Diana watched on in silence as Donovan held his breath, his face managing to reach a somewhat bright shade of red before he exhaled in relief.

"Made it, hell yeah." As he staggered backwards from Chestnut's hand, he raised a fist in the air. He was triumphant, and though Diana did not quite understand the struggle he had just gone through, she could celebrate with him silently on the understanding that he would not celebrate something minor. He struggled for breath after this, if only momentarily, though he was quick to recover. "Was that good enough for you?"

"It was an excellent display of your abilities, Donovan, though I must say that I think you went about it the wrong way."

Don's face screwed up, the glow of his achievement ruined by the Arboreal Maiden impending criticism of what he could have, should have, done differently. "How should I have done it?"

Chestnut produced a fiber of light out of nothing. Obviously it was the work of split, but this was not immediately apparent to those unfamiliar with what it can do. "You controlled your strand by pushing the head around."

She began to prod the front tip of this fiber to move it through the air.

"As you can see, it doesn't much like to follow where you are directing it. No matter how precise you are, you won't ever be able to sustain that sort of pushing for very long, the strand will simply slide out of your influence or move away of its own accord." She continued to push it around a bit to demonstrate her point. "What you should be doing instead is pulling the strand."

Placing her finger at the tip of the strand, she made a wide sweeping motions with her arm. Naturally, the fiber followed obediently, shaking but never straying. "As you can see, when you coax it along like this it will always try to go to the point of influence. I take it you can imagine why this would be easier?"

Donovan felt like he had been struck by a bullet. No, 'pulling' the strand had not occurred to him. Hell, he had forgotten that 'pulling' was even an option when it came to movement. Thrust, at least in his mind, was always envisioned by 'pushing' and object, that was how movement worked in space. Of course there were reasons to tow and tug, usually as a result of damage, but towing was rarely ever desirable as you would have to cut the wire when making drastic changes in direction in order to not force a collision.

"That would have been so much easier..." Donovan was crestfallen, and he certainly sounded the part.

"It most certainly would have. That being said, I find what you have accomplished to be incredibly impressive. You are undoubtedly inexperienced with manipulating split, but the fact that you were able to perform such a feat this early on in your career. What you lack is instinct, which is something you will have to make up with knowledge and experience." Chestnut waved her hand, dissipating the fibrous light into the ether. "I can confidently claim to be the most proficient manipulator of split you would have any hope of finding, so please ask away should you have any questions."

"What if it's something like this? Something that I don't know I'm doing wrong?"

"Then I will be here to correct you. However, I have a feeling that you will be able to find far more efficient ways of doing what I ask of you on your own in the future. Remember that there are certain paths in your body that transfer split far more efficiently than others, I will teach you how to find them once you have reached a sufficient level of progress."

Donovan looked down, still disheartened. "I got it."

"Good, now for you." She extended her other hand to Diana, making it clear that she intended to give Diana a similar check up to Donovan. "Fret not, I won't have you do what Donovan did just now. More than just thinking you are unprepared, I feel it would be unnecessary for you. You have yet to reach the point of growth pains, so scouting out your capabilities would only do you harm."

"It would?" Diana was apprehensive about giving the Arboreal Maiden her hand now...

"Yes. Given the fact you are not yet at that level, it would only hurt your confidence should you fail. I don't mean to offend you here, but you are not nearly as capable of shrugging off blows to confidence like that. Remember, split is incredibly responsive to the intent, and therefore emotions, of the person attempting to influence it. A lack of confidence may very well send you into an irrecoverable spiral."

Diana frowned, feeling like her confidence had taken a hit just from her saying that.

"While we do this, I would like to once again speak about something." She closed her hand around Diana's this time around, clearly something was going to be different about her analysis. "More specifically, I would like to talk about the weaponry you plan on using in your future conflicts."

A singeing sensation enveloped Diana's hand for only a moment. It was enough to make her flinch, but it wasn't really painful, more surprising than anything else. "Why?"

"Simply put, I do not wish to see cities burn at your whim. The vast majority of people fight with your technological equivalent of sticks and stones, and therefore do not stand much of a chance against nuclear weaponry. As such I would like to enact some . . . provisos, to my assistance." She chose her words carefully, not because she was afraid they would shoot for loopholes but because she wanted to properly convey what she was trying to negotiate for.

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"Provisos, on nuclear weaponry?" Donovan raised an eyebrow. "You know we didn't have any plans on using those against terrestrial targets. We have a bad history with that sort of thing."

Chestnut nodded, Diana grimacing in discomfort from her probing. "I understand that, however I can't assume you will hold that position indefinitely. Of course, the scope is not intended to be limited to solely nuclear weaponry."

"So, what, you don't want us dropping rods from space either? I think we can manage without doing that." Diana got a word out while she tried to stop herself from wiggling around. It really felt like there were worms in her arm.

