Chapter 227: The Undercurrents of the Alliance
"The God of Skewers... are you fucking kidding me!?" I say as I instantly try to Inspect the old man, only to fail.
"That explains why I couldn't see anything about him. And I must say, I'm both surprised and not that no one knew about this," Aurelia says.
"What do you mean?" Wanjing asks.
"It's... strange... that... someone... so strong... can go... unnoticed... but who... would normally... try to... find out... the identity... of an... old man... who runs... a food stand..." Hakase says.
"It's not like no one knows my identity, the Governor of Draelgium is informed as well as the other leaders of the Alliance. They just choose not to spread it, I've never asked them not to do so but it doesn't matter, but sometimes I do wonder why they don't," the God of Skewers says.
If I had to guess it was probably because no one wants to poke the foot of a God, but I won't say anything.
"Now move along, I've got other customers to serve," the God of Skewers says, shooing us away as the line for his stand fills up once more.
Taking a seat on a nearby bench to finish the last of the skewers, Wanjing asks, "so is that guy really a God? He said he'd been to Shengdi and he even spoke our language, but he doesn't really feel very impressive."
"Compared to when we met Serabane back in Zhongyang, who was radiating energy nonstop, he felt like a regular person. If what he says is true then he must have some impressive skills in regards to concealing his strength," Gyosu says.
"It probably is, the biggest give away in my eyes is the inability to Inspect him. Here we have a common skill called Inspect, which allows us to see a bit of their status. This can fail if the person we are trying to look at is much stronger than us or if the skill level is too low, but another reason for failing is when trying to view the status of a higher power," Lia explains.
"It's one of the most useful and essential skills around, I was actually quite surprised when I found out that the skill is unknown in Shengdi. We can teach it to you three as we did for Wanjing a while back, but it will have to wait, we have a guest approaching," Aurelia says, turning her attention to the side.
Following her gaze, I see Milla walking towards us with a couple of her personal guards. She isn't in her usual roguish outfit and is instead wearing more formal clothing. Brightly coloured ceremonial robes, resembling what the other nomadic Dragonoids wear, but with a much higher standard of quality.
"I should have known better than to wait around in my room and should have just come straight to the old man's stand. Figures you would come here first," Milla says as she walks over to us.
"Who's she? She kinda reminds me of the Imperial Family of Shenzhou, in both physical appearance and choice of clothing, although slightly different in both aspects," Wanjing asks.
"So do you intend to explain who these foreigners are and introduce us?" Milla asks.
Although they can't understand what the other is saying, they're surprisingly in synch.
"These four are from Shengdi, that one's my pet-- I mean student, Wanjing, and the others are uhh, researchers and inventors, I think that's the best way to describe them. The tall albino is Hakase, the other woman is Boshi, and the guy is Gyosu," I say.
Then turning to Wanjing and the others I say, "this is Milla, she likes to boss people around."
"Will you do a proper introduction or should I translate what you just said to Milla," Aurelia says, whispering near my ear.
"I was just joking, don't think too hard over what I just said. Milla is one of the Alliance leaders and head of the Dragonoids, she's also a gang leader like Yue," I say.
"To be more precise, her title is Khatun and her social standing is about the same as the Imperial Families of Shengdi," Lia says.
"I feel like Cordelia was doing typical Cordelia things, but that's not important right now. Come with me to my hotel room at the Golden Palace, we have things to discuss beyond your little adventure," Milla says, turning around to bring us to the Golden Palace.
We have a few questions to ask regarding the current situation and Milla also has her own questions to ask us, but she says to wait until we reach the hotel room because she doesn't want anyone to eavesdrop on the conversation as many details haven't been publicly announced yet.
Before long we arrive at Milla's room and Aurelia secures the place with here barriers to prevent anyone from beyond from listening in. We all take a seat as Milla gives us an overview of the current situation while Lia acts as a translator for the four from Shengdi while also giving them a little more context for Milla's explanations.
The basic rundown can be separated into three sections. The first being the initial reason Milla wanted us to hurry back, being the rising internal tensions within the Alliance between the Dragonoids and the Elves. Although it's unclear as to what they're doing, people living near the border with them have gone missing and it has been some hints of a possible conflict with the Elves.
The second section is being the mysterious bar on the status. Its sudden appearance has caused some unrest, but for most people, it's just a minor thing, although there have been some doomsday conspiracy theories. While most people aren't buying into the conspiracy theories, the leaders are still a little worried about what the bar's significance is, especially now that it's reached 90%.
But neither of these two is enough to cause an emergency meeting of the Alliance leaders. The main reason for this is the incredibly high possibility of war with the Grand Duchy of Argos, no, it's the Empire of Argos now. The Grand Duchy had been showing its imperialistic tendencies for a while now, and with its recent subjugation of its former neighbours, it has sent out an official declaration to the world announcing its new name, the Empire of Argos. And now, the Alliance is its new neighbour.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
Akkre_Kojuuin
Akkre_Kojuuin I'm back, although my arm is still having a few difficulties, I can do much more than I could a few days ago. But I'm still not supposed to do too much with it. And thanks for all the kind words in the now deleted announcement chapter regarding my injury. Anyways, we should be back on schedule for now with only a handful of chapters left before we're done so I'll give a bit of insight into my plans and reasoning.
So why am I choosing to end the story here to continue it in another book? Because I want to rework the system and I want to focus on writing Eternal Universe Online. And since the two stories now take place in literally the same universe, I thought of some ways for them to intertwine. But one of the big reasons is because I want to actually put some thought into what's coming next. This story has been a rollercoaster of random ideas, if I thought of something mildly interesting, I shoved it into the story and I only ever had a vague idea of an ending without the slightest idea of what to actually do to get there. I mean there will definitely be more random ideas in the future, but I want to tone it down and have an actual plan.
Have a nice day everyone.
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