And so Wepwawet sent a delegation east to follow Cynisca and her group back to their superiors, and hopefully reach them soon.

The clock was ticking. General Peridot's ultimatum would expire in ten days, and while Wepwawet was glad that he secured Promesse and kicked Beelzebub out of his territory beforehand, he still had yet to bring all of Verglane into the fold. The bulk of the giants' mercenary company had set up camp a few days away from Roynimalia so they had no time to waste.

Considering the werewolf had done a good job spreading his faith in Roynimalia and that he needed Victoire to ensure a peaceful reorganization of power among the Glarmes Order, Wepwawet had put Goreville in charge of the mission. He assigned Sagesse, Mistouffe, and Grudu to assist him; the first because of her diplomatic experience, the second because her merchant mindset would fit well among the giants, and the third as security due to his near peer size with most giants. Cynisca also insisted on taking their dead soldiers with them back to her boss since they were still 'company property.'

Wepwawet had an idea of how to put the corpses to use, but he would rather discuss it with this Jarlack first…

Meanwhile, Promesse was fast transforming into Crafter Central. Now that they had emptied out its contents, Wepwawet had decided to turn the Holy Vault into a laboratory for Slimon's use; its secure underground location would keep citizens safe from whatever mishap the slime might come up with. The city also had plenty of forges and facilities far more advanced than the rest of Verglane, from glassworks to tanneries and most importantly, a fully functioning mint. This would tremendously accelerate his plans for a unified currency.

Promesse's lack of natural resources and advanced facilities would make it an ideal production center for refined goods. Narc and Icefall would provide the raw material to fuel the industry, and finished products could be sold off in Roynimalia's markets to fuel their economy.

I better centralize my facilities around specific areas of expertise, Wepwawet thought. His Altar teleportation network would greatly help with this by allowing his Champions to travel where they were needed during the day and return home for the evening. I've invented this world's first commute.

Considering the strong possibility of a protracted conflict with the magmorians, Wepwawet assigned specific tasks to everyone. He ordered Alpine and Kale to prepare and stockpile easily portable rations for the army, while he entrusted Slimon with exploring the magical and alchemical formulas contained within the Holy Vault's dragonscale grimoire. Rapoleon, Viviane, Renarde, and Rickart would focus on recruiting fighters in Roynimalia, which Victoire, Raymond, and Filou would train.

Finally, he put Lourson and Wintresse in charge of analyzing the remains of any Lunarian technology they could find in case they could repurpose some of it, and had Bernard handle the parasites' corpses for study. The yeti's Perks gave him an intuitive understanding of monster biology, enough that he thought he could refashion some good weapons and armor from Zelesto's corpse, though he warned that his duties to his dragon master would likely delay his progress. At least that dragon was too distracted by his Treasure Hunter Perk to bother everyone else for now.

Wepwawet himself didn't stand idle either. Now that he had a steady and sustainable amount of daily mana to draw upon from his current Altars, he began to invest in infrastructure. Narc's population woke up this morning to see him raise a Terraformer below his Idol and then expand the outer fortifications with Wolf House and Ice Barrier; a process he would likely repeat with Roynimalia in the near future.

These Miracles represented a significant investment—especially Terraformer, since it permanently diminished an Altar's mana production by 1—but the warmer climate and improved fortifications should draw in more people to the town and in turn increase mana production in the long-term. Settlers from Roynimalia were already moving to Narc through the teleportation network for work.

The grimoire's instructions on how to build magical vaults also offered Wepwawet a few opportunities for city development. Creating secure bunkers would provide emergency refuges, protected storage rooms, hidden labs, and escape tunnels in his settlements. The production cost was a bit too high to justify the investment for now, but Wepwawet looked forward to exploring this project once they had repelled the magmorians.

He had received disturbing reports on that front lately.

Wereling scouts and clerics under his employ kept a close watch on Citadel Sapphire from afar in order to predict troop movements, while itinerant merchants were paid to bring back whatever rumors they heard from Lavaland. All of them reported a disturbing build-up of troops there around Peridot's fortress. The sky had grown dark in the area from the accumulating smoke of campfires and burning forges.

Most worryingly, Wepwawet's scouts insisted more soldiers walked out of the fortress than people coming in.

The Citadel has to contain an Altar which Pele uses to summon troops from elsewhere in Lavaland, Wepwawet thought. This complicated his options to take the place by force should it be necessary, since the magmorians could easily resupply it. She must have heard word that I oversee Verglane by now and Miss Athena likely informed her I've been fighting Beelzebub on everyone's behalf, yet the troop buildup has only increased. She's either serious about conquering my civilization, or ready to use force and intimidation to extract concessions from me.