"I wish for you to voluntarily restrict yourself from using weapons of mass destruction in situation where they are not strictly necessary." She placed a heavy emphasis on 'voluntarily'.

"If Nukes and God Rods are already off the table, there isn't exactly much else for us to use is there?"

Chestnut shook her head, she had anticipated this misunderstanding but it still felt weird to have to point out. "Perhaps for you those would barely classify as weapons of mass destruction, but I wish for you to look at this from the perspective of a peasant who has barely seen much of their own world, much less the wider galaxy. To them, what would constitute a weapon of mass destruction?"

"No clue." Donovan didn't even try to think about it. There wasn't any point, Chestnut clearly had an answer in mind.

"I think that something that could be used to devastate a small village would be enough to constitute something like that."

Donovan racked his mind for some otherwise conventional weapon system that fit that bill.

"Thermobaric munitions?" A large enough fuel-air bomb warhead certainly had the potential to level a small village, if not completely then damage most of it.

"Those would certainly qualify, however I think that there are a few even smaller and less destructive tools at your disposal that would also qualify to them. Incendiary bombardment, for example, would very quickly burn all that they know to the ground."

Peasant would probably have some sort of wooden housing, so that made sense. In a particularly dry season it wouldn't be unreasonable to assume that a single fire could burn down a town if everyone lived close enough.

"Okay, I can live without using those. It might be a bit of a pain, but ultimately I shouldn't need napalm and white phosphorous to take over a planet." Donovan assented to the forfeiture of that method of attack, he really didn't have plans to use it anyways.

"I concur. Should we ever decide to choose the path of conquest, I would like to bank on the potential goodwill of the lower class in order to solidify our rule in the local area. It would be unreasonable to burn their villages to the ground and then expect them to trust us."

Chestnut nodded, peering further into Diana's body. "I would also like to ban the use of most high explosives." The instant she noticed Donovan holding his breath and looking towards Diana was the instant she knew she was going too far.

"I can't agree to that, it simply isn't possible for me to forfeit that advantage."

A huge part of the combat strategy Donovan had been tutored under utilized the 'King of Battle', artillery and other types of indirect fire equipment, to suppress and neutralize enemy positions. These systems were one hundred percent worthless without any explosive filler in their charges, and he wasn't willing to sacrifice it for anything.

"I see, that is certainly reasonable. Then how about this, no guided explosive munitions. Is that acceptable?"

To that, Diana shrugged. This matter was firmly in Donovan's court, and she could not consider herself learned enough in that field to make a judgement call.

Donovan, on the other hand, was thinking very hard about this. Guided munitions were certainly effective . . . but would he need them? He doubted that his prospective opponents would ever be able to outrun a bombardment, and he could rest easy knowing that none of them would have the technology to both detect the location of a battery and engage in counterbattery fire. Those were the two big draws of guided munitions though.

A missile or finned shell could be redirected onto a moving target midflight in order to dispatch it, or alternatively guided by GPS to a predetermined location like an ammo dump, but neither of those were likely to be an issue at this point. Nobody had the technology to fight dumb munitions in the first place, so why would he ever want to spend more expensive guided shells to achieve what would effectively be the same objective?

"I can live with that restriction as long as it only applies to indirect weaponry. I would like to reserve the ability to give any troops I receive guided weaponry so long as line of sight is maintained."

"That compromise is acceptable to me. Would it also be possible to request that you not perform bombardments of any kind from beyond the atmosphere of planets?"

"That seems reasonable." If they couldn't drop nukes or rods, then there wasn't really any other form of bombardment available to him.

"Good. In that case, I would also like to add the stipulation that you do not use any other weapons of mass destruction that you develop in the intervening time. I am fine with you building and even testing any of the systems we have discussed today, however I don't want to see them used against your enemies. Am I clear?"

"Crystal clear." "Those are perfectly reasonable terms."

"Good. Now obviously I don't expect you to hold to them once your opponents catch up, but I believe it would only be fair if you waited to unleash yours until after they demonstrate their ability to use them. Is that also acceptable?"

Don frowned. He would really like to avoid being attacked first in such a situation, first strike protocols and whatnot, but that eventuality was definitely a far off dream at the moment. "I will accept that begrudgingly."

"Good. Now let me tell you what I wish to offer you in exchange." Diana held her breath as the worms reached across her entire body. "The exact reasons will become clear after that child awakes, but I will offer you a source of manpower to tentatively crew as many ships as you require for an extended period of time. So long as you provide basic training to these crewmen, they will do whatever you ask of them for that duration, up to and including assistance in your terrestrial construction efforts and training whatever personnel you decide will be their replacements to an exemplary degree."

Donovan immediately became very suspicious. "How long is an extended period of time?"

Chestnut smiled. It was beautiful, but also somewhat unnerving. "We can discuss that at a later time, once you are closer to actually having a navy in need of crew. For now though, just understand that I am considering making a certain admiral candidate the two of you are somewhat familiar with the head of this operation."