II-133 Engineered Bloodshed (INFERNAL ASCENSION TTF)

There's gonna be a war at some point between us and the fictionals. 

I don't like it. I don't want much want to fight it. I don't want to be here in the fathoms, but there's gonna be a war. Why is there gonna be a war? Because some of you other Trespasser assholes can't stop making a mess. Listen, I understand that some of you have problems. All right, but you think that this is some kind of post-death paradise that you're going to enjoy every aspect of Your life down here because you're blessed or whatever God you believe in place you here. So that you can indulge your every wild fantasy. But these people are alive.

Not only are they alive, they're alive, and they're really, really pissed off at us. You have any idea what kind of a mess we're in? Do you have any idea how badly we fucked this all up to get them all united against us? 

Because that's what's happening, slowly they're uniting against us. Now I understand some of you are mingled with them. Hell, some of you are gonna turn on us and join in with the fictionals if this war starts. You don't much like earth. You don't much like the rest of us, fine. I don't even actually blame you that much, but what I'm going to tell you right now is this: Earth is going to be invaded at some point.

Because after all these years of being dropped into the Fathoms, The fictionals are going to plan to solve the problem as well. They are not going to just take it. They're not just gonna be reactive all the time. They're gonna try to fix us the same way we've been fixing them by suddenly showing up and shitting all over their realms. And the worst part of this war, it's gonna be conducted by people who are Trespassers. Big winners are gonna be the ones who got here earliest. I'm talking about the head of the Trespassers Lodge. I'm talking about the inheritors. I'm talking about Mepheleon. They're gonna be fine as per usual.

We fell out of earth and Once again, we're fighting a war for someone else's great game. We're not the elites trespassers. We're just peons, too. Get your heads out of your asses and get gone when the fighting starts. It's not worth it. The fictionals, they're not our allies. They're not our enemies. They're here. Just like us. 

They don't have a choice, just like us.

-The Trespassers’ Compendium

II-133

Engineered Bloodshed

Greatest eyed Wei, Moonscar, and Bishop as he took another sip of coffee. "This tastes pretty good. Is it Earth made?"

"Yes," Moonscar said. "Decaf."

"Decaf," Greatest said, nodding slightly. "You all come up with the strangest words. I even like saying some of them. Decaf." He licked his lips and let out a sigh. He looked around the room and examined the ceiling. It was pure gray with a dim light at the center. Before him was a plain wooden desk, and on the other side were the subjects of his attention. He gestured at Wei first.

"Listen, I'm sorry to drop in on you so fast, so soon. I saw that look of surprise in your eyes earlier." Greatest licked his lips. "You know, despite everything, I genuinely do feel kind of bad for you. When it came to you earlier, I was trying to figure out if you were some kind of jackal just trying to muscle your way into a game you had no business being a part of. But now, now I kind of get you."

"Get me?" Wei said. ‘What do you mean?”

"That you’re just understandably pissed off, genuinely and truly just pissed off. Had a conversation with Kalrus earlier, while he was examining that special something in my ass. He told me all about his experiences working with you.” 

Wei blinked. “Kalrus? He’s..”

“He's inside there right now. But that’s not important. What’s important is that I get you. I know why you’re so mad. And that’s right. And look forward to helping you kill more of those Trespasser shits soon. But first, we gotta talk about the nuke.”

“The nuke?” Moonscar asked. “What nuke.”

“Oh. The submarine came with a few warheads. And one… is inside me right now.” Greatest leaned back as he delivered his verbal haymaker.

Bishop let out a hissed, "Fuck," as he facepalmed as hard as he could. Moonscar's expression turned severe.

"A warhead, old Soviet warhead," Greatest continued. "That is going to be our special little surprise for one enemy prince in particular. And once we get rid of him—well, the others might think twice.”

“Why is this necessary?” Wei asked. “I thought we—

Greatest interrupted him. "You're got to be pretty good to kill Duchess as a Marquise. Doesn't matter how powerful your system is, I can taste the Essence of you, and what you have, that's not nearly enough for a Prince or higher. What you basically pulled recently is stinging a white lion to death when you're barely the size of a wasp. Princes aren’t lions, kid.”

