Page 148

In the morning of the following day, Emily finally leaves her room, leaving her bag behind, and heads towards the bridge in anticipation of their arrival in Liberte. She steps into the room and looks around.

The bridge is only slightly larger than Calypso’s, with an open window facing the front of the ship. Unlike Calypso’s though, the patrol ship’s window has metal bars running down it every metre or so to help reinforce it.

There are four chairs in the room, three to control the ship from, and one behind them from which Colette commands the pilots. Colette’s seat doesn’t have many controls in front of it, with only a few buttons, a glowing green crystal, and a strange-looking open tube that Emily knows spreads through the rest of the ship.

“Hello, Miss Coldstone,” Colette greets as she enters, placing a hand on her heart and nodding at her. “I take it you’re here to see Liberte from the sky?”

“I am, and please, just call me Emily,” she replies, waving off the soldier’s formality.

“Understood,” Colette says, gesturing to the window as she looks ahead again. “You’re in for a treat. The city looks just amazing from the sky.”

“How far off are we?” Emily asks, looking at the vast expanse of sand stretching out towards the horizon before them.

“Oh, don’t worry,” Colette says with a chuckle that’s matched by her crewmates. “We’re closer than you think.”

Emily shrugs and leans back against the wall, staring out of the window and waiting. After a few minutes, Emily pulls out The Clock and looks down at it to check the time.

It’s five past nine now. I thought she said we’d get there at nine, but I still don’t see anything yet.

As she tucks the small pocket watch back into its place on her belt, Emily looks back up and immediately questions her eyes. Instead of the open desert that was there when she looked away, she sees a sprawling, wall-less city stretching almost as far as the eye can see.

The city is built in concentric rings of height, starting at the towering white behemoth of a palace in the centre and spreading out to the squat, sheet-metal homes at the outer edge. It’s overwhelmingly bright, with a majority of the buildings being carved from the same white stone as the palace, and the rest being a mix of well-maintained, polished metals that reflect the morning sun like glistening gems.

There’s no overhead rail system like in Chroni, but the streets are dotted with small, motorised vehicles and large, multi-segment personnel transports.

“Woah,” she quietly exclaims, shocked by the sudden sight.

“Haha, it’s incredible, isn’t it?” Colette asks proudly. “And I take it from your reaction that you didn’t know about the oasis barrier?”

“Oasis barrier?” Emily questions, her eyes roaming the busy streets below, watching pedestrians going about their days. “Is that what kept it from being seen?”

“Yes. This city was built on a natural oasis where several mana veins meet, and somehow the council elders created a spell that lets us use that to hide the city from prying eyes. Don’t ask me for the specifics though, because I can’t even begin to understand it.”

Incredible. They took the concept of an oasis mirage and reversed it. I didn’t even notice anything from the outside.

“That’s amazing,” Emily says, watching the view shift as the ship turns to head towards a massive rectangular building on the southern edge of the massive, walled-in compound that takes up a sizable chunk of the west of the city. “The council elders are your fourth circle mages, right?”

“Yes, they are,” Colette says before leaning forward and pulling the tube in front of her towards her mouth, pressing a button beside it before speaking into it. “We are approaching headquarters now. To landing positions.”

Her voice echoes through the entire ship, alerting the crew and starting a flurry of hurried movement that Emily can hear through the wall she’s leaning against. She doesn’t say anything else, going quiet and letting the crew focus on their landing as she continues to admire the city from above.

“This is border patrol ship code zero four two approaching with friendly unknown,” Collette says with her hand resting on the crystal in front of her, pouring a steady stream of mana into it. “Please open bay U zero one.”

She falls silent but keeps pouring mana into the crystal, turning her head to look over her shoulder as she does.

“I’m asking them to open one of our unprotected bays so I can take you in safely,” she explains.

“Unprotected? This is a military compound, right?” Emily questions with a raised brow.

“Yes, but I was only referring to our defence array. There’s enough artillery mounted around the base to blow most ships from the sky before they’d even get close to the entry bays. The defence array is more for stopping individuals.”

“I see.”

“Confirmed,” says a deep voice emanating from the crystal under Collete’s hand. “Doors opening now, please proceed.”

