Chapter 54 - Convoy arrival

Chapter 54

Red Sands Desert, Principality of Rebirth.

In flight over the city of Rebirth.

"Lieutenant, report." Said Calder.

"Sir!" Said the lieutenant as he snapped a salute. "6 vessels approaching, 5 freighters and a single warship."

"A warship?" Said Calder, slightly puzzled.

"Aye sir. Heavy frigate, an old Tarkian Sky Sword class if my guess is right. They are flying the crest of the House of Estogan sir."

Allya was impressed, the lieutenant didn't even so much glance at Willard when he said that, especially since he had his family's crest printed so much on his outfit he looked like a walking advertisement board. She looked at Calder as he turned towards her, and rose an eyebrow.

"They are expected arrivals captain Calder. A bit early, but still expected."

Calder nodded, not commenting on Willard's slightly smug expression. Allya and her council had accepted his invitation to watch the approach of the new convoy from his ship, although it was as much a spontaneous invitation as the offers to develop the town infrastructure by various companies had been. Truth was, after the unholy clusterfuck that the Greymane caravan had turned into there was no way she was letting them come in unsupervised, and settle outside the defensive perimeter. Hence why the Alberta and the Sakura were currently flying out to meet the convoy and 'escort' them in, with the clear subtext that refusing the honor guard was a very bad idea.

Not exactly subtle, but she was done with subtlety if it meant getting more of her people killed just because some morons wanted to make an extra buck. Which reminded her that she still had to meet with the Greymane caravan leader. He'd moved his people into her defence perimeter as soon as the wounded had been taken care of, but he had been too busy to meet with her. Something with her men finding half a dozen crates of eltherian dust in his cargo, which strangely didn't have the right customs paperwork. Usually she'd be willing to overlook that kind of small...irregularity, but eltherian dust was a potent -and highly lethal- combat drug as well as a horrifyingly powerful magical and alchemical catalyst. Horrifyingly powerful as in the main guns of the Eris Imperial AirFleet's dreadnoughts used it as ammunition. In fact it was a combat drug in the sense that it acted like a massive enhancement spell and a mana overdose at the same time, overloading the body of the person taking it and turning them into a magically enhanced killing machine for a few minutes. If their bodies survived the intake of course, which required either careful dosing or some serious resilience.

Well, she was sure he would find something big enough to bribe her with so she closed her eyes and let it slide. He seemed like a resourceful fellow after all, and she didn't really care as long as the cargo wasn't going to the Elkis Republican Army. Which was why had instructed Anders to detain the crates until he had extracted from the caravan leader the actual destination of the cargo.

"Well, this might take a bit." Said Calder as he looked at the rapidly growing dots. "I suggest we prepare the welcoming party. Would you like to board the lead ship lady Allya?"

"That would seem to be the most efficient course of action on both counts captain."

"Very good, let's be about it then."

*****

"Ah, looks like the new guys are there."

"Well, it's not that hard to tell. The ships didn't exactly come out of nowhere."

Alexandra chuckled.

"Fair point, fair point."

They were currently looking at the screen, where one of her new sentinel golems on top of the mesa was contemplating the ships that were currently landing. She had been alerted as soon as the two warships had taken off in a hurry, as having the two most heavily armed vessels going to battlestations very much qualified as something she wanted to be aware of, especially after she'd seen the effects of their broadsides. Which reminded her that she needed to get one of those cannons, or an alchemist. There was no way whatever they were using as propellant was black powder, despite the smoke clouds. The canon balls were going almost as fast as 20th century artillery shells!

"Well, what are you going to do? You said you'd put contingency plans in place, right?"

"Already did. The old claymores from the core hallway, you know the recycled betty warheads?" Emilia nodded. "Well, I used them to booby trap the hall of valor, or, well the entrance hallway, since we haven't put anything there yet. I also did the same for the floor elevator, as it occurred to me that they might be leming-like enough to just try to rush it after the elevator had exploded."

"What's a leming?"

"It's-" Alexandra blinked. That was an excellent question actually. What was a lemming? She knew what the expression meant, but she had no clue where it came from or what it referenced. "I...uh, don't know. But it's a saying from Earth. Apparently lemmings are suicidal and extremely stupid, and will gladly march to their doom until they succeed at their tasks."

"So...they're like cheap golems, in short?"

"That...." Alexandra blinked. "Isn't necessarily a bad analogy. But yeah, I reinforced the booby traps in general. I also installed the new booby trapped pillars we designed for the entrance."

Emilia nodded. They had spent a few hours making modifications on the entrance pillars. The situation was unlikely to ever arise again, but if a monster tried again to use them as ammunition they were going to have a very nasty surprise.

Alexandra had forgot to mention that it would work equally well in shredding an army marching into the dungeon. Especially since, as with all of her new booby traps, she'd wired them directly to the command center to prevent jamming.

"That's good. At least if any of them try anything they'll learn the lesson pretty quickly. Besides ther-"

Alexandra looked to the side, frowning as Emilia stopped mid sentence.

"Is everything alright?" Alexandra mentally started readying emergency protocols in her interface as Emilia failed to answer. She couldn't see what had gotten that reaction out of her, the passengers were just starting to disembark from the arriving airships. She grabbed Emilia's shoulder hand shook her firmly. "Hey! Vampy!"

