The next few days flew by as everyone worked hard to come up with a solution to the impending crisis. That didn't mean everything was rainbows and sunshine though.

Norman grudgingly worked with the other leaders and a few other researchers to come up with an acceptable array size to implement. Too big and it would take far too long to create the proper arrays to prevent exactly what they were designed to prevent. Too small and they wouldn’t charge fast enough to trigger the spell. A spell that hadn’t been designed yet so there was quite a bit of guesswork involved.

With all the unknowns, he could now understand Marlinik’s feelings on the matter. They would be lucky to come up with a solution that met all of the requirements necessary to save the planet in time. That didn’t stop Norman from assisting though.

“We all agree that this array,” Norman tapped at the picture on the board, “is the ideal configuration?” It was an array that consisted of a central array with four primary feeder arrays attached to it along with twelve secondary feeder arrays.

Any more than that and the cost to benefit simply wasn’t worth it. The smaller the array, the more expertise was needed to construct them. The smaller feeder array’s mana siphons also overlapped far more, making them less and less efficient.

“Yes,” Mylara stated bluntly. “But with that design, we will need to double or triple the number of arrays we place. It will take more time and materials.”

And that was the second big hurdle. These arrays would need to be made with gold. Nothing else had the longevity to survive the near decade-long charging process that would need to occur to power whatever spell was eventually created to fit inside it.

“Is there even that much gold on the planet?” Oomaku asked.

“Normally, I would say no,” Donovan chimed in. “But going by Lord Norman’s expression, I believe he has a solution.”

Norman schooled his face, inwardly kicking himself for the lapse in concentration that allowed his feelings to show. It seemed he would have to give up another secret, something he seemed to be doing far more than anyone else in this room. “Normenia has recently come up with a method of reducing the gold requirement for long-term spells.”

That got the people in the room talking eagerly amongst themselves. Who could blame them? Reducing the gold required for permanent spell structures was huge.

“I assume Kalia was instrumental in this accomplishment,” Vincent shot back.

Norman didn’t like the tone the man had taken and narrowed his eyes as he responded to the pompous ass of a man. “My wife… was part of the team responsible for this discovery.”

Vincent smirked, but remained quiet otherwise. God Norman would love to zap the self-righteous look off of his face. Thankfully, Kalia was in another room. If she were here having to listen to this man’s bullshit, he wouldn’t have remained as civil.

“That only stretches the gold we have. But by how much?” One of the researchers asked.

He really didn’t want to answer this question but now that it was asked he didn’t have much choice. “One-twentieth the amount.”

If his previous statement got the room talking, this one sent it into an uproar.

“You must show us this method immediately!” One man in the back shouted.

“No, no I don’t.” Norman’s words shut down all conversation and the room fell silent. All except the man who shouted.

“What do you mean?” he asked, getting to his feet and looking positively irate.

“I mean what I said. I will not be sharing this knowledge outside of Normenia.”

“You- You can’t do that!”

“Sure I can.”

“Do you not grasp the seriousness of this project?” The man was practically foaming at the mouth now. “This discovery could be the deciding factor on whether or not we save the planet, And you refuse to share it!”

As the man ranted and raved, Norman watched Donovan’s expression from the corner of his eye. The more the man riled up the rest of the group, the more Donovan’s smirk grew. He had suspected some of these researchers, who had randomly shown up in the last few days, were plants. Now he was almost certain they were.

Donovan hadn’t offered much in the way of assistance. And he certainly hadn’t added anything to this project like the others had. Even his useless son Vincent had added more to these meetings than the father had.

It seemed like Donovan was only here to steal ideas and gather data. And Norman wasn’t simply going to hand over one of his people's most accomplished discoveries.

“I do. And if you don’t like it, you can fuck right off. There is always the standard method of creating magical arrays.”

The man spluttered. “That much gold would beggar most nations.”

Norman just shrugged. “You seem to be mistaken about my intentions here. I’m only here to save my people. It just so happens that we need to work together to do that. And I have given my knowledge and expertise to make that happen. Now if your leaders wish to negotiate with me, I can arrange for assemblies to be made available that use our techniques.”

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“You would use this crisis to enrich your own people! You… you’re a goddamn monster!”

This made Norman smile. “No, Sir. I am a leader. And a leader protects his people and ensures their future.”

With an angry huff, the man stormed out, followed by a few more researchers with anger-filled faces.

Norman didn’t much care. He suspected they would go crying to some perceived authority figure demanding that Norman turn over this research. As if anyone could make him. It would be highly amusing to see someone try though.

After the angry group left, he looked over the rest of the room, but everyone was quietly in thought. Even Donovan’s smirk had faded when those researchers left.

Oomaku cleared her throat and Norman turned to her. “What would it take to get these assemblies?”

This question brought a genuine smile to Norman’s lips. “We can discuss that after we have a plan.”

***

The array discussion ended not long after and Norman headed to the room Kalia was working in.

It had been agreed upon by most of the people in the building that coming at this problem in two ways would ensure a better outcome. Especially if one of the methods failed for whatever reason.

The first would be the array Norman and the others were working on. He suspected the research on that would go down the path of ending the collapse once and for all. Nothing else really made sense.

