Chapter 685: A Gift Before Splitting [Bonus - ]
Kara inclined her head with a warm smile.
"I’ll pass your thanks along to the rest of them."
Kassandra’s sharp eyes lingered briefly on the faint heat radiating from Rika’s cloak before she took her seat beside the defensive telemetry banks.
The two white-cloaked women came last.
Both were slender and pale, their long cloaks stitched with glowing solar runes, and they looked so alike that only the way they carried themselves told them apart... one strutted while the other drifted.
The one in front kept her chin high, a rapier of white light-crystal hanging at her belt.
"Celeste Sunsword, High Priestess of Light of the Unmovable Wall!" she announced, her chin lifted so high it was a wonder she could see anything, her voice pitched in that high noble tone. "Ordained by the heavens to banish all darkness!"
She gave Kara the shallowest nod etiquette allowed. "And this is my sister. We were told to expect guests from Blessed Land. I trust the voyage will be less eventful than the war..."
Her fingers drifted to the bridge of her nose before she caught herself.
’Sunsword,’ Silas thought, fighting a smile. ’Tasmin was right, her parents really did name her that and that nose healed nicely.’
Her twin said nothing at first.
She only bowed with her gloved hands folded in front of her.
𝒇𝒓𝙚𝒆𝔀𝓮𝓫𝒏𝓸𝙫𝓮𝓵.𝓬𝙤𝙢
"I’m Hana... Welcome aboard, honored guests," she murmured, and slid into the seat beside her sister, her gaze never quite leaving Celeste.
Celeste sat with a sniff, though her eyes flickered over the Blessed Land crests with grudging respect.
The officer at the central console stepped forward, offering a formal bow to Kara and the guests.
"Greetings, travelers of Blessed Land," She said. "I am Brainbox, Lord Sky’s only Intelligence Hero... I have no combat abilities whatsoever, so please don’t ask me to hold a sword. I manage the calculations, defensive harmonics, and spatial trajectories for the Unmovable Wall so please remain seated and ensure your internal mana pathways are anchored... Spatial translation across world boundaries can cause severe disorientation to unprepared meridians."
She turned back to the primary console with her fingers blurring across the glowing holographic glyphs.
"Initiating spatial engagement protocols," Brainbox announced, her voice echoing through the ship’s internal intercoms. "Engaging external crawler treads... Venting excess boiler steam..."
HUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUM!
Deep within the bowels of the machine, a massive power core roared to life.
Massive pulsing shockwaves of azure mana rippled through the hull, vibrating directly through the steel floorboards and into the seats.
Outside the panoramic quartz window, the landscape began to violently shudder.
The house-sized crawler plates groaned as they bit into the rugged terrain, pulverizing ancient boulders into gray dust and snapping thick mountain pines like dry toothpicks as the three-story fortress surged forward.
"Tread plates locked... Shields at ninety-eight percent," Brainbox reported calmly. "Ascending to the spatial rift plateau."
The momentum of the machine was breathtaking.
It moved like an unstoppable iron juggernaut, crushing every natural obstacle beneath thousands of tons of enchanted steel.
Sitting in the commander’s seat, Lord Sky turned his red-tinted visor toward Kara.
"Silas," Sky said softly. "Before we meet again in the Sovereign Realm... or perhaps out in the real world... it’s going to be quite a while. Once we touch down, my schedule is going to be packed with fleet audits and territorial reorganization before resuming my streams... I’m going to be buried under administrative hell for weeks."
Kara turned her head, her black bangs swaying as she offered a curious, amused smile.
"Sounds exhausting. Don’t tell me you called me over just to complain about your schedule?"
"Hardly," Sky grunted through the modulator. "I got you something... A proper parting gift before we go our separate ways."
Kara tilted her head, genuinely intrigued. "Oh? What did you get me?"
’Knowing Evelyn, it’s a bill or a bomb,’ Silas thought.
Lord Sky didn’t answer with words.
Instead, Sky’s right gauntlet flared with a brilliant intricate pattern of azure spatial mana.
The air above the armor twisted, the dimensional seam unsealing as Sky reached deep into the primary storage of his inventory, pulling free a—
"Space Anchor engaged! Spatial coordinates locked!" Brainbox’s crisp voice rang out across the bridge, drowning out all conversation. "Dimensional gateway opened!"
