235 Chapter Two Hundred and Thirty-Five – Gather ‘round, Brothers... (1/2)
”How long until we find out the results of the auction?” Wayfair asked me quietly.
I had to roll my eyes. ”We're in a time-acceleration zone, and it's going to take at least three real days to set the auction up. So, not until we are out of here.” I gripped my fists despite myself. ”So unfair!” I hissed.
”I know, right?” she giggled, and we hee-hee-hee'd all the way to the bank whose gold coins were dancing in our heads. After all, after working with us the grand sum of less than ten days, Wayfair knew how grossly under-Geared she was, and was in serious need of some supplementary accoutrements... preferably at exorbitantly high QL's and fashionably done, of course.
Wardrobe was not one of them. She had a different outfit for every single dead Mu illusion she poised in front of, and they all answered to different adjectives. Serene, sexy, dazzling, delightful, enigmatic, regal, kinky, alluring, charming, pure, daring, innocent, formal, mesmerizing, stylish... she pulled every look you could imagine off perfectly and without a hitch. I had great fun just matching her hair styles!
Her voice could sell air conditioning atop a glacier. I almost felt bad for the bidders who were going to eat it all up, and then have almost no time to capitalize on their acquisitions. Almost. There were going to be a lot of unsavory characters bidding on Mu Goo...
There were going to be five different auctions, starting in Ogredown, and going to each of the capital cities, ending in Zynozure itself. We'd separate the Mu goo into five age categories, which would indicate its QL, quantities of 1000/500/100/50/20 gallons at the outlier March capitals, and double that in Zynozure itself.
Based on what we understood, the day after the last auction, everything was going to go to shit, so getting as much money out of the cities as possible was kind of urgent.
All of the Mu Goo was good to 40 QL. The older stuff ranged all the way up to 55, truly ancient shit. The money would be rolling in.
Hee hee hee!...
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Yes! On to Imperial Zone #1!!!...
”Well, isn't that an interesting place.”
It was horrible what they could do given the literally hundred thousand years or whatever they had to work on this project.
The last zone was basically a city that filled out the whole place, interspersed with park-farms and some basic ranching areas. Elves as a whole subsisted to a degree on magic, so they didn't have the same dietary needs as humans and stuff, but what was basically confronting us was bloody rings of walls every thirty miles, and whole cities of drow spaced in between.
The central thirty square miles about the key Obelisk were a freaking fortress... or pleasure palace, take your pick. The population of shroom-bombed drow numbered in the tens of millions.
There was no way I could take my company in there. Just on numbers alone, they'd be overwhelmed, and base Drow were Casters, just like elves. When ten thousand Casters toss a spell at you, you are going down, even if they are all Two's.
Which wasn't an issue, when we breached the Zone, and some fine Brothers were waiting for us there.
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There were probably a lot of things out there that would have paid a hellacious price if they could pop a nuke on this place. The whole array of Void Brothers for the continent, all in one spot. All the assassins would have fanboy-sighed and fallen over in joy.
Wayfair certainly found all of them interesting... and carefully acknowledged how dangerous they all were. High charisma and charm or no, she'd be dead in seconds if there was combat, and she knew it.
I looked them all over, noting that they looked more travel-worn and battle-hardened then before, and definitely needed a new change of clothes.
And to their utter shock, I did indeed pull out new clothes for them all. Like I wouldn't be thinking about them after they spent three years doing some power-leveling?
Despite themselves and their urgent, priority, must-do mission mentality, they found a creek mostly free of rotting 'shrooms, took a bath, and put on their new threads with some relief. They looked pretty spiffy, as even if they were done in shades that would disappear in shadow, they still reflected the colors of their Helices here and there.
Black predominated, of course. They were still shadow hunters, not tanks. Although there'd be a lot of both going on shortly.
The fact was, we could leave the zone and the natives... probably could not? Weren't sure on that. There was a road, so there was some kind of trade, but it was probably controlled by the Hags. Open up the border, hack down a bunch of 'shrooms to feed the millions, send it back up. The 'shrooms were a lot shorter here close to the border...
But there was indeed no way we could bring the main force all the way in. They'd be crushed under weight of numbers.
That wasn't true for the Brothers, Briggs, and I. My Ironblood Forsaken were needed to provide cover for the rest of the company from magic, so they needed to stay behind, too.
We couldn't disguise the fact that we were coming, because we had this huge spike in the sky broadcasting the fact, and we'd be driving it towards the Obelisk like God's Own Nail of Reality come a-calling and saying that it didn't much like what was going on.