Chapter 218: Authority 7

Chapter 218: Authority 7

The month of October was constantly eventful. It was easy to say that I had received more than enough opportunity for exercise.

The Scourge was relentless. There were thousands of troops attacking in massive groups at any given moment. It was common for one, two, or even three divisions to be sent out for battle multiple times a week. The Snow Doves were especially busy. There was no longer any need for recon since we had planes but since we had the intel advantage, we were aware of every Scourge force that tried to make a move on us. It was often the job of strike teams to search and destroy those high strength low count forces.

Thankfully we had things like helicopters that could drop us beyond the majority of enemy activity and not far from our objective. Instead of missions taking the better part of a day, it would take hours. It also meant we were getting more missions in general but I had to pick and choose my dissatisfactions.

I may complain, but I wouldn’t have things any other way. I was glad to be fighting alongside the Snow Doves. I took pride in my ability to slaughter thousands of monsters in mere minutes. I could control battlefields, and with me there, my troops were in lesser danger. By extension, with me there, Nonnen was able to loosen his restraints and focus on his enemies, leaving the rest of his platoon to me.

I didn’t want to leave because that felt like leaving my troops to fend for themselves, especially when the Scourge only picked up the pace.

We were constantly slaughtering them, firebombing them, driving back their hordes. When the end of October came Polly estimated that we had killed over 200 thousand in just that month. However, when the second week of November came and ended, we had killed another 270 thousand in those two weeks. Scourge armies started increasing from 50 thousand strong to 100 thousand strong. We were receiving thousands of troops a day, pulled from the Kingdom’s apparently vast reserves, and yet it felt like we were losing more than we were gaining. Every soldier that died was statistically taking 20 to 30 monsters with them, which was an amazing performance record afforded only by bombing runs. But when 60 thousand monsters came, that was still 2000 dead troops, and far more wounded.

270 thousand dead Scourge in two weeks meant 15 thousand dead troops in two weeks. And unlike the Scourge, we couldn’t replenish such numbers easily. They would overwhelm us sooner rather than later.

That wasn’t even mentioning the battles among the Brigadiers. We had lost six during October. We had managed to kill 10 in that same time, which was just under a 1 to 2 exchange. After all, we couldn’t kill Brigadier Class Scourge with bombing runs. They affected that stratum of power in no way.

It’s what the missiles and tanks were supposed to help with, perhaps some anti-personnel explosives I had in mind, but even after a month of development they wouldn't be getting fielded soon. Tanks were getting close but I had gotten word that they were running into problems perfecting the propellant for the main guns and making sure everything was “stupid proof” as I put it. All summoners knew exactly what that term meant but it was difficult to implement it.

Still, they had prototypes out and Sawn was building tanks even though the shells weren’t perfect. He knew they’d get used and was stockpiling in advance.

He also knew that the Treehouse was getting desperate. He was sending almost all bombs he produced to us in order to help me, but we were using them just as fast as we got them. C-400 planes were coming and going multiple times a day carrying all kinds of cargo, but it never seemed like enough. The Treehouse by itself was consuming more manpower and resources than entire fronts. It was like the Scourge was entirely focused on us because there was no other base that was taking as great of a hit by a long shot.

However, because of that, my planes were showcased as the single greatest wartime invention in the Kingdom’s history. They were the only reason the Treehouse was able to survive so long. They would’ve been toppled under normal circumstances.

The entire Kingdom was seeing just how amazing they were. Because of that, the Kingdom signed another contract for 2 billion coin with Sawn Industries for planes, bombs, more airfields, and more Aerial systems. Sawn couldn’t actually keep up with the orders despite hiring what seemed like every free enchanter in the Kingdom.

And although I had to start paying taxes, I was slated to receive almost half a billion coin for my work.

I was a rich man by every metric, and yet none of it felt like enough.

Thankfully, I was about to acquire more of a different kind of power.

With every day that I stressed myself on the battlefield, my cultivation advanced. My second Spark developed more and more, by leaps and bounds every time I drained my Psyka and regenerated it using my advancement formation. The Authority 7 behemoth White Crystal Maxwell gave me had vast power within, but I sucked it down every time I cultivated without issue. My dreams helped as well, as they always did.

When the second week of November passed, I was close to advancing. It was then I finally decided to head back to the Capital, and I sent a message to Maxwell letting him know that he’d need to ready up.

Authority 7 was here.

......

...

November 17th, 625

“Why is your house always so cold? It’s like you’re not as rich as me.”

“My clothes thermal regulate just fine. I like the cold anyway. Not a fan?”

“No.”

