January, year 583 on the New Kaledonian calendar.


    “Welcome to Zanyr!” is what the guards said when we arrived.


    I thought this place was called Brilliance.


    The guard shook his head. “That’s what the emperor decided, we think it’s stupid so we still call our capital Zanyr, so welcome to Zanyr!”


    The emperor sounds like a weirdo.


    “Oh, you have no idea! But it’s better than when he was a dictator, I guess you win some, you lose some.”


    How odd.


    The guard was smiling at me and I tried my best to ignore all this. We walked into the city and it seemed way better than I remember. I could say what I want about that emperor but he’s at least doing his best to make this a better place.


    Agnis, can you explain to me why there is a statue of you here?


    Whoa maybe he’s a fan of you!


    My jaw dropped as I saw a large statue of the emperor and a smaller but still large statue of me; we were shaking hands.


    That idiot! Guys change of plan! We’re going to the palace!


    People looked at me as I stormed to the palace.


    I approached the palace gate and the guards made way for me. “Do you have an appointment?”


    Move!


    They didn’t seem as they ever planned to stop me. I bet it’s that emperors doing! I ignored the palace guards that tried to stop me as they didn’t seem to be doing their best to stop me though.


    Agnis wait! You can’t just storm into a palace!


    Oh yes, I can see me do it!


    I went to the throne room, augmented my leg and kicked in the heavy doors.


    Dimitri! You asshole why did you build a statue of me!


    “Ohh, my handsome friend! You have finally decided to be my advisor!” Dimitri had scantily clad women comb his hair as he was admiring himself in a mirror.


    I have not! Take it down!


    “But why? It signifies our friendship!” He spread his arms, making a welcoming gesture.


    You decided that by yourself! These here are my friends!


    I pointed at Greg, Raishin and Elliana. Dimitri made a pensive look.


    “Oh I see!” He clapped and an attendant went to him. He whispered something in her ear, she nodded and ran off.


    “Don’t worry your friends will also get their statues, now come let’s have a feast! How have you been?”


    Wait! No that’s not what I meant!


    Wow my first statue! Thanks!


    Raishin please shut up…


    No statues! No feast… on second thought lets go for that feast!


    I thought you came here to solve a problem?


    Yes, I can solve the problem of an empty stomach and that statue in one go! Two harpies with one fireball!


    Greg facepalmed and we got led to a large dining hall.


    Ohh so exciting! This is my first… second royal feast!


    This is my 7th.


    We looked at Greg.  What? Wait you got named the Obsidian Prince because one, right?


    That is correct.


    Raishin and I made fun of Greg while the food got placed in front of us.


    “So, tell me my handsome friends how have you been!”


    Uhh, busy, you?


    I dug in and started eating some funny looking but delicious pasta. I secretly stashed some food in my dimensional pocket because there was no way we could eat all of this.


    “I’ve had some difficulties with some issues lately but nothing Dimitri Handsome can’t fix!”


    Ah, cool story, so can you remove the statues?


    “There is a concern about another war breaking out though…”


    Another war?


    “Yes, Bizax is planning to wage war on Yzs, and the president of Yzs has asked me to back them up in exchange for drastically lowered electronium prices. My old self would have instantly agreed but I feel conflicted about profiting from a war.”


    Hoo boi, this is going to be messy. First thing, as your ehh handsome friend I advise you to do anything to turn Bizax into a burning pile of ash, secondly, Yzs, is kinda… gone.


    Dimitri got up quite excited. “Does this mean you will become my advisor?”


    Hell no!


    He sat back down disappointedly. “And what do you mean with ‘gone’? I spoke to the president last month.”


    Greg explained what we had seen half a month prior.


    Dimitri beckoned another assistant. “I believe my handsome friends but I still want you to send people over to investigate with the highest urgency.”


    “Yes Handsome!” The assistant bowed and ran away.


    “So, we have an enormous problem if Yzs is gone. Besides losing 85% of the continent’s electronium, we don’t know if this will happen to other countries. For example, Jarn kingdom.”


    Aren’t you guys also getting screwed over because all the wood comes from Aquini?


