The Storm King-Chapter 1071 - Rising Readiness

Silence. Despite being separated from the Void only by relatively thin armor plating, all Leon could hear was silence. Given the stresses of the Void, it spoke to his Kingdom’s fine degree of manufacturing that his new Ulta suit didn’t so much as creak once.

“How are we doing, Siddi?” Leon asked aloud. His head was pressed against the cloud glass, but he simply found it easier to ask his giant companion questions aloud.

The projected figure of gray smoke answered, “All systems are normal, Divine One.”

Leon nodded in satisfaction. He took a long moment to gaze at the scene in front of him with both the Ulta suit’s suite of sensor enchantments and the suit’s interior projections.

All around him were hundreds of arks and Ulta suits. Two carriers, three heavy cruisers, six frigates, and three destroyers circled him at varying distances, along with all seventy-two fighters and sixteen transports from the carriers, and more than two hundred Ulta suits. Each of those suits were only about half as large as Leon’s, but their numbers were incredible.

All-in-all, this amount of force represented about half of the planned expedition’s forces, and with the date of their departure closing in, Leon and the Jaguar had started drilling them relentlessly. They wanted the crews to be as familiar with their new kit and responsibilities as possible. Accordingly, Bolt in Shadow hovered nearby, though it wasn’t going to participate in any of these exercises. Leon was originally going to use his Clan’s ancient heavy cruiser as his platform for monitoring the exercises, but decided that he wanted a closer viewpoint, and decided to kill two birds with one stone and practice his skills with his new Ulta suit while he was at it.

The arks and suits of his people flew around, firing their weapons at certain targets, and performing various feats of maneuvering and logistics, including ‘rescuing’ several pilots and other crew from certain arks and suits that were ‘killed’ during the exercises.

These weren’t the first exercises that his people had held, and it was evident from the confidence they piloted their machines that they were growing more and more used to their new kit. Leon felt no small amount of pride in watching them complete their training objectives.

While he observed, he said, “Say, Siddi, while we’re here on our own… Mind dropping the ‘Divine One’ stuff?”

“How exactly would I drop it, Divine One?” she asked. “I’m not holding anything.”

“That’s not what I meant—I’d really prefer it if you just used my name when we’re not in public, you know?”

“Rakos was clear when assigning me this position that I was to offer you nothing but the highest honor, Divine One,” Siddi smoothly responded. “Such an order from our Chief wasn’t needed; I would’ve done so anyway.”

For the most part, Siddi spoke in a professionally detached manner, never allowing too much emotion to enter her voice. However, in this statement, Leon heard a distinct hint of pride. Though Siddi didn’t have a face capable of it, she sounded like she was smiling.

“Well, I like a little more informality when out of the public eye,” Leon responded. “You don’t have to worry about being ‘respectful’ when I’m the one asking you to do it.”

Siddi was silent for several seconds, then hesitantly agreed, “Very well… Leon…”

Leon grinned. “Thank you.” He watched the training exercises for a few more seconds before a thoughtful look crossed his face. “Just now, something you said made me a little curious. Mind if I ask you a few questions?”

“You may ask me anything, Div—Leon.”

Leon softly chuckled. “You say that now, but it’s fine not to answer if you don’t want to.”

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“My people have nothing to hide from our creators.”

A quiet sigh escaped Leon’s lips and he decided not to keep harping on that point.

“Very well. How long have you been around, Siddi?”

“One hundred and thirteen years, Leon,” she answered without hesitation.

“So you joined me during the migration from the Border Mountains?”

“Yes.”

“Thanks for coming so far with me. I’m certainly looking forward to working together.”

“You honor me, Di—Leon. To serve you in this capacity is the greatest joy I can find in life.”

“Is it…?” Leon wondered aloud. “What did you do before this?”

“I was given a combat form to pilot,” she answered.

Leon nodded, his eyes quickly locating a few giants out in the Void, their bodies gleaming in the light of the sun. Those built of steel were combat forms and were almost indistinguishable from the Ulta suits. There were several more bronze giants, but they stuck close to the larger arks as they were tasked with any maintenance on the exterior of the arks since their bodies were immune to the ravages of the Void.

“If you had to take control over this suit, could you do it?” Leon asked. “And if you could, are you confident that you could perform well in it?”

Again, Siddi’s voice was audibly tinged with pride. “I am undefeated in training fights, and ranked highest among my peers when competing for placement in Ulta suits. Before the migrations, I was a hunter, tasked with protecting the Crater Tribe from any potential threats coming from the mountains. I am confident in my skills to fulfill any task put before me.”

