Chapter Two Hundred and Twenty-Six. You had to have seen that coming.

Chapter Two Hundred and Twenty-Six. You had to have seen that coming.

Ed fought the urge to rub his temples. "Madam President," he began, "this cannot possibly come as a surprise."

It was a bit of a thrill to speak so directly to the President of the United States. "The Old Guard made their position crystal clear. If we weren't going to make disabled veterans a priority, they would take matters into their own hands."

"Ed, they abducted almost two and a half million people," President Hartford replied, frustration evident in her tone.

"Likely more than that," he agreed, "as I've contacted a few shelters, and it appears that they went after the homeless veterans as well."

"A couple of hundred civilians going missing is one thing, at least they all seem to have put together a semi-believable cover story, but how are we supposed to explain tens of thousands of patients disappearing from hospitals around the country?" The President demanded.

"Madam President, I don't know," Ed stated flatly. "I had just enough political acumen to be appointed, and my appointment was largely due to your cabinet being entirely devoid of any military experience whatsoever."

"You have a veritable horde of media-savvy advisers, all of whom are better suited than I to spin this event," Ed continued.

He had to admit, knowing what was coming was freeing. He wasn't sure if the United States would exist after the integration, but he didn't see himself having a part in it, not based on what he expected to happen. He'd fought in one war and commanded in another against strongman governments, and he wasn't going to be part of one himself.

"I submitted my request to start the process of gathering wounded veterans, not once, but twice," Ed shook his head. "Both times it stalled, and both times you could have pushed it through. I'm sorry that it came to this. The Old Guard would have been content with a slow and careful approach, but the one thing they wouldn't stand for was no action at all. Once they realized that nothing was happening, they took drastic action, no doubt assuming that we would move to stop them if we discovered their plans."

"Of course we would have," The President sighed, waving his arguments away. "And yes, I'm aware that this could have been avoided, it simply wasn't deemed a priority. What I'd like to know is how they managed to get the resources to pull this off?"

"The Endless helped them," Ed grinned, "on the one hand, I want to scold them, but on the other, how can I be upset at a group of people who are helping us on every front, at every turn?"

"You'd think someone would exert a calming influence over them," The President replied. "What part did Whitman play in all this?"

"All he did was sling regeneration rituals," Ed said.

"Doesn't he have some sort hold over the Endless?" President Hartford asked.

"They all like and respect him," Ed said slowly, "from what I can tell, most of them attribute their success to Bob's discovery of how powerful their path could be with an Affinity Crystal. There are even a small number of them who seem to view him as an almost messianic figure. But he doesn't have a seat on their council, and he isn't part of their command structure."

The President sighed. She looked tired, Ed noted, dark circles under her eyes, hair slightly tousled.

"Prime Minister LaFarge and President Garcia have both indicated that they have their troops ready to establish a beachhead on Thayland," The President shook her head. "Apparently, the Queen is already over there, and according to Prime Minister Julwry, she's got a couple of thousand civilians establishing themselves."

She smiled wryly. "She wasn't too pleased about that, but it does give them an advantage," she looked down at her tablet for a moment. "Prime Minister LaFarge has selected troops who all speak English, but President Garcia's men aren't all bilingual. How many curators do we have who speak Spanish?"

Ed took a moment to consult his own tablet. He'd considered that potential issue, and he had the answer, he just didn't remember it off the top of his head. "Just over two hundred," Ed replied.

"We'll need fifty of them seconded to show the Mexican troops the ropes," She ordered.

"About that," Ed began, steeling himself for the next uncomfortable conversation. "Casualties have been mounting as tens of thousands of troops fight monsters in shifts. Due to the nature of our new reality, there is no such thing as wounded troops, only dead ones."

"I've seen the numbers," President Hartford agreed, "I'd assumed that some casualties were inevitable."

"That's not entirely true," Ed shook his head, checking his tablet and sliding it across the desk to her.

The President studied the graph for a long moment. "This is measured by hours spent fighting the monsters," she noted.

"Exactly," Ed nodded, "you can clearly see the difference between the two groups."