Wei met his eyes and didn't flinch at all. "It can be done," the young master said. "I have done it several times. One simply needs to make no mistakes, to strike every time deep and true, and to bleed their adversary with every passing blow."

"I'm not doubting you," Greatest held up his hands. "In fact, I'm complimenting you. I’m sure that with your system, you’ll find a way to bring down a Prince somehow. Eventually. Maybe. But do you really want to risk it.”

Wei simply scowled. “If that is what is necessary.”

Greatest considered Wei's words and then gave a shrug. "Sure, we can do that, or you can help me, and we can bluff our way through this. I, you already know why I want the Trespassers gone. You want to know what I want from you, but right now I want to tell you about some of my," Greatest frowned. "I wouldn't even call them my peers. None of us like to consider the others peers, but they're not rivals either. You try to knock your rivals off. They're more like passing nuisances."

"Passing?" Wei asked. "Why passing?” 

“Because they're self-resolving problems. When you're a Prince or a Princess, usually what you're trying to do is gun for the spot of the king. I'm not interested in that spot. It's a miserable spot because you either hold it and you have to keep holding it, or you get cut down by the current king and then, well, even if you prevail, your reward is king. It's a little bit more power and frankly, not nearly enough to justify the constant assassination attempts you have to endure." Greatest yawned. "It seems more like a punishment than a reward to me. I came here to enjoy the Claimed Hells, not to suffer it."

Wei observed the Prince of Pride for a long moment and he read something greatest expression. "You're afraid," Wei said.

The Greatest blinked. "I'm what?"

"You're afraid."

Greatest started laughing. "What can I be possibly afraid of? I'm here offering you the means to…”

"No, no," Wei interrupted him. "You're not afraid of death. It's not that kind of fear. You’re not afraid of battle either. You're afraid of losing what you have right now. You're fighting for, preserve something."

And then Greatest's mouth opened before he pressed his lips together. He pointed at Wei. "Yeah. I'm afraid I won't get to be Prince anymore, that I'll have to be King in the big mess that's going to follow. I'm afraid that I'm going to be knocked into a position where I'll have to fight for power, help to scramble to survive. I don't want that. What I want right now is everyone to be looking at you, and then everyone to be looking at me."

"But why?" Wei asked.

"Because I am a known factor. All the other princes and princesses don't come after me because they know I'm not interested in them. All of them except for one. One of my fellow princes of pride, the Sovereign. He will come for you. He has close associations with Lein and so the nuke is mainly for him. But also…”

"What?" Wei asked.

"There needs to be a reason for the Claimed Hell to rally around you. For you see, you're going to help stop, save the other princes, princesses, kings, and queens when it goes off. Spare their lives from an assassination attempt.”

“Assassination?” Bishop asked.

"How am I supposed to do that?" Wei asked.

"Because you're the one with Source. You're the one who's a half-Trespasser. I'll have Dr. Kalrus and some of my other experts explain the details to you. But the warhead, when it detonates, it's not going to detonate with a lot of Essence, no. It's, it's going to detonate because of science, because of pure physics. And there’s just going be enough magic that you can affect it. That you can blunt it. And you’re going to want to pull that save in the middle of the meeting." And already she could see cogs spinning behind the Prince of Pride's head. He was scheming, plotting, and Wei was a part of his machinations.

"You wished for me to use my Concept Breaker to redirect a blast."

"Something like that," the Prince of Pride said. "But now, not even to redirect. I want you to pull him into that little thing you do, that realm you can summon. The one where all the scythes come out. There, you can break the blast. Get some shards after Sovereign gets fried and we all end up happy.”

 Moonscar interrupted. "Greatest," she said, "you're making things messy. Why? We are you pushing this assassination angle so hard on us?"

Greatest threw his hands up. "Well, I don't fully know either. I'm planning as I go along, but I do have all the pieces. I have the warhead," he pointed down and Wei cringed in disgust. “ I have the instrument for both the submarine and to contain the blast," he pointed at Wei, "as well as the Hell's Vanguard. And then I have you two," he looked at Bishop and Moonscar. "You are here to help me get the other things in order.”

"What kind of things?" Bishop asked.

"I want there to be a false flag attack. Well, it doesn't need to be a false flag attack, just have the inheritors strike at the city again. Give them a reason to be mad, give them— 

“You know Lein was working with the Inheritors?" Moonscar said.

