Kris and Briggs put in a lot of forge time over the next forty hours. Main reason? Making the old Knights of Silyun new Swords, blades similar to those of her Knights of Lost Light.

  Viamontians preferred to fight with larger blades and in heavy armor, without shields. The hand-and-a-half blades being forged for them were blue-black adamantine, gleaming and heavy, thrice the weight of a normal steel blade, and only men with inhuman strength could wield them easily.

  Despite their age, those knights all qualified as such, and if they had not engaged in such incredible grinding in their youth as so many Isparians had, they had seen a great deal of combat against the Eaters since then, and they were indeed no slouches.

  Their own weapons were carefully maintained, but with the loss of the magical Weapons in the Fall, were clearly old and in bad shape. Their expressions as they were awarded Blades that were superior in foundational form to anything they had wielded from before the Fall were awed and humble at what this terrifying young woman and her awesome mate and commander had made for them.

  They swore no Oaths at that time. But when she raised Quaver and took them across the ocean, across the land, and away to the Halls of Lost Light to kneel before the remnants of an order of heroes thousands of years reborn, then, then the Oaths came, in tears and solemn understanding that there was a truly great purpose awaiting them, something that their own long-fallen princess would have died happily to undertake.

  Then it was off to the Crater of Mount Esper, to receive their first Infusion of Fire, and to venture up quickly into the Jahannan Vault to gain their Fire Stones, both new ones and ones from the teams working the Vault to gain a new Stone every day.

  Then to the Serac Vault, also being worked every day by teams gaining experience in fighting the undead, and then to the depths of the Incunabula Vault, to gain their Cold and Acid Stones respectively.

  Lightning would have to wait, as the virindi had resecured the place.

  When that was done, it was Briggs who brought them along to the Olthoi Hunter south of Arwic.

  The means to craft the Olthoi Armor from olthoi parts was mostly done, the treatment of the shells being experimented with and fine-tuned. However, the Olthoi Hunter was still capable of providing instant armor customized to the recipient on demand. The old and tattered armor of the Silyun knights had withstood as much combat as it could, and it was time for something new.

  A battle was fought against an olthoi horde that came out of nowhere, the Olthoi Slayer I’d Mass-Infused into their Weapons did its job, and the knights butchered their prizes, brought the shells and carapaces to the Olthoi Hunter, and received their rewards, one by one.

  Commander Briggs paid her in cream pastries, fine cheeses, and good wine as the new Knights of the Lost Light cast aside their old and failing armor for these new suits of reinforced olthoi shell, grim and splendid in their own way, definitely a new style for a new day.

  The Olthoi Hunter smiled, her face glitching as she ate and drank, watching but saying nothing as the Viamontian warriors strapped on their new Armor. Briggs quietly assured her that she would be free when the push against the Olthoi began, but until then, to scam every single set of Olthoi Armor and Weapons out of the system that she could.

  It turned out that she could summon in the horde once a day, but for specific individuals, only once a week. Army groups with full picnic baskets for her came to take that fight every single day, staying with her and making sure she ate and drank with them in celebration of their victories.

  Then they were gone, Teleported by Endure along Lived-Lines back to Silyun, and it was time for them to start feeding their Matrix Levels, and growing their Weapons into something greater.

  The Walk across the Hlaetians began with a Salute to Aru by forty-some Weapons of the Lost Light, and without hurry, only purpose and intent, Kris and Briggs led us across the islands, Master Oswald and Adso shaking their heads at how different the land looked, but still staying on track for where we needed to go.

  -------

  We killed everything on the way, without restriction, and Sealed the Summons points with vivus. That we did did not truly matter, given how many thousands there were across the islands, and how densely populated the Summons were.

  We also slaughtered three hordes of Eaters over the three days of our trek. I Shaped us walled redoubts raised up high enough that the Eaters couldn’t run over them on their dead before the dead burned down, and the Eaters were cut and pierced down, Burned to white ash, and perished with great speed and skill as Slayer counts and Achievement Feats all stacked up nicely to help the killing process.

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  Weapons grew, Levels gained, and we continued on the trip until the night came. Then a Seal Focus was dropped, we were brought back to the Fortress of Karlunn, and the Knights helped me make them Sustaining Oathrings in formal Ritual. The Rings crystallized the promises they Swore to Warlord and Imperial Princess Kristie Rantha-Briggs, and gave them something else to feed and grow.

  The first pyreal goldweight bars were awarded them, too, and they Burned them to start the process on the protective Amulets that would shield them from enemy magic.

  After the Salute to Aru, we Teleported back to the Seal Focus en masse, and the Walk resumed.

