Grand Saint Alloy

Lesly looked back and forth between Tristan and his prone father. She had not been aware of the animosity between them and had not even realized that Shadow Fist was his father at first. There was no way to know, she knew that Bruce had bullied a kid with a metal kern, but had never met him. By the time Helen and Shadow Fist became their neighbors again, they had a daughter named Tristan and never mentioned a son. When Shadow Fist arrived at the fort he never called Tristan son, only ‘the silver devil.’

She looked over at Bruce and hissed, “Why didn’t you warn me?”

Bruce shrugged, “I thought you knew, it is not like he kept it secret.”

“Well I didn’t, and now we have an unconscious emissary from the Forest Caldera!” Lesly rubbed her temples. She was starting to understand why Vin snapped.

Eve looked over, whatever mood she had been in seemed to have passed, “We should take him to the infirmity, right?”

Lesly gave an absent nod and watched as the elite warrior, Kale approached. Kale folded his arms and glared at Lesly. She tried to glare back, but Kale was actually one of the scarier people she knew. If Tristan knew she thought Kale was scary, he would have laughed at her. However his view of Kale was skewed, it was like a child with a large dog. The child could not see past the fluffy fur, while everyone else saw a beast with sharp teeth.

“Why would you bring Tristan anywhere near his father,” Kale grumbled, “I can’t imagine a worse way to do it either.”

Lesly sighed, “I didn’t know Shadow Fist was his father. I thought he was just here to retrieve a miner to help in the mines.”

Kale shook his head, as he watched two doctors led by Eve start dragging the man off, “I guess I should apologize then. It was too much to expect him to properly explain the situation.”

Lesly was surprised that someone like Kale would apologize. The strong did not need to humble themselves before the weak. Her family’s business believed that there were three kinds of power, the power of money, the power of violence, and the power of standing. Admitting fault violated her worldview, but instead of feeling contempt towards Kale, her respect grew. It was counterintuitive causing her to fall into thought.

“Do all of your subordinates on your normal team still respect you?” Lesly asked. This was a genuine question. She struggled to get the hunters at the fort to listen when she was absent.

Kale laughed, “No, I have no subordinates, I have four teammates and a team leader. I probably rank lowest out of all of them,” he slapped his injured leg, “This stops me from surpassing the youngsters who are always growing. Though to answer your question, yes they all respect me, most people believe that power and respect go hand in hand, well that's a lie. Power buys sycophants, constancy and effort at self-improvement buys respect.”

Lesly was not sure what to think about that, her father was a civil protector, the only tier four in the Forest Caldera. He had a lot of money and owned some less than noble businesses. However, Lesly had grown up in that environment, she was starting to wonder if her family had mistaken fear and greed for respect. The Golden Hearts had respect for what they were, but Lesly was finding more desire to be respected for who she was instead.

“Thank you for the thoughts,” Lesly paused for a moment and bowed to Kale, “You have given me a lot to ponder, but I have to sort out this mess.”

Kale gave a small smile in return. He loved the exuberance of youth. A few words spoken at the right time could change their lives, and if his life experiences could supply those words, he was happy to give them. Walking over to the middle of the now vacant sparing ground, Kale knelt and observed the sand. It should have been covered by silver-red blood, however, the only sign was the depressions in the sand where the liquid had fallen.

Kale frowned, he had seen things like this before, but he was not sure if he was happy or horrified that this was happening again. About twenty years ago, Kale and his team back then had fought a tier-eight mythical beast. It was a tough fight, but this thing was once a human, it was intelligent and could seemingly control death. It had a metal skeleton like a warped human one. Sharp teeth and eyes that were too large.

The blood of the mythical beast was corrosive, its aura sapped them of essence, and it could fire off a beam of black nothingness that deleted whatever they hit. They only won because the creature had wanted to die, the pain it was in was too much for it, but it was unable to kill itself. Kale had never gotten the full story on it, however Elder Plain had purchased the bones at an auction. Kale was worried that he might be watching the creation of a second one of those creatures.

Standing he left the sparring grounds and went to go do some work. Contrary to common thought, warriors had been trickling in from the Forest and Stone Caldera for quite some time. Enough that Kale was worried about the integrity of the wall. Some warriors were left behind to start with, but there were only five or six hundred to protect a nearly three hundred and fifty mile border. Leaving only one hundred behind seemed foolish.

Regardless Kale was not in charge, and he was glad that he was not. In the second barracks that had been constructed was a large empty room in the center of the second floor. Most of the hunter teams were not aware that this building was occupied exclusively by tier three warriors. Kale was heading for the conference room built into the second floor.

When he stepped in a deep voice said, “Kale, good, you’re early.”

Kale nodded to the burly man. Cole, the civil protector of the Stone Caldera, and it was easy to see how his earth kern had influenced his growth. The man was muscular, with a square jaw, brown eyes, and short hair. He looked like he had a little bit of ogre in his ancestry. Still, he was a decent person, and Kale had decided that he was worth following.

Cole waived a letter and grumbled, “It looks like we might actually be seeing the first war in the last century.” He slid the letter across the table to Kale, “Read it and you’ll understand.”

Kale had done his best to stay out of politics, but politics would always find you if you did your job too well. He opened the letter and started reading. It started off with the normal slander towards the opposite side. Evidently, both Elder Forest and Elder Stone were accusing Elder River of betraying his duty to the Caldera and demanding that he step down. Kale’s eyes widened as he read further.

“Is this real?” Kale asked.

Cole grimaced, “Yup.”

“The exploration team actually found people?” Kale asked.

“Hostile ones,” Cole said with a nod, “They used strange weaponry and used an unusual essence type.”

The letter was one of those rare letters that let the warriors know why their leaders were acting. There was another nation with a border only one or two hundred miles from theirs. The Caldera needed to be unified, however Elder River refused to work with them. The letter was worded to shove all the blame on the enemy Elders, however, Kale had lived long enough to see the goal of this war.

Whichever Caldera controlled the plains would have a near monopoly on food production. It was the reason why the four Calderas supported the Grass Caldera when it split from the Plain Caldera. The Forest Caldera would be particularly powerful with possession over the plains. With total control over the means of producing both weapons and food, no one would be able to stop them.

Kale looked up at the civil protector, “Is Elder Forest trying to become a king?”

Cole folded his massive arms and nodded, “That’s my guess too, and I think it will work. The other people are alien and hostile, but not to the point of invasion, Elder River did try to stop a plan to save the Caldera from an internal threat, and he lost his civil protector to the alchemist. Anyone who thinks about it will see that it is more propaganda than reality.”

“Most people won’t think about it though,” Kale said. It made him sad, supposedly there was a caste of teachers, called guiders. However these seemed to be mostly aristocrats, and they told people what to think, not how to think.

Cole sighed, “I look forward to the day when I can use this tier four kern for more than killing. It was fine when it was beasties, but I know a lot of Old River’s warriors.”

Kale eyed the civil protector’s massive shoulders, “I can’t really picture you enjoying the quiet life.”

“Hey, I am damn good at making pottery,” Cole grinned, “Only found that out when my son learned how to throw stuff.”

The door opened and several other scarred men stepped. Each one took a seat, relaxing. Many of the older warriors had aches and pains that never quite went away, but sitting in soft chairs was always better than walking upstairs.

“Are we ready to get started?” Cole asked as he unrolled a map on the table. He set down some clay figurines, some painted blue and some green. Looking around to make sure he had everyone’s attention, “Alright let’s talk about how to make Elder Forest into the King of the Forest.”