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”Alright Karna, I’m guessing this is about what you promised with the spatial pathways. Why are we all here though?” Arjuna asked his daughter. There were several members of the Magocracy’s Council present, along with officials from the Elven court, including the Queen. They’d all been gathered at Karna’s request. Most of the people, including Arjuna, were attending as mere illusionary holograms as they were still back home. Communication across such large distances was still difficult, though made easier by the connected communication arrays at Karna’s and Arjuna’s towers.

"You guessed it." With a small wave, a 3D hologram was projected above the table they were all sitting around, either in person or as illusionary images. The hologram showed a gateway of some sort and judging by the figures floating around the image, the 4-part gateways had a diameter of around 300 meters. "This is the basic version of a gateway I've designed. If we have a gateway like this both at this new world and back at home, we can connect the two, creating a stable and efficient spatial lane between them."

Karna had often compared the spatial forces that existed between the worlds of this universe to travel through the deep ocean. A deep ocean that was filled with storms, crushing pressure, and violent currents, and those were the least dangerous things about it. These gateways created a tunnel between them where the 'pressure' no longer affected any ships traveling between them and even punched through the spatial forces to shorten the distance. The tunnel wasn't completely without risks, but any danger would have to be powerful enough to collapse the entire tunnel to get at the ships traveling between the gateways. She gave the basic rundown of how the system worked to everyone gathered.

"What kind of travel speeds are we talking about?" One of the Council members asked, curiously studying the explanations of the enchantments that floated around the hologram. "In comparison to standard spatial pathways, I mean. I know ships travel at differing speeds of course." When ships traveled between worlds often using the same path, the frequent travel helped to stabilize the path, creating a sort of spatial road that could develop later on into a sort of ‘highway’. Both the speed and stability of the path increased with the amount of traffic, making the most often trod paths the safest, increasing traffic further and forming a positive feedback loop of sorts.

“This basic version would allow travel at around six to seven times the speed of standard paths. For example, if it takes about three weeks to reach this place from the Magocracy, then these gateways would allow a ship to make the trip in little over three days.” Karna answered simply.

“Alright, I’ll bite. You’ve been calling this the basic version a couple of times now. I assume there’s a not-so-basic version as well?” Amaranthine asked with a knowing expression.

“Well, as you can see, the gateway isn’t very large. the path created between the gateways is the same size as the gateways, which would make it difficult to have traffic in both directions at the same time without risking ships crashing into each other. So, naturally making the gate bigger would alleviate the problem. This current version is the smallest you can make the gateways and have the system work. Making the gateways bigger improves them in just about every way. The larger the gateways, the more stable the path and the faster you can travel. It also makes the pathway more resistant to dangers and allows for more traffic both ways." Karna made the hologram double in size and showed an example of traffic going both ways through the created path. Most airships that carried cargo or a lot of people were rather large after all.

“But?” Amaranthine pushed.

“But making the gateways bigger also makes the whole project more expensive and it will take longer to complete. To properly stabilize the path at certain sizes also requires more valuable materials, as it’s not quite as simple as just using more of the same stuff. On the positive side, unless we make the gateways absolutely massive, the price of the required materials is currently rapidly going down with the influx of new resources from the worlds created by the Expansion. In fact, most of the materials needed can be found on this world. They just need to be extracted.” With a wave of her hand Karna created four more holograms of gates in different sizes, and next to each was a list of materials and the expected travel speed. “These are only estimates, though they should be fairly accurate.”

All of the officials started speculating and estimating prices while debating the merits of each example. They all noted that after a certain point the prices started increasing almost exponentially. "Ah, I think I see what you're getting at." Amaranthine suddenly realized. "It seems rather obvious to me that instead of building a separate gate for both the Magocracy and us, it would be more effective to build a single larger gate that we can both use.”

“Very perceptive your majesty. That is indeed what I’d consider the optimal solution, though I’ll of course defer to your judgement.” Karna had known the Queen would notice there was an optimal size for the gate, a certain sweet spot between price and effectiveness, and that size was a bit excessive for either country alone, but together…

Amaranthine scoffed. She was rather certain Karna had designed things like this on purpose. There was even a good chance the cheeky girl had tweaked the numbers just to deepen the alliance between the two nations. “We’ll have to run the numbers by our respective logistical experts, but I’m tentatively accepting the idea of a joint gateway, say in the territory of the old holy kingdom to make things even?”

“Ah, you can actually move the gateway according to needs as long as it’s not moved so quickly that the spatial pathway destabilizes. I would suggest rotating the placement every now and then to keep everyone happy.” Karna suggested instead. She’d hoped this would be the solution they’d end up with, and the elven queen didn’t disappoint. She’d even made all the plans with this in mind.