  ------

  The Fiun Outpost, where once the last of the Fiuns had set up a place away from the merciless hands of the Corcosi forces, was on the northernmost side of the Vanguard Island, across a channel with interested Aquatics sniffing around but staying away from us, and through a whole lot of landscape spawns, dominated by enslaved Viamontian knights and random Eaters, but with plenty of other creatures for variety, too. Both of the hordes we ran into were on the Vanguard Isle, as the density of the Spawns could support massive numbers and growth of Eaters, and we ran into them fairly quickly as they tore across the landscape on their constant hunt to fill their bellies with something beyond ectoplasm.

  There wasn’t anything living remaining at the Fiun Outpost when we got there. The closest thing to it was the Deathstone Pit, where the last of the Fiuns looked to have died among dozens of Isparians, and a few lugians, Aun, and Gearknights. The stone buildings had been toppled and scattered all over the place by rooting Eaters desperate for any scrap of food they could find, but of the Fiuns who used to live here, there was naturally no sign left.

  “They were not an evil people,” the Mick assured us all, looking about sadly at the place as we all watched the Deathstone Pit Burn misting flames. Even the Eaters hadn’t bothered the bones crackling and fizzling with power here, as if the silent screams of the trapped spirits were enough to drive them away. “Repentant, aye, an’ depressed, doomed by their own power an’ them thinking they were beyond being able to fail. At least, at least they died fast at the end here, instead of eaten alive by the hordes o’ starving beasts that claimed their world an’ followed them here.

  “They’ve done left us a scourge, a thing that eats an’ grows without limit or restraint, an’ we’ll have t’ be shutting it down to free the land o’ them, an’ restore it to the green.

  “They were an old an’ mighty race, an’ they fell. Now, ‘tis up to us to pick up after them an’ clean up the mess our elders made o’ things.

  “Rest assured, Elders, an’ be at peace. We’ve found a Banner t’ rally around, something to unite us, an’ we’ll not drop the ball on this. When the last Eater be gone, when the land be clean again, we’ll be back here, an’ raise a monument to ye, to let ye know the task is done.

  “’Twill be a Great Quest, aye, but the knights of Silyun have already Sworn to see it happen, an’ the Lost Light will stand with them to see it through.

  “Peace, elders. We’ll do the job, gory an’ dirty an’ bloody an’ true, an’ we’ll be back t’ set ye at ease!” he promised, raising the hilt of Bunita and bowing to the mist-filled crater before him, the gesture repeated by all those present, Named Weapons a-glitter with Lost Light in every hand.

  ------

  We purged the northern coastline of Spawn Points completely. In the future, Eaters would find over twenty miles of absolute barren devastation here, save for any penguins who flitted off into the sea as soon as they saw the Eaters coming.

  The penguins weren’t quite so wary of us, but given our numbers and how quickly we slaughtered any that came zooming up to attack us and chase us away, they soon opted to acknowledge our warnings that we were coming through and would appreciate it if we didn’t have to butcher them when we did so.

  Then, it was across the shallow waters of the ford to the Island of Ruin.

  There was actually a single Viamontian outpost here, located on a high hill at the top of a steep slope. They’d not bothered to build a wall around the place, only a single watchtower that hadn’t been enough to keep the Eaters back. I knew this because Kris had me Lightjump across the island to investigate its status, just in case, and there was nothing intact remaining.

  I eyed the scraps of acid-seared, Eater-chewed armor lying in the scattered stones of the Eastern Watchtower, and the remains of the few knights still screaming in the Deathstone Pit there. Most of the garrison had probably ended up eaten alive or hacking one another to death in mad magical confusion, the fate of many of those who didn’t become Eater food soon enough.

  From the top of the mountain, I could look down and see plains and islands covered in incredibly dense spawn points… and no less than three different Eater hordes, chewing their way through them mindlessly. I could only imagine how fast eating pure ectoplasm was helping them regenerate from their combat injuries as they made endless cycles of the Summons points. I could even see the routes they took, worn into the ice and snow that covered the cold and barren rock in this place.

  I could also make out no less than nine separate Dungeons from the top of the mountain as I skirted the edge of the plateau-like top of the former encampment. Three of them were due west of me, due east of the rest of the party, famous mines occupied by the Gotrok clans and considered the strongholds of the Tukora: the Paths of the Blind.

  I wondered if they still held onto them after all this time, then shook my head. Even if they had Deathstone effects and could respawn, there was no food and no resupplies coming after the Fall. Unless they fell to eating Eaters, the Tukora there would have starved to death… and the Summons points in there had been famous for rapid respawn speeds.

  Without layered Lightning effects on everyone’s Weapons, we weren’t going to risk the Dungeons there.

  I set the Deathstone Pit en vivus, gave the souls their final rites and the assurance that we would kill the Eaters in time, did what I was sent there to do, and Lightjumped back in the direction I’d come.

  Behind me I left a circle of stone standing upright, a Rune-carved double of the Jumpgates we used back south.

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