---Minas Mar, Delta---

With a sigh of relief, Mary put together a stack of papers and laid it to the side. Some of her most pressing worries had been resolved over the past month. The construction for the Pythian Games was finally finished. Although there had been some problems with Cade and some of the people of Gamma, they blew over without greater implications after Gamma Resistance's Garwell offered to act as a mediator.

After a month, the food prices had stabilized across the three stations. The solution was easier than expected, as many people changed their classes with the rise of food prices. It had taken some encouragement from the local governments, but agricultural classes had a chance to shine and show their worth. With a mix of skills, magic, and hydroponics, the Tree Stations managed to mostly cover their own consumption, making them almost self-sufficient in food matters.

The new connection with the Mur Empire also helped. Although the project of a subway between the stations stagnated, Karina finally fulfilling their promise of a tree in Thres had tremendously strengthened their relationship in the eyes of the public. Quite a few Merchant Caravans had added Thres to their destinations, increasing the exchange of goods.

With the influx of Golems, Arget Nore also seemed to have stabilized their situation. After an official apology, they not only started paying for the initial order but made even more orders. It seemed that they decided to invest heavily in the golems since they had not been able to recover the force that was lost on an “expedition”.

According to Seth, most of these Golems actually stayed in Urth. There were quite a few reasons that could have been the case, but the most likely one was that they intended to use the golems as the main force in case Spatia attacked, giving them a chance to recover their dwindled number of undead. The only unsettling detail was that they were still unable to catch the culprit behind the undead rebellion.

At this point, if they added one-to-one, it seemed clear that the terrorist attack on Delta and the upheaval in Arget Nore were meant to destabilize Delta, Minas Mar, and the undead empire. There was someone in the dark, trying to weaken them all and the chances that was Spatia were high.

However, after these two incidents, it had been silent for the past two months. There were no greater incidents around the connected world, giving them ample time for their own moves. While Seth had been working on raising the capabilities of the crafting teams, Leana, Mary, and Luf had tried to recover the influence Minas Mar had lost when Al'Zalsar left.

Al'Zalsar was a powerful sorceress and she had been able to get quite the influence in Delta, rivaling the dark machinations of the Scene at the time, using her special set of skills and spells. She had used it to enable Project Iego, but this power was lost with her departure.

The Scene had grasped that chance back then with the backing of Spatia and the consequences were terrible. Now that the Scene was gone and Ichabot had stepped back, it left a power vacuum, with an emergency government trying to lead Delta until the next elections.

Like Seth, the people of Minas Mar like Mary and Jane were never interested in power or influence, but in the current situation, they decided to move. Not to gain influence, but to prevent any more tragedies. Chrona had proven that their inner ranks were not as benevolent and reliable as they used to be, foreign powers could not be trusted in general, and Spatia had not only tried it before, but they were the most likely suspect to have created the current situation in the first place.

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To prevent further harm, to themselves and others, the administrative members decided that if there was free power lying around, it was best kept in the hands of Minas Mar. If they grasped all the political power, nobody would be able to use it against them. Even Seth, famously uninterested in political games, had agreed that this was the best choice and left it to May, Leana, and Luf to raise their influence in Delta.

As one would expect, with new goals came new worries. They had been working on collecting supporters in the emergency government when it was announced that the representative of Chrona would change again soon. What was worrisome about this, was that Leana had absolutely no info beforehand and no idea who it was.

She had actually lost connection with her brother Hardwig in Chrona, cutting off all the insider knowledge they had beforehand. She was also unable to reach any of her other allies like Idyllin Moe, making them blind to the things that were going on behind the scenes of the empire.

One might not think there was a big difference in who represented Chrona, but the previous example showed that it was very important. With Leana in the lead, Delta was able to thrive. The guy that came after her was a piece of shit that was easily bribed by Spatia and The Scene if there was not even more behind his actions.

Under him, Delta had seen a period of misery, as they tried to implement more and more of Spatia's ideologies. The current guy was kind of okay, not as capable as Leana, but not as rotten as the last guy. Delta was able to kind of recover, but the previously done damage couldn't be mended. The most extreme example of this were the terrorist attacks.

The princess losing contact with their allies in Chrona was no good sign for the future. The next guy might be the worst one yet. With the relationship between Delta and Chrona souring over the past two months, who knew what they would try? A hardliner might try to wrestle control of Delta from the emergency government. Since Chrona was in charge of Delta's border protection, there were more than enough soldiers to do so already present.

Delta's biggest ally had turned into a potential oppressor. At that point, the people of Delta would be stuck between a rock and a hard place, since the Demon District had also become more and more dangerous over the past month.

It came at the worst possible time as the deadline Master Mountain had predicted also drew near. The chance that cultivators would start appearing in the Districts once again was rising and it was unlikely that it would stay peaceful.

Despite the brewing disasters, she was quite happy she managed to finish some of the pending problems and projects. It was good to know that not everything was in a constant downward trend.

...

Seth was also quite happy. With Tored managing the blacksmiths, he was able to fully concentrate on cranking out items. In this month he managed to raise his to craftsman lv.1 with the help of Nädel's tutelage.

His skills were not all that had grown. Just recently Seth was also able to raise his level of existence by one. Gaining roughly 205 points per day, Seth had been able to accumulate just enough to raise his level. Currently, he had 50/15000, just 14050 more and he could rise to lv.4. Seth tried to stay positive in the face of these abysmal numbers. He looked forward to the tournament, which would not only promote Python but also his skills. Hopefully, this would speed up his growth.

With Leana's message that the initial preparations for the tournament were finished, he decided to finally start on his new project tomorrow, so it was finished in time for the announced start date of the tournament.

Since he reached craftsman tier in he was just good enough for what he was planning. Although his goal was the master tier, he had reached the bare minimum to go through with it. Over the past weeks, the project had taken even better shape in his head as his experience with the work grew.

He had already made sure Neeco was ready for the work...