NOVEL NEXT Chapter Three Hundred Ten
By the time we rejoined the others, Mel and Abel had mostly managed to talk down the terrified members of the Pavilion, though most of them were still shooting fearful looks at my uncle. Zeke ignored them, of course, and was sitting with Alden, who had offered him a beer and was having a grand old time talking to the younger man. Although...I wasn't sure how true that was. Alden looked older, but Zeke was a B-ranker. For all I knew my uncle and parents could be thousands of years old.
Once they calmed them a bit though, Abel and Mel had distracted the others with the Skill Crystal, and they were in talks about using it to teach martial arts to all of them. I'd assumed Callie would be the one to imprint on it, but someone suggested Abel, and no one could really argue the validity of the suggestion despite all of us having been so focused on Callie.
Callie herself joined in the discussion, and as she did I walked over to slump down next to Alden and Zeke. "You two look thick as thieves." I said wryly. "I should have expected the two drunkest people I know would have some things in common." I pointed at Zeke. "Him I get Alden, but aren't you worried about the tournament? Your disciples are going to be in it. Even if you aren't concerned for the two of us, there are other Master Candidates coming. Hell, might be more than a few, who knows how strong the other forces in the Gloryfire System are."
Zeke rolled his eyes. "Please. I'm surprised even a pair of Master Candidates popped up near here. Maybe if it was in the Unity Hub I could see a reason to worry, but the Gloryfire System is a wasteland. You might see more impressive people in the Glade Itself. This particular tournament is for the System as a whole, and all hundred of the Systems in the Axiom Cluster are going to be sending their best."
That brought up something important I'd been putting off asking. "Ok, so what the hell is up with all that? Clusters, Systems, Planets, how is all that related?" I'd heard plenty of that kind of talk in passing. All I knew at the moment was that we were in the Gloryfire System right now, and on a D-rank planet. "Actually." I cut in before he could answer. "Why is it happening here anyway? Wouldn't a higher ranked planet be better?"
That got a chuckle from my uncle. "No. Weaker planets work better, means the locals are less likely to try to assassinate the visitors. As for why it's happening here...well, let's just say that the WCP doesn't want anything going wrong and arranged for it to be in the territory of someone inclined to ensure that. The Gloryfire System is right on the edge of Cult space, as you may have noticed from their bullshit theatrics around here."
Huh...so they had set this up because Zeke was around? I assumed that was what he meant. I didn't bring that up in front of Alden though. He might know Zeke was powerful, but that didn't mean he knew everything. Zeke nodded approvingly at my silence when the bearded man wasn't looking, then continued. "You're right though. You should know the layout of the local area at least. The planets thing isn't necessarily important, every system has multiple planets, depending on their size."
He looked genuinely interested in the topic, and I listened with rapt attention as he informed me more about how the universe worked. "The Gloryfire System is a three star system, and every star has multiple terraformed planets surrounding it. There are several D and even C-ranked planets among that number. As I mentioned earlier, Gloryfire is one of a hundred or so Systems in the Axiom Star Cluster, and among those Systems there are other three star, four star, or even five or six star systems. The stars can, of course, be spread out and have multiple planets in their orbits that never intersect, though they all orbit a central star in the system, even if that star isn't easily visible from each planet."
Ok, that made some sense. So we were orbiting one of the outer stars, which were orbiting the interior star of the System. "So the Axiom Star Cluster is the territory controlled by the Unity? Star Clusters are the same thing as Galaxies right?" I'd looked that up when I heard the term System, though information about the actual political formations of Systems was obviously not available, the structure of the physical phenomena was common enough."
Zeke shook his head. "No. Not even close. A Cluster is a agglomeration of Systems, and a Galaxy is an agglomeration of Clusters. The Unity's territory is the smallest of the five factions, with only a single Galaxy to their name. This is because the Unity himself is the youngest god. Older and more powerful factions have several to even dozens in the case of the Empire and the Fairyland. Technically speaking the entire five faction alliance occupies a single Galactic Cluster, but we mostly just use the Universe as shorthand because there are no known civilizations outside the cluster."
"So the Gloryfire System is one of hundreds of Systems in the Axiom Cluster, which is in the single Unity Galaxy?" My head was hurting at the concept of how fucking big the world was, and how many planets that would have to be. He mentioned multiple planets around each star, which could mean into the double digits, and the scale as that went up was mindboggling. I knew farming renown was important, but still, to expand to that scale...
