The Zombie Knight

Chapter Two Hundred Nine: 'O, expanding venture...!'

The next three weeks were blessedly peaceful. Busy, perhaps, but peaceful. Hector became more accustomed to his routine as Lord of Warrenhold, and remarkably, many of his worries seemed to be lessening--if only a little.

By all accounts, Leo appeared to be quite comfortable in his new role. Roman and a couple others had volunteered to work with Leo temporarily to help him get acclimated, and incredibly, the plan to gain informants around Gray Rock was already bearing fruit. Hector was starting to receive miscellaneous reports about various things happening around the city. They weren't especially helpful yet, mostly just mundane rumors, but it was something.

Ericoros had thus far proved completely uncooperative. The reaper hadn't said a single word to Hector at all, although he'd apparently spoken briefly to Melchor when it was the man's turn to hold onto him. Ericoros had asked Melchor about Hector, wanting to know why someone as famous as Darktide was following him.

And Darktide, team player that he was, had apparently talked Hector up as being some kind of great man, worthy of trust and respect.

When Garovel had privately relayed that information to him, Hector felt more uncertain than ever about this whole thing. Getting Melchor to lie for him like that was absolutely ridiculous, but considering how deep into this they were now, what other option was there?

Regardless, Hector had a feeling that it was going to take some time to get Ericoros talking. He just wondered how long. Given the longevity of reapers, this shit could take years.

But oh well. There was no rushing something like this. For now, all they could do was try to show Ericoros the kind of people they were and what kind of operation they were running.

At this rate, though, they would soon need to come up with a more long-term solution for the reaper's captivity. They couldn't just keep handing him off between servants forever. Trapping Ericoros in a soul-empowered box seemed rather inhumane and counterproductive to the task of trying to win him over, but it might be necessary.

A few of the Rainlords had suggested that they shift some of the reconstruction effort to building a prison that could hold reapers, and Hector was considering it. Even if they didn't intend to use it for Ericoros, such a facility could certainly prove useful in the future.

In fact, he was a bit surprised that Warrenhold didn't already possess such a place, but after consulting Garovel and Voreese about it, he learned that it used to.

According to Voreese, the half-destroyed Star Tower was where the prison had been located.

Which brought up all sorts of questions to Hector's mind regarding Warrenhold's history. Was it merely a coincidence that, of all eight towers, the one with the prison in it had been the only one to incur such heavy damage? When had that tower been destroyed? And who had caused it?

Voreese didn't have any answers for him, unfortunately. She may have been the reaper of the original builder of Warrenhold, but until recently, she hadn't even visited in over a thousand years.

The reconstruction effort overall was progressing in new directions as well. After completing work on the Entry Tower and moving most of their attention to the Bell Tower, some of the Rainlords began expressing an interest in the problematic lake that sat below Warrenhold. Specifically, they wanted to start draining it so that they could get a better look at the ancient buildings therein.

Hector was more than happy to give his approval, but it apparently wasn't going to be a quick process. There was simply too much water down there and too few people to work on it. Theoretically, a materialization user could just push the water up and out with gigantic buckets, but where were they supposed to move all that water? The surface? That was a hell of a climb up the cave's winding staircase--and then also through the Entry Tower's dozens of flights of stairs as well.

And if they tried to cut corners or get reckless with their handling of so much water in one trip, then there was a very good chance that it would spill and flood Warrenhold itself. There were far too many non-servants around to risk something like that.

Instead, they'd decided that the better location to deposit all the water was the underground river. They still had to trek up those winding stairs, but rather than going through the Entry Tower, they had to go through the bathhouses and into a long tunnel that eventually led out to the waterfall--the same one that could be faintly heard from Warrenhold's main plaza.

It was still a considerable distance to transport so much water, so they considered rigging up a high-powered pumping system in order to at least automate the process, but in the end, they figured acquiring all the parts for a large enough contraption of that kind would be a needless expense. They resorted to simply using a materializer for the pumping job instead, and occasionally, that materializer was Hector.

He created a long iron tube and snaked it all the way up the side of the cave, through the bathhouse doors, and down the tunnel to the waterfall. He would capture the lake water at the opening of the tube and then push it all the way to exit with a moving inner wall of iron.