Greatest's eyes grew wide. "What, really?"

"Yes. She was supposed to procure the system for them. We intercepted some communications between her and her Inheritor liaison."

Wei turned slowly as he regarded Moonscar. "And when did you learn this?”

"A few days after you killed her," Moonscar said without looking at Wei. "And I wasn't informed?"

"It didn't matter to you anymore. Besides, you were mostly," Moonscar went silent for a moment, "working through your anger in the base during that time and were therefore unreachable."

Wei winced. He remembered that period, that haze of bloodshed and chaos that consumed him in the aftermath.

"Well, well," Greatest breathed. "This makes things much easier. All right, so Lein was already a turncoat. That makes Sovereign look ugly by association. But not enough. Still, good to ratchet up the tension. And good for our boy Wei here. We need him to be greased up with Trespasser blood.”

"Trespasser—lay what you’re thinking out for us from the start," Bishop said. "What do you want to do? What are you planning right now?"

"A few things. The first is placing Wei under my protection, or at least making it seem that Wei. He has the power to bestow aspect advancements. That is more valuable than anything in the claim tells. When you get powerful enough, the amount of Essence you need to concentrate to get to the next advancement is absurd. Easy as pie. Now that means that a whole bunch of other princes and princesses are going to make a mad scramble to make a slave of you immediately."

Wei clenched his fist. "I would like to see them try."

"Oh, they're going to try," Greatest nodded. "Except they might be dissuaded from trying if I'm involved."

"And you're sure they're going to call for this conference?" Moonscar asked.

"Oh, I'm absolutely certain," Greatest said. "See, already there are going to be whispers and these whispers are going to be traveling up to the other princes and princesses, and I might have let leak what Wei gave me, might have also misplaced that shard he offered. It was very useful and soon, well, the Claimed Hells are going to be in an uproar from top to bottom."

"Once that happens, though, you wish to use your position to shield me," Wei said. "Otherwise another prince might reach out for me first, might risk challenging the Tribulator just to capture me.”

“Or to capture the people you're with. Your little sect is growing a little too fast. You're inviting far too many people behind your walls, Patriarch. But that's fine. Because they're all going to report the same thing soon, that we're going to be in league with each other, properly, officially. This will immediately narrow down the scope of our problems and make Sovereign come to me and force a conference.”

“Why are you so intent on him?” Wei asked. “Is this a personal grudge you’re using me to resolve.”

"No. As I said before, he's problem number one for a reason. You see, doesn't matter if Lein was Inheritor plant or whatever, the fact is she was his, his attack dog, his special little violent monster. And now she's dead, thanks to you. Now he's going to try to replace her using you, and he's not going to take no for an answer. So we kill him, and not by using that gun of yours, but with an amount of firepower specifically from Earth meant to devastate entire continents."

Greatest just laughed. "Continents, it's not big at all. You guys, like you were so special," he sneered at the trespassers. "I've cracked world, you know. Just taking a swing at them, pop them, watch the core leak out molten and bright like egg yolk kissed by the sun. But even so," he let out a tense breath, "even so, the thing I have inside of me, if it goes off, it's nothing I could do against it because guess what? I'm not that real, not like you. Well, the most of you. Two and a half trespassers, with half being my salvation."

Wei regarded as the greatest. "And so when Sovereign decides to act on us—

“We can kill him in a variety of ways. And then… well, we can do other things.” He grinned at the Trespassers.

“Greatest,” Bishop said. “The fuck are you looking at us like that. Just spit it—”

“I want them to think it was you,” Greatest said.

“What?” Bishop replied.

“I want the other great powers of the Claimed Hells to blame the Trespassers for Sovereign's murder.”

“And spike Anti-Trespasser sentiment,” Moonscar said.

"Bingo," Greatest said. "Is that what you Earth people say? Bingo? Some of you guys told me that."

"Yes, we do say bingo," Moonscar replied, and she sighed. Then, she glanced at Wei. “And Wei will in turn save the other Princes and Princesses during the attempt. Gain their favor. And lead a functional pogrom against the Trespassers.”

“Oh, wow,” Greatest said, clapping. “Got it in one go.”