“I never took you for a summer guy.”

“I enjoy not worrying about having to warm up. The snow is bad enough outside, and yet you make me trudge through it without at least warming up your house for me to defrost in.”

Maxwell grumbled, making me snicker a bit. He acted like his clothes didn’t also thermal regulate better than mine.

The house I had gotten was toward a more open area of the Capital. I had about two acre's worth of land to separate me from the rest of the populus and I had modified the property to sport a helipad for my personal helicopter. I naturally had one as rich as I was. It was good to get me from my house to the Spire or to the nearby airfield where I could board a plane to Wonderland.

The house was big enough, certainly not a noble estate, but it was more room than I knew what to do with. The two biggest rooms were my office and bedroom, which was most of what I was concerned about.

There were even maids who came in to clean occasionally. I was a personal chef away from living the high life.

Maxwell waved, “Alright, let’s get this going. Took you long enough to get to this point.”

“I’d say a year and a half to get from Authority 6 to 7 is pretty damn fast.”

“Yeah, yeah, don’t break a hand jerking yourself off. Prep the formations and let me see them. Mind Palace technique as well.”

I chuckled as he set up the tempering chair. It was a nicer chair than what I remembered, cushioned instead of just wood, with a larger ring of Crystal cradles around it. It was also heavy with enchantments.

I sat on it in the middle of my sparsely furnished living room before showing off all the formations. The advancement formation was by far the most complex but with this advancement I’d also be advancing my Mind Palace Technique to a whole other level.

I already had some big ideas for how I would change it, and they would cascade into a paradigm shift when combined with the changes my second Spark brought about.

Maxwell nodded when he saw the formations, starting to slot Crystals into cradles.

“Good. Seems like I was right all along.”

“About what?”

“About everything regarding my Call of the Fallen Angel. It is the prime path for a summoner’s advancement. With every Authority you advance you are only proving that. The very fact that you have gotten here means it is the correct path. Now continue. I will wait until your advancement starts.”

“Hm, alright.”

I just nodded, closing my eyes as Maxwell slotted in the last Authority 9 White Crystal into the tempering chair. Once my advancement formation was conjured he activated the chair and immense pressure was placed on my soul, the Magika becoming denser than fog as it clouded the chair. I couldn’t see my own hand in front of my face.

I went with it and started cultivating the last of my power. I was already on the threshold.

I felt my mind open itself to more power, Psyka circulating along the advancement formation and coalescing in my mind space.

My consciousness was moved to my Mind Palace. My soul stood within my Grand Library, the repository for all of my knowledge and memories.

In the center of that library was the core where my Sparks were. The first, fully formed and churning heavily with computational power, the second, mostly formed, not yet filled with any information.

The power around me was so dense that it took but a minute to add another layer onto the second Spark and maximize its power. That’s when my advancement formation flashed, manifesting over the Spark and engraving itself into it.

The process officially started.

My entire mind shook as it and my soul opened themselves completely. Magika flooded in, washing through my entire Mind Palace, so dense that it became cloudy with power that I couldn’t seem to find a place for.

The walls of my Palace were so heavily saturated that they became weaker instead of stronger. My Aura, originally cloudy with illusion, went into disarray. My Grand Library, full of books and texts and pictures, went through a shattering upheaval as my mind attempted to expand it, and failed when I couldn’t figure out how to make a library so massive as to accommodate that much power.

My home, composed of familiar furniture mimicking my Black Spider Hotel room, was upended. It no longer acted as the anchor by which I remembered things. My memory was so good that it didn’t require associating one thing with another to strengthen the memory. That may have been true in the past but, especially with this advancement, it was far from the case.

My memory was about to become perfectly infallible. I could already feel it working, but with that realization I became acutely aware that my Mind Palace would have to be changed.

I looked at the pedestal and touched the Orb, thinking of something.

“Cat.”

The room changed, becoming a shelter where a dozen cats were held in cages along walls.

Then it shifted again, showing a house, a kitten running around the living room and chasing a child pulling a string behind them.

It shifted once more, an adult cat curled into the lap of the child, now a teenager.

It continued shifting, turning into a forest, where I saw a tiger prowling through tall grass.

It shifted from there to show a lion in a savannah, chasing and hunting a herd of prey zebras.

Then when I willed it, the images flashed away, returning to a blank room.

Above the Orb was a search bar and a word within that bar.

“Think.”

I muttered, understanding that this place had just become more than some cold storage for data and processing. It had become more than I initially conceived.

A secondary mind that could, in a way, think for me. I only had to think of a cat and this facility would hand me every detail about a cat within my mind. It would be perfect data, data that I could pull on with my Psyka and Aura directly.