It wasn't terribly difficult, but Hector still found it to be a somewhat interesting form of training--both because of the sheer volume of iron and water involved and because so much of his work had to be done without visual reference. He had to rely almost entirely on his imagination. Moreover, the total travel distance of the tube was greater than his sphere of influence with materialization, so he had to keep walking back and forth as well.

Tedious was certainly one word for it, though.

It no doubt would've been much faster to drill down below the lake and simply let the water drain out on its own, but the big concern there was that, with so much water in need of removal, the amount of drilling required would be too dangerous. The structural stability of the cave itself might become compromised--not to mention the possibility of encountering volcanic gases. Reapers could phase through the rock and locate lava, since it emitted light, but gases remained invisible to them.

It was a shame, too, because one or two destruction users probably could've taken care of that job in a few days.

This did, however, get Hector thinking about the local environment a bit more. He was starting to wonder if he should try to recruit a geologist. Maybe not right now but eventually, perhaps.

On the subject of recruitment, however, one other person had recently gained Hector's attention: a woman named Madison Reach.

Roman had of course told him about Madison's circumstances already, about how she was in hiding from a group called "Andalero," but Hector hadn't really spared it much thought. As far as he was concerned, she fit right in with all these fugitive Rainlords, and if Roman wanted her to be protected, then Hector was more than happy to have her stay here.

It was only very recently, however, that she had introduced herself to Hector directly.

And boy, could that woman talk.

She was quite nice as well, expressing her gratitude for her accommodations repeatedly and enthusiastically. But she also had some suggestions, apparently, regarding the overall decor of Warrenhold. She even went so far as to ask if she might be granted some funding in order to help pursue her passion for interior design.

Hector had been at a loss for what to say to that.

"I'm thinking some nice rugs would go a long way to making a lot of these rooms more welcoming and, just, 'homely,' y'know? And goddess knows this place could do with a bit more light. I'm thinking some lamps to hang along the top of each tower. Help brighten up the ceiling in particular, which I think will improve the already-gorgeous view from the main plaza. Oh, maybe some nice banners to drape down the side of each tower would be good, too, but I imagine you would want those to be custom made, eh? Do you have an insignia or crest? I could look into--"

And she had just kept going. If not for the Lord Dimas Sebolt's timely arrival, Hector wasn't sure what would have happened.

"Perhaps you should give him some time to think about your proposals," Dimas had said.

"Oh! Um, sure!" Her eyes had seemed to light up even more when she'd noticed Dimas there. "You're probably right! I'll do that! And you'll keep me company while I await his response, won't you?"

"...Not the entire time, but yes. I would be happy to."

And the way she had wrapped herself around Dimas' arm--that was perhaps the most surprising thing Hector had seen in a while.

The relationship between those two had quickly become a popular subject of discussion around Warrenhld. According to Garovel, they were quite the passionate couple--to the shock of basically everyone who knew Dimas. "Passionate" was one word that Hector did not think of when trying to describe that man.

Reportedly, most of the "passion" seemed to be originating from Madison's end, but the fact that Dimas never rebuffed her open displays of affection was still a bombshell in its own right to the other Rainlords.

Diego Redwater appeared to be taking this development especially hard, though Hector wasn't entirely sure why.

Hector kind of wanted to ask Dimas about the whole thing directly, but he didn't really have the time, and it seemed a bit rude, besides.

On the matter of treasure hunting, there had also been considerable progress. Three teams had been formed and deployed to different locations across the world. As the head Rainlords had discussed, they each consisted of servants with little or no renown, and three support teams had also been formed to help them, consisting entirely of non-servants who were multilingual and knowledgeable in both telecommunications and cartography.

Roman had been generous enough to provide transportation and false documentation for all of them, but they were still expected to operate stealthily whenever feasible.

Despite the whole thing being his and Garovel's idea, Hector had been rather nervous about sending them all out on their own like that, but after speaking with the chosen team members and getting to know them a little better, his concerns abated somewhat. They all understood their objectives and were taking their roles very seriously--as one might expect from Rainlords.

Thus far, none of the teams had reported back with especially good news, but with only the general location and artifact description to go on, it was expected that these missions would take quite a long time to find anything--assuming there even was anything left to be found. Hector just hoped that Emiliana's intel was solid.