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As she was putting together some of the materials the gateway project would need regardless of the gate’s final size, Karna noticed Gem suddenly slithering out from the shadows. The spirit was in the form of a shadow-walker, a snake-like spirit that was not very powerful in direct combat but extremely stealthy and fast. “Gem. I assume you have news finally.”

"Yes, master. The Sentinels were extremely careful, but I finally located their communications center." Gem managed to look quite proud of herself despite the form she took being essentially expressionless. "They had the damn thing hidden below this world's crust."

Karna gave a small whistle of appreciation. Few people would be paranoid enough to do something like that. These Sentinels were really taking their precautions seriously. No wonder Gem had been forced to waste some time finding the place. “How did you find it then?” She asked curiously

“Well, their own carefulness was also their downfall. Naturally, with the communications center being located so deep underground, they’d need either a connected array on the surface to get any messages out, or they would need to overpower either their magical or technological system with enough juice to get through the crust and still have enough power to cross the distance to the destination accurately. The latter one would be impractical if they relayed the entire tournament with all the feeds they were providing. Still, I tried to search for any signs of the latter first as that was an easier search to perform. No luck as I expected, so I went on a hunt for an array. I finally caught a break when the Sentinel’s on the surface had to communicate with the comm-center underground. I followed their trail to the array, and the array had a hardline connection to the center. They’d actually placed the array deep underwater, not all that far from the island you claimed actually.” Gem preened in pride at her success.

“Well done.” Karna didn’t mind giving credit when it was due, though she did feel like teasing the puffed-up spirit a bit, an instinct she tamped on for now. “What did you find out?”

“Three things. The Sentinels are in fact under a third party’s control, though the offer to give us control is genuine for as long as we won’t go against their maker. Secondly, this third party comes directly from the Crossroads. I can say this with certainty because the third thing I found out was that they’re being led by Ysendra. Oh, and Ysendra already knows, or at the very least strongly suspects who you are. I overheard her talking with the Sentinels.” While she’d been playful and proud before, Gem got serious with the last thing she said.

“Ysendra, huh?” Karna set down the materials she had been working with to consider how to react to the news.

Ysendra was one of the most powerful beings in the multiverse, and they were on friendly terms. They had created the Crossroads together after all. The tiny dragon combined both a Cobra Dragon and a Faerie Dragon, a very dangerous combination. Faeries Dragons were all insane, and Cobra Dragons were one of the oddest offshoots of the draconic species, mostly known for their proficiency with poison. One notable thing about Ysendra was that she wasn’t a reincarnator, but she was so old that she had enough skill to match one. She was in fact one of the oldest beings that had lived only a single life, old enough to match hundreds of Karna’s normal and admittedly rather brief lives. The dragon was extremely powerful and skilled, and she’d earned both with work and time. Few beings ever reached rank 14 in any universe. Even those that Karna had run into in all her lives were in double digits, and not the high double digits either.

It also wasn’t wrong to say that Karna had raised the dragon almost like a child or a pet. Not that their connection was that close anymore. They didn’t dislike each other or anything, just that they hadn’t really interacted for such a long time. Even if she’d helped build the Crossroads, Karna didn’t really visit the place all that often as she liked her simpler lives to stay confined to a single universe. There were exceptions of course, but you could count the number of times they’d met in the last…who even knew how long with the fingers of two hands. “That is both good news and bad. She’s…relatively rational and not likely to just kill us on a whim, unlike many reincarnators. On the other hand, she almost certainly has a plan of her own that she’s trying to accomplish, and if that plan runs against ours and she isn’t willing to negotiate, then we’re completely boned.”

“Yeah, she’s one of the beings we won’t be able to do anything against, even if we were willing to throw our lives away. And seeing as this is supposed to be your last life, we’re not willing." Gem nodded. They had also agreed that this life would be a last hurrah of sorts, so they had more reason than usual to try and stay alive.

“On the other hand, her presence will likely keep any nosy immortals away from us. Even the True Gods of this universe aren’t willing to pick a fight with Ysendra, so if we can use her presence to our advantage…” Karna immediately considered the flipside. “And she’s likely to be willing to protect us.”

“She’ll want something in exchange.” Gem pointed out the obvious.

"She likely already does. I have a feeling this entire tournament was just a way for her to locate me. She knows I'd be drawn in if I were born in this universe and had already reached the Higher Planes. I'm not that hard to identify all things considered." Karna pursed her lips a bit. She had some educated guesses about what Ysendra might want. "Speaking of, the word about my participation in the tournament would've likely spread. Even though I tried to avoid being too flashy, there will be some immortals that will likely want to scope me out." Even if the immortals were not looking for her specifically, they were looking for 'princess Ynnead' which would mean they were on the lookout for someone with her hair color. Hopefully, they were too busy to pay too much attention.

