Chương 360: Council Meeting

Veridian strode into the meeting room, before she plopped herself down onto one of the soft, cushy seats with a sigh. She looked around, and confirmed that she was one of the last ones to enter the meeting room. They were still waiting on the two final advisors, but the King and the three Sentinel-Reclaimers were already here. The others gave her polite nods, although Veridian couldn't help but feel slightly estranged from most of them. They all looked so young except for her.

It was another reminder of Veridian's age. Once, she had been the youngest advisor of the council. Now, all of her old friends and acquaintances had died, leaving her to advise and safeguard the new generation. At least, for a few more decades - Veridian didn't have long left before it was her time. She could feel it in her bones, as deeply as some of the old battle scars on her body. Some managed to live past five hundred, eking out a few more decades.

Veridian doubted that would happen - she would be surprised if she even made it all the way to five hundred.

"Elder Veridian," said the King, as he reached for one of the snacks on the table.

"It's good to see you here."

"Of course," said Elder Veridian, as she settled more deeply into her plush chair. She was glad that the council had done away with the study posturing and adherence to titles and etiquette hundreds of years before she was born. It would have been annoying if she had to constantly bow and refer to the king as 'your majesty' or some similar nonsense. Councils were for defense preparation and planning for the future.

Even if the King and the Sentinel-Reclaimers were the four who truly made decisions in this room, at least everyone should be free to voice their thoughts and opinions as equals.

"It's nice to see you again, Elder," said another man. Miria and her friends would have recognized the man as Felix's father. Elder Veridian gave the man a friendly smile, before she also reached for one of the foods on the table. It was a bowl of soup, and after a spoonful, Veridian grinned. It tasted lovely. It was even packed with absorption essence, so it would replenish what she had used up over the course of the day to maintain her abilities.

While Veridian was eating, the final members of the meeting arrived. Miss Alastia closed the doors to the meeting, sealing them off from the rest of the woman's house and family and formally starting the meeting. The king cleared his throat, before he turned to Veridian.

"This is mostly intended to be a follow up meeting about the heroes, so I'd like to start by asking Elder Veridian what she observed. What do you know about the heroes that were born in the city? What are their temperaments like? How strong are they? What can their magic systems do?" Veridian winced.

"The new heroes are… well, I'll start with the positives that I've noticed, at least from my first interactions with them," she said.

"The two heroes seem nice. Miria has been healing people over the city from the moment her abilities were exposed. She also gave a soldier a hug during the previous raid, which the soldier noted was unexpected, but felt surprisingly nice. Most reports I have about Miria's actions over the past few years are remarkably consistent. She's someone who seems to care a lot about her family, and likes hugging people." The king blinked in surprise.

"She likes… hugs?"

"Quite a bit, apparently. I can't find any major character flaws or vices in her. Granted, she's only twelve, so she hasn't really had a chance to express any major negative personality traits either. However, even if we didn't know that Miria was a hero until now, it seems like she has known for quite a while. In those years, even though Miria seems to have a solid understanding of what being a hero means for her, she hasn't exploited her position to do anything at all.

She hasn't used it to oppress other kids, or even ask for an extra piece of candy from her parents. She just… does her thing. Most people that have interacted with her had a very positive impression of her." Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site. The king's shoulders relaxed, although his movements were subtle enough that they were hard to miss.

"What about Anise?" He asked, after a few heartbeats passed.

"Most people say that she's obsessed with magic. She seems to love magic, spellcasting, and the theory behind it. She has a deep passion for it that borders on madness. Most people claim that she's a nice enough girl outside of that fact. I don't think this is a deeply problematic personality trait - just a quirk." The king shrugged.

"I don't think that's a major issue either. If she loves magic, at least we know she'll be dedicated to her training. Do you think it will hinder her willingness to act in moments of danger?"

"No, I doubt it. She will probably have no problem assisting the city when raids occur, especially if we find some way to incentivize her with more magical knowledge as a result. We can brainstorm ideas for that later." The king's eyes glinted.

"That's wonderful. I've heard in some stories that some of the heroes of past legends were incredibly hard to manage - they could even prove to be more of a hindrance than a help, although it was rare." Then, the king's eyes narrowed.

"You said you would start with the good news. That implies there's bad news." Veridian sighed again, and then she nodded.

"There is, indeed, bad news. The heroes aren't very strong." The king frowned.

"How strong are they?"

"Well… I suspect that they're stronger than the average spellcaster, but not by much. I suspect that Miria and Anise have somewhere between five and ten percent of my essence pool. They are an entire order of magnitude below the city's strongest. Of course, they don't need food to recover their essence, but even so… well, I suspect their essence generation per day is incapable of making a serious difference.

Optimistically, they would still probably account for less than 1 percent of the city's yearly essence generation, unless I'm missing something." The king winced.

"That is… a hefty difference in strength. And a much lower amount of essence generation than I was hoping for. It would have been great if each of them generated as much as the rest of the city combined. That would have been a source of real hope." He paused.

"How sure are you?"

"Not entirely. We're working off of rough estimations here. Precise measuring machines for things like essence pools were lost when we fled to the sanctuaries, after all. But even if we assume that heroes get stronger as they grow older, and take an optimistic view on my measurements and assume I underestimated them a bit… I'm worried. The heroes might not be enough to turn the tides of the era around. We've been withering since the moment we fled to the skies.

I had hoped that the heroes could turn things around, but right now, I just don't see it." The king sighed.

"For now, let's continue training them. But don't pour too many over the top resources into their training. If they're willing, we could try the Balthinian method of converting monster corpses into 'supplements' to improve their maximum essence pool? Our records of how it worked are quite vague, and we have never devoted much time to it because it still won't change how much essence we have to defend ourselves each year.

However, when we factor in the fact that hero essence generation is based on their maximum capacity, it's probably worth trying to recover that bit of lost technology." Veridian nodded.

"I think that's a good idea." The king grinned.

"I'll have a few scholars and mages start working on it, and we'll see what they can do. Apart from that… train the heroes well. But for now, I think you should train them with a focus on ceremonial duties instead of combat ones. If they're as weak as you say, the front lines might not be a good place for them. Luckily, that's not the only place they can help out. The three cities of our island all know that a hero has been born, and it looks like a lot of people are celebrating the birth of a 'new hope.'

We don't need to crush that. If the heroes show up, heal people, and perform ceremonial duties every year, we can still raise morale."

"Morale won't be enough to stop the end of our people," said Veridian, as she felt a touch of bitterness well up in her heart.

"It's all we can do," said the king.

"Monitor them when you mentor them, and see if there is any way to make them grow strong enough to impact real combat in high-danger raids. If there's any chance we can help them grow to a point where it will really matter, take it. But if you don't see a way… at least we can bring our people some comfort as the end approaches us." The other counselors in the room looked frustrated by the king's words, but no one raised an objection. In the beginning, there had been dozens of sanctuaries.

Now, less than ten remained. The weakness of the heroes was a bitter pill to swallow, but the group would grit their teeth and keep hoping for a miracle. In this dying world, that was all they could do.