All of those developments, however, paled in comparison to what happened with the banking project during these three weeks. The final name of it was the Darksteel National Bank, and it was now officially open for business.

That first week of operation had been especially insane.

As the Madame Carthrace had predicted, new customers came pouring in. Much of it could be handled online, but they'd also leased an office building in downtown Gray Rock specifically for the purpose of receiving new customers. And every time Hector visited that place, it was absolutely packed with people, oftentimes with waiting lines that extended all the way out the door and around the corner of the building.

His appearances there always turned into a bit of a circus as well, since basically everyone in the country knew his face at this point. All the attention was certainly overwhelming and uncomfortable, but he found himself being less concerned about his own feelings and more so about all the people waiting in line. According to the news, many of them didn't even leave once the Bank closed. They simply camped out overnight, waiting for the doors to reopen.

They ended up renting another building a few blocks away to help alleviate the problem, but it still persisted--now in two locations instead of one. Amelia was now considering upgrading the second building from a rent to a lease. As Hector understood it, a lease here in Atreya required at least a three-year commitment, which was why she was reluctant to go through with it. This initial surge of customers was obviously not going to last for three years, and Amelia was doubtful that they would need two buildings in such close proximity to one another.

But then again, people were traveling to Gray Rock from all over Atreya just to open an account at the Darksteel National Bank, so maybe it would be worth it. Or maybe they needed to open a branch in another city.

It was all a bit too complicated for Hector's inexperienced mind, and he was glad to have the Madame Carthrace in his corner.

Overall, things were looking up, but funding for the Bank was still a concern. It would take time to process all of the new customers and begin earning revenue from them. Hector fully intended to reinvest everything back into the Bank itself in order to keep growing operations, but in the meantime, he wanted to do everything he could to secure more immediate funding as well.

Which was where the other Atreyan lords came in. Prior to the Bank's official opening, he had already completed all of the postponed Gala meetings, so now he was working on an entirely fresh batch of lordly meetings.

Some meetings, he pursued himself--at the recommendation of his newly-formed Board of Advisors, which currently included Amelia and everyone whom she had handpicked. Now that the Bank was officially operating and getting tons of free publicity on the news, their hope with this new round of meetings was to appeal to the other Atreyan lords as potential investors.

And it was still very early to be getting too optimistic, but the Board seemed to be in good spirits. The more reserve funding the Bank had at its disposal, the more new customers they could accept. As Hector understood it, according to state regulations, any new bank had to possess enough reserve funding to cover the potential loss of every single customer's assets--up to two hundred thousand troa each.

Therefore, taking on too many customers too quickly was tantamount to fraud--which would probably cause the Bank to collapse before it even got off the ground. These regulations would only begin to relax if the Bank continued to operate for several years with consistently proven "solvency"--meaning, never failing to repay its debts or meet its other financial obligations.

That was part of the reason why they were having to put so many applicants on a waiting list. So every time Hector was able to secure new investment from a fellow lord, that waiting list could have a huge chunk removed from it.

And besides all that, it was just good to have more domestic investors. The whole point of the Bank was to prevent foreign influence from taking over the nation, so any help that Hector could get from fellow Atreyans was a step closer to that goal.

For their part, though, the other lords often seemed a bit uncomfortable with the whole thing--in some cases, even when they agreed to invest millions of troa.

Hector couldn't be entirely certain what the source of their collective discomfort was, especially with how guarded many of them were in his presence, but he could imagine why they might be feeling a bit trapped by him.

With the current state of the economy and the very public commotion that the Bank was stirring up, there seemed to be a fast-growing cultural sentiment that helping Darksteel National Bank meant helping Atreya itself--and by logical extension, not helping Darksteel National Bank meant borderline treason. If the public found out about a lord's refusal to invest any troa at all, it wouldn't look good for them.

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Hector felt kinda bad about that development. He hadn't intended to bully anyone into joining hands with him, but with the way some of these meetings went, it sometimes felt like that.

He didn't want to apologize unnecessarily, though. The purpose of the Bank really was to help Atreya, after all. It wasn't like he'd done anything wrong. And hopefully, all these lords would eventually be seeing huge returns on their investments.