VUUUUUUUUUUUUUUM! FLASH!
Before Kara could even catch a glimpse of the object emerging from the light, the world outside the panoramic quartz glass vanished entirely.
The rugged Umbral Basin, the jagged mountain peaks, and the sky were violently obliterated by an all-consuming blinding flash of pure white light.
The spatial translation engaged with the force of a collapsing star, and in a single timeless heartbeat the entire Unmovable Wall vanished from the northern wastes, leaving behind only an empty silence and two deep ruts where its treads had stood.
...
BOOM!
The blinding white light of the spatial transition collapsed with the sound of a rushing vacuum, folding away into the deep expanse of the afternoon.
Where the deafening roar of the Unmovable Wall’s gargantuan crawler treads had dominated the world moments prior, a bizarre tranquil silence settled over the hull.
The house-sized steel plates settled onto a wide reinforced landing terrace of dark vitrified cobblestone, nestled within a private estate basin surrounded by towering spiraling spires of wrought iron, glowing runic lamps, and lush weeping willows.
...Central City.
The sheer scale of the metropolitan skyline loomed beyond the high perimeter wall... there was floating celestial barges drifting along designated mana currents, gleaming skyscrapers clad in polished mythril and enchanted glass, and sky-bridges connecting district towers like glowing webs across the azure sky.
Even from the bridge the noise of it reached him... the drone of sky-trams threading between the towers, the bell-chime of barges docking at their mooring spires.
A crowd had already begun to gather along the perimeter fence, pointing up at an iron war-rig parked in the middle of their pristine park like a bull in a flower shop.
On the bridge of the mobile fortress, Lord Sky stood up from the captain’s throne, rolling his armored shoulders as the seals in his collar released a measured hiss of excess pressure.
"Spatial anchors stabilized," Brainbox’s smooth voice echoed from the calculation pit with her amber-hued diagnostic screens dissolving into floating motes of light. "External pressure within normal parameters and the Territory core has successfully linked to the Central City grid."
Sky reached up, tapping the side of his alloy helm with the synthetic voice projecting cleanly across the command deck.
"All units, stand down from transit alert... We’ve officially touched down in Central City. Before we begin our scheduled deployment protocols, we need to completely overhaul our supply stores. I want the cold vaults restocked with fresh rations, the munitions bays replenished with standard cartridges, and the armory outfitted with proper spare gear and clothes... Get proper civilian wear for the off-duty shifts."
Standing near the perimeter rail of the dais, Elm, Hiro, and Kassandra exchanged startled bewildered glances.
Elm stepped forward, her long white hair catching the ambient blue light of the bridge.
Her silver eyes widened with a hesitant cautious curiosity with her fingers tugging on the hem of her simple tunic.
"Lord Sky..." Elm murmured, her brow furrowing slightly. "Are we ordering from the discount surplus depot in the outer ring again? The bulk crates of preserved field mash and surplus canvas coats? Not that any of us mind, of course! We’re used to the ration bricks, but... well, we just figured..."
Beside her, Hiro’s posture remained rigid, though the dark silk blindfold concealing his eyes tilted slightly downward toward the floor.
Even the disciplined blind swordsman seemed acutely aware of the territory’s usual austerity.
Behind the dark-red visor of the helmet, Evelyn’s teeth clicked together in private burning irritation.
’Discount surplus...’ she thought, a flush of embarrassment prickling the back of her neck beneath the thick padding of the armor. ’Do they really think of me as that much of a cheapskate?! I kept us alive through four blockades on stale hardtack and scrap iron, and now they expect me to buy them burlap sacks in the greatest trade hub in the Sovereign Realm?!’
"No," Sky barked, cutting Elm off with a sharp flick of his gauntlet.
The armor clinked as Sky reached into a hidden compartment at his hip, pulling out a heavy polished platinum card embossed with the crest of the Valoria City bank.
With a crisp casual flick of his wrist, Sky tossed the platinum card across the dais.
"Whoa—!"
Elm scrambled forward, her hands flailing in a frantic ungraceful panic as she barely managed to trap the gleaming card against her chest before it could clatter onto the steel decking.
"Get the high-grade provisions," Sky commanded, his synthesized baritone leaving zero room for argument. "No surplus mash and no dry biscuits... Buy the premium grain, fresh game from the hunting reserves, and proper insulated wool for the crew. Get whatever keeps everyone comfortable and operating at peak capacity. Clear?"
