Elder Cultivator
Chapter 1281

The Wayfarer found itself as part of one of the fleets coordinating with the Free Planet Guardians. While the Free Planet Guardians operated entirely independently, sharing information on mutual foes was a must. In this case, knowing in which regions of space they intended to intercept invaders was the key.

The Lower Realms Alliance was invested in taking out as many invaders as they could, regardless of where their destinations were. However, they also had spent quite a lot of effort calculating what sort of trouble they could anticipate in each area so they didn’t spread themselves too thin.

General Gabriela and her crew were faced off against the Swirling Swarm- part of the Swirling Swarm, because there were so many of them. Previously, they hadn’t come this far west, but they’d been expanding in the upper realms. Likewise, the Alliance hadn’t had the manpower to involve themselves so far beyond their borders previously.

Along this route, they were defending Temine among various other potential targets. Temine would be responsible for any invaders who ended up in their system, but the Alliance was invested in making sure they and people like them made it to the next cycle. Especially since they had void ants. They needed a new infusion of like minded individuals into their culture or it might grow stale. They could compare what worked and what did not.

Since the previous cycle, Gabriela and the Wayfarer had been developing their skills. Some of the lower ranking crew members had cycled out, either looking for other opportunities or simply growing old- those who went beyond Life Transformation had extensive lifespans, but a handful of centuries was the limit for others. Overall, the Wayfarer had improved greatly, pieces and people swapped out.

Maybe enough that it wasn’t the same ship anymore, but Gabriela would say that as long as she or Neven or any of the others were still around, it was the same ship. And that conceptual connection provided power.

They had been ready to overcome any difficulty. Fortunately, that also included cutting down countless numbers of individually weak foes. Each individual moment was less strenuous than dealing with powerful Augmentation cultivators or special weapons made in the upper realms. However, their numbers felt truly endless.

They Wayfarer’s tactics were to circle around the Tides that this segment of the Swarm was using to drift into the lower realms. Cultivators chased after them in a helix pattern, rising up where they had passed but never really getting ahead. The whole time, they made use of every weapon emplacement, rotating their ship as they circled around to give everyone an opportunity to participate- and to evenly distribute the strain. This was going to be a marathon, after all.

When the Swirling Swarm managed to begin moving ahead of their path, cultivators trying to cut them off, the Wayfarer simply expanded the radius of their assault, moving further out. Of course, it was possible for the Swirling Swarm to simply pull away from the tides, but they would immediately find themselves in a difficult situation. The Alliance could simply pull away, able to recover energy while any pursuers wouldn’t have the option.

If the Wayfarer were alone, it would be difficult to outmaneuver their foes. Even if they were faster, enough attacks could be launched into the general region of space they were going to occupy to overwhelm them. But of course, they weren’t alone. They had many others to fight against the endless assaults, ships strafing the swarm and targeting anything or anyone that looked important. Slightly stronger cultivators and ships were the key targets, as they could be damaged but would prove the most trouble if left alone.

Gabriela was glad that there was no Domination cultivator in this mix… either that or they were waiting until half of their cover died to do anything, which would be a bit of a problem.

Ultimately, they wouldn’t be able to stop them all. They would cause as much damage as felt reasonable, rest and recover, then move on to catch the next closest gathering of foes. Aside from the Swirling Swarm, there were also more concentrated threats from other parts of the Trigold Cluster. That included the Shimmering Spears… who were focusing on the Free Planet Guardians. Probably because they were embarrassed about their style being taken over by Tor in the lower realms.

But the upper realms would remain much the same for ‘just’ six centuries of development- and Gabriela would be surprised if the Shimmering Spears of the lower realms didn’t have a thorough series of counters to the upper realms style. Whatever they’d managed last cycle would have only been the preview to the damage they could cause this time.

-----

Anton was tired… but it was a good tired. Yes, he would have preferred to be hunting food and dragging it back to his family… but taking out vicious beasts so his farm and people could be safe was also something he’d been doing forever.

He was constantly moving, focusing on a route based around his bound stars- to which he’d added a few for this very strategy. It placed him vaguely near one or two streams flowing from the upper realms all along his path, generally matching up with the projected travel speeds of foes. He picked out prime targets- whatever the Exalted Quadrant would miss most. Usually, that was their Augmentation cultivators but sometimes it was expensive ships.

Now, he’d spotted a stealth fleet. The vessels made good use of the Tides, drawing upon that energy to hide their presence. They were powered mainly through formations- which meant they had some traces of standard tech. The upper realms were adapting, but most of their sects were slow to adopt anything new. They were just now implementing tech that might have been used in the first couple shifts in the Tides, hardly better than Rutera when he’d first come into contact with them. Maybe a few pieces were newer, but they weren’t as smoothly integrated with the formations.

It was inevitable that various groups would begin to learn from the Scarlet Alliance, as they’d had multiple wars- some number of vessels would be captured or salvaged. They might also have spies feeding them information, though there was so much of it that it was difficult to do without proper computerized transmissions- and those were highly secure. From what Anton understood.

If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

“Everheart says hi!” Bear Hug reported.

