Adamant Blood

Isoko answered the door to her room and stood surprised. “I, uh, put in the request for transfer, uh, 20 minutes ago?”

She was not packed yet.

Lola Turner, Inquisitor, stood with a bag of luggage at her feet. “I was packed and ready to go after Mark ten minutes after hearing he was missing. I have made further decisions in the last hour. I am transferring to Memphi, and I am requesting to join the Freyalan expedition to Daihoon. David and Orissa are going as well, though they will be coming at a later date. I have a hovertram booked for me, leaving in 45 minutes. If you wish to join me, then you must be quick about it. We can discuss Union lessons on the way.”

Isoko’s eyes went wide. She rapidly bowed, saying, “Yes! Thank you, Inquisitor Lola.” She rose. “I’ll be ready quickly.”

Lola nodded, ever perfect, ever professional and polite. “I will see you at the station then, Miss Kanno. We will discuss bandits and the like on the trip as well.”

Isoko’s eyes went wide. “Thank you for your instruction.”

Lola did the smallest Xerkonan nod and then she picked up her bag and walked away.

Isoko shut the door and wondered why Lola was so invested in Mark… Besides the obvious reasons that Mark was a True Union user and would form the center of any team he happened to be on, and the dragon was there, too—

Oh. Lola felt guilty about putting him into a coma, obviously, but the dragon had to be a part of her decision—

Isoko had no time to think about all of that. She got to packing faster. Her room was already torn up, posters in a pile, books in boxes, clothes in containers, but now she started shoving things into boxes and wrapping them fast. Everything that wasn’t packed would never follow her wherever she was going next.

She didn’t even know where she was going to live.

“I’ll figure it out,” Isoko said, over the sharp, tearing noise of packing tape, and the satisfying sticky rip of another box, sealed.

She was moving on and she was almost ready, but not quite.

She smiled.

This was the best time to move on. There was just enough left undone at Citadel to have something to come back to, if she needed to come back, but most of her life was destined beyond the horizon. Isoko wanted to see that horizon, and further beyond, beyond even the impossible valleys and the tangled horizons of Endless Daihoon, too.

She might not have inherited her grandmother’s Sky Shaping, or her naming convention as a villain, but she certainly inherited her wanderlust.

“I could always get a name change as a villain, though,” Isoko said, as she rushed to pack away the books she cared about. Comic books went into the shipment box, along with ‘Details of Dragons’ and ‘A History of the World, 2048-edition’… In fact, all of her books went into the box. She wasn’t getting rid of any of them. “Maybe I could be ‘Wandering Platinum’… No.” Isoko laughed. “Grandma would have to fight me if I cleaved that close to her name—”

Isoko stopped.

Her heart beat hard and she radiated good and bad out into the world, though she did not have the veins in her astral body like Mark did.

“Could I beat grandma?! … Ha!” Isoko instantly shook her head, laughed, and told herself in a mocking voice, “ ‘You’re 50 years too early for that sort of tribulation, Hime-chan’!”

She smiled as she continued to rapidly pack.

Gods above! Isoko could be BOTH a green-ranked Slayer, like Freyala wanted her to be, and also a supervillain in Memphi! Holy shit, this was going to be awesome—

“Holy shit I’m gonna be late.”

Isoko prioritized.

The next half an hour passed in a complete blur.

Isoko was on the tram and then off the tram at the hoverport just in time to race out to the fields, to see Inquisitor Lola stepping into a very crowded hovertram. Paladins and important-looking people filled the tram. Ambassador Wavecrash, Paladin Orissa—

Holy fucking shit was that Justicar?! Lola had seen him once or twice, but it was still amazing to see one of the world’s top heroes, here in the transport, sitting right up there with Ambassador Wavecrash.

There was room for Isoko, though. Lola had her sit down next to her.

“Welcome to the tram, young paladin,” Lola said, grinning.

The tram lifted off without Isoko realizing it.

The lessons started before Isoko was ready, too.

Lola began, “Healing for the paladin is different than what Mark might have told you. It’s a lot simpler. But the grafting of Freyala’s Power onto the astral body always introduces small issues here and there.” She took out a small knife and began, “This is a mithril knife. I will press it into my palm to show you where I want you to begin…”

When Isoko got around to poking her own palm with the knife, there was a lot less blood than she thought there would be. Time progressed fast, and soon Isoko was distracted.

Lola got distracted, too.

Over in the other part of the transport, practically everyone was either talking or listening to Justicar and Ambassador Wavecrash regarding the new laws of the settlement, and how they were going to deal with dragon cultists, or dragons themselves.

It was getting animated up there.

Lola saw Isoko watching the brewing fight, and she quietly admitted, “We can postpone the healing lessons and speak of banditry and capital punishment instead, if you wish.”

Wavecrash heard and spoke up, “It’s going to be Settlement Doctrine, Inquisitor Lola.”

Justicar complained, “Settlement Doctrine isn’t good enough.”

