Wish upon the Stars chapter 905

In the morning, I stockpiled my scrolls and then Callie, Abel, Bethy and I went down to the club proper for breakfast (the others were mostly sleeping in). When we arrived in the dining room, we found Devlan and Walden at the table, poring over a set of maps of the city. I raised an eyebrow, though I realized with my mask back in place no one could see it, so I sighed internally and verbalized my curiosity. “What’s with the maps, we’re leaving, right?”

I’d been confused about this for a while. I absolutely did not understand what Devlan wanted with this city. He was about to abandon the place for greener pastures, so why have me steal the key? He obviously wanted to use it, but what exactly was in this town that would be useful once we left?

Devlan looked up, amused. “Ah, you’re wondering what the point is. That’s fair. Let me ask you something. Why do you think the zones exist? What is the point of them, at least outside of the succession war?”

I considered. “I mean, back home we had tiered cities like this to stratify the renown. It kept super high rankers from siphoning off all the reputation and preventing growth.”

“Less of an issue here,” he said with a shrug. “We have higher rankers who give renown themselves, and as you know, that scales. No, the main reason for the stratified nature of this planet, outside of these few times, is simple. Logistics.”

“I don’t follow,” I said in confusion. “Why would logistics be stratified?”

Devlan sighed. “It’s complicated. As I’m sure you know, higher tier materials are always categorically better. HOWEVER, they’re also categorically more difficult to utilize. In order for a society to function, it requires full engagement from all levels of the citizenry. More than that, there’s prestige involved. While it’s theoretically possible for an A-ranker to build a city in a day, do A-rankers have the time to run around and build D-rank cities?”

“Supply chain limitations,” Callie cut in. “Construction of things like machines require tons of tiny moving parts. Chips, gears, screws. You can’t have A-rankers constructing those, but D-rankers are perfect for it. Stagger your resources so everyone is using D-rank machines, and D-rankers can play an outsized role in the workforce. That’s why the higher rank zones maintain a presence down here, you’re their supply chain.”

He nodded. “Just so. Beyond that, D-rank materials work for most things. A-rankers don’t need A-rank showers, or soap, or beds. HAVING those things isn’t the worst, but they aren’t a requirement. Quality of life investments work just as well for high rankers, outside of some niche luxury products.”

I was beginning to have a bit of a sneaking suspicion. This planet was a giant manufacturing hub, and the WCP, aside from wishes, was renowned as a colossal marketplace. “It’s not just the locals. The branches do it too,” I interjected. “The cities act as production facilities, and the local high rankers make deals with the branches. They get favors and information that can be cashed in during the succession war. Some of the branches already HAVE alliances set up, don’t they? Does your organization?”

“The High Society is a bit…special,” Devlan said with a chuckle. “We’re a wholesaler. We don’t act as a direct supply chain, but instead manage various material resources required to produce useful items. It means we have our fingers in a lot of pies, but aren’t actually allied to anyone specific. That’s why I’ve spent so many years attempting to secure this key. Do you know how this city was built?”

I shrugged. “It’s a spoke on the wheel. There’s lots of them, right?”

“There are,” he admitted. “But that’s only within a certain radius. There’s a lot of wiggle room with city locations. Did you ever wonder why both this city and the nearby Kobold city are in THIS location? Why the first city lord built this absurd fortress town, and the even more absurd fortress inside it?”

My stomach dropped. Because I knew that there were other forces nearby. Hostile forces that had been extending their reach into this place. The Void was here for something too, and whatever he was building up to, I somehow doubted it was anything I wanted the Void having access to. “There’s something under the city, isn’t there?’ I asked quietly. “Some kind of rare resource.”

“Infinity crystal,” he stated grandly. “A huge deposit of it. It’s MOSTLY been mined clean, but moving it out of the city is prohibitively expensive and unsafe. Infinity crystal is delicate and extremely unstable. You can’t put it inside anything that’s been spatially expanded, and moving it in bulk is stupid and risky. There’s a production complex under the city, but it’s nowhere near efficient enough to put a dent in the mineral reserves they have stockpiled down there.”

I thought about the platform under the island. Then I considered the chasm itself, and suction effect. Except maybe it wasn’t suction. Maybe it was gravity. Or some kind of spatial warping. It was obvious infinity crystal was some kind of space mineral, but I didn’t know what kind, so I looked to Abel.

My mentor noticed my gaze and inferred my question. “Infinity crystal is a spatial amplifier. It’s what they use to make space rings. It’s also commonly worked into foundations to allow for larger volumes of spatial expansion in buildings. It’s considered one of the most stable spatial resources. Of course, it can and will blow you to shit if you mix it with other spatial energy, so it has to be handled carefully. But still, it’s WAY less dangerous than a lot of the other materials you can get, and much more effective than freehanding it.”

