Tristan was tense when he approached the enclave of humanity. There was a small town built out of wood with tile roofs. No wall surrounded it, which looked wrong. What would the people do if a drake waltzed in?

“The legend or one of his direct subordinates would kill it,” Vulcan said, “Most beasts won’t enter the nest of a predator that wants to kill them.”

Slightly upriver from the village were two towers standing four stories tall. A few people at the top were ringing gigantic bells, while others worked together to push a giant wheel. The purpose of the towers was revealed when a chain rose out of the water in tandem with the pushing guards.

Tristan frowned how did he stop a boat on a river? The chain was not emanating a force, but it was still thicker than his arm.

“Head to shore!” A voice boomed out over the water, “A land dock is off to your left, submit to Alsgraf law and no harm shall come to you.”

Tristan could not see the speaker but assumed that his voice was being amplified by an artifact. He didn’t know what a dry dock looked like. The only docks he had ever seen were jetties that extended out into the water, but he had a destination, left. Frantically he pushed his oars into the water.

The architect alloy paddles were meant to paddle his previous boat which was significantly smaller. Tristan had not considered how water resistance could affect a paddle and groaned as they bent under the pressure. He put up a valiant effort to get to the shore, but he had no experience paddling with damaged equipment. Well, he had none with undamaged equipment either, but the soldiers would not care.

Several people in shiny armor watched on in disbelief as Tristan slammed into the net. His boat did more damage to the chain than the chain did to his boat. The absorption infusion held up admirably while he was nearly pitched out of his boat by the sudden stop. Thankfully the chain net caught him.

Sighing, Tristan tamped down his embarrassment as he used the chain to pull himself to the appropriate shore. Then he realized something, he had understood the soldier. Hopefully whatever trade language he spoke was the language of the area he had just entered.

When he got to land one of the soldiers grabbed Tristan’s boat and helped him get it onto land. The people here were strangely uniform. All of them had pale skin, blond hair, and green eyes. They could have been Luke’s long lost relatives. Tristan frowned, why wouldn’t their kerns affect their growth?

The only one with a streak of red in his hair stepped forward, “Lezahot et atsmach.” At Tristan's blank expression, he frowned and tried again, “Identifisere deg selv.”

That last one sounded close to identify yourself, though the wording was butchered, Tristan answered with that assumption, “I am Tristan, I have no idea what you are saying.”

The soldier nodded and spoke intelligibly this time, “Do you speak anything besides the trade language?”

“No, is that a problem?” Tristan asked.

“No, though it may make your life difficult,” The soldier said, “Please follow us, we need to ask you a few questions before we let you enter.”

The soldiers formed up like guards around him and started marching towards the tower. Tristan started moving, only to nearly run over the man with the red streak in his hair. He stopped in time and frowned. These people moved so slowly. Were they testing him? That didn’t make any sense, they should want him where they could control him and they would be able to use the towers to restrain him with their full numbers and preparation.

Tristan asked Vulcan about the oddity, “Uhh, they are all tier one and not naturally tier one. The one with the red streak was a natural tier zero, but he got raised to tier two with a fire kern.”

“What do you mean, everyone is at least tier zero,” Tristan frowned at the people around him.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

“What tier is your anima at?” Vulcan asked.

“Zero,” Tristan answered, not understanding what Vulcan was getting at.

“True tier zero, you couldn’t even power an artifact with it, most people start there unless their parents are elites,” Vulcan said, “While the Caldera, and these guys apparently, had the disability of only possessing a kern, your home had a gene pool made completely of combatants. Genetically that was probably the strongest part of the world.”

“How many people normally become warriors?” Tristan asked.

“That has to be bred into a family over multiple generations, it's not normal. Tier one is as high as it normally goes,” Vulcan said.

Tristan couldn’t help but chuckle. The Caldera had the potential to be a world power but had never grown due to superstition and isolation. All the potential in the role would not help if no one could harness it.