“Did you find out anything about what they want?” She asked while considering how she should react, or if she should. She was reaching a point where she couldn’t just be whisked away by the first immortal that showed up. There were laws about what the Host could do, and while they didn’t always play by those rules, she was becoming strong and prominent enough that they’d have to. She wasn’t a criminal after all.

"Very limited information on that. They want to use us as a partner to provide legitimacy in this new universe. That's about the extent of what I overheard. The rest is speculation." Gem shook her head.

“Mmh, you already got more than I expected. We can work with this. It would be useful if we could get in contact with Ysendra, but I suppose we’ll need to wait for her to make the first move.” Karna decided.

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"I'm sorry, what?" Prince Tethrine asked, the news being shocking enough to be a little difficult to take in on the first hearing.

"We've reached an accord with the most powerful of these new arrivals, and part of that accord includes our forces staying away from their sphere of influence. In return, they’ve agreed to take care of the defense of that area, allowing us to free our own forces to deal with the Scourge threats elsewhere.” The Titan speaking to Tethrine wore the armor of a general among the Host, one of the most influential ranks one could have in the Divine military. The Titans held most of the important positions currently, which was one of the reasons House Titannica was considered to be the second or third most important among the hierarchy of the Divine Planes. That and the large number of influential gods among them.

“I can see that there would be benefits, especially if this is an alternative to making yet another new enemy, but this sets a bad precedent. If we allow a part of the great formation to be controlled by a force other than us, that’s going to give all sorts of ideas to people that chafe under our rules.” The Prince reasonably argued.

The Titan General wasn’t a fool, so he nodded in agreement. “That is true, but the situation is unusual as it is. We truthfully do not have the power to fight against the most powerful among them without the True Gods becoming involved, and you know as well as I do that there’s very few among them willing to risk their necks for a Plane or two. Besides, we have other concerns. While the cracks formed by the spatial disturbances have finally been closed, the Scourges have all launched massive invasions on both the Higher and Divine Planes that were created by the Expansion. We need our forces on the frontlines, not patrolling the newly created areas in search of hostile outsiders. This new outsider is taking care of the niggling problems that have been sapping at our strength. As much as I agree with you that this is not a great deal, we must deal with one danger at a time. We’re in an all-out war. We must first secure the great formation before we can start quibbling about who owns which parts of it.”

Tethrine could see the strategic benefits of this deal, essentially turning a major risk into a potential asset, but the repercussions would be much further reaching. The Host had compromised with an enemy, and everyone would know of it! Even if the area they ceded had all been created by the Expansion, and thus not causing any of the previously controlled worlds to be lost, that wasn’t how the political enemies of both House Titannica and House Asuryan would spin it once the dust settled. Heck, they were already making waves with the Grand Assembly!

“I’ve made my dislike of this idea known, yet I know that nothing I say will change it.” Tethrine had to simply accept the situation. “I’m assuming that I should keep my forces out of the areas affected. Anything else?” While important news, he doubted one of the generals would’ve bothered contacting him personally for just that.

“I have a mission for you. A mission directly from the Grand Marshal.” The Titan confirmed his suspicions. “The world you’re currently residing on is in an interesting position. They recently won a colony rather deep in the Expansion created areas. A rather valuable colony I might add.”

“Yes, I’m aware. There was a tournament for the control of the world if I recall.” Tethrine frowned. He’d been a bit busy lately to pay attention to minor details like that.

“Well, according to our informants, this world falls into the sphere of influence of another very powerful member of these outsiders. We do not fully understand the extent of this being’s power, but from what little we’ve managed to extract from prisoners, this Ysendra might be even stronger than the being we made the agreement with. At least this being was in some sort of leadership position before their arrival, though her powers are more a subject of rumor and legend than fact. Your objective is to use your connections with the world you reside in to travel to this new colony and make contact with this Ysendra. We would prefer it if you reached the same kind of deal as I mentioned before, but you have some leeway to negotiate with. Of course, if you can reach a better deal, then that’s all the better.” The General explained.

“And?” Tethrine could sense this wasn’t everything. It never was. It would’ve been too simple.

The Titan in golden armor smiled at his perceptiveness. "And we're sending someone to join your delegation. Ostensibly they will be there to have a final say on whether any deal you make falls within our parameters or not, but in reality they have another mission to complete. A mission that you should try to avoid making any harder than it already is. And before you ask, I cannot tell you what that mission is. I was not informed either. I only know this mission was also ordered by the Grand Marshal. And from what I was given, this mission will take precedence over yours should there become a conflict."

To say Tethrine was unhappy about this addition was an understatement of epic proportions. There was always some bullshit he was saddled with!