"Implications," the Cyapri Clanlord Gaulithar Thallaniin repeated in a bit of wonder at that viewpoint. "What implications?"

"The rise of a nobler and gentler empire, run on benevolence and goodwill, instead of self-seeking glory, conquest, and domination. Everything you teach your Rangers is a direct blow against the overall lack of moral center and decadence continually trying to establish itself in the Empire, a decadence orchestrated by the same Immortal who specializes in bringing down empires across the millennia. It could grow into a bright movement of hope that could change the very nature of what Siricil IS, because elves are here to keep shorter-lived humans on track and tied to that moral code.

"Tenya doesn't think such a thing could happen, at least while Her worship is so central to Siricilan culture. She took so many pains to embed war and fighting prowess at the heart of their traditions, beginning right from the founding of the empire and the betrayal of the mage, priest, and rogue-dominated cultures that once fought alongside Siricil, and who ended up becoming its vassals."

"Ah." The treacherous slaughter of the allied nations in fighting off the Delphan Empire's domination by the first Siricilan Empire had been put down in the initial histories as a cunning attack by Delphan assassins, which only the soon-to-be emperor had survived. Few actually believed it, but that had been the official story.

I'd had a Sim there watching to learn the truth of the matter.

"This Immortal corrupting Tenya's creeds likewise sees what your Rangers can grow into, and are subtly striking against what is most certainly the brightest Good of the entire Empire. Peace, tradition, loyalty, goodwill, racial harmony, skill, magic, ancient wisdom, new energy; your Rangers exemplify so much of what is opposed to the Siricilan mindset that has been established by a warrior goddess and a treacherous liar.

"This is why the Rangers and indirectly the Cyapri have been targeted, elder. No more, and no less. The traitors seek to crush the greatest threats to the racism and xenophobic standards that could become great tolerance and open-handedness and really undo all their work.

"You have brought a great Good into the world, Elder Thallaniin. The darkness is naturally striving to slaughter it in its infancy, and maintain its stranglehold on the hearts and minds of the average mortal."

"Well." The Clanlord's expression was both mollified and belatedly proud. "It was rather to avoid having to flee greatly superior human numbers and still preserve the forest. They totally would have burned it down around us to win…"

"It is rather harsh being outnumbered by them so much, especially with their higher birth rate. Without them fighting one another so aggressively, there would be great problems if they were racially united. Alas, a problem that is not restricted to humans, of course," I mused aloud.

He gave me an odd look. "There are elves warring upon other elves? Ah, you refer to the Shaden and their conflict with Sidheduiche."

"Prodded by their Immortal Patron, and completely willing to drive the Sidhe out of the very forest they created. The very first major elven tribe to declare war upon another one in the history of this world!" I sniffed in complete disdain for such idiocy. Just one more thing I had to take care of.

"So, it is a great and good thing we are doing, but there are very powerful forces who understand the implications and will punish us for it.." the Clanlord murmured.

"It moved our place in line up. They would corrupt and kill us all regardless, especially if we try to improve the world and our place in it. Until we can defy the Immortals and grow past their petty race politics and Spheres of interest, such disasters and catastrophes will continue for their entertainment."

"Those are very dangerous words, Lady Edge, but given what you have told me, I cannot deny their relevance," Gaulithar Thallaniin said grimly. "The Ranger program will continue, regardless of reluctance from the more isolationist of our people. They think by leaving the world outside alone they will survive…"

"Fools. The world will come for them, sooner or later. Any elf should know that peace is transient, and wishing for it to continue never works." I had no sympathy for them.

"You are working very hard for a greater dream, it would seem," he commented with some insight.

"I have power, skill, wealth, time, and ability. The only course for me to follow is those of dreams. Raising the great and Good in the face of pettiness and Evil is one of those dreams.

"Stay great, Clanlord. It is good to walk alongside a legend who actually deserves his accolades."

---

As the mighty elfin walked away, a picture of ivory-skinned fey grace and otherworldly beauty mesmerizing to watch when she let it show, Clanlord Thallaniin had to consider the implications that she did not mention such great beauty as one of her assets. Her attire, like dark flames in the forest, was almost a shout for attention to the eyes of an elf, and at the same time, a dangerously tempting threat display that they could feel in their bones.

Do Not Test Me. It fairly radiated off of her, with every ruffle of crimson silks and black lace, a walk that was more of a glide, magic glittering around the edge of sight upon her...

She had no romantic interest in him, a kind of spiritual chill about her that warded off inquiries into such matters, as if even thinking of bedding her made the blood run cold, not hot. Even the most hot-blooded fool taking a risk to dare such a thing would find his blood turning to ice and his desire shriveling to dust, Thallaniin was certain.

He did wonder what kind of elf she might call an equal, some day…

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We left Emeraltan at the dawn, the image of the humans and elves of the Cyapri forest granted another positive image to all the students here.

Now, it was overland for several hundred miles to the great city of Siricil.

First we had to go through the powerful Duchy of Ladnasil, one of the three great lands of the empire. It was the home of the third great tribe that had founded the Empire, the Siricilans and the Angru being the others. It was also the center of the empire's horse breeding, cavalry training, and typified by great fields of grain over the rolling grasslands that formed much of the Duchy.

Riding was considered very much a local pastime by anyone of the middle class and higher, so there were herds of horses, ranches, and horse-breeders and trainers all over the place, with the animals present drawing wagons everywhere as the products of the many farms were transported to the city and fortress derived from the name of the Duchy and tribe.

