Meeting the Vampire was amazing, and seeing old Arble again was great, and I had a lot of questions…but they all fled my brain as the herald announced the next entrant. Or rather, started to, because I missed the actual words as I turned and stared in awe at the next entrant to the banquet.

A colossal man in shining red with black accents, a long crimson cape flowing behind him, strong jaw and long dark hair as familiar to me as my own, since I’d spent most of my formative years seeing them on posters and comic books. I spun to tug on Callie’s arm, eyes wide and shocked as I hissed. “Oh my gods! That’s Captain Cataclysm!”

“What?” She snorted as she turned. “No it’s…holy shit it is!” We both watched in thrilled amazement as one of the most well known heroes in the entire Conglomerate stepped into the room.

My sister raised an eyebrow. “Wait…who?”

We both spun to gape at her. “Captain Cataclysm?” I said in outrage. “The Crimson Comet? The Man of Forever? The single most famous hero in Conglomerate history barring the Unity himself? His battle against Doctor Darkdevil was only the greatest fight to ever be fought.”

“Um, excuse me.” Snapped Callie. “I think you meant that it was pathetically inferior to his fight against Eternia. They put out a SUN.”

Benny rolled his eyes. “Oh gods, there’s two of them. You can’t possibly be as big a comic nerd as he is.” He sighed in defeat. “Perfect for each other, I swear. But I’m surprised this hasn’t come up before.”

Callie blushed. “I…I don’t like to talk about my collection. People make fun of me. Like Shane’s collection of novelty Nightstrike mugs. It’s lame.”

“Those mugs are an INVESTMENT.” I repeated. “There’s nothing lame about making responsible fiscal choices to prepare for your future.” Benny opened his mouth, clearly about to mock me mercilessly, but I just held up my hand. “Yeah, I know, I heard it as the words were coming out of my mouth. Shut up.”

My sister giggled at my obvious lameness as she nodded to the rest of the party. “I admit I don’t know much about the Unity’s heavy hitters. Do you recognize any of the others?”

To my surprise, it was Benny who answered. “That’s Sam Savage.” He pointed to the shorter man I’d almost missed in Captain Cataclysm's shadow. “My dad used to watch his movies as a kid. He’s a genius detective with amazing stealth powers. He’s kind of gone out of fashion, because his coat and hat look is a bit dated, but he was really big back in the day.”

“And the woman with them is Daystar.” I finished, gesturing to the smiling blonde lady who didn’t look much older than us. Her bright blue eyes shone with warmth and reassurance, and she practically glowed with kindness. Wait…no, I activated my Eye of Revelation and she was ACTUALLY glowing with kindness. That was weird.

Callie gasped. “Oh, my god it is! I was so distracted by the captain I almost missed her. I used to watch her cartoons as a little girl. I had a poster of her fight with Baron Behemoth up in my room for years when I was a kid.”

Chelsea raised an eyebrow at us, and I just chuckled. “The mythos for heroes and villains is different than normal high rankers. Actually, I don’t think I’ve seen many of those kinds of advertisements or media since becoming an Ascendant. But for mortals, especially younger ones, our media is stratified into two tiers. There’s popular local heroes, and then there’s ‘the greats’.”

“These are people we grew up watching on scan boxes and reading about in comic books.” Callie agreed. “Like…heroes in our area were somewhat idolized, I even got some of that myself, but it’s not the same thing at all. These were our idols.”

Benny shrugged. “They’re right. I never got super into the lore like these two apparently did, but like I said, my dad grew up on Sam Savage movies.”

Which I now realized was the Conglomerate’s purpose. I’d always known that besides the local stuff that seemed to be mostly stratified, the big names got a slice of the pie too. It was still amazing to see them here in person. I cleared my throat. “So Celine, you know anything about the people who got sent by the Fairieland? My mom said it was a Princess.”

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Celine nodded. “I’ve been contacting some of my family members trying to learn more about the delegation. Princess Levinia Darksparrow is the S-ranker in attendance. She’s one of the Queen’s favorite grandchildren. Her mother Valeria is one of the eldest princesses. Third in line for the throne, I believe.”

“Aren’t gods immortal?” I asked in confusion. “How would they even inherit?”

My mom cut in with a chuckle. “The Queen has been considering passing down the title. The WCP has shown how effective a tool it can be for the title to pass on. It’s been a contentious debate for centuries actually, but support has been slowly swinging that way. In the meantime they treat distance from the throne as a social construct to determine political power.”

“The heir, Prince Valyard, is the second most powerful person in the Fairieland.” She said proudly. “I think he’s even one of the top five strongest S-rankers.”

My grandfather nodded. “Third.” He said bluntly. “After Lark and Moonlight. Valyard is nothing to sneeze at. I’ve seen him fight. Almost surprised Layla didn’t send him personally. But with the war coming she might have deployed him to a trouble spot to deal with issues. The Fairieland is isolated, which means there’s a good chance they’ll be getting it worse than most places.”

