Chương 1368: 1398 - Brantiir

It didn't take long from when the Lumenite portal activated for solid ground to once again be under Leon's feet. The river of light deposited him and his companions safely and swiftly on a purpose-built landing pad in Gwarim's capital city. Immediately, they were assaulted by noise as hundreds of soldiers roared at their appearance. Leon almost drew Iron Pride by instinct, but the music playing, barely audible under the weight of the soldiers' merry shouting, was enough for him to stifle that instinct.

As the golden light died down, Leon saw with his physical eyes the immense form of Gwarim, laughing as he strode forward, an arm outstretched.

"Leon!" he boomed as his soldiers ceased their loud welcome.

"My friend! It's about time you found your way here!" Leon smiled as he clasped Gwarim's arm, his hand almost disappearing in the nearly eight-feet-tall man's titanic appendage. Gwarim then pulled him in closer for a short embrace, and he whispered, though not silently enough to be inaudible to other nearby strong mages, "Welcome to Brantiir—my home." Leon, still smiling broadly, looked around and responded, "It's incredible. I should've visited sooner." His words were honest; he was impressed.

The landing pad he and his companions had used for their Lumenite strand was on one end of a tall but narrow ridge. Gwarim's 'castle', as much as it could be called as such, was on the other end. It was a beautiful structure, tall and slender, with gleaming white walls interspersed with stripes of purple stone. It had a wide footprint in an absolute sense, but rose for thousands of feet into the air, and so maintained its elegant, almost needle-like appearance until the structure reached its top floors.

There, the tower flared outward in elegant curves, looking almost like a flame or flower petals made out of purple stone, capping the tower. But its beauty wasn't simply in its appearance; Leon could sense a complex array of enchantments woven into every brick making up the structure.

He'd seen many defensive fortifications have almost chaotic, if effective, wards that had clearly been added piecemeal over many years, or where the designers clearly didn't care about how the enchantments would feel to a mage compared to how they functioned. But in Gwarim's castle, Leon could sense a harmonious flow of magic that, while it didn't quite compare to how he'd set up the wards in Westmount and Artorion, still felt viscerally good.

The city below the great tower was just as impressive; the Storm Lands this far east were hot, humid, and covered in jungles. The city was made of local orange stone or dark brown timber, and blended almost seamlessly into the broad-leafed ferns and tall trees thick with vines and branches that surrounded them. Colorful and aromatic flowers lined the streets, almost demanding that any visitor explore further to see just how extravagantly colorful the city could be.

The city as a whole hadn't been built into a flat plain, but rather filled several broad, connected valleys between tall hills teeming with green plant life. While the city's structures were mostly concentrated in those valleys, larger palaces and other structures, all made of shining marble, dotted the hills, each one trying to catch attention in a way that seemed almost at odds with how the rest of Gwarim's city practically blended seamlessly into the jungle.

The ridge that Gwarim's castle occupied was at the southern end of the city, jutting out from one of the taller hills on the city's southern border. Rivers cut through the valleys and hills, creating natural passages to the fertile fields and farms to the south, and the deep jungle lakes to the north. While Leon preferred somewhat more temperate, or even mildly cold forests, he could still feel himself relaxing minutely at the sight of all of Brantiir's greenery, and how close the dense jungles were to the streets.

A man was never too far away from simply vanishing into the brush if he wanted to.

"You should have!" Gwarim responded, laughing as he released Leon from his tight, brotherly embrace. He then turned to Leon's companions, greeting Valeria and Cassandra warmly and respectfully, while Zhang, Daryun, and especially Alcander—all five of whom were twelfth-tier, just as Gwarim was—were outright embraced by Gwarim just as Leon had been.

"Only a hundred years," Gwarim said as he and Alcander separated, "and you have added such power to your Kingdom. You rise like a meteor, Leon."

"I'm not so sure meteor's rise," Alcander quipped. Gwarim lightly punched Alcander in the shoulder." You still owe me another duel!"

"Name the time and place," Alcander responded.

"I wouldn't mind handing you your ass again!"" Again!" Gwarim protested.

"I'm in the lead!" Leon wasn't sure how many duels he and Alcander had fought, but he knew that the two had struck up a fast friendship when Gwarim had visited Artorion following the death of Anax Alderion. He wasn't surprised the two found so much common ground, but their friendship had been somewhat complicated by Alcander's duties as the commander of Leon's Tempest Knights and the tier difference between them.

Now that Alcander was Leon's Paladin and of the same tier as Gwarim, they could now justify being friendlier in public.

"I'll happily take on whoever wins," Cassandra interjected.

"I haven't had a good fight in a while…" She snuck a provocative glance at Valeria, but the silver-haired woman didn't take the bait. Cassandra frowned slightly but didn't press Valeria any further, and Leon noted that Valeria seemed distant—more than usual, at any rate.

"Then let's head inside!" Gwarim said loudly, and at his word, the honor guard that had surrounded the pad to welcome Leon to Brantiir formed into two columns that lined the colonnaded street linking the Lumenite pad to Gwarim's towering castle. As they walked, Leon noted that no one seemed to spare Nestor or the dozen beautiful golems he led so much as a glance.