That left the enchanters with the second method, mitigation. Each collapse caused widespread destruction and earthquakes in most regions. Finding a way to reduce this damage on a large scale would ensure more people and infrastructure survived until the array was charged.

When he poked his head into the room, he saw over a dozen people huddled around a floating magical diagram that looked awfully familiar.

The three-sided pyramid slowly rotated as the people poked and prodded, adding or removing lines of enchantment from its surface, and even sometimes below the surface.

“Norman!” He was shaken from his fixation on the display as Kalia ran up and hugged him.

He hugged his wife back.

“Are you okay?” she asked. “You look distracted.”

“I’m fine. What’s that?” he gestured with his head.

She stopped squeezing him and glanced over at the floating pyramid.

“It’s not what you think. But I did take some inspiration from them.”

He didn’t think she would have disclosed their communication tower technology. But he had been surprised to see something that looked so similar.

“Come with me and I’ll explain.” She grabbed him by the hand and yanked him out of the room and into an empty room where she shut the door.

Before he could ask what she was doing, she pressed a finger against his lips and kissed him. “Just wait a moment.”

He quirked an eyebrow but held his tongue as she pulled out a small array from a bag on her hip and placed it around them. Then she activated it.

Everything outside the circle distorted slightly and all sounds were muted.

“Privacy array. Can’t be too careful. I’ve had people badgering me about secrets the last few days.”

“Who?” Norman growled.

Kalia just rolled her eyes and slapped him lightly on the arm. “While I appreciate your concern. I can take care of myself.”

He grunted noncommittally, earning a pointed look from his wife. “I mean it, don’t go starting something.”

“Fine. So long as nobody gets belligerent.”

She looked like she was going to argue with him, but then seemed to change her mind. “I guess I can accept that. As to why I pulled you in here. You recall how the towers work?”

Norman nodded. “They pick up vibrations in the ground.”

“Essentially, yes. Well, what if we could use a similar wave to cancel out seismic activity?”

“Like noise-cancelling headphones?” Norman asked.

“Precisely,” she smiled.

“Won’t that be extremely difficult?”

“Yes. What you saw in there was just the sensor. You would need to place hundreds of them along every border to detect the incoming tremors. Then you would need to create an inner layer of dampeners. Maybe even multiple layers. Or you could just surround a city with them.”

“And you all agreed this will work?” He was surprised with their approach to mitigating the damage.

“It should. The real issue is getting enough towers built in time to make a difference before the next collapse. They are cheap and easy to construct, but they still require a talented earth mage to create them. Right now we are trying to find the most ideal and quickest design possible. The sensors only need to detect the wave and transmit it ahead so the other towers have time to counteract it. They won’t be perfect. We don’t have time for that. But we do have time to reduce the magnitude of the quakes by maybe half. Each layer after that could further reduce the damage.”

Norman wiped his hands through his hair in frustration. This was going to be a monumental undertaking no matter what happened.

Kalia stretched and kissed him on the lips. “Don’t worry, Dear. We can do this. You just need to have faith.”

He smiled and kissed her back. He had faith that his people could get this done. And despite what he told the jackass in the meeting, he did care about other countries. Everyone was going to have to pull their weight with this threat looming.

It just felt like some people still had an agenda. Or at least weren’t as invested in saving everyone else as they were in saving themselves.

“I have faith in you. That’s all that matters.”

The pair shared one more kiss before Kalia deactivated the array and stored it again. “I need to get back. We should be done with the sensors in a few hours.”

“Alright. I’ll see you at dinner then.”

She opened the door and nearly ran head-first into Vincent. Kalia gave a startled scream and took a step back, nearly tripping.

“Kalia, I-,” The man didn’t get out another word as Kalia’s guards tackled him to the ground.

“Get off of me you filthy abominations!”

That set off a chain reaction and Marines started running down the corridor toward them. Donovan arrived first.

With a flick of his hand, the two Death Knights were sent tumbling away from the prone form of Vincent.

By this time, Norman was standing in front of a terrified and shaking Kalia, his full armor on display and a crackling bone pointed straight at the man.

“Attacking my son? Have you no shame?” Donovan asked as he gently reached down and helped his son up.

“If I were to attack your son, he would not be here to complain about it,” Norman ground out. “Stay the fuck away from my wife. I will not warn you again.”

Vincent glared at him while wiping the dust off of his clothes.

“Come on, Vincent, we don’t need to associate with these barbarians.”

The two casually strode away. Norman waited until they were out of sight before disarming his spell. Then he turned to his shaking wife and held her tight.

But he glared at the Death Knights. “What happened?”

No personal guards were allowed inside the building, so he was surprised to see the Death Knights here.

Then again, he did have a Wraith keeping an eye on certain individuals.

“We were alerted to Vincent’s movements as soon as the enchantment was triggered. But we had trouble getting past the guards at the front door.”

Norman exhaled through his nose as he held Kalia tightly. The personal guards had been read in on the Wraith Program. Enchantment was just a code word to refer to the Wraith he had following Vincent. The guard situation wasn’t good. Even now, he saw a group of angry but unsure Marines standing outside the room. They had the common sense not to barge in though.

“Anyone injured?”

“No, Sir… At least they shouldn’t be any longer.”

He was going to have to apologize to Admiral Barnes for this incident. But it was better to ask forgiveness than permission. “Alright, return to your posts outside. I will deal with this.”