I wasn’t sure what this meant for my illusory abilities, but it was immediately clear that my Auric technique had just taken a hardly fathomable step forward.

I gave a simple nod and left the data center.

I backed away and saw the entire Mind Palace. I made sure it had enough facilities to support what I’d do in the future, including a place dedicated toward processing advancement formations.

This place would become my weapon. It would conduct war, and it would excel at every facet of what war entailed.

It was my war machine. It was brutalist, utilitarian, but that’s what war called for. I wouldn’t give the Scourge the luxury of flair or finesse. I would slaughter them with utter efficiency.

But of course, this massive fortress would need power to drive all of its functions.

I rubbed my chin before looking beyond the fortress at the flowing vortex of power that was my Psyka.

The pool had expanded to many times what it was before. Just like this fortress was several times bigger and far stronger than my previous palace, the vortex was not just 5 or 6 times larger, but thicker, denser.

I shifted that vortex, gathering up the rest of the lingering power through my mind and situating it above the fortress.

Then I made it flow downward, the vortex converging in the center of itself before dropping like a beam of light and shooting into the fortress.

The entire structure flashed, every conduit nearly overloading before it was all saturated with dense power.

That’s when I finally felt my mind blank, my consciousness disappearing for an undeterminable amount of time.

......

...

Maxwell sat on his own chair not far from John.

Initially he had simply activated the tempering device and waited, sipping a glass of wine and reading a book, bored out of his mind. Not that he hadn’t often been bored these days. He had long learned to deal with it and be idle.

Several hours passed though and John was still going through his advancement. So much Magika was flowing from the tempering device that Maxwell couldn’t help but be worried for the kid’s body. It was supposed to temper him, not kill him. But from the density of Vigor radiating from John’s body, he had to be at least at the Authority 3 or 4 standard for knights. Of course, John couldn’t actively use any of that Vigor but it still strengthened his body to an unbelievable degree.

He couldn't help but wonder what was happening in his mind that took so long. The Mind Palace technique should make things go by quicker. Maxwell had managed to develop the technique for himself. It was rudimentary since he couldn’t take advantage of an advancement to entrench the technique, but he found that it greatly helped with keeping his mind balanced.

His broken vessel was prone to overexerting itself. The Mind Palace was a good way to stabilize himself. He could admit that this student of his had come to him with an amazing thing back then.

What John was doing was something different though.

He decided to take a nap while waiting, slumping a bit in his chair.

That lasted for about 4 hours before he was startled awake.

His mind picked something up, a vast impenetrable Aura that threatened to blast his own away.

But it didn’t. Maxwell’s eyes snapped open just in time to see it.

John’s power was solidifying, his Mind Palace finally taking on form. It was projected through his Aura, and Maxwell felt like he could see into John’s mind.

He barely understood what his senses took in.

A metal fortress of colossal proportions, armed with inconceivable weapons of such destructive force that the only reason he could comprehend their power was because Maxwell himself had seen what the height of Sovereign power looked like.

The vortex of power that converged down upon the fortress with a beam of light was the only indication of the level of power behind those weapons. It was impressive, but nothing that surprised Maxwell.

No, what he found hard to comprehend was the sheer complexity behind what lay within the fortress, in its deepest depths.

Visualizations of devices so utterly dense with computational power that no human could possibly hope to match it, not even the greatest summoners. Worse yet, it was real technology, not simply a baseless visualization of something John didn’t understand.

Maxwell could sense these things in John’s Aura. Every weapon, every construct, was something that John created because he understood how they worked and what they could do.

The issue was that none of those things were within the bounds of what this world understood.

He sensed one thing that gave it away. Sure, there were hints of things from their world within that fortress, but Maxwell could sense the distinction in that fortress, as if John himself was speaking its characteristics into his mind.

It was Earthly. It used modern design, ballistic armaments, Grade 5 Titanium Alloy, microelectronics. It was a war machine.

It was of another world.

John is not from this world.

Maxwell reeled when the whispers came into his mind, pulling back his Aura and scowling at the adult man before him, willing himself not to be terrified of the fortress's ability to wipe him from existence with a single one of those thousands of cannons and missiles.

It would be shameful to show weakness before his student. It would be lowly of him to show inferiority before someone who came from an entirely different world.

He gradually calmed down, John’s mind closing itself off as the advancement completed.

Maxwell let out a long sigh, shaking his head and rubbing his face in exhaustion.

“What terrible place have you come from John Cooper? And what terrible things have you been brought here for?”