Emilia shook her head, and turned towards Alexandra, and the Earth-born almost recoiled. Was the vampire girl crying? Her blood started to boil. Someone had made Emilia cry?!? Whoever they were by the time she was done with them they would wish they had ended up in the 9th circle of hell! She wasn't going to leave enough atoms of these worthless bastards to fill a-

"They're here! I never thought...It just....I haven't seen them in so long!"

Alexandra's train of thought came to a screeching halt.

"What?"

Emilia pulled out a hankerchief and quickly dried her tears.

"Sorry, just....realized how badly I missed home. Can you ready some golems to escort them in?"

"Escort who?"

Emilia smiled, and pointed at two....maids? That were currently coming down the stairs from one of the ships.

"Sara and Ella of course! My handmaidens!"

Alexandra looked at the screen, all thoughts of unleashing hell vanished.

"Oh. Uh, sure, I'll get right on that."

*****

"Well, you sure know how to deliver mister Willard." Simply said Allya.

Which, as such things went, was a massive understatement. When Willard had promised to have a house for his family, with defensive forces to assist them in the defence of the town, she'd thought of, oh, a few squads of trained soldiers, and maybe a few specialists. Not a full platoon of knights with a freaking Tesla Tower in tow! Where had he even gotten that? These things were used by capital ships and city defense tower to zap fighter crafts and bombers out of the air!

"Thank you milady, I aim to please." He smiled smugly, then his expression became serious again. "In my family we very much believe that it's better to overkill than to lose people. I believe you follow the same philosophy, and while this might seem like a touch over the top, well..." He shrugged, and gestured at the Greymane camp area, wordlessly indicating both the monster attacks and the defiant caravan.

"I see what you mean." Simply said Allya. "Well, hopefully it will stay overkill." Although she highly doubted that. News were starting to filter through news channels that the Elkis Republican Army was massing at Erakis, just like Neptunite had said. There were even reports of an airship mooring tower beginning construction there, although whether to accommodate the sudden increase in trade or military activity was unclear. Probably both.

"Hopefully." Said Willard, although from his tone he didn't believe it for a single second either.

They watched in relative silence as the soldiers unloaded the gear stowed aboard the warship and one of the merchant vessels, with Allya trying to avoid stealing glances at the freighter at the tail of the group. It was hard. She didn't know what an Erisian trade vessel was doing here, but it was kind of creeping her out. In fact, according to some gossip Calder had already been gathering from the other captains, the ship had been directly commissioned to carry two passengers with all due haste to the city. She'd missed their disembarkation -she'd been too busy trying to look unimpressed as the platoon of knights in shining armor paid their respects to her and Willard-, but some of the reports she'd heart from Anders were....worrying. They said two maids had come down, presumably to pave the way for their masters or mistresses, and-

A sudden commotion caught her attention, and she turned around, frowning as something happened at the dungeon entrance, although it was too far to discern exactly what. Dear Gods, had the new adventurers started trouble already?

Then all speculation vanished from her mind as she heard the unmistakable, distant sound of a hundred metallic boots, or feet, hitting the ground, and a phalanx of golems exited the dungeon in battle formation.

Oh shit.

*****

"They are, indeed, my guests. And I would like for them to be given passage. If not....well, I will have to recover them myself. We don't want that to happen, now do we lieutenant?"

The lieutenant gulped, and nodded at the golem. Alexandra had used her best 'superior officer telling a junior that they're being a moron' tone, and it seemed to have worked. She was glaring too, but the golem didn't have eyes. Oh well, it's the thought that count.

Currently, she was possessing the golem at the head of the hastily assembled honor guard -if you could consider a full company of golems an honor guard-, and facing down the soldiers and adventurers at the dungeon entrance.

She had to admit, the guards had actually done their jobs well. The new adventurers had, predictably, tried to swarm the dungeon entrance, but they had gently, but firmly, held them back, and kept the guild attendant at the entrance desk to ascertain loot in clear view at all times, serving as a very real reminder that the guild was watching, which had probably convinced even the most hot headed to take a deep breath. By now they'd probably already heard of the story of how Dominique had stared down an entire riot by herself, given how gossip in these small towns worked, and what she'd experienced as an adventurer herself, and none of them were willing to risk the wrath of the guild over this.

Then Sara and Ella had arrived. And walked right through. The guards, obviously, had stopped them, and one of them had....been a bit too hands on with...Sara, if she had discerned which one was which correctly from Emilia's semi-babbling.

That guard was now in six different pieces and their colleagues were getting rather agitated to say the least. After gawking for a solid 3 seconds -she had barely seen a blurr when the vampire maid had moved into action, even with her essence enhancements- she'd immediately ordered her honor guard to double time it, because she didn't want the whole situation to end up in a bloodbath.

"Very well. Still, they must answer for their aggression." The lieutenant said valiantly, and Alexandra's appreciation of him clicked up a notch. The kid had balls, she'd give him that. Answering like that to a dungeon core was already pretty up there, but with a hundred golems that he knew that held off a manticore at her back? Damn.

"That is an excellent point lieutenant. I will personally make sure your comrade is resurrected, and pay for any due reparations. Is that acceptable?"

The lieutenant stopped for a second, thinking it over, then nodded.

"Yes ma'am. That would be acceptable." He gestured at his men, who unhappily parted their ranks, and let the maids through. Alexandra nodded in thanks, and before the maids could do anything, surrounded them with her golems and marched back into the dungeon, softly speaking as the door slammed closed behind them.

"That, ladies, was a stupid stunt. Now if you'd care to follow me? Emilia very much wants to see you."

The maids nodded, and followed her into the depths. This promised to be an....interesting conversation, to say the least.