“Welcome to Earth.”

  We stood at the railing looking out over Solacetown. Sunie was silent as he surveyed the town, giving it the once over. HIs eyes took in everything, from the walls, to the academy just visible outside the walls. He looked out over the lake, seeing the construction on the island. There were a couple of airships taking off, one landing, another boat sailing across the lake.

  “This is your capital?” he asked.

  “Yep. Great place isn’t it?”

  “It’s small.”

  “Yep. I like it that way.”

  He laughed.

  “How’s it feel to be the second non-human on Earth?”

  “Second?” he asked, confused, but then nodded. “Ah yes, the halfling.”

  “They prefer Puka,” I said, feeling Sunie’s side-eye that turned into a roll of the eyes.

  “Did you know that we prefer elvict over elf?”

  “Really?” I asked, looking at him, surprised it hadn’t come up before.

  He laughed.

  “No. Most of my people don’t care. Some from the other planets do, but we avoid them. Stuck up asses.”

  I laughed.

  “What about dwarves? They okay with that?”

  Sunie shook his head.

  “Absolutely not. Calling them dwarf is a good way to start a clan war.”

  “What do they prefer then?”

  “Dvorkan.”

  “I’ll try to remember that. I’ve already got enough enemies in the multiverse.”

  I shook my head. I probably needed to ask Stylo about what the various races were really called. I was going by the old myths and stories from pre-System Earth. Probably needed to stop that. It was still crazy how the beings in the multiverse were close to the stories. There were even beast people.

  How many anime and manga fans dreamed of meeting a catgirl someday? I’d met one.

  I pointed to the road that led down the mountainside from the Nexus Portal. It wasn’t quite a road yet, still a trail, but the folks in Solacetown were working on it. There wasn’t much traffic going to the portal yet, but someday there would be.

  “I thought you said you have portals?”

  “We do,” I said. “To go from some of the bigger cities to others.”

  “But no inter-city portals?”

  “Why would we need that?”

  “To make it easier and quicker to get around,” Sunie said. “Even a place this small.”

  “Portals are expensive to build and maintain,” I said.

  “I forget how provincial your faction is,” he said, but with a tone that I knew he was teasing.

  I did stop and glare at him, making Sunie laugh. He had his hood down, his bark color skin and green hair, along with the ears marking him as an obvious elf, had drawn the attention of the guards stationed outside the portal. They didn’t say anything but were probably gossiping like a couple of old hens right now.

  Sunie held his hands up to ward off my glare, still chuckling.

  I shook my head. I knew he was just joking around. And he did have a point. Inter-city portals would make it easier to get around. Not like Solacetown was that large. Fred’s United American Alliance’s capital was three times the size. Now he could use inter-city portals at that place. Even with my speed, it took a while to get through the city.

  “What’s your capital city like?”

  “On Cerim or one of the other planets?”

  I shrugged.

  “Cerim is huge. Easily one billion people living in the city. Most buildings are ten or more stories tall. It covers miles of land. There’s an elegance to the architecture, but honestly, I kind of like this,” he said, pointing out at Solacetown.

  That made me smile. We tried hard to keep Solacetown’s rustic feel. Of course, he had to go and ruin it.

  “It’s got that backwoods feel that I personally enjoy.”

  I groaned, making Sunie laugh.

  “Seriously Nick, I do like this.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Try not to let it change. So much of the Multiverse is about expansion, growing and numbers. It’s nice to see a place that just wants to be what it is.”

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  “We’re trying hard not to change.”

  ***

  We reached the bottom and started walking down the cobblestone street. There were a few people out and about. This wasn’t the mercantile part of the city and not a residential neighborhood. We’d chosen the spot for the Nexus Portal to be a little bit more out of the way of regular traffic and since there would be more traffic to the portal, we didn’t want it where people lived.