    “Zanyr doesn’t have as big of a problem with that as Hjuva has but it is a problem yes.”


    Wait I thought Yzs was only responsible for 70% of the continents electronium.


    Dimitri closed his eyes trying to recall something and opened his eyes. “Our biggest electronium mine dried up 2 years ago.”


    Wow this continent is doomed, what do you guys think how about we move to a different continent?


    Greg smacked me.  So, what are the alternatives?


    “Well, we are still working on that. We have to resort more primitive methods but we can’t use the method Itris used because of the state of the lightning spirits.” If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.


    What have they done to the spirits this time!


    Dimitri beckoned another assistant who gave him some documents. Dimitri read through some of them.


    “Reports state that most of the spirits have just vanished without a trace.”


    Uh oh. I guess they got sucked up into the spirit world.


    “Oh how knowledgeable! Our head spirit mage assumed something similar but no solution to it, so we are quite stuck. My ancestor had found an ancient structure 860 years ago which produced multiple colors of lightning but his greedy ministers had abused it, causing it to break. This caused it to stop producing lightning and nobody had been able to fix it ever since. Also, some strange events have been occurring there which made it even more dangerous. No investigation team has ever returned from there” Dimitri stopped talking but he continued reading and flipping through the documents.


    Do you mind if we take a look at it? I have experience in archeology and Agnis is familiar with ancient structures and language.


    And me? what about me!?  Raishin said as he pointed at himself.


    Raishin is our moral support, most of the time…


    “Ohh I’m glad to have handsome and capable friends! Very well. BERTOLLI GET YOUR ASS OVER HERE!”


    A middle-aged man clad in fancy armor stormed into the dining hall.


    “Yes, your Handsome?!”


    “My handsome friends here are going to take a look at the Amber Spire and attempt to fix it. Make sure they will have no obstacles in doing so!”


    “Yes Handsome!” The guy saluted and ran off.


    Can you tell us about its location?


    “It is a bit north west from Sparkling mountain.”


    Don’t tell me that’s what you called Zanyr mountain…


    “It won by popularity vote but nobody calls it like that, they still call it Zanyr mountain…”


    Was the vote open to suggestions or a vote between multiple choices?


    “Multiple choices, why?”


    There is your problem…


    Elliana put up her hand. “Uhm emperor sir, why did you tell your assistant to make sure we have no obstacles fixing the spire?”


    “Oh you can call me Dimitri, beautiful, and people have tried to raid the spire so we had to heavily guard it, To protect the treasure but I guess it also protects them from going missing. Well excuse me, I will arrange suitable transportation for you!”


    Oh, there is no need.


    “Nope! I won’t accept my handsome friends traveling in an unsightly manner! You will go there handsomely!” Dimitri snapped his fingers and an army of attendants flooded the room and carried us to our vehicle.


    I should have kicked his ass when he deserved it…


    So, we ended up in an extremely gaudy carriage carried by horses in suits. The horses looked handsome in those suits but I suppose that was the point.


    This is so cool!


    This… sucks.


    This is so slooow!


    “I like it! I feel like a princess!” At least half of us seemed to enjoy this.


    Hey Greg, why did you suggest we fix this spire? If the guys from the Yttroz Industries couldn’t fix it what makes you think we can fix it?


    We needed an excuse to take a look at it.


    You do know that that weirdo would have probably let us regardless of how we asked right?


    Hey Agnis how do you know the emperor?


    I don’t! I just called him a lunatic in public and got thrown in jail, I met him several times and he got thinner and thinner. He was so fat in the beginning. He was bigger than this carriage! Anyway, he somehow credited losing weight to me and asked me to become his advisor, which I refused. I don’t know anything besides that.


    You do seem to have a strange effect on most of the people you encounter.


    “Is that a nine tailed spirit fox trait? I actually don’t know much about the tailed beasts, only that there seem to be 9 of them. what are they?”


    Huh that is actually a good question, I have no clue on the single tails, I think the 2 tails were dogs? Not sure, and also not sure what they do, we have shadowcats as 3 tails, forest rabbits as 4 tails, no clue on 5 tails, lightning tigers as 6 tails, crystal wolves as 7 tails, monkeys as 8 tails and spirit foxes as 9 tails.