Wepwawet had asked Axomamma to organize a meeting between him and Pele as a neutral host if she could, but all hints he'd received so far pointed at a looming war with Lavaland.

The intel Wepwawet had gathered so far at least gave him a better understanding of the magmorians' social structure. They were an absolute monarchy led by Fire Sultan Onyx, who had ruled over Lavaland for over nine hundred years. In fact, the sultan was the only sovereign the country ever had—magmorians considered him the first of their kind, the primal ancestor that first arose from their holiest volcano's belly.

Fire Sultan Onyx did however have three daughters called Alexandrite, Bloodstone, and Topaz in order of birth. Wepwawet gathered that the eldest was a mage and their father's main advisor, the second a general in Lavaland's army, and the third the object of Jasper's affections, but little else. He did hear that the Fire Sultan had the equivalent of a prime minister called Grand Vizier Malachite negotiate a trade deal with Stalheim a few years back

Unfortunately, none of this gave him much understanding of Lavaland's political state. The magmorians only interacted with other races to sell or buy them things and otherwise stuck to themselves. Even their 'Eternal Flame' cult was almost completely insular with no worshiper beyond their kin.

If Fire Sultan Onyx has indeed ruled his people for almost a thousand years without opposition, then I should assume he has a near unbreakable grip on his nation, Wepwawet thought. There would be no political opposition to exploit. If I were Pele, I would have given him a divine mandate to rule in order to win his favor too. Mortals love those.

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The only people with the political clout to reason with Onyx would be his daughters, but would any of them be open to negotiation? And would Pele even listen?

"Your Majesty?" Wintresse's voice echoed in Wepwawet's mind in between two prayers. "Would you mind giving us a moment of your time?"

Wepwawet turned his attention to Wintresse, whom he located in Promesse's forge in the company of Lourson and Bernard. His three Champions had gathered a hefty pile of flying saucer parts there and managed to reassemble a primitive oven from them. He immediately manifested his spirit in the room.

"Thank you for visiting, Your Majesty," Wintresse said, welcoming him with a deep bow while Lourson and Bernard stuck to sharp nods. "We have good news to share with you."

"I don't doubt it, Wintresse." Wepwawet smiled at his Champions. "I am happy to see you are healing up well, Lourson."

"The day a bug puts me in the ground hasn't come up yet," Lourson replied, his throat sounding a bit sore. "Still coughing now and then though."

"I wish a nap would heal me up like it does with you werebears," Bernard said. "I can only enjoy those when His Glorious Majesty Insupportable is busy elsewhere."

"You don't have to call that pompous lizard by his full title when we're alone," Wepwawet reminded him.

"You are kind, Lord Wepwawet, but you underestimate my master's sharp hearing." Bernard shrugged. "Anyway, Lady Wintresse suggested we make a group report on the Lunarian threat."

"First of all, I have confirmed that this is indeed the same Blackstone material discovered in Mortis and Shadazar, which in turn led me to another discovery." Wintresse stroked her chin as she studied the pieces, her eyes gleaming with fascination. "My people always believed that this substance was a naturally occurring material, but the study of that flying machine would indicate that it is instead an artificial alloy. Some of its components are known to us; others, not so much."

"I have a theory about where those come from, albeit a wild one," Lourson said. "I would be tempted to discount it, but everything about this matter stretches disbelief already."

"What theory?" Wepwawet inquired.

Lourson cleared his throat. "That it comes from the moons, Lord Wepwawet."

The werebear probably expected his god to laugh at him, but Wepwawet gave it serious consideration. He had already suspected something like that based on the Grand-Loup murals, the fact Lunarians were aliens and, well, had lunar in their name. "What's your reasoning?"

"I've grown better at understanding metals since you blessed me yesterday, if that makes sense," Lourson replied. "The way the unknown ores reflect light is very similar to moonlight. I can't think of anything else that shines that way."

"It is indeed possible that these Lunarian creatures do come from the moons above our heads," Wepwawet said. "Life can exist on other worlds and environments far more threatening than Elphion."

"Is that so?" Wintresse asked. While Lourson and Bernard appeared a little spooked by the revelation, the changeling sounded more and more fascinated by it. "Then they sailed to this world on their flying machine?"

"It is too early for me to say," Wepwawet replied. "The Lunarians' vile masters have conspired to keep information on their servants hidden from me."

"The otherworldly hypothesis would line up with my autopsy of that Zelesto creature and its parasites," Bernard said. "Neither of their biology made much sense to me, or at least when compared to creatures inhabiting our land."

"Oh?" Wepwawet inquired. "What did you find?"

Bernard scratched the back of his head. "Well, first of all, the Lunarian creature doesn't need to breathe and its body can endure extreme temperatures. Its brain is easily detachable from the rest of the body–although what purpose that serves remains a mystery to me–and it constantly produces a magical 'wave' of some kind."

