I’m not surprised by the Third’s offer. It was quite apparent that she isn’t fully sold on having Sailhin as her avatar. I’m sure she’d prefer to find someone else entirely, but she doesn’t have the option to do that. Comparatively the other gifts are much greater than her options. They reflect the monarch’s satisfaction with their choice. Well, near elation in the case of the seventh.
“If that’s truly possible, I’d like to choose to erase my cousin’s memories. I have a replacement spear, so I don’t need that one repaired anyway. If you can truly ensure that my cousin’s won’t remember seeing Quartz. I’d like to select that as my option.”
Her cousins already don’t remember meeting them. Her assumptions about the tower’s mechanics were correct. It seems The Third wanted to perform another test. I doubt she’ll be fully satisfied until the tower is cleared entirely. The Third has always been the most fickle of them.
Terothyn snapped her fingers, I assume it was simply for display since she wasn’t actually doing anything. Then she pulled out the mithril spear.
“My monarch is pleased with your choice, and has gifted you a spear as well.”
She held it out.
“How can I be sure they don’t remember?”
“We have no reason to lie to you about this. All the gifts given have no tricks. My master is particularly fickle. She simply wanted to test you once more. Erasing their memories is hardly something difficult for us to accomplish, and it helps us as well.”
Mostly because it wasn’t something that we needed to interfere in order to achieve it.
“Great, now that that’s all done, they will head off and we can get to the heart of the discussion.”
I pulled the panel back up and after they disappeared, and turned all their statuses to invisible. Then returned the contracts to their proper appearance settings and placed the vassals as observers on their respective avatars. That way, the monarchs could watch things without needing the young master’s presence. They could only appear when I allowed it.
Allow is a very strong word, but they couldn’t just pop down to visit on a whim. I’d have to go through the same method, and it wouldn’t be an instant thing. I was linked to Quartz through his class, as long as I lifted the minimum price for my summoning I could be summoned indefinitely.
Alathein was the only one who remained as agreed upon, and I ignored the silent message he sent. I swiped it out of the way before reading it. If it was anything important, he was sure to pester me about it.
“Where would you like us to start?” Alathein said.
Sailhin put a hand over Paeris’s mouth and said, “What is the whole avatar business?”
“It’s as we stated in our introductions, our masters, the monarchs, have chosen you as their avatars. The term is simply used to refer to that.”
A non answer, for a very bland question.
“Chosen for what?”
“To clear the tower, the monarchs are frustrated at the stall. Especially since there doesn’t seem to be an issue with the difficulty of the tower.”
I pressed on the quest notification for them to read.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Quest: Clearing the tower
The monarchs have requested the tower be cleared. The avatars must be selected, and they must be the ones to clear the tower.
Completion requirements:
All Avatars: 7/7
Floors Climbed: 38/50
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“This is written as if there’s no downside to agreeing to this, what happens to the world when we clear it? Is the tower just gone? What about all the people inside?”
“There are no downsides to agreeing to it. Clearing the tower removes it from the world. All living challengers will be teleported outside of the tower once the quest is completed.”
I’ll just let Alathein answer the majority of questions. His façade did come in use now and then.
“What do you get out of it?”
“Does it matter what the seemingly all powerful beings that can manipulate the tower’s system get from clearing the tower?” Lefty asked.
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“They can’t manipulate the tower enough to clear it on their own. They need us. They must get something out of it.” Sailhin retorted.
“Does it matter what they want?” Dodger asked.
“If it will cause problems for us later on, of course it matters.”
“If we just have to fight a bit more even with the tower gone, what’s so wrong with that?”
Leave it to a goliath to not care if the fighting never stops.
“Without the tower, and the power it gives the main guilds, for all we know it could lead to another war. The world is quite literally dependent on the tower, it’s sudden disappearance could lead to more trouble than it’s worth.”
“What do you suggest instead?” Paeris asked.
“Ylandyr needed the information, I’m sure he’s got a plan in place. A plan better than one that leads to the sudden collapse of a societal framework that’s been in place for thousands of years.”
“That framework has led to an abuse of power, and the suffering of millions,” Dot retorted. “If they want us to clear it, and will help us do it, that’s the obvious thing to do.”
“Their help is restricted,” Sailhin reasoned, “who’s to say that once we get to the fortieth floor, the door to the next floor isn’t guarded by Winged Mercy? How will we get past them then? The best course of action is to get to the fortieth floor and discuss this with Ylandyr.”
Dot snapped “He’s your prince not ours. What if he doesn’t want us clearing the tower on our own?”
“She’s not wrong Dot,” Paeris said.
“Why’re you suddenly on her side?”