    The single tails are gemmed merfolk and the 5 tails are plumed hurricane falcons.


    Merfolk?


    Falcons with 5 tails? How does that work? And wait merfolk were tailed beasts?


    For the falcons, they have 5 tailfeathers, similar to the phoenix, they also rival a phoenix in flight, for the merfolk, no, only the gemmed merfolk are, just like not any fox is a tailed beast only the 9 tailed spirit foxes.


    Oh, so I guess they keep the water clean or something.


    I am not sure about their function only that there are at least 4 types. Ruby merfolk, Sapphire Merfolk, Emerald Merfolk and Topaz merfolk. The ruby and sapphire merfolk are the toughest, the ruby ones have high offensive capabilities, the sapphire ones are deemed to be quite invincible because they have defensive capabilities on top on their toughness, the emerald ones specialize in nature energy and love making jewelry and I don’t know what the topaz merfolk do besides that they are proficient in lightning magic. There might be more types of gemmed merfolk but I am unaware of their existence.


    So, what do the falcons do?


    I don’t know, sorry. Shouldn’t you know of at least the forest rabbits, Elliana? They seem to be quite similar to elves.


    “I don’t know… our village had been mainly focusing on spirits and on our spirit gua… on Bywen. Elves like Sylvana had pointed out that we’re focusing on the wrong thing but nothing really happened after that.”


    Racial responsibility, eh? When are you 2 going to do something about that?


    What?


    Hmm that is a good question. I can’t say I am aware on how to do that.


    I have responsibilities?


    Hardly any, as its stuff you normally do, you just have to do it better, I assume and put it in the world system or something? How is that even supposed to work? But well, it’s not my responsibility so its ok for me to not know, you two however need to know!


    Hmm yes, I guess Raishin and my role are similar so we should work together to find that out. Let’s try and do that after we’ve visited this fascinating spire.


    The spire could be seen at a distance but it would take days maybe even weeks to get there on this snail’s pace.


    Oh, speaking of responsibility, some dimensional holes have opened. Time to fix them!


    I opened to correct filter and jumped out of the carriage. A big hole had opened, or well had been here for a while and 2 tears had recently opened, these tears are what alerted me. I made bridges over the tear and closed them quite efficiently.


    This was a bit difficult to do for the hole but I made a network of bridges that eventually closed it. This took the longest and most effort.


    It is quite bittersweet that my horrible experience had another silver lining that I can make bridges between the dimensional fabric now. There was no scarring with these bridges. The tears looked neat; the hole was a bit sloppy but I’m just a brat in 9t years so I think I did a good job. I did spot a relatively large hole near the spire, however. It seemed to be festering and I could see maggots, centipedes and beetles around it.


    What I know from Neia is that this is the sight of something that has invaded our dimension. I’m still wondering what might have invaded our dimension near Boshi town. I climbed back into the carriage when I remembered something.


    Guys. We should be careful when we arrive at that spire. Please don’t ask any questions if I forcefully teleport us out.


    What did you see.


    I linked them up with my eyes and showed the festering dimensional fabric.


    “Eww gross! What is that!”


    Ugh, kick me out of the link…


    Raishin emptied his stomach out of the window


    It’s just like Boshi town, fine! I have no objections!


    Me neither, did you figure out what that means?


    They got kicked out of the shared vision.


    No but as we know it’s bad news.


    I decided to lie because I wasn’t completely sure but I had the feeling I wasn’t wrong. Things are finally starting to connect. Greg and I encountered scythe dogs in the underground library, these apparently are fairies.


    The fairies that captured me said that they had successfully invaded our dimension. I didn’t check the fabric of space around their domain but they might not have invaded where they eventually ended up settling.


    The festering of the dimensional fabric was probably a result of the successful invasion of the scythe dogs. Which means that there is a high chance that this one means the same. The spire might be infested with fairies…


    I am glad that I got rid of my trauma but I still am terrified. Dimitri did mention that nothing returned from there… This is bad…