On a more pleasant note, however, the Bank was also getting quite a few offers of investment on its own, without Hector having to go and meet with anyone personally. Business owners and lesser-known lords were apparently calling in every day, asking to get in on the action.

It was all just so very, very strange.

A few months ago, Hector would never have imagined that he might become a banker, of all things. And at the age of seventeen, too? What the hell kind of life was he living, exactly?

Hector had no idea what the future had in store for him, but in the back of his mind, he was immensely disturbed by the current level of comfort that he was enjoying. He was able to eat quite luxurious meals every day thanks to the passionate Rainlord chefs, and the supply team was able to get its hands on increasingly higher quality goods for everyone.

Technically, the job of managing supplies belonged to the castle's "steward," which was the official title of Amelia Carthrace, but as she was often busy managing financial and legal matters with the Bank, the task of overseeing the supply team had largely fallen upon her recently-appointed secretary, a bespectacled Atreyan woman with dark hair and a face that fit in quite well with all these stern Rainlords around.

Her name was Mara Rogers, and while Hector hadn't interacted with her directly very much yet, he saw her around quite frequently. She only looked to be in her mid-twenties, but she didn't seem to be struggling much with her position, which he found impressive, considering she was basically managing the entirety of Warrenhold's day-to-day operations now.

So when a knock arrived at his door as he was preparing for bed after another long day, he couldn't be all that surprised when it turned out to be her.

"Lord?" came Mara's voice from beyond the door. "I know the hour is late, but might I have a few minutes of your time?"

Hector, already in his pajamas, looked at Garovel hovering there next to him.

'Well? Invite the lady in. I can't do it.'

Hector's expression flattened. Sometimes, he wondered why he bothered consulting the reaper at all. "...Sure. Come in."

She entered, still sharply dressed as usual and carrying a pen and clipboard. She remained near the open doorway. "I wanted to speak to you on the matter of your chamberlain--or rather, your persistent lack thereof."

Hector sat down on his bed. "It's not that I don't want a chamberlain," he said, "but it would be an unnecessary expense. I can take care of my own room. I'm not even here all that often, so it doesn't even get that messy to begin with."

"Your frugality is admirable, Lord, but a chamberlain would be able to provide you with many more services than just the cleaning of your bedchamber," said Mara.

That was news to Hector. It was true that he had only given the subject of castle staff a quick bit of research. "...Like what?" he decided to ask.

"A competent chamberlain could run your entire household for you," she said.

Hector cocked an eyebrow.

"I do not mean all of Warrenhold," she clarified. "I mean only you and your immediate family."

"...That's just me and my mother, then," said Hector. "I still don't really think it would be worth the expense, right now. Maybe in the future, when money is less of a concern."

"Begging your pardon, Lord, but in the future, you may have a wife and children to factor into the equation as well."

Hector did his best to not be taken aback by that statement, but it was hard. He didn't want to appear flustered in front of a staff member, but at the same time, what she'd just said struck him as so utterly inconceivable that he was struggling not to let it show on his face.

"And in such a case," Mara went on, "it would be ideal if your own chamberlain were already a long-serving and well-trusted person. They could have a significant impact on the lives of your children. And of course, if your wife happens to be a woman of means, then she may have personal retainers of her own who would be moving in and tending to your family as well. You might be a bit overwhelmed by them all, if you do not have any of your own. And forgive me if I am overstepping here, but I believe that such an imbalance between you and your wife could invite problems into your relationship that might otherwise have been avoided."

Hector just kind of sat there, blinking.

Mara shifted some papers on her clipboard. "I have some candidates in mind who I think would be a good fit for the position. And not to worry, I have only considered lowborn individuals. Anyone with ties to the aristocracy would be riskier regarding information leaks, which I know you are quite concerned about. And regarding money, I believe--"

"Ms. Rogers," said Hector. "I... appreciate your diligence, but I have no plans to get married."

"I was not under the impression that you did, Lord, but it is still good to be mindful of the future."

He had to admire her determination. "...You really want me to hire a chamberlain that badly, huh?"

Mara adjusted her glasses. "I do, Lord."

Hector took a deliberate breath. "Will doing so make your job easier?"

