Depthless Hunger

Chapter 207: A Meeting with the Elites

Growing up, the Frontier elites had always been Kai's greatest goal in life. They were truly the best, standing far above the strongest in any individual nation. More importantly, they were the front line against the monsters of the Frontier, keeping humanity safe. The idea of joining them had been like a dream that could barely be grasped.

Since then, he had come a little closer. He'd met several of them, even been saved by their teleportation technique, and technically helped them fight the incursion. But being summoned east to meet with them still twisted his stomach into knots.

As he flew out, he found other tensions building inside him. Was he going to miss the gold to crystal ratio going critical? Would Slaerta finally be attacked? Would retaliation come in some form he couldn't imagine? Yet the further east he flew, the less he could think about any of those issues as the upcoming meeting swelled to consume everything.

Their meeting place was a minor fort that turned out to be a destroyed ruin, presumably due to monster attacks. He was more interested in the woman who was waiting there - it was the same Irunian woman he had met when he was first entering Krysal and he instinctively checked her soul.

She had a veil that he couldn't pierce, but when she sensed his spiritual sight she withdrew it irritably.

Name: Sheiri Kagskan

Total Power: 638

Path of Steel: Truesteel 9 (108)

Windborn: Twiceblown (283)

Physique Level: E-6 (98)

Soul Level: 7 (49)

Emergent Class: Whistling Steel (+100)

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There was no question that she was stronger than him, even with his monstrous abilities. But the gap was much smaller now, and for the first time he was actually superior to a Frontier elite in a single category. Of course, for her Physique was a secondary ability, while it was a major core of his strength. And he remembered that Enalanis of Magma had been even stronger.

Climbing closer to the level of the Frontier elites actually increased his admiration for them. They didn't chase after power wildly, they each had a sensible balance of powerful capabilities. Most notably, those he'd seen had an "Emergent Class" that he guessed was some sort of synergy between them. In all his travels he had yet to meet anyone else who knew the same secrets.

Kai belatedly realized that all of that was probably less important than the fact that she looked pissed at him.

"What have you done?" she demanded. "You say you want to help in Krysal, then you start a goddamned war?"

"You told me there was a rot in the heart of Krysal!" Yelling at an elite was probably a bad idea, but Kai angrily gestured back over the land. "I'm just trying to help. What did you expect me to do?"

"I didn't expect you to start killing crystalliers! They're the backbone of the Krysali defense during incursions and it sounds like you're taking them out right and left."

"It sounds bad if you put it that way, but how many of them actually help? How many crystalliers fought in the last incursion?"

The woman took a deep breath and the anger disappeared from her face, or perhaps just hid behind an Irunian mask. She rubbed the bridge of her nose and spoke in a lower voice. "Truthfully... when I said that, I expected you to go into Krysal, see the decadence, and realize that not all problems could be so easily solved. But it seems like you're determined to solve it anyway."

"You know how many people are suffering, right? People live and die in mines as slaves, without ever seeing sunlight." Kai took a breath of his own and tried to deescalate with her. "I don't know if any of this will actually help them in the end, but I'm sure as hell going to try."

"I'm not here to attack you. I understand your good intentions. But consider how this looks from our perspective. Krysal is weakening economically, which means they send us less support. The city states are burning a huge amount of their strength on internal warfare, and we have no guarantee that all these workers you're training will actually support us in the incursion."

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"Krysal might be weakened now, but what about the long term? They'll eventually figure out a new system and there will be new crystal cultivators, but now they'll be supported by other fighters who have been kept suppressed. We have seven years to rebu-"

"Six."

"What?" Kai understood what she said, it just took him aback. He'd been through so much, from monster hunts to living in the cities to the revolution, that of course it had been a long time. But he'd been focused on all of that, not thinking about how the clock was ticking down...

"Closer to five and a half, actually." Sheiri rubbed the bridge of her nose again. "That's why everyone is angry. The next incursion is going to be bad, and it would be difficult even if we spent all seven years preparing for it. We can't afford all of this."

The amount of time still left him feeling strangely adrift, but Kai forced himself back to form another argument. "I know about the damage to the wall, and I saw what happened. Can you honestly tell me that any conventional methods will be sufficient to deal with all that?"