Seeming to see my shock, Zeke smiled. "Yeah. The Chiron Galaxy. Most people just call it the the Unity Hub. The Conglomerate is the managing government of the Axiom Cluster, to put things in perspective. Anyway, like I said, the 'geniuses' in this System won't be worth much. It's the ass end of nowhere and there are less than a dozen planets. Being able to spawn a pair of Master Candidates is already decent. You might see a few freaks with rare abilities or weird racial traits, but probably not many people on the level of Abel or the spear wielder. Maybe one or two more tops, since there are a few C-rank planets in the System." He said that like it was irrelevant.
"So you said that the Black Sorrow Cult's Galaxy is near here?" I focused on another relevant issue. The Cult were enemies of mine and especially of my mom who was a Saintess of the Red Revenant Church. From what I knew Black Sorrow and the Red Revenant were old enemies from before they ascended, and this had carried over to their factions. Being able to kill the son of a Saintess would be a huge coup for the Cult.
"One of them." Zeke said with a shrug. "They have like a dozen. As I mentioned, the Unity is the youngest of the gods by a large margin. Black Sorrow and the Red Revenant each control about twelve, counting their central and original territories, the Night Demon Abyss and the Holy Dominion respectively. Those are nicknames, like the Unity Hub. Most Galaxy names are pretty nondescript. Anyway the closest to us is the Extreme Void. The Gloryfire System is right at the edge of Extreme Void. Probably how the Darkling Institute made contact with the Cult in the first place."
Yet another reason to get off Callus. Zeke wouldn't be protecting me forever. Once I hit D-rank I'd be a Master ranked Ascendant and officially recognized as being able to take care of myself. Forgetting the fact that I couldn't even reach D-rank on Callus, even if I could I wouldn't dare to do it so close to the Cult's territory. I decided once we finished our adventure in the Moonsong Glade we'd go out on our own. Maybe visit the central Cluster of the Unity Hub, or even take a look around the Empire or Faerieland. The latter was pretty insular, but even they maintained decent relations with the Wish Curse Palace. Not having our own territory made it possible to be uniquely entwined with the entire five faction alliance. Though now that I knew how big the Universe (or Galactic Cluster I guess) was, I doubted 'no territory was exactly literal. We probably had a home planet or even a system. Just no Galaxies to our name. I really did know so little about the world as a whole.
Alden looked mildly fascinated by hearing about things at this level, but not as much as I'd expected. Sure enough he probably came from a larger force originally. Maybe not at the Galactic level like the factions, but still. Though that brought up an interesting question. "I've heard there are a lot of powerful clans. Are they all part of the factions? What about the WCP? We have a lot of branches don't we?" I knew anyone who reached S-rank like my grandfather was eligible to start a branch. Theoretically they could even start a new clan, though I was told that didn't really happen.
"They're all part of the factions. Or they live among their territory anyway." Said Zeke. "Most of the Galaxies outside the main Galaxy of a faction are controlled by an S-rank clan. They're top officers of faction. The Kings of the Empire are all S-rankers who serve the Emperor directly for instance. Not every S-rank clan runs a Galaxy of course, but they mostly have their own territory. Our branches usually operate at a Galactic level, working alongside S-rankers in that specific Galaxy. Sort of like how the Deacon of the Rajak WCP operates alongside the local Unity leader. Being spread out like that keeps us from being too big a threat and let's us get along with the other factions, though of course the Wish power certainly doesn't hurt our PR at all."
I decided that was enough learning for the day. My brain was already exploding with new information and if I kept going I wouldn't be able to focus on anything. I knew Zeke tried to ration the amount of this stuff that I learned to keep me from being overwhelmed and discouraged by the size of the Universe. I had a feeling you could take a century long class on global politics and force distribution and not even scratch the surface of the full picture.
Seeming to sense my train of thought he laughed and clapped a hand on my shoulder. "It's not good to get too caught up in that stuff. You only really need to worry about the here and now, kid. This planet, this system. Soon the Cluster maybe, but nothing past that. Galactic matters need Galactic power, and you aren't even close." He said this kindly, not meaning it as an insult, and I took it that way too. I didn't want to go swimming in deep water until I was a shark.
With a solemn nod I exhaled. "You're right. I just need to win the tournament and get that Moonglow Dew. Having the extra Impact will make me that much stronger compared to others my rank. Even if I run into some crazy monster with Master rank Skills at F-rank it's useless if they can't hurt me." Not that I was confident the Moonglow Dew could even DO that. That was a big gap to close. But it would definitely at least help. In the end, this all seemed complicated and scary, but it came down to the same thing Ascendant stuff always did. Want to be left alone? Get stronger. If I wanted to adventure and see the Universe with my friends I needed to have the muscle to back it up. I'd better get to work.