"Ah--" She hesitated for the first time that Hector had seen. "Perhaps, yes, but I assure you, that was not my--"

"Fine. Show me your candidates."

For a moment, she just stood there, staring at him.

Hector glanced at Garovel, who had been chuckling beneath their conversation the whole time.

It took a while, but they went through the résumés of Mara's candidates and eventually chose three to interview. As they were wrapping up, Garovel decided to chime in.

'I like this woman,' he said. 'You should give her a promotion.'

Hector paused, for two reasons--the first being because he wasn't sure if Garovel was serious, and the second being because he'd actually been considering doing that himself. 'Do you really think so? Or are you just saying that?'

'When have I ever said something just to say it?'

'Only in every conversation we've ever had.'

'Promote her, dammit.'

Hector was watching her excuse herself and turn for the door. 'Are you sure? Because I will.'

'I bet you won't, you wimp.'

Hector gave the reaper a scrunched up expression, though accompanied by a smile. 'I'll do it right now.'

'Oho. Go on, then.'

"Ms. Rogers," said Hector aloud.

She stopped in front of the door and looked at him again.

"...Seeing as the Madame Carthrace has essentially handed off all of her duties as the Stewardess of Warrenhold to you," he said, "I would like to officially grant the position to you."

Mara stared. "I... sir, I'm not..."

Hector waited for her.

Still, she was faltering. "I don't know what to say, Lord..."

"So... you want the job, then?" said Hector.

She held her clipboard close to her chest and nodded fervently.

That made Hector smile. "Good. I'll tell Madame Carthrace in the morning."

"Ah... you have not already discussed this decision with her, sir?"

"No," said Hector flatly.

"I see..."

"Why? Think she'll be upset?"

"Well, you are giving her job and title to someone else without consulting her first, sir..."

Hector gave an admissive nod. "True. But she already has another job and title to spare, so I'm pretty sure she'll understand." He lay back on the bed and closed his eyes. "But if you're that worried about it, you could always just turn my offer down."

"No, sir. I will gladly take it." And there was a pause. "It does come with a pay increase, doesn't it?"

"Yeah."

"In that case, I am suddenly also certain that she will understand," said Mara.

That made Hector laugh a little, but his eyes remained shut, and he didn't move.

"I suppose I will let you rest, Lord. And thank you."

"Keep up the good work, Ms. Rogers."

"Yes, Lord."

And with that, he heard her leave and close the door behind her.

Hector wedged himself beneath his bed sheets and was already half-asleep when Garovel decided to continue the conversation.

'Well, aren't you Mr. Cool?' the reaper said.

Hector rolled over. 'I don't know what that means, and I'm too tired to figure it out.'

'You're really taking to this whole "Lord of Warrenhold" thing.'

'Mm...'

'It's good. Weird, but good.'

The reaper let him go to sleep soon after that.

The next day was rather special, because Warrenhold would be hosting royalty. King William was visiting, unfortunately without the Queen, as she was still too busy and also believed that her attendance would turn the whole affair into a media circus.

So instead, Lynnette and Mehlsanz accompanied the King. The man's several other attendants were only allowed as far as the castle's main gate.

This would technically be Lynnette's second visit--the first being when she'd asked him at the Queen's behest to accompany her and Prince Meriwether to Sair all those months ago.

There was considerably more to see now, however, and her surprise was apparent even while they were still aboveground. The surface buildings of Warrenhold had been receiving a moderate degree of reconstruction as well, and now they all at least had four walls, a roof, electricity, and running water. They were nowhere near as impressive as the eight towers underground, though, and probably never would be, so when they started descending through the Entry Tower, the heightened amazement on all of his guests' faces put Hector in quite a good mood.

They of course made sure to provide everyone with an explanation of Warrenhold's anti-pest mechanism and its corresponding psychological effects. Ms. Rogers proved very helpful in that regard, since Hector still had a bit of trouble talking to Lynnette.

He wanted to get past that problem of his and soon, but it just wasn't that easy, apparently. Every rational thought in his brain was telling him that he didn't need to be afraid of talking to Lynn, that he'd already spoken normally to her before, that he'd been through way more difficult conversations with way more difficult people. Logically, it made no sense why he should still be struggling with her.