It took me a second to realize that Layla must be the Queen’s name. I’d never heard her referred to as anything but the Queen, just like I’d never heard anyone call the Emperor by name. It made sense that someone who trained under the Red Revenant like my grandpa would know her name though.

As if summoned, the herald called out another party. “Announcing her highness, Princess Levinia Darksparrow, and her knight, Edward Banesear, Duke of Ill Fortune. Accompanying them, their son, Baron Saylan Denroth.”

We all turned to watch them come in, and I was pretty sure I spoke for everyone when I say I was blown away. Beauty is an integral part of the fae legend, especially for high court fae. I’d never considered exactly how much that would affect years of Ascendant children, but apparently, it was a lot.

All three of the people who entered were absurdly good looking. Symmetrical features, bright eyes, in incredible physical shape. I mean, Ascendants in general tended to get better looking over time as they were idealized, but these people were next level attractive.

My mom snorted. “Show offs.” She said with a smirk. “Those are fae crafted clothes made to highlight their features.” She said in explanation when we looked confused. “It’s an extension of formation crafting, and it’s something that only the fae are really vain enough to bother with. Don’t get me wrong, they’ll all very attractive, but they’re thumbing the scales right now.”

Bethy looked intrigued. “That’s so cool. I wonder if I can learn how to do that? Maybe I could adapt it to some kind of stealth clothes. I’d just be like, whoosh.” She waved both hands in front of herself. “Then disappear, and people would be like ‘oh no, where’s Bethy?’ Wouldn’t that be so cool?”

My mom laughed at her enthusiasm. “I’ll talk to Levi, maybe she could give you lessons. Your dad doesn’t have the best relationship with the fae, though devils usually take to him well enough.”

“Daddy says fairies taste delicious, but devils are too spicy. He ate one of their princes once and it gave him heartburn” She said wisely.

My mom glanced at me. “I see now why you keep her around, she’s fun.”

“Reminds me of her mother.” My grandfather said with a chuckle. At our surprised looks, he just raised an eyebrow. “What? I told you I knew Lark. I’ve met Delilah before. She’s a lot of fun to spend time with, if somewhat more violent than most people prefer. She and Celia get along splendidly. Cece’s family situation makes her comfortable with crazy violent people.”

My mom snorted. “I’m telling her you said that for sure. Don’t bother trying to convince me otherwise.”

“Please.” Laughed the old man. “Cece knows I think her family are violent lunatics, at least on her mother’s side. That ship has sailed. In any case, I’m going to go talk to Levinia. I want to make some positive inroads with at least one of the factions before the games. Andrew will stick with you and Chelsea, but otherwise enjoy yourselves.” He ruffled her hair, ignoring her scowl as she batted at his hands, and then strolled off.

My mom rolled her eyes fondly. “That old man can never sit still. Speaking of which, Shane, I was hoping to talk to you.” Her eyes flicked to Zeke. “Mind masking our conversation for us?”

He nodded easily. Reaching into a pocket, he pulled out a ball of clay, and with a series of movements so deft I could barely track them, made a full sized mask. He carved in a few symbols, then flicked it up into the air, where it caught, freezing in space, and a sort of environmental disturbance wrapped around me and mom.

“I didn’t know he could do that.” I said in an impressed tone.

She shrugged. “It’s not something that’s useful outside of very specific circumstances. It’s temporary, very small scale, and all it manages is Perception. If this place blew up we’d still take the hit. Good news is we’re covered by his Path, so unless there’s an S-ranker or a high A-ranker with a Path specifically geared towards Perception and spying, we should be fine.Also he can only do it when he has open mask slots. He broke a bunch in his fight with that Duke and hasn’t replaced them yet.”

“Fair. Still cool though.” I chuckled. “So, what did you want to talk about?”

“Your training.” She said bluntly. “I was serious about teaching you to apply your flames better. Your Mephistopheles form has a lot of potential. Hell, they all do, but I’m not geared to help with most of them. We were going to start today, but time got away from me. We can begin work after the banquet. You might have to go without a bit of sleep, but I’m sure that won’t be a problem for you after your experiences on Stratholme.”

I shuddered. “Yeah…I can handle that. Are you sure you’re the best person to teach me though? Your purification flame isn’t exactly the best suited for my combat style, is it?”

“Nope.” She said cheerfully. “But my other ability will be pretty well suited to coaching that form. You remember I have two, right? My martial art ability, Stellar Flame Fist, has several forms that are suited to different uses of fire. I’m not the Rainbow Pope or anything, but I’ve got some versatility that will probably help with the training.”

Her comment about the Rainbow Pope reminded me to look into him. I’d heard interesting things, including that he collected different types of fire in exchange for resources at a place called the Promethean Library. Seemed like it might be a neat place to visit.

In any case, I agreed to her help, and she gave me a warm smile. “Excellent. After the banquet, you can head to my building, bring Calliope if you like. I’m sure we could help her refine her technique as well if she’s interested.” Gesturing to Zeke, he let the mask turn to dust as the shroud around us rescinded, and then we spread out to mingle. It was going to be a long night.