"Even now?" Lourson choked. "That thing is still alive?"

"No, it isn't," Wepwawet confirmed. Although he couldn't target Zelesto with his Mummy's Call by virtue of him having been a Commander in life, his Miracle did recognize him as a dead creature. "But we'll move the brain elsewhere in case its psychic magic may negatively affect any people nearby."

"My theory is that it's some sort of psychic distress call," Bernard explained. "I couldn't find any reproductive organs on the smaller parasites, so I'm pretty sure they're all sterile and that the Zelesto creature spawned them from a pair of sacks in its back. Its dead brain must be calling all survivors to come and protect its corpse in case they can salvage anything."

"You suggest that the parasites are extensions of a Lunarian rather than independent creatures?" Wintresse guessed.

Bernard nodded in agreement. "I think it behaves like a dragon."

"Ugh," Wepwawet complained. "Please no…"

"I swear, it'll make sense!" Bernard insisted. "See, a dragon is big and strong and wants to be fawned over, so it gathers a court of minions around itself to rule over. The difference is that a dragon symbiotically trades that service for protection from other threats—including from the dragon itself—while the Lunarian parasitically exploits their court by controlling their mind and offering nothing in return."

"So one species practices racketeering, and the other slavery?" Lourson asked with a deadpan look.

Bernard grit his teeth. "I don't like that phrasing."

"But that would be the correct one," Wintresse said with amusement. "Which begs the question, how would these Lunarians behave toward each other?"

"If they're anything like dragons, they would all live far apart from each other outside of families, since there are only so many minions to rule over in an area," Bernard explained. "They would only gather in large groups for rare events like mating seasons, bragging days, or migrations."

Wepwawet wasn't particularly looking forward to either events, though he did see the silver lining: Lunarians lived mostly solitary lives and rarely gathered in large groups. That would explain why Zelesto was the only Lunarian hibernating in the Sacred Source.

Of course, that was assuming Bernard's guesses were correct and that Beelzebub hadn't reorganized the species. Lunarians were at least smart enough to build advanced technology, so it would surprise Wepwawet if they lacked any way to communicate with each other over long distances.

"Did you identify any natural weaknesses we could exploit?" Wepwawet asked Bernard. "Besides a vulnerability to dragon stupidity?"

"None," Bernard replied with a shake of his head. "This creature's corpse is extraordinarily resilient."

"You can say that again," Lourson grunted while idly rubbing his throat. "The bug could hold its own even when we had it vastly outnumbered."

"I would assume others of his kind will be just as hardy and deadly," Bernard pointed out grimly. "Maybe even moreso."

"We couldn't figure out their technology either," Lourson said with a sigh. He sounded quite unhappy about their lack of progress. "The saucer's pieces were too damaged for us to gather much from the wreck, and we cannot produce more of this Blackstone alloy without the missing elements."

"It's fine," Wepwawet reassured him, having expected as much. Giving flying saucers to people whose greatest technological wonders were crossbows was always bound to yield minimal results. "What bothers me is that if this Blackstone alloy cannot occur naturally, then its presence in Mortis and Shadazar would suggest Lunarians have a foothold there."

"Your Majesty is wise," Wintresse flattered him. "I can assure you that I've never heard of any giant bugs lurking in either country, so if they are present there they are either extinct or in hiding."

Wepwawet, unfortunately, suspected the latter. A civilization's worth of Lunarians would imply a large number of them still remained active somewhere, and Zelesto had apparently hibernated in Promesse for centuries. He would need to warn whichever of his classmates ruled over the countries of Mortis and Shadazar of the threat.

"Gathering more information on the Lunarians is victory enough for now," Wepwawet said. "Is there anything we can do with those leftovers?"

"I can fashion good armor and weapons from Zelesto's corpse," Bernard said.

"We can reforge the Blackstone metal too," Lourson confirmed, much to his god's joy. "The alloy's melting point is much lower than steel and iron, and it's both surprisingly flexible and lightweight."

"Blackstone can conduct magic better than any other material I know of, especially psychic magic," Wintresse explained. "It would make an ideal component for wands and magical constructs."

"Such as a golem?" Wepwawet asked with immense interest.

"If Your Majesty can convince a few andvari magengineers to assemble them," Wintresse replied with a chuckle. "May I suggest kidnapping one's family to force them into cooperation?"

Wepwawet immediately shot the idea down. Besides the idea's ruthlessness, it would violate his treaty with Axomamma. "We have enough issues with Lavaland to bring Stalheim into the mix."

"A shame." Wintresse's eyes flickered with ambition. "In that case… how would Your Majesty feel about magical artillery?"

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