He knew that that suited the dead man just fine, and that Nestor was leaning into that reaction more than a little by acting stiff and uncurious—just as a normal wisp-powered golem would. Everyone else in his party knew Nestor well enough not to draw attention to him, so for the moment, at least, it seemed that Nestor's guise as Leon's 'support golem' was passing without even a mention.

Upon reaching the tower, they found that a low, heavily enchanted wall surrounded outer gardens and courtyards, some of which spilled down the sides of the ridge onto narrow terraces. Given how the terraces were built, it made it clear that there was a sizable underground component to Gwarim's castle. Gwarim proudly led them through the outer gates, sparing nothing in declarations that the castle was impregnable.

Leon wasn't so sure about that, but he knew with only a glance that the wards were serious, if inelegant. Upon entering, they found themselves in halls of glittering white and silver, broken up with the occasional line of purple. The main decoration within the interior was huge stained glass murals, backlit by arcane light. Most of the stained glass in the atrium was purple, casting so much cool-colored light over the walls and floors that the air itself seemed to take on a slightly purplish hue.

Within the castle, the more castle-like aspects became clearer to Leon as Gwarim led them onward—the layout was seemingly chaotic, but obviously designed to confuse potential intruders and isolate entire winding sections of hallway between easily-held chokepoints. But the castle's owner, however, knew exactly where he was going and navigated the labyrinthine interior with confidence. Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Magical lifts took them to the higher floors, and Gwarim gave them the entire run of a guest level large enough to house a hundred, including the staff. It was only then that he mentioned Leon bringing along 'domestic' golems, but he also offered the use of his castle's staff for their stay, which Leon graciously refused. Their group was small enough and well-seen-to by Nestor's golems already, and he didn't want to include any new faces among them, even if those faces belonged to Gwarim's people.

As the others got settled in for their time in Brantiir, Gwarim and Leon made their way to a private balcony nearby, ostensibly for a few appetizers before a promised feast in the evening. However, once the doors closed behind them, Leon felt privacy enchantments activate, and Gwarim, his good cheer fading slightly, lowered himself into one of the balcony's lush seats.

"Though I'm delighted that you've finally found the time to visit," Gwarim said, "I can't help but wonder what has brought you so far away from Artorion, and with so small a retinue… A man like you ought to travel somewhat more… encumbered, wouldn't you say?"

"Encumbered?" Leon responded with a wry grin.

"Do I really seem like a man who needs a thousand attendants?"

"No," Gwarim replied, a ghost of a smile flickering across his face.

"But you also know that was not what I meant." Leon shallowly shrugged as he joined Gwarim sitting by the edge of the balcony.

"Firstly, my friend, since when do friends need excuses to visit each other? Secondly, I am confident enough in my power that I don't feel the need to travel with vast armies shadowing my every move."

"I'd be confident too, if I were in your shoes. But your enemies are hardly small in number, and you've already told me that you intend to continue on soon, though you won't tell me where…" Gwarim levied a mildly accusing stare at Leon, which Leon weathered like a mountain enduring the waves.

"Besides," Gwarim continued as Leon remained tight-lipped, "I like to think that I know you at this point. You're not one to leave home without reason. You're friendly enough and always welcoming, but getting you out of your Kingdom without a war takes power bordering on the divine. I wager Khosrow himself could rise from the dead and even he'd struggle to pry your ass away from Artorion…" Leon chuckled.

"Well, Khosrow returning would certainly be a reason for me to mobilize, I suppose. I can hardly imagine a worse enemy to have for my prospects of reclaiming my Clan's old place in the Storm Lands. But I suppose I can say that you're right enough, I left Artorion for a specific purpose, though I'd prefer to keep that purpose secret for the time being."

"I won't tell anyone," Gwarim said, punctuating his statement by bringing his fingers up and pinching his bearded mouth shut for a moment.

"I know you won't. But I'd prefer not to speak of it, all the same." Gwarim's shoulders sagged slightly, but he soon straightened them out and asked, "Then why don't I help you out as much as I can? Where do you intend to go from here? Perhaps I could help smooth your journey along." Leon considered the offer for a long second or two, eventually judging the risk, such as it was, worth it.

"East," he said.

"Not looking for trouble, you know, but a personal thing to handle that I'd rather not be publicly connected to…" Gwarim nodded, encouraged at least by even these crumbs of information.

"Then on to old Nuertis' territory from here? He's not far…"

"I was thinking so, but making such small jumps would make my travel time fairly long."

"Further east, you said?" Gwarim asked as he pulled out a map and laid it on the small table between them. The edges sagged off the sides, but the most important details were shown perfectly well. It showed the Storm Lands in detail that seemed too fine for human hands to draw—mortals would've struggled to read the tiny print, and some of the smaller domains would've appeared as little more than colored dots on the paper.