The capital city of the Duchy was the largest port on the Sea of Strife, while the city of Siricil itself instead located on the strait between the Seas of Strife and Dawnbreak Ocean. That gave Landasil a brisk mercantile business, if not as great as the Siricil itself, and it definitely dominated in the trade of horseflesh, as was apparent by the odor in the air that seemed omnipresent in the Duchy's cities.

Landasil was where we met our first groups of scammers, thieves, pickpockets, thugs, and other fine upstanding citizens trying to get our gold out of us by means fair or foul. One fine fellow turned into a dog with a human head, who ended up serving as a Charmed guide through most of the city, did a fine job warning off the more astute of the locals from sharing a similar fate. Three pickpockets had their arms fried when their fingers went places they shouldn't have, and the muggers unfortunately ended up mostly dead when we demanded all their belongings in return, they refused to pay us, and whelp, we took them anyway, leaving them to enjoy their nudity stacked in a back alley in compromising positions.

Unfortunately, a con artist and his guardsman brother-in-law got into their heads to extort us for damaging his shop and cheating him out of the price of his goods (we did neither), backed up by the latter's patrol and their authority, complete with a smirking mage along with them and helping make them feel superior to Zanzyran spellcasters.

That particular incident ended up with most of the parties put to sleep, painted blue with the runes for 'Thieves' painted on their faces, their armor and weapons rusted into uselessness, and the wizard turned into a cat that our human-headed dog was instructed to chase all over the city.

We left the city without doing much business, but our main purpose was laying the lived-line, so not being able to spend gold was not nearly as much an imposition as it could have been, despite the city being larger than Zanzyr City, and only smaller than Federyn City itself on our trip here.

Siricil itself was only a couple hundred miles down the road. It was afternoon when we hastily vacated the city, basically staring down the gate guards looking for a bribe from outlanders until they started shuffling uneasily, three of them had their drawers dropped down around their ankles, breastplates started falling down, weapons belts were slipping, a horse stomped on the foot of one of the soldiers, and suddenly we were only charged the nominal silver coin and were hastily shown out the door with great false smiles before more things could go wrong.

Welcome to the great empire of Siricil!

------

It was well after dusk when we finally reached the great walls of the unmatched glory of the city of Siricil, as told to us smugly by the few people out along the road we rode as we passed along the wall. They were a bit intimidated by the fact that we were riding Disks or gliding along, with brightly colored robes, flying skulls shedding light for us, flames on staves, a variety of oddly-colored eyes, sparks trailing along casual hand motions…

Yeah, maybe more than a bit intimidated now. We noticed that being bloody obvious about having magic ready made the thieves and con artists quite a bit more reluctant to oppose us, and we didn't want to have to keep stopping at churches to donate their belongings to the poor.

Still, the gates closed at dusk, and unless we wanted to get into trouble by flying over the walls, we were going to queue up with everyone else in the morning.

Given that there were five different models of airships in the sky and several dozen flying creatures with riders zipping about, probably the best way to handle things.

-----

We were in a little clearing instead of the very overpriced inns catering to late travelers there, which also employed snatch teams to spirit foreigners off to be enslaved if they thought they could get away from it.

Duum was up in the air, Invisible, looking for signs of such fun activity, and given permission to intercede if he spotted any, while staying rather low and away from the city walls. There'd been a couple curious skulkers come around to our brightly lit tents, complete with glowing skulls circling the place, and for some reason nobody was trying anything as the skulls slowly turned to look at the spotters and helpfully illuminate them for attention.

A map of the provincial capital city of Ladnasil we'd left behind us was spread out before us all.

The group had fractured into fours and fives while we were there, basically spreading through the interesting parts of that city and seeing what was where, staying a step ahead of the criminal and legal elements (hard to tell which was which sometimes) trying to take advantage of us.

Very pointedly, we had been looking for slave traders, mercantile operations, the shops of craftsmen, and similar things.

Especially the first.

Nico's smile was all teeth as a section of the square abutting a courtyard with a permanent stage built to one side blew up in size on the Holo. Pointedly, he emphasized the sign hanging discreetly by the doorway. "This is the offices of the Iron Ring, I am sure of it."

Everyone murmured approval for finding it, the Black Wolf on a chain an altered version of the Black Wolf Baron's personal heraldry, doubtless trading in on his ancestral name and lineage to those in the know.

"There are six different slave-trading enterprises just on this plaza. Even casual conversation revealed they all had specialties. The Hoe the Dirt group here specializes in trading agricultural workers back and forth for farms and plantations, especially to the nobles further east. Proper Hands actually gives some minor training for craft workers and maids or house workers. Veiled Interests trains and sells slaves for brothels and other 'entertainments'. Grunt Works is about manual labor, while Blood and Chains specializes in gladiatorial fodder," Laurentine sneered artfully as she took up the descriptions. "The Iron Ring would be a supplier, feeding new slaves to the major traders here and taking potential orders from them. Their facilities here are probably designed to break potential slaves and ready them for the major houses or specialty buyers."

It was all going into my Visual File and off to my Allegiance members. Unsurprisingly, there were a large number of volunteers, especially among the Elber Moorsmen, interested in helping liberate a lot of those slaves, and plans were being drawn up to do just that. The speed with which a lot of people could be evacuated was greatly helped by the mobile Mirror-Portal we could use, and we could easily bring away hundreds or thousands of them in a very short time if we so desired.

The settlements up in Eislas needed more people who knew how to work, only this time for themselves, not for others. Most of them would also be non-natives of Siricil, which would help immensely given the ambitious, grasping, and treacherous culture here. Slave traders, slavers, and slave-owners were indeed excellent targets for that kind of activity, and it was Good work, too.

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