“Congratulations,” Leon replied. “That certainly boosts my confidence in here with someone of such skill helping me out.” He paused a moment to let his magic senses sweep over his forces outside and, satisfied with how they were performing, asked, “What’s it like living in the Border Mountains? I confess that I’m rather less familiar with your people than I’d prefer…”

“In the mountains we were born, and it is where we are most comfortable,” Siddi answered. “Though we now have new bodies granted to us by our creators, we are at ease knowing that we can return to stone if we must.”

Leon nodded in understanding. “Hopefully that won’t ever be necessary. How do you like your new home? How does it compare to the Crater?”

“I am happy to serve my creators,” Siddi calmly answered.

“Not what I asked,” Leon replied as he shifted his gaze to the cloudy projection of Siddi above his left armrest. “Is everything there to your satisfaction?”

“I am without want, Divine One,” Siddi immediately replied. “I deeply apologize if I offended you!”

“It’s fine, we’re just having a chat. If you don’t want to answer something, I won’t force you to. But if you have some problem with your new home, then I’d like the opportunity to fix it.”

Siddi’s projection flickered for a moment, and she replied in her usual calm and professional tone, “We have no complaints, Divine One. We have been welcomed into your Kingdom with graciousness we have never expected from humans. To not only be welcomed so, but to fulfill our purpose and serve our creators, my people would accept any living conditions offered. We are supremely grateful that we have been given so much.”

“That’s great that your people as a whole are happy. But what about you? How do you like the state of things?” Leon leaned a little closer to Siddi’s projection, her evasiveness elevating what had been a casual question into one he was much more invested in having answered.

Siddi’s projection flickered several more times. “I… am happy, Divine One. I could not ask for a better place for my people to live. But… even as long as we have lived there, it has yet to become ‘home’.”

Leon sighed again as he leaned back in his seat. “I get that. Nothing can ever compare to where we grew up, can it?”

“I first became aware in the Crater,” Siddi quietly stated. “I thought that I would die there, and my stone would be passed on to another newborn giant. Much has changed, and all for the better… but sometimes I think of the Crater, and I wish I could return.”

“Next time I visit, I’ll be sure to stop in the Border Mountains,” Leon said. The unspoken part burned in his throat until he added, “Though, I do not know when that might be.”

“I wish only to serve you in whatever capacity you would demand, Divine One,” Siddi hurriedly said. “Please pay no mind to my ramblings, my desires are impractical and of no use to anyone.”

Leon chuckled. “I’ll keep it in mind. It’s good to hear that you have desires, though; I have to admit that your people tend to become rigidly formal around me, offering me nothing but your service. It’s rare that any of you admit to even having desires.”

“We wish to fulfill our original purpose,” Siddi explained. “When presented with the opportunity to do so, we take it.”

“It’s fine to want other things, too,” Leon offered. “We are all alive, aren’t we? And we all want a better life for ourselves and our kith and kin.”

He knew that giants had much looser family structures than humans did. Four giants were needed to create a new giant, and knowledge was passed on during the creation process, so giants didn’t have a ‘childhood’. Newborn giants were still ‘raised’ communally until they were assigned to various tasks based on their aptitude. Given their descent from working golems, Leon could understand why their society was the way it was. However, for all that utilitarianism and strict hierarchy, he knew that the giants formed close friendships and bonded with those giants they were ‘raised’ with, and those that they worked with. They were born of automata that dispassionately went about their assigned tasks, but they were more than that now.

“In serving our creators, we elevate ourselves,” Siddi stated.

Leon sighed once more, this time without much enthusiasm. He didn’t think it was the time to start speaking with Siddi about this yet, but he had a quiet fear that the giants might lose that spark of life if they devoted themselves too completely to him and his Clan. The last thing he wanted for them was to revert to mindless wisps, incapable of anything more than what they were designed for.

He hoped that by speaking more with Siddi, he might be able to form a bond with her akin to that she might form with another giant. If they did, then he might be able to open her mind a bit to the joys of life outside of blind devotion to his Clan.

While it was hardly beneficial to his Clan to encourage such autonomy amongst the giants, he considered them alive, and he wanted them to remain so.

Besides, he doubted he’d get half as much utility from them as he might if they reverted to mere wisps.

For the moment, he let the conversation lapse as he focused again on the training exercise. However, he silently promised himself to take the suit out for practice more often, if only to chat more with Siddi.