“The complex is at the bottom of that chasm, isn’t it?” I asked. I was sure my suspicions were true now. More than that, they were worse than I’d expected. Space and the Void had an extremely intertwined relationship. My first experience with the Void had been back on Callus, when Abel had commissioned a Labyrinth under his brother’s circus that was hanging halfway into the void. He’d used it as a clever method of limiting the cultivation rank of anyone who wanted to enter.

I didn’t know what the Void children could DO with a massive stockpile of space warping crystals, but I was almost positive it wouldn’t be good. Which is why I was pretty sure I liked where this was going. “You’re planning to rob them?” I asked with interest.

“Of course,” he said cheerfully. “It’s just sitting down there untouched. The turnover on those space rings is slow. And while they’re obviously a key resource, we have our own manufacturing lines, or at least close allies with them, that can massively increase the production capability. If I bring a substantial bounty of crystals with me, The High Society will value me IMMENSELY. Any request I put forward will be taken very seriously.”

I glowered at him. “You set this up on purpose. According to our contract I could demand we leave right now, and you’d be forced to comply. But you knew that once you shared the plan I’d be roped into working with you to get the crystals and you wouldn’t even need to pay for it.”

“What a hurtful accusation,” he said with faux sadness as he put a hand to his chest. “I truly believe this course of action will be the best possible outcome for all of us. Of course, I didn’t approach you simply out of random assumption. I did a bit of digging on your group, and it came to my attention that you have a method of moving large groups of people in a spatially excluded manner. Now there are a few potential items or abilities this could be, but it SEEMS like one of you might have a true Domain.”

That explained why he’d gone out of his way to contact us. In fact, I suspected Animal had been either directly pressured or subtly guided to reach out to us. At least assuming he hadn’t known all this and approached us with this in mind.

Among the entire contingent of candidates and their retinues I was pretty sure that if Bethy wasn’t the only one with a real Domain, she was probably close. Melding with a Domain seed was generally considered a dead end except in VERY specific circumstances. Barring unique cases like Bethy’s where an active demigod personally adjusted things for her, no real genius would be willing to cut off their path to godhood so early.

“So you want us to move the crystals with Bethy's Domain,” I said flatly. “And you think that getting us an in with your faction is enough to make that tenable? Kind of seems like we’re paying you to do something we already have you locked into doing. What if I decide to send you ahead without using that key? Our deal was just for me to steal it, not let you use it. And you work for me now.”

Sighing, Devlan leaned back, raising an eyebrow, steepling his fingers. “And what would you want in exchange for helping us? It’s not like you could unload the crystals if you got some. Our connections are needed for usage. Not to mention that in order to take them to begin with, given the lack of spatial ring accessibility, we’ll need to supply men to help move them, AND to combat the manpower in the production facility. They’re designed to resist a Kobold invasion.”

I had my own manpower…but he wasn’t wrong. Those Kobolds had been a nightmare, and I’d fought ONE small warband. Sharing the chasm with a CITY of those monsters was like walking on the edge of a knife. Given the placement and purpose of the city though, I suspected there were some built in defenses to help. Whatever the case, if he thought we needed more people, then we probably did.

Still, I wasn’t going to get fleeced on this. “Twenty percent,” I said bluntly. “Converted to cash. I’m not unreasonable. I don’t expect it paid up front, but I want a contract in place for installments.”

“Do you have a Twilight Bank Box?” he asked after a delay. His easy agreement told me I probably could have gotten more, but I wasn’t worried about it. He certainly wasn’t HAPPY about the cost, so I hadn’t done bad.

I glanced at Callie, who nodded. I raised an eyebrow, and got a quick mental message of ‘later’ before nodding to Devlan. “I do. We can hash out the details later, for now, I need to know more about the tactical situation and about our resources. I assume you’ll be supplying more than just the few dozen people that are in the club?”

He snorted. “This is much too big a job for one branch. Luckily, the succession war has everyone mobile. No one will notice The High Society collecting D-rankers around Yettin, especially not with you and I talking alliance. They’ll assume we’re meant to fill out your forces.”

“Which you WILL,” I amended. “After we get the crystals.” He didn’t look convinced, so I shot Callie a message, and after a brief back and forth, I sighed. “In exchange, we’ll amend our percentage to fifteen.”

“Ten,” he shot back immediately.

I shook my head. “I’m going to counter with fourteen, you’ll say twelve, and we’ll meet at thirteen. So thirteen, AND I want a bulk contract for ten years of service from all the incoming forces. Deal?”

He stared at me intently for a moment, then grinned. “Deal. I do love working with someone with a brain in their head.” He drew out a stack of blank papers and a pen. “How about we hash out terms now. After that, we have a meeting. I got a lead on the investigation you asked me to launch.” I settled in for some good old fashioned contracting, and then, we had a lead to chase down. I didn’t want the Void dropping in on this clusterfuck, so we had to dig them out early.