Elm stared down at the platinum card in her trembling hands with her jaw slacking so wide it threatened to detach.
Hiro’s head tilted back by an inch in sheer, silent disbelief, while Kassandra’s eyebrows nearly vanished into her hairline.
Sky’s visor swept over the frozen group, the modulated voice sharpening with defensive indignation.
"Why the hell are all of you staring at me like that? It’s not funny. I said buy what you need. Move!"
"Y-Yes, Lord Sky!" Elm squeaked, clutching the card like it was a live explosive.
She offered a frantic clumsy bow, turned on her heel, and practically bolted toward the elevator corridor, dragging Hiro and Kassandra along with her before their commander could change his mind.
As the heavy steel doors slid shut behind them, Lord Sky muttered a string of low incoherent curses beneath his breath, leaning back against the edge of the tactical hololithic console.
Standing just three paces away, Kara rested her elbow against the handrail with her black bangs swaying as she watched the entire exchange with a slow amused smirk playing on her lips.
Inside the feminine shell of Kara White, Silas’s thoughts were racing with fascinated wonder.
’Evelyn really has changed...’ Silas mused, her violet eyes gleaming with quiet humor behind the illusionary disguise. ’When we first met, she was the undisputed queen of miserly survival... Even when she was sitting on millions of liquid credits laundered through Jax’s back-channel brokers, she’d count every single one and patch her clothes with scrap wire... It rubbed off on her entire territory, the Unmovable Wall ran on pure grit and penny-pinching paranoia. Sure, I poked fun at her for it, but that was just her nature. Who was I to tell a fortress lord how to run her household?’
Yet now... watching her toss a platinum line of credit to her First Hero just so the crew could eat fresh meat and wear soft wool?
’It’s good to see,’ Silas thought warmly. ’Her people deserve it. Though... if she’s suddenly feeling so generous, she ought to spend a few of those millions spoiling me too. I did help her, after all.’
Kara smoothed the lapels of her pristine tailored coat, taking a graceful step forward.
Her melodious feminine voice cut smoothly through the hum of the cooling turbines.
"So, Lord Sky... before your operators interrupted us with that dramatic spatial leap, you were mentioning something about a parting gift?"
Sky sighed, a heavy synthesized rumble that vibrated through the helm.
"Yeah. Hold on."
Sky reached up with both gauntlets, pressing the dual release catches beneath his jawline.
Psssshhhh-KLAK!
The pneumatic pressure hissed outward in a plume of cool vapor.
Sky lifted the heavy alloy helmet, pulling it off to reveal Evelyn’s face.
Her messy black bun was completely flattened with stray strands of dark hair sticking to her damp forehead and her sharp dark eyes carrying their usual heavy sleep-deprived bags.
She shook her head, rolling her neck until the joints popped, and glared pointedly at Kara.
"Take that stupid ring off for five seconds, Silas," Evelyn grumbled, wiping her brow with the back of her wrist. "I’m not having this conversation with a fake high-society noblewoman... It gives me a headache looking at your fancy cheekbones."
Kara chuckled softly, reaching down to her right hand.
Fwip!
She slid the thin translucent silver ring of the Disguise Artifact from her finger.
The prismatic shimmer rolled backward across her form like mist evaporating in the sun.
The long black hair shortened into its natural unruly midnight hue, the violet in her eyes bled back into gold-ringed blue, the pinned left sleeve filled out with an arm again, and the delicate feminine jawline widened into Silas Graves’s handsome composed contours as the tailored silk merchant coat settled back into his comfortable charcoal linen tunic.
Silas leaned against the console, crossing his arms with an easy, teasing grin. "Better, grandma?"
"Call me grandma again and I’ll feed your ring to the combustion furnace," Evelyn snapped, though there was zero venom behind it.
She took a slow deep breath with her expression shifting into an unusual hesitant stillness.
The sharp foul-mouthed swagger that usually defined her seemed to peel back, revealing the awkward guarded twenty-two-year-old girl underneath.
Her right hand flared with a soft intricate circle of azure spatial mana.
Fwump!
The dimensional seam unsealed, and Evelyn carefully pulled an object from her personal storage.
Silas blinked, his gaze dropping to what she was holding.