But Leon could see every detail, including the faint lines of rivers and mountains that crisscrossed the gargantuan continent. The Storm Lands were much larger than even Aeterna—many times larger, in fact. They were so large that in an absolute sense, they were rather underpopulated even after eighty thousand years since the Nexus' last Reconstitution.

More than a hundred million miles across, and tens of millions of miles long, the Storm Lands were so large that cartographers had to account for the inward curve of the Nexus when drawing maps. The continent could be described as roughly diamond-shaped, extending north and south along a rough axis, and east and west along a rough axis.

In the southwest and northwest, however, the land bent inward, more toward the center of the continent, while it bent outward in the northeast and southeast, leaving the continent feeling somewhat unbalanced. Further exacerbating that was a long, straight channel separating the Storm Lands from the Burning Lands to the north, which almost seemed to force the northern tip of the lightning continent to be smushed back toward the continent's center.

Leon's lands in the Far West, extensive now that he'd taken over all of Alderion's holdings and vassals, lay at the farthest end of the western axis, serving as the cap to the westward peninsula extending east from the continent's center. Gwarim's territory still lay in the west, but the Lumenite strand had brought Leon more than halfway to that center point.

He and his companions had passed over endless miles of empty, wild territory to reach Gwarim's land, and while the map showed that territory was owned by other Lords, compared to the Far East, the western half of the continent seemed woefully underdeveloped and underpopulated, even by the standards of the Nexus.

In the east, there was far more land, and cities looked almost stacked one on top of one another, and Leon noted that most of the Anakes in the east had much smaller territories than he did in the west—though, they also controlled far more people in far more cities, even if they looked less impressive on Gwarim's map.

"Despot Heron," Gwarim said, illuminating a city almost directly on the continent's center point, "will happily host you for a day or two—assuming he's honored with a worthy gift."

"I've brought more than enough storm crystal for gifts," Leon said.

"Enough to even pay to use your Lumenite, if you had any to spare." Gwarim snorted in amusement.

"Normally, for a friend, I'd allow them to use my Lumenite freely if they only need to travel quickly. However, my stewards would have me flensed if I turned this down, so I'll accept it in the spirit it was offered in." Leon nodded, the supply of storm crystal he'd planned on giving to Gwarim already separated from the rest.

It was a veritable mountain of the stuff, enough that no one in Gwarim's administration could argue that helping Leon wasn't at least profitable, even if they might not say it was in their best interest if they knew what Leon planned on doing.

"From Heron's territory," Gwarim continued, "you could run through Basileus Gerhard's territory. He operates a neutral, no-questions-asked hub for Lumenite travel." Another bead of light illuminated much further east, right at what Leon could consider the 'doorway' of the Far East, as Gerhard's territory bordered Kamran's, along with Anax Salem and Anassa Celina's territory—both of whom were fifteenth-tier.

Leon was rather amused to see that Gerhard's territory also bordered Anax Jericho's land, and he supposed he might've found a day or two's rest in his current ally's land if he'd wanted to.

"From there," Gwarim concluded, "you could go just about anywhere in the Storm Lands. Gerhard could even send you all the way back to Artorion if paid handsomely enough."

"Depending on how this all plays out, that might just be what happens…" Leon murmured.

"Intending on some excitement while you're out east, are you?" Gwarim asked with a knowing smile, and Leon immediately froze.

"Relax, my friend, relax. I won't pry. But I will say that, given it's pulled you from Artorion, I'm rather expecting some excitement."

"None that will find its way back to you," Leon promised.

"It won't? That's a damned shame," Gwarim replied as he folded his hands behind his cleanly shorn head.

"I was almost hoping for a bit of excitement to liven up these dull days." They shared a chuckle for a light moment. Then, Gwarim leaned forward and warned with deadly seriousness, "Be careful out there, Leon. The war between Kamran, Halbast, and Auset has most of the Lords on edge. Some believe we're moving into a new phase of chaos, while others believe that we're close to gaining a new Storm King.

But few of the Lords out there will appreciate you being in their territories right now, even if they remember the Thunderbird Clan fondly, or even if they mean you no ill will, personally. Some of them might even hand you over to more hostile powers, should they find the opportunity to do so. Better to travel a little more… a little less recognizable, I should say."

"Weren't you just a moment ago wondering why I wasn't traveling with an army behind me?"

"I wasn't sure where you were going, or for why," Gwarim replied, grinning.

"I still don't, but now that I know that you're heading into the heart of the Storm Lands, I thought I ought to give you my honest recommendation."

"It's well received, thank you," Leon replied. He glanced back at the map again, and they both went silent for a few more seconds. Then, Gwarim stood up and said, "Come. It seems my palace servants are too afraid to disturb us, but the rest of your people should be sampling some of the finest food that Brantiir has to offer right now. Shall we join them?"

"I say we should," Leon said as he stood up. Gwarim let him keep the map and promised to help Leon with his travel plans, and Leon quietly added a few more chests of storm crystal to the pile he'd set aside for Gwarim. Then, they both headed back inside and put such serious talk aside in favor of feasting and fun. Leon wasn't staying long, but Gwarim still planned on making it as enjoyable and memorable as he could.