“Just think about it for a second. They stopped climbing for a reason, right?” he started. “But why? If the final floors are relatively easy, but they don’t want it to be cleared, wouldn’t the other guilds stop at nothing to keep anyone from climbing? And Alcoroth and the others don’t seem to have enough power over things to just make us skip the fortieth floor entirely. There are too many variables, who knows how the other floors function. The floors between the last guild floors. and what is probably the next one, have functioned completely differently than the first nineteen let alone the twentieth. And then there’s the fortieth…” he trailed off.
“I’m not against clearing it,” Sailhin reassured, “but without more information we’ll just make things harder on ourselves. Knowing the monarch’s intentions, what they get out of this will only help us. If we act in a way that they don’t like, who knows what would happen.”
“They’re all gone?” Quartz came down the stairs, his hair dripping wet.
“So pleased you considered joining us Imuril,” Alathein said in ijanoin, “come sit, let me do your hair.”
It was strange how comfortable Quartz was with Alathein. His instincts usually seemed to be animalistic in nature. I would’ve expected someone like Alathein to make him uncomfortable.
Instead, Quartz shrugged and went to the kitchen, I assume to grab a chair. It wasn’t the first time that Alathein had offered, but since it would be strange to the others he hadn’t gotten the chance to do so. I’m sure that if my master hadn’t picked Quartz already Alathein would’ve pressured the Sixth to pick him even though he couldn’t use mana.
“They’ve only acted in very limited ways until now. Simply observing and then bestowing gifts,” Sailhin continued.
“Think about who they gave the gifts to before this floor though.”
I grinned, their difference in life experience is showing. Dot is still young enough to be blinded by her emotions.
“First it was Brick, then Lefty, then Paeris. Do you really think those gifts are without any strings just because they said so? I don’t think you me or Dodger would’ve left the others to fight this on their own if we hadn’t accepted our gifts first.”
Quartz returned with a chair and put it in front of Alathein sitting down in it.
“You’re forgetting Quartz, he’s already gotten his gift.”
“I haven’t technically received it yet, not that I’m overly interested in it.” Quartz responded as the young master was placed in his lap.
“Then why are you climbing. You really don’t seem like the type to do this for any altruistic reasons,” Sailhin questioned.
He closed his eyes relaxing as Alathein started working on his hair.
“I was going to be climbing no matter what, I just decided to participate a bit instead of just going along for the ride.”
“Quartz fails to understand himself properly, so discussing his reasoning won’t be helpful for you,” I interjected. “Just know that the monarch and the young master have a vested interest in Quartz and his survival. For him, there are only positives towards climbing. Don’t direct any questions for him though he doesn’t have much to add to things. He wasn’t that curious in the first place, so he didn’t ask many questions.”
“I hope you all know though, there is no choice. The tower will be cleared. Participating in it though is your best option.” Alathein said, “there are many benefits for you.”
“I assume there is a time limit then?”
“Of course, you have one month.”
“What?!”
“The floors after the fortieth are not difficult. You will have no trouble completing them within that time frame. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have been selected in the first place.”
I’m sure Alathein was doing their best to come off as reassuring, but eventually the others would catch onto their personality.
“Do you have any requirements regarding how we complete it?” Paeris asked this time.
“No. The gifts were given for the specified reasons. And to help you to clear it faster. Realistically we would’ve given you a little over a week to climb the floors themselves, but we don’t know how the fortieth floor will influence your timeline and that’s why we’ve given you more time,” I said.
“They’re that easy? So, it is solely due to greed that they haven’t cleared things.” Dot growled, “and those wasarera bastards are profiting from it.”
“It’s been quite a long time since the mage tower has been linked to the stall. So long in fact, that they’ve become far too dependent on the resources they’ve gained from it. I’m sure your personal goal will be achieved quite easily once the tower is cleared,” Alathein said.
“It can’t be this simple. You’ve helped us with your gifts, but that can’t be the real reason you gave them to us. Sure, you could say that they were used to entrap us in your goal. But as you’ve already said that just clearing the tower would be a reward in itself.”
Brick’s words burned above his head and made me smile slightly.
“It seems to me like those gifts, were more like rewards. If we paid attention to what they each said to us regarding the gifts, it’s clear that some were greater than others. The third monarch doesn’t seem to be happy with choosing Sailhin and her gift reflected that. But if she was that unsatisfied and wanted something more, then wouldn’t she look for that someone?”
“We’re their only options,” Sailhin finished Brick’s thought.
“You thought there must’ve been something else they get out of it. What that something is…” his words trailed off and he signed “it’s entertainment isn’t it?”
Out of the corner of my eye I saw Alathein’s face twist into the smile I was much more familiar with. One I much preferred. It suited their features quite well.