Lola, who was now on the spot, politely said, “Forgive me for my inquiry, but what does it mean, exactly, when the city is not a single city, but a twin city to Memphi, which has its own unique set of laws that are not related to Daihoon at all. Specifically, how is nobility treated? We don’t have nobles on Earth, and for good reason. No one should be allowed direct, legal power of execution over those below them. Quizzically enough, the reasons we don’t like nobles on Earth are the same sorts of reasons that Daihoon doesn’t allow dragons; they take over everything.”

Justicar, who was a little animated and happy to hear Lola’s words, said, “There we go! That’s what I was getting at, Wavecrash. Thank you, Lola.”

Lola gave a small nod.

Wavecrash looked to Lola as he gave his own small nod, saying, “Earthlings have a fear of higher power abuses just as Daihoonians do, but nobles and dragons cannot be equivocated in this manner. And yet, your point has merit, Inquisitor Lola.” He said to Justicar, “Settlement Doctrine is but a stepping stone toward eventual charters that take in the positions of all neighbors, so as not to disrupt those neighbors. I imagine that a portal city charter will be quite disruptive, by its very nature, but it will also take into account the needs of both cities.”

An open-ended answer, if there ever was one.

Justicar said, “Can you do better than that, Ambassador? I’ve never done this settlement thing, and I’m worried about dragons of all flavors and sizes, including human-shaped sizes.”

Wavecrash solidly, quickly, said, “Never call a person a dragon when a dragon is around, Justicar. That might insult the person most heavily, as well as offend the dragon.”

Justicar strongly said, “I plan on offending and killing lots of dragons both real and self-styled, Ambassador, so I am glad my words will have that effect.”

Wavecrash raised an eyebrow, and then simply nodded. He continued, “I imagine the laws will settle as Aluatha-derived on Daihoon and Central Cities-derived on Earth, with a transfer zone that has stricter laws than both. Possibly a combination of the most restrictive parts of both sides, with multiple checkpoints on both sides. That is how it is done in Crystal Tower, in Tokyo. It has worked well for them, so I imagine the same sort of scenario will take place with a Memphi-based portal.”

That pronouncement caused a few people to relax. Isoko did not relax. She thought of home. If there was one place Isoko had never been back home, it was the transfer zone near Crystal Tower. No one went there if they could help it; people were arrested for the smallest infractions and then detained for days.

One famous story was a dockworker who got arrested for having some imported meat on the sandwich his wife had packed in his lunch, because that imported meat was monster meat, and the wife hadn’t known. The authorities had treated it as a possible attack on the transfer station, because the meat had been treated and cured to keep it magical, and so the near-living meat set off contamination alarms. Everyone thought it was ridiculous for the operation to be that high strung, but then the guy monsterized in lockup and he had to be killed.

The wife who made the sandwich was found in her house, crushed into the basement and layered with clothes to hide her body. They had identified the body as a week dead, but the wife had been up and around, calling for her husband to be returned to her while her husband was in prison, just the previous day. She had even gotten the news involved, asking for his return.

Isoko never heard the ending to that story, but it was a pretty famous one from years ago.

Mostly, though, transports were normal affairs. Stuff flowed through the portal, while Glorious Man and the Crystal Teams were deployed on both sides of the Two Worlds, prepared to kill any kaiju that appeared. And the kaiju always appeared.

Lola asked, “Does anyone here have personal experience with Crystal Tower’s transfer zones?”

Isoko froze. And then she almost spoke up—

But some other woman spoke up, saying, “I’ve been through there multiple times. Someone is always getting detained either coming or going, and goods are always detained at least a full day. Nothing really happens, though everyone is always worried something might happen.”

Lola nodded. “It is my understanding that the Central Cities have a hands-off approach to the lands outside of their city walls, and that they have a banditry problem. What issues do you foresee arising from there, Ambassador Wavecrash?”

Wavecrash said, “If this portal district does happen in Memphi, then undesirable elements would need to be taken in hand. Not executed, not at all, but instead rehabilitated, and possibly given blanket pardons for all offenses committed outside of the walls. Standard affair for rebuilding efforts; that sort of thing.”

Lola nodded, satisfied.

Isoko felt weird for reasons she couldn’t articulate well.

Here Lola was, riding with the big boys, asking questions and getting answers. And she had invited Isoko here onto this transport. Was Isoko supposed to be here? Not really, right? The fact that Wavecrash was the source of these answers was just a matter of course; he was an Ambassador, and those types were supposed to have solid answers that would help communication between nations. But it still felt odd for Lola to be speaking in this sort of environment.

Justicar was right over there, after all.

But as soon as Isoko realized she was questioning Lola’s position, Isoko realized she was being foolish.

Isoko might not be a supervillain like her grandmother, but she was a paladin of Freyala, and all of these people were either paladins or inquisitors. She had every right to be here, same as all of them. Lola did have a whole lot more seniority than her, so of course Lola was speaking with the big boys. But Lola had every right to be here. So much right.

Isoko was missing a lot of context, and some of that context was Mark and Addavein and Lola’s central position in all of that, but Isoko got enough of it to know that she was here, where she needed to be. Hanging with the big boys… Even if she was off to the side and staying quiet.

Isoko grinned at her new life.

This was all so weird.

It was freaking awesome.