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“None will be able to stand against us!” Nikolaos boasted as the report for the training mission was given. “With the power given to us by our rightful King, the Thunder Kingdom will be invincible!”

“Careful old man,” Makar, a ninth-tier Ji Spider cautioned with a grin that didn’t quite reach his eyes spread across his pale face. “No one’s invincible.”

Nikolaos glared at the Spider, but before he could say anything, Leon lightly rapped his knuckles against the table. He stared at Nikolaos and Makar for a long few seconds, then cast his gaze around the room. Dozens of the most powerful elders from every Tribe in his Kingdom were present to hear of the training mission, along with several high-ranking officers in his central army, and a number of bureaucrats who were important to his logistics chain. All of them were indispensable to the upcoming expedition, though in the elders’ case, they were mostly going to be left behind to keep the peace in the Kingdom while Leon was gone. In that respect, hearing of the power of his new arks served not only as a confidence booster for his people, but also as a subtle warning about what might happen if peace were not kept in his absence.

“It’s good for everyone to be reminded on occasion that we are not invincible,” he stated. “Especially since we’re bound for the Nexus. Who knows what kind of threats we may face up there? We are going to have to be at the top of our game if we want to compete against more established powers. And if the expedition fails, then we have to be ready to fall back to Aeterna so that we may try again.”

Nikolaos bowed his head slightly. Leon appreciated the old Jaguar’s enthusiasm, but the threats of the Nexus were great, and for all his own power, for all the reasons he had to get to the Nexus as quickly as possible, he wanted this done right. If it wasn’t, then even with contingency plans in place, he may not get a second chance.

As silence fell upon the room, Leon nodded to Lana, who was conducting the report. The newly-ascended eighth-tier Bison gave voice to the conclusion that Leon and his top brass had come to when they’d gone over the report themselves only a few hours ago.

“Though we’re still waiting on the city ark, one carrier, two destroyers, and three cruisers to be completed, it’s our belief that we’ll achieve our desired readiness to launch the expedition in two months’ time. Our crews have trained to proficiency, the giants and our King’s wisps have integrated well into our forces, and all of our new arks are performing above expectations.”

Whispers broke out amongst the listening elders. They still had three months to go until reaching Leon’s deadline, so they were a month ahead of schedule. Leon felt many eyes flit to him as the murmuring began to intensify.

To head off any questions, Leon suppressed his desire to leave right there and then and announced, “Though that’s ahead of schedule, I don’t plan on moving the schedule up. Given the stakes involved, I want this done right. We’re going to take that extra month to make sure that we have everything in order.”

He paused to let the elders chat a little bit more. Then, he pushed himself to his feet, and the room fell silent.

“I’m not one for grand speeches, you all know that,” he said with a self-deprecating smile. There were a few polite laughs, but he didn’t give them much time to echo amongst the relatively small crowd. “I would be remiss,” he continued, “if I didn’t state how proud I am of everyone here, of the people involved in this endeavor, and all of our efforts that have brought us this far. Let what we have achieved in less than a century stand as a testament to what we can do when we are united, when all of us here under the aegis of the Thunder Kingdom move toward a single purpose!

“The Nexus, which once seemed so far away, is now within reach!”

This time, Leon took the opportunity to pause and let the elders cheer. Since they were cheering on not just his accomplishments but their own too, the cheering was loud and enthusiastic.

Still, everyone quieted down when he raised his hand, wordlessly demanding silence.

“More than that,” he pressed on, “the homes of our Ancestors are closer than they’ve been in eighty-thousand years! Though our expedition will take us to the Nexus, the city we build there will be but a stepping stone to greater heights! From the Nexus we will stretch across the universe and return to the planes from whence our Honored Ancestors came from! We return our people first to the Nexus, and then we go home! Our true home, where the bones of our Ancestor lie in wait!”

That was where he decided to end his little speech, but from the way the elders roared and stomped their feet, he felt he’d achieved the desired effect—especially amongst the more battle-hungry or traditional Tribes, like the Lions and Jaguars, respectively. Still, even the normally reserved Harts and the generally less-enthusiastic Spiders joined in to the point that even with the heavy wards of his palace, Leon thought the entire city might hear them.

It took some time for calm to return to the room, and when it did, Leon returned to his seat.

“The Elder Council will be called in three months,” he declared. “Then, we will feast! We will celebrate! And then we will launch this expedition!”