That gave Anton a moment of pause. Then he returned to picking targets, focusing on engines. They might be able to drift along with the tides, but without proper propulsion no vessel would make it to neighboring systems. The cultivators would have to go alone. “... What?” Anton asked.

“Okay, so,” Bear Hug began to explain. “Technically, he didn’t. But that’s the sort of thing a normal person would have done. And I didn’t tell him I could say hi, or he definitely would have. He was asking about you, though.”

“... What did you tell him?” Anton asked.

“Nothing secret! I don’t even know anything secret. You shoot real far and you’re strong and you have stars. You also don’t like bad guys. The kind of thing that everyone knows.”

“I see,” Anton said. He had a lot of thoughts. His personal interactions with Everheart had been… fine. However, that didn’t mean he lacked caution about the man. “How did you end up in contact with Everheart?” That was the part that was most important to Anton.

“He came to Second Gift! I gave him all sorts of samples and then he went away. He said he didn’t want any fishies but his turtle totally ate some. The turtle’s name is… Squeak?” Bear Hug spoke the name aloud.

“Pipsqueak,” Anton said. “Unless he got another one.”

“... I thought that meant small. Doesn’t it mean small? This turtle isn’t small.”

“What if you compare to Paradise…?”

Bear Hug thought for a bit. “Not too big. But I don’t think you can be called small just because you’re only the second largest thing.”

Anton shrugged. “Sometimes that’s the way things are. And sometimes names are for ironic fun. Sometimes people say small when they really mean big.”

“People do do that, huh,” Bear Hug nodded. “Anyway, Ratna said I did good since he went away. I don’t think he’s as bad as people say he is.”

On that, Anton agreed. But that was only because people said Everheart was the worst thing ever, when half of that was him causing trouble for people who deserved it. As for the other half… it still didn’t make him as bad as people like the Tilki clan. But from their perspective, it made total sense that he would become the number one villain- and Everheart loved it.

“He’s dangerous,” Anton finally said.

“Like you!”

Anton processed that for a moment. “Not like me. Like… a meaner version of me.”

“Does that mean I can’t be friends with him?”

Anton had to seriously consider that. “I am not going to tell you that you can’t. If you can become friends- real friends- I won’t begrudge that. However, you must make sure he’s not trying to exploit you for information. Or trying to take stuff from you.”

Bear Hug thought for a bit. “He took a lot of stuff, but I wanted to give it to him. I think he’s gonna make a Third Gift!”

“Knowing him,” Anton said. “He’ll call it Best Gift. Or Greatest Trove.”

“Is that not okay? We like people to develop stuff.”

“We do,” Anton agreed. “Anyway, if you ever encounter him again… make sure to tell me about it. When it begins, I mean, not after. I will help you talk through things, since you haven’t interacted with many people who are deceptive.”

Anton shook his head. There was some chance that Bear Hug might actually make Everheart into a friend. It wasn’t high, but it was worth considering. And even if that meant only having another ‘multividual’ that Everheart wouldn’t purposefully hurt, it could be quite useful. But if Everheart did hurt Bear Hug, Anton would figure out how to shoot him from a full realm away.

Maybe he should communicate that through Bear Hug if it came up.

-----

“I had so many plans,” Aconite commented to Chidi as they traveled between different stations along the border. “I have cool poisons that are super good against overly large beasts. And some that might make people reincarnate poorly.”

“Uh-huh,” Chidi nodded. “And?”

“And now I’m going to try plan C next!”

“Three plans isn’t a lot,” Chidi pointed out.

“C stands for Contagion.”

Chidi made a face. “I thought you had moved past that one.”

“This is specially made for the Swirling Swarm! And it can’t live without constant energy from me. It’s no different from a fancy technique, I swear. It’ll only hurt bad people.”

“That’s what you said before you dropped a bucket full of choking powder on the battlefield during the death tree incident.”

“You were fine!” Aconite protested.

Chidi nodded again. “I know. That’s my way of saying I trust you… if you’re really certain.”

“I am! Also, we really need to get rid of these Swirling Swarm guys. And if something goes wrong… uh, nobody should be on the same battlefield with me. So what I’m saying is I think you have to fight Sudin alone.”

“Not true,” Chidi said. “I’ll probably have snipers.”

“Probably?”

Chidi shrugged. “If I can’t sense them, are they really there?”

“Yes.”

“You and your science. But seriously, will it be okay?”

“It won’t hurt me so if it goes ultra virulent we just need to make sure nobody makes it to a neighboring system.”

“Please tell me that’s not a real option.”

“I’ll stop it first,” Aconite said. “I swear.”

Some people might have had problems with using poisons- which Chidi obviously did not or he wouldn’t have remained friends with Aconite from the beginning. Biological warfare seemed like a step worse, but killing people was killing people. As long as it was the right people and not intentionally painful, Chidi didn’t care. Killing the right people was the important part. If he swung his sword and cut down a city, he was responsible for all those deaths. He only kept asking because Aconite felt too eager, not because he didn’t trust her word. Each reminder would help her keep control.