And yet he was, goddammit.

Regardless, it was nice to show the three of them around. It was bit weird to see Mehlsanz traveling with two people who couldn't even see her, but the reaper didn't seem terribly upset about it.

'We have a fix for that, though,' Garovel told her. 'In part, at least.'

'A fix for what?' said Mehlsanz.

Garovel's skeletal grin seemed to widen. 'Hector, let's go talk to Roman.'

Roman and Gina had their own rooms in the Tower of Night, just below the master bedroom. They'd been coming and going from Warrenhold as they pleased, but lately, they'd been spending more time here than not. Roman had become fast friends with several prominent Rainlords, especially Diego Redwater.

Somehow, Hector wasn't surprised by that friendship.

Gina, by comparison, was more reserved around the Rainlords, Hector noticed. As soon as it became clear that she and Roman would be spending considerable time here, it had become her priority to ensure that Warrenhold had internet access--which was no small feat, since Warrenhold didn't have cable lines that she could create ethernet ports out of.

Hector wasn't too clear on the details of what she was working on, but apparently, she wanted to install some kind of super-extra high-speed fiber-thing. It sounded pretty difficult and expensive, but Hector decided to just leave it to her and the handful of like-minded young Rainlords she'd teamed up with.

Roman, Gina, Lynnette, and the King were all quite pleased to see each other again. For Hector, it felt like a lifetime ago that they had all been together in that underground bunker full of cars.

It was nice to see them all smiling and enjoying themselves.

Gina retrieved a box from beneath her corner desk and set it down in front of Lynnette. "Here," she said. "Take one. We've been collecting them."

Lynn pulled out a pair of Hun'Kui-made goggles, obviously not sure what she was looking at.

Gina took a pair for herself as well and donned it immediately. Her gaze fell instantly upon Mehlsanz. "Unfortunately, this doesn't let us talk to them, but at least we're able to confirm with our own eyes that Hector and Roman here haven't been lying to us all this time."

Lynnette's lone eye widened briefly, and then she put her goggles on, too. "Oh my goodness...!" A curt laugh escaped her lips as she stared at Garovel.

Garovel gave her a small wave.

"You didn't tell me they would be so horrifying-looking," said Lynn, "but I guess they are reapers, so..."

"Oh," said Hector. "Ah. What do they look like for you?"

"Umm... wait. What do you mean 'for you?'"

"They don't always look the same for everyone," said Roman.

"Oh..." Lynnette still seemed a bit awestruck, and she turned to find both Mehlsanz and Voreese present as well. "Well, I see skeletons in armor. With flaming skulls and long... dripping tongues."

Voreese cackled inaudibly. 'That sounds pretty fuckin' gnarly!'

For a while, the conversation remained there as they all traded descriptions of what they saw. Gina saw reapers as hooded swordsmen, and the King saw them as spectral ghouls with glowing, bulbous eyes--and even Mara joined in as well, at Roman and Hector's insistence. She also saw reapers as skeletons, though hers were covered in blood and strips of rotting flesh.

Mara did not wish to put the goggles on again.

"Where did you get these things?" said Lynnette.

"The Undercrust," said Roman.

When that did not answer the woman's question satisfactorily, everyone seemed to realize at once that this was going to turn into a long conversation. They decided to get breakfast together before going into it.

Even though she'd heard about it back at the Gala, Lynnette still looked mildly confused by the notion that there existed an entire civilization beneath the planet's surface, and she used this opportunity to ask more questions. The King also looked surprised, though perhaps less than Hector expected, which made him curious.

"...Did you already have some knowledge of the Undercrust, Your Highness?" he asked.

"I wouldn't go so far as to call it knowledge," said the King, "but I have read of such things in mythic tales."

"I see," said Hector. There was something else he wanted to ask the King about, but not with everyone around like this.

"Truth be told," said Gina, "we're still not entirely sure how these goggles work--or how they're made. We know that they're infused with ardor, but the process by which we might accomplish that feat for ourselves is still mysterious to us."

