vanguard seeks to dominate.
𝕊𝕠𝕦𝕝 𝕎𝕖𝕒𝕡𝕠𝕟 𝕌𝕡𝕘𝕣𝕒𝕕𝕖:
𝔼𝕟𝕕𝕝𝕖𝕤𝕤 𝕃𝕖𝕟𝕘𝕥𝕙: Can now be shortened and lengthened at will, up to a mile long. The longer they get, the more difficult to control.
ℕ𝕖𝕨 𝕊𝕠𝕦𝕝 𝕎𝕖𝕒𝕡𝕠𝕟 𝔽𝕠𝕣𝕞: Flail Sphere Form - Each end of the chain features a heavy spiked steel balls, hot as magma at the tips. They explode upon impact, dealing huge concussive and heat damage.