“If there is a specific type of stone you wish them to be made of, then indicate so and deliver the stone to us, or we will simply make them of Sea Basalt,” I informed the Sea Dragon blandly. The stuff was ridiculously common, almost impervious to