"And even if it wasn't mysterious to us," said Roman, "there could be more to it than just the infusion process. The Hun'Kui are a pretty interesting bunch. I've made a few solo trips back down to the Undercrust, trying to get to know them and their culture better. In theory, it seems like ardor-infused earbuds or headphones should allow you to hear a reaper's voice, but so far, I haven't been able to find anything like that. I'm also not yet sure why these goggles have become so widely used among the Hun'Kui."

"What do you mean?" said the King, still wearing his pair. "Are they not being used for precisely this same purpose? To see reapers?"

"That's what I thought at first, too," said Roman, "but the more time I spend down there, the less sense that makes to me. I haven't really seen that many reapers down there. They seem to be just as rare in the Undercrust as they are on the surface."

Gina chuckled. "You say they're rare, but we have three in this very room. And how many more are hanging around Warrenhold, right now?"

Roman put up his hands with a shrug. "Yeah, okay, this castle is a bit of a reaper hot spot, but as far I've been told, there are less than a million reapers in the entire world. Maybe that seems like a lot, but it's really not, especially when compared to the billions of living people that they're supposedly watching over."

'Shit,' said Voreese, 'you're making me feel guilty for not getting much reaping done, lately.'

That made Hector think. It was sometimes easy to forget how important reaping actually was. Alleviating the suffering of departed souls was a big responsibility, and it wasn't hard to understand why so many reapers chose to focus on that alone.

"But regardless of any of that," said Roman, "I think the reason these goggles are so popular might just be because they're currently fashionable. I doubt they were developed purely for fashion, but it might be why they're so widespread among the Hun'Kui. Maybe I'll try to find an Undercrust reaper on my next trip and ask them what they think."

Truthfully, Hector was actually a bit uncomfortable with Roman's recent solo trips to the Undercrust. He didn't want to doubt the man, but given everything that he'd personally experienced down there, it just seemed like such an incredibly dangerous thing to be doing.

But a useful thing, nonetheless.

Hector was certainly curious to learn more about the Undercrust, too, especially about its political climate. Thus far, Roman hadn't heard anything about anyone named Royo Raju or Malast making waves down there, but it wouldn't surprise Hector if that changed soon.

Their conversation continued for a while, and Roman gifted the goggles to Lynnette and King William. He made a point of warning them about how important these items were, about how problematic it might be if they fell into the wrong hands.

And perhaps Roman warned them a little too well, because after hearing that, the King decided to politely decline the pair that had been offered to him. Lynnette, however, kept hers and expressed her gratitude.

Those goggles would be a huge boon for her, Hector knew. He certainly still remembered how potent she had been back when they were rescuing the King from Abolish's clutches. Her main weakness in that fight had been the fact that she couldn't see the enemy reapers, but that wouldn't be a problem now.

The tour of Warrenhold continued and lasted much of the day, as the King wanted to meet all of the head Rainlords and talk to each of them for a while. Hector sat in on each one, mainly just observing and not saying much.

It seemed to go well, he thought. All of the Rainlords were appreciative of the asylum being granted to them, and the King was very welcoming and friendly.

His Majesty's primary interest seemed to be in Rainlords' plans moving forward. In every meeting, he asked about it. How long did they intend to stay in Atreya? Would any more of them be arriving? Where were the rest of their kin? What about their subjects in Sair? What were their intentions regarding Abolish? And the Sandlords taking over the Wetlands?

The King had a soft speaking voice, but he didn't pull his punches when it came to the subject matter of his questions. He could've just asked Hector all of these things, but he probably wanted to get his answers directly from the source.

Hector tried not to take it as a sign the King didn't trust his word. It was simply wise--not relying on only one person for all the answers to such an important subject.

That being said, though, the Rainlords didn't have that many proper answers for him to begin with. There was still so much uncertainty in their future, and they all knew it, even if they were reluctant to say so like Dimas and Zeff. Mainly, they told the King about their current efforts to rebuild their power so that they could "eventually" go reclaim their kin from the Vanguard and retake their territory.

It was nearly evening already by the time the King finished meeting with everyone.

And it would be on this day that Hector did something that he had never done before--at least, not on this scale. Ever since being informed that the King intended to visit, Hector had been thinking about what this evening might be like. And he of course made sure to warn the kitchen staff several days in advance.

He invited everyone in the castle to come eat together with him, and he hosted his first proper banquet in Warrenhold.

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