One of the soldiers glared at Tristan and muttered under his breath. The words were not in an intelligible language, and Vulcan chose not to translate. Now that he knew the stooges person here was likely tier two or three he relaxed. He could still be killed by a person at tier zero with the appropriate weaponry, but it was unlikely. They did not know what he could do, locks would not hold him, most poisons weren’t effective, and he could make himself far more durable than he had any right to be.

The door to the tower was a simple wooden construction, made to funnel people in one at a time. A spiral staircase took up most of the space, but there was still enough room for an entry room with a table and a mobile desk. Light stones lit the inside with blank white light revealing just how clean the room truly was. Aside from that, there was no furnishing.

“Please sit,” The soldier with the red stripe said.

Tristan looked at the step he was pointing at, “You want me to sit on the steps?”

It would block anyone from coming down. Maybe they could roll something down at him? It was a stretch, but a large enough ball could do it. At the soldier’s insistent gesture, he shrugged and sat. The desk was rolled over and slid up to him, it sat just above his lap. He noticed that it had two points of connection force on each corner facing him and those two points connected exactly to an area containing the same force in the wall.

It was not quite handcuffs, but the height of the desk would give the soldiers plenty of time to stab him with their spears. Tristan shrugged and let them use their sneaky tactic. They wouldn’t be able to see him use decay on the wood until it was already too weak to slow him.

“Bag on the desk,” The soldier said, “Please let me know if there is anything fragile or explosive inside.

Tristan sighed and set it on the desk. He had quite a few valuables, but he also did not want to make a bad impression the moment he stepped into this nation. So he shook his head. The soldier flipped the bag upside down. His eyes widened when forty or so essence reservoirs tumbled out. He reached out to pick one up.

Tristan caught the soldier’s hand and shook his head, “You can look, if you have any questions ask, but don’t touch.”

The soldier glared at Tristan and jerked his hand away. He waved at the other people to lower their spears. Tristan had seen the look in his eyes, these were valuable. As they took a human life to be made, it was likely that their value was higher than Tristan had expected.

“You cannot enter Alsgraf with potential weapons of mass destruction,” The soldier said, “We confiscate these and send them to the appropriate authorities.”

“Then I won’t enter Alsgraf,” Tristan shrugged. If these were the soldiers protecting the border, then Tristan was sure he would eventually find a civilization that would take in a friendly and unaligned tier five.

The answer seemed to surprise the man, but once it passed he continued, “You are already in Alsgraf, you don’t have the choice.”

“Careful how you handle this,” Vulcan cautioned, “If you dump the reservoirs your essence will not be strong enough to register with the legend, but it's still not worth being on his scrap list over these grunts.”

Tristan nodded, “I have no conflict with you people, so either get someone who’s not going to steal from me or I’m leaving.”

The soldier’s face scrunched up in anger but Tristan held up a palm, “Do hunters, peddlers, or tradesmen of any kind move through the wilds? If so, one of these reservoirs is enough to buy passage into Alsgraf, regardless of your laws.”

Tristan swept the objects back into his bag, an action that had four spear points aimed at his chest. He sighed and infused the table with decay. One instant it was solid the next it was mush. The spears thrust forward and Tristan lunged back up the steps. He still had to slap one blade aside but they were unable to threaten him.

He knew that a confrontation would be bad, but a four story drop was easily survivable. Tristan had lived alone and had done fine for himself, there were many treasures in the wild. Before he could ascend the tower and jump, the tower’s door was slammed open.

A man with the bearing of a soldier, but in casual clothes ran in. He saw the situation and jumped between Tristan and the hostile soldiers. The man started yelling something that Tristan didn’t understand. All the wannabe thieves paled.

“Vulcan please translate,” Tristan asked.

“Stop, Stop, he’s tier five,” Vulcan parodied the man’s high pitched voice, “Oh and they’re sending the hero from the closest settlement.”