"Alright, so we have one group who aren't suffering casualties, and one group that is," she sighed, "so what is the difference between the two groups."

Bob winced. "You might be best served by being ready to reincarnate as a tier six?" He suggested.

Erick looked confused, which Bailli picked up on. "What Bob calls the System is what we call Mana, capital 'M,'" she explained.

"How do you know that something is going to change?" Erick asked.

Bob grimaced, shaking his head again. "I trust you, but there is a term from Earth called 'Plausible Deniability,' which means that if you don't know, you can't be held liable, more or less."

"Can you give us an idea as to what these changes will be?" Bailli asked.

"Specialization," Bob replied. "When you choose a skill, you won't be able to level it up to your cap anymore. At each threshold, you'll be required to spend another skill point to advance the skill."

"That's six points to cap a skill at tier five," Erick muttered.

"It applies to schools as well," Bob agreed. "It's going to force people to choose one skill to cap, two if they don't mind giving up a lot of utility."

"That's brutal," Bailli said slowly.

"There are some positive changes," Bob leaned forward, "you'll keep this to yourselves for the moment, right?"

Erick and Bailli nodded, and Bob began to explain.

Jason used his Control Earth spell to send a long, thick spike of stone up from the floor and into the soft underbelly of the beetle-like monster that was barreling towards him. A happy bark heralded the arrival of the Queen's summoned corgi, and Jason shook his head as the adorable dog tore into the pinned monster.

Despite being the size of a small pony, the corgi retained its normal proportions, as well as its sunny disposition.

He glanced toward the tunnel wall, preparing to spike another monster. He almost had the timing down for when they respawned.

The Queen had been delving like a fiend for nearly a month now and was rapidly approaching the tier cap. She'd chosen not to push her Summoning spell, moving to the next level only once her armor spec, melee spec, and dodge had reached their cap. She'd informed Jason that once she'd reached the tier cap, she'd be taking a break to attend to matters back on Earth directly, at which point he would build a Dungeon for the United Kingdom and then train a group of carefully selected men and women to become curators.

Which meant that he wouldn't be building the Dungeon he wanted to build. The Queen had been quite specific as to what she expected from him.

Jason wanted nothing more than to slink off to see his friends, with the possibility of going into hiding for a bit.

If there was a bright side to the whole situation, beyond being called to service by The Queen, it was that he was finally gaining levels again. It had taken almost three weeks for the Queen to reach his level, but once she had, the twelve-hour delves had served to advance his skills and raise his level quite quickly.

Well, that and he was hanging out with bloody Queen. He had to admit that she was every bit as impressive as he'd always been told. Smart, charming, with a cutting wit, she was the leader the country needed.

In the privacy of his own thoughts, he had recognized that she was also hot. Being tall and broad, he'd always preferred petite women, and once he'd finally allowed himself to recognize it, he'd had to accept the fact that The Queen was going to turn a lot of heads. Prince Phillip was a lucky man.

He used his control Earth spell to pull the Mana Crystal that had coalesced from the monster he'd spiked a few seconds ago over to himself and into the bag at his feet. He was also on crystal collection duty.

His watch chimed, and he called out a warning to the group. "Switching to Air!"

It was a little irksome that he had to utilize each element in combat to ensure that it kept leveling up along with the others. Earth was clearly the most effective element to use, but if he allowed the others to level passively via persistent effect, they'd fall behind, and building a Dungeon required all four of them.

As another monster rushed towards them, he used Control Air to create a dense pillar in front of it, shaking his head as it rammed into it headfirst, staggering to a halt. The Queen was there in an instant, her greatsword practically whistling through the air as it sliced down, nearly halving the monster in a single strike.

Her corgi slammed into the rear of the monster with sufficient force to tear loose the back half of the monster, leaving it in two pieces, front and rear. He pushed his mana into another control air spell, this time sparking a lightning bolt that crashed into the monster's face, ending it.

Two more hours, and he'd be done for the day, Jason sighed as he pulled up another pillar of air.