"I... no." For the first time, the Frontier elite looked a little lost too. "You aren't the only one arguing the same thing. Your old friend, Gunjin - he's been banging the same drum for a year, saying that wild gambles are better than certain death following the old paths."

"What about the other continents? If we could receive just a little support from Cloudspire or Rosemount..."

"We never will. It's been tried in the past, with limited results. Their strongest aren't willing to live here, and they don't take the threat seriously."

"Do none of them have to deal with monsters in the same way?"

"Not as intensely, and before you ask, we're not sure why." Sheiri hesitated with an odd frown on her face. "One of our scouting efforts between incursions said there's actually something similar on Rosemount. But their forces that fight off incursions are so effective that the rest don't think they're a real concern, and they didn't see any strange invaders when we did."

They stood in silence for a while. Kai now felt less like he'd been called in to account for causing trouble and more like they were both standing on the precipice of the same problem. Being reminded of the time remaining had thrown him off and he couldn't find the same confidence as before.

"I want to be one of your wild gambles," he said. "I'll come back for the incursion, I promise. But I don't know if I can... it's been over a year and I'm still so far from you..."

Sheiri laughed, then saw his face and laughed harder. It all ended abruptly with an unreadable grin. "Are you mad, boy? You entered Krysal a year and a half ago at about the strength of a crystallier and now you're fighting some of the most powerful people on the continent. That's insane growth."

He wanted to be encouraged, but... "Is it enough? I've seen more people from the other continents now, and they're overwhelming. If I went over there, I wouldn't be remarkable anymore."

"That isn't true. You'd face opponents with similar strength due to the vastly higher environmental energy, but if you're expecting them to be your superiors in every way, your opinion of them is too high."

"Then it might work? Going over there to train, then bringing that strength back to Deadwaste?"

"It can be done, but we don't attempt it often." Sheiri shook her head slowly. "The risks are high. Getting poisoned by cultivators with mana-destroying alchemy, or having some idiot kill you because his chakra is just too intense. Most who leave Deadwaste don't come back... those who manage to survive the transition tend to stay because the luxuries there are too tempting. We've lost a few good elites that way."

Kai wanted to insist that wouldn't happen to him, but he was getting ahead of himself. Before even thinking about continents, he needed to prove he was equal to all the challenges he faced in Krysal. So instead of throwing out the first arguments that came to his tongue, he took a moment to gather himself and then took a different approach.

"If you want Krysal to be prepared for the next incursion," he said, "then help me. Make sure that this gamble pays off by helping the revolution succeed."

"Our neutrality is absolute. If we start getting involved in other conflicts, we'll never be able to keep the alliance of Frontier nations together. It's hard enough to extract support from them as it is."

"I don't expect you to fight, but you can still do something. Surely you have crystal cultivators at the Frontier, could they offer their secrets? And you must have information about the deeper workings of Krysal. Just a little information in the right ear..."

"Training is unquestionably military support and off the table." Sheiri paused, regarding him with narrow eyes. "However... I can share a few rumors. The merchants will try to send contacts to the Elemental Nations, to buy mercenaries and resources, but they're wasting their time. There are other problems in the north. But Goralia... let's just say that Goralian potions are undervalued in Krysali markets."

"Is that all?" Kai asked. "I know you're going out of your way to help, but you expect me to be able to decode hints about economic movements?"

"It isn't buried deep, so find someone who can. You have a chance at this, but remember this isn't a battle with just two sides, there are a dozen. The odds will change wildly." The Frontier elite began summoning wind around her. "I came here thinking you were a fool, but now... good luck."

She streaked away on a jet of wind and he was soon alone again. Kai shifted his weight and stared into the sky as he considered what came next.

Maybe he'd made good progress so far, but he couldn't be satisfied with that. He needed to be strong enough to take on the Diamond Crystalliers. He had to advance until he could go to Cloudspire and help Zae Zin Nim deal with her father. He wanted to gain the strength to fight the incursion and push back the threat to his old home. And then, if he somehow survived all of that, he could reach toward the god-like beings he'd seen over the abyss.

But first he turned and headed back to the Krysal City States to finish what he'd started.

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