Colette takes her hand off the crystal and starts issuing commands to her crew as the ship begins its descent, so Emily returns her attention to inspecting the military compound below. The roof of the large building they are approaching is formed from a plethora of large, rectangular metal plates of varying sizes that she could barely make out the seams of from afar. One of them drops down before sliding to the side to reveal a gap large enough for the patrol ship to enter, and Emily immediately marks the building as a dock.

The rest of the buildings wrapped inside the low metal wall with the dock range in shapes and sizes from what looks like a small, two-story home to several vast warehouses that cover thousands of square metres. There are soldiers in blue uniforms walking with purpose everywhere, along with several small cars weaving quickly between them.

Emily confirms Colette was serious about the compound’s firepower when she spots several well-hidden seams and lookout windows on several of the building’s top floors, a few of which she’s able to peer through as the ship sinks halfway into the dock. Inside, she sees the intimately familiar sight of mounted anti-aircraft cannons.

Damn! Are they hiding artillery inside false floors on their buildings?

With an impressed nod, she quickly scans the compound wall before she loses sight of it, seeing dozens of unhidden artillery placements, along with several cannons pointed outwards to protect from a siege and a few odd-looking mounted guns that catch Emily’s interest.

What are those? Their barrels are too small for cannons, but why would they mount slow-firing normal guns? Have they already created magazines?

“What’s with those guns mounted to the walls?” she asks as they touch down inside a mostly empty landing bay and the roof slides shut above them. “Their barrels look too small to be cannons.”

“Do you mean the chain guns?” Colette asks, pushing herself out of her seat and gesturing for Emily to follow her. “They’re Earnie’s pride and joy. Unlike our normal cylinder-based guns, their ammo is fastened to these long metal chains that allow for much longer, continuous fire. We use them at all of our more permanent emplacements, and they’ve done wonders for our defensive abilities. It’s a shame he hasn’t made a more portable version. Our border would be growing much faster if he had.”

“That’s ingenious,” Emily says as one of her cores immediately starts designing a similar system to compare to her magazines. “Who’s Earnie? I’d love to meet him.”

“He’s one of our unawakened weaponsmiths and I doubt you’ll enjoy it as much as you seem to think you will. He’s known for being a little… eccentric.”

“In what way?”

“He basically lives in his workshop and talks to his machines more than he does other people. He refuses to let anyone he doesn’t deem worthy in, including whichever squads are positioned there to protect him.”

“That seems perfectly reasonable to me,” Emily says with a shrug. “I wouldn’t like it if people who didn’t appreciate my work wanted to invade my workshop either.”

“I may be inclined to agree with you there,” Colette says, pausing in front of the exit as it slides open. “If he didn’t blow up or set fire to something every other day. Do you know how hard it is to protect someone from themselves when they won’t let any of the mages that could help them in until after something has gone wrong?”

The bags beneath her eyes seem to deepen as she complains with a tone of tired resignation.

“Are you in the squad that protects him? It sounds personal.”

“Not anymore, thank Ulea,” Colette sighs, leading her down the steps. “Earnie duty isn’t something most of us have to deal with once we reach third circle. Other than Maria, bless her soul. That poor woman has been stuck there for years now. I’m pretty sure she’ll celebrate if he manages to get himself killed.”

Before Emily can ask any more, the large door at the front of the hangar slides open with a hiss and a first circle soldier runs over to them. He stops in front of them and salutes, placing his open palm on his heart, before holding out a small, rectangular metal token. It’s around the same size as Emily’s hand and is covered in fine, multicoloured engravings.

“Here’s the pass you requested Ma’am!” he says.

“Thank you. At ease,” Colette responds, taking the pass from him and handing it to Emily. “Keep this on you for now. Don’t lose it or put it in a spatial storage unless you want the full force of our magical defences coming down on you.”

“Got it,” Emily says, sliding it between her thigh holster and her leg for safekeeping.

“Report,” Colette says as she turns back to the still-waiting soldier.

“The vice-commander has called you to his office to verify your report on the friendly unknown,” the soldier replies, glancing at Emily curiously.

