"Khatif and Kha, under the direction of the Alpha, along with others from a different angle!"

Then we would be getting reinforcements. Most of Tala was coming, then, as well as the supplies Tar had promised us, perhaps? I grinned widely. "I'll go greet them myself!"

Pushing the worries from my mind, I jogged back towards the city, my mind shifting from anger and vengeance to diplomacy and interspecies relations. With me ran Brutus, and we quickly found ourselves past the city, skirting its walls and running north. From far off, I could hear the faint sound of hundreds and hundreds of feet crunching through the snow. We hustled forward, though Foire, Silf, Trai, and several of their followers sprinted out of the city and forest to join us on our journey to greet the new arrivals. If this was the rest of the population of Tala, would it be a full thousand Kha and Khatif coming to join us? And how long would it take for the Kha to begin evolving to Khatif en masse?

I pushed such hopeful thoughts from my mind and instead merely focused on the sounds of my people's approach. The trodding feet were accompanied by constant hissing commands, occasional screeches of rage, and a generally happy feeling that settled over me as I listened. Even so, I wasn't satisfied merely to wait for their approach, and instead wanted to ensure they arrived at the city without any incident. After all, there wasn't any telling for sure where the Misti Hawar were hiding at the moment.

Before I could start grumbling to myself about the damned traitorous ambushers, I instead focused on the reinforcements that Chjell managed to send our way. That would be impactful, as every number we had was another assurance that the Misti Hawar would be forced to give greater credence to our strength and hold back their assaults to prepare themselves more. The more time that we had to prepare… well, I had every confidence that we were making better use of our time than they were, and we would continue to do so.

While I strode through the deep drifts of snow, layers of thawed and refrozen ice layered over power and slush, I broke through layer after layer of ice. The chill tried to pierce me through to my bones, but with my scales all tightly pressed together, I was spared from the harshest of the winter's rage. My people, though, those who were coming towards us and had spent the vast majority of their lives in the temperate, tropical north, were suffering. Some leaned on others, while most seemed to be pressing forward largely through grit and spite.

As soon as they laid eyes on me, the Alpha, who carved the way through the snow that their followers expanded on in a chevron shape behind them, called out in their eerie way, "Hail, Zaaktif Ashlani!"

"Hello!" I replied. "You've nearly arrived, and we will have shelter and food for you as soon as you arrive!"

"Thy magnanimity knoweth no bounds, our respected Zaaktif." The male half replied to me.

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"Our gratitude doth overwhelm and swell within us." The female added.

"Then let's get you behind the walls." I commanded Foire and Silf forward with a crook of my finger. Both understood what I was commanding and had their Khatif begin carving a wide swathe through the snow towards the city's walls. The snow was frequently trodden by at least some of our people, and on the clearest, warmest days, we'd lead the herds out of the city walls, though that seemed like it would no longer be the case, given the Misti Hawar's continued insistence on being the worst creatures I'd ever had the misfortune of learning existed.

"We commend to thee our greatest humility and appreciation." The male voice spoke with an ever-slower voice, as if he'd lost much of his strength the same moment that he learned that escape from the cold was nigh at hand.

"Now hurry up." I commanded with [Innervating Address] filling my voice. "I'll guide you all to the walls, and there, you'll be brought to eat enough to ensure you can rest well. From there, we'll find out how best to ensure that you are well taken care of for the duration of your stay. After all, we'll ensure that the best of you have the opportunity to become Keel before long!"

That my words with [Innervating Address] during the attack of the Misti Hawar hadn't triggered the [Skill]'s evolution drove me crazy, that it hadn't counted as "using Innervating Address to significantly raise morale of a force of at least 200 while in battle." In the end, I'd figured that the issue was that somehow, I'd kept my people's morale from dropping too low through the training and preparation we'd had for the Misti Hawar's attack, and when they'd come, there hadn't been a whole lot of clarity about how bad it was until after we'd turned the tide of battle around. Maybe that was the case, or something different entirely, but whatever the cause was, I found myself grumbling.

Beyond that, since this wasn't a damned battle, I couldn't even evolve the stupid [Skill] right now even though I was raising the morale of hundreds of my people much more than mere words in a fight would. Just as soon as the thought crossed my mind, the [System] spoke to me.

[Alternative evolutionary possibility for Skill: Innervating Address possible. Would you like to evolve Skill: Innervating Address? Warning: The Skill to which Innervating Address evolves will be vastly different than what it would evolve to were the Skill to be evolved through the previously stated method of evolution.]

That answer almost made it worse in my mind. After all, I'd already made my decision to complain about it, but now, instead of being able to complain and grumble about what it was that the [Skill] was or wasn't doing or evolving to, now the decision was in my hands. Would I make a gamble for an evolution that was wholly different from what I already had, or would I trust what the [System] and possibly Nievtala herself had laid out for me over a year ago? I forced myself to stop thinking about it that same moment as I instead turned my attention to the Alpha.

"I would love to speak with you more at length about what you're hoping to get out of this pilgrimage and so on, but before that, I have some more visitors that I'll need to attend to. If you'd give me some time, I want to to speak with you before you go to rest for the night."

"Thy will be done." The female bowed.

"Let thy servant do as thou commandest." The male echoed the bow of his other half. I waved them in as I turned my attention to where the supplies would be coming from. But… why was there snow coming down from the mountains' peaks?

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