  The people all took note of Sunie. It wasn’t just his skin and hair coloring. It was obvious he wasn’t human from his build. We had slender humans, but an elf, sorry elvict, was just different. There was the way he walked, his clothes and everything else. He wore leather armor and a cloak, but the style was so different from anything we had around.

  And there were the ears.

  “Hope you don’t mind the stares,” I said.

  “It’s fine,” he said, smiling and waving at a couple of young women that were giving him the look. “Don’t expect the same treatment when you come to Cerim.”

  “Oh?”

  “We’ve had humans there before.”

  I nodded. That made sense. Give it a couple years and we’d have more non-humans as regulars in Solacetown. Especially if I had my way.

  When I’d asked Sunie if he wanted to come to Earth, he’d readily agreed. It had taken some time for him to communicate with the Sunrise Formation’s elders in the Nexus to get permission and then he’d extended the offer from them to me. Once the business on Earth was done with, and we’d made up the time lost in the Infinite Tower, I could go to Cerim.

  That was exciting.

  The part about visiting another world, not about making up lost time in the Infinite Tower.

  That was the problem with the Tower. It was a pretty constant grind once started it. Needed to keep running the biomes to keep advancing up the floors. Lag behind and wouldn’t make up the Levels to keep pace with others.

  Once this business was done, we’d have to really push hard in the Tower to make up for the time away. Missing a day or two, not a problem. A week? That started to cause issues.

  Sunie got more looks as we walked through the streets, heading for the Town Hall in the middle.

  “Is that your home,” Sunie asked, pointing to the Town Hall.

  It was the biggest building in the city, and the grandest.

  “Nah,” I replied. “That’s the town hall, the seat of government.” I turned, pointing to the left of the portal where my home was just visible. “That’s my place.”

  He laughed. That drew some eyes. It was a different kind of sound. More musical. I’d gotten used to it, but to people seeing an elf for the first time? It stood out. Not in a bad way though.

  “I should have known,” he said, slapping me on the shoulder. “You don’t strike me as the type that needs a large palace.”

  “No thanks,” I said. “Sometimes that place is too big for just me and Jack.”

  “You should see Lord Mashio’s home on Cerim. It’s probably half the size of this entire city.”

  “For just him?”

  “And parts of his personal family Clan, but yes, mostly just him.”

  “That’s crazy.”

  “It’s normal,” Sunie said “You, my friend, are very different from every other faction leader in the multiverse.”

  “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

  “It was meant that way.”

  ***

  We were only a block away when the first person stopped us. I was kind of surprised it had taken that long. A kid, probably only ten or so, had run over to us. She stopped in front of Sunie, looking up at him, with those big curious kid eyes.

  “Are you an elf?”

  “Dian,” a woman said from a couple feet away.

  The kid’s mother looked scandalized. Even more so when I turned and smiled, and she saw that it was me.

  “Lord Howell, I’m sorry for her..”

  I raised a hand to the mom, waving her concerns off. The other ruffled the kids hair as Sunie crouched down in front of her.

  “It’s okay,” I said to the mom.

  She didn’t look any less scandalized.

  “I am indeed,” Sunie said. “My name is Sunie Teralei. What is yours?”

  ‘Where are you from?”

  “A world called Cerim. I am here with my friend Nick.

  He pointed up at me. I waved to the little girl. The kid looked up briefly but then back at Sunie. She could have cared less about me. Which probably made her mom even more scandalized. I just laughed.

  “I need to steal my friend,” I told the little girl. “We have urgent business at town hall.”

  She glared at me like kids do when you tell them that the funs over.

  “I’m sure you’ll get to see Sunie again.”

  Still glaring at me, the girl ran over to her mom, who started talking rapidly to her. The little girl looked back at me, not quite glaring but a little unsure of how to behave now. Mom must have told her who I was. All she probably understood was that I was someone important.

  I kind of missed the days when I wasn’t someone important.

  “Come on,” I said to Sunie as he turned and waved at the little girl. “Let’s go see what the big emergency is.”