It’s probably not normal for an outsider to be called straight to their vice-commander.

“Understood, we’ll head there now. Dismissed.”

The soldier salutes one last time before turning around and running out again.

“He seems busy,” Emily comments with amusement as they follow after him at a leisurely pace.

“He’s an errand-runner. If he finishes his task quota for the day early, he’ll be allowed extra free time to train.”

They leave the hangar, stepping through an invisible film of mana that gives Emily an unsettling feeling of being watched, and enter a wide-open corridor. They pass several soldiers who salute them on the way past. Some of them have one or two lines through their emblems, matching their circle, but the rest of them have none, marking their unawakened status.

All the unawakened soldiers carry a gun with them. For most it’s a sleek clockwork rifle, similar to those used in Modo but with a few small differences in the design like the guard that completely blocks off the front of the handle to protect from slashing weapons, and the pump slides beneath the barrels instead of bolts. However, some of them are carrying heavy pump-action shotguns with backup pistols mounted at their waists.

All of the soldiers, both awakened and not, carry a cold weapon on them as backup. The most common is a small knife strapped to their belt, but Emily also sees several swords, maces, and even a second circle mage with a long spear strapped to her back.

“Does everyone here have close-quarters weapons training?” Emily asks as they enter a large room with a wide-open bay door and several parked cars, a few of them with soldiers hanging around next to them chatting and smoking.

“Yes. We consider it very important to be able to handle yourself in close quarters, especially for our mages. You can’t exactly cast a spell with a knife in your throat,” Colette says, glancing down at Emily’s exposed body armour and forearm bracers as she leads them towards one of the cars with two smoking soldiers sitting on the hood. “Is that not the same in Modo? You look like you’ve received proper combat training.”

“Haha,” Emily chuckles lightly, her face barely moving. “It’s not quite the same, and I’m not exactly normal. What gave me away, the gear?”

“The walk,” Colette replies, shaking her head and levelling a glare at the two soldiers before them which they quickly notice, jumping off the car and saluting. “I can barely hear your footsteps and you’ve been next to me the whole time. Even among our trained combat mages, it’s rare to see someone with that much control over their body.”

Emily raises a brow silently and listens carefully, realising she really isn’t making much noise as she walks.

I didn’t even notice I was doing it…

“At ease,” Colette says, relaxing her glare. “Take us to the vice-commander’s office.”

“Yes, Ma’am!” both soldiers say in sync.

One of them moves to the driver’s seat, and the other opens the passenger door for Colette before moving to open a rear door for Emily and himself.

“Thanks,” Emily says with a nod, slipping into the car as it starts with a quiet hum.

Curiously, she injects a burst of machina into it and quickly discovers the magic crystals powering the engine. She glances at Colette before converting the machina touching the crystals into mana to probe them. Immediately, Colette’s head snaps back to look at her with a dangerous glint in her eyes.

“What are you doing?” she asks calmly, though Emily can feel a minute quiver in the mana around them, suggesting she’s preparing a spell.

“Nothing,” Emily replies without batting an eye, immediately converting the mana back into machina, already having claimed her answer.

Fire and water crystals. They’re using the same trick I did in my Steam Source to produce steam. However, it looks like they’ve managed to charge the ignition key with mana to activate the system instead of breaking an active array like mine does.

“Sure,” Colette says, narrowing her eyes. “Please don’t use mana again within the compound unless asked to.”

The car falls silent as Colette looks forward again. Emily glances at the soldier sitting beside her and sees him practically dripping with sweat while staring down at the back of Colette’s seat. She shrugs and relaxes into her seat, reaching into her belt and pulling out the long, empty bullet casing with the Crystal Skull’s logo engraved on the side.

She rolls it between her fingers while observing the compound pass by around them as they head towards one of the smaller, two-story buildings. The driver of the car skilfully weaves between walking soldiers and a few other cars, quickly bringing them to their destination.

They step out of the car to approach the building, and Emily immediately feels the pressure of a fourth circle mage wash over her. She takes a deep breath and raises one of her hands to rest on The Clock’s pouch with barely a thought.

This will be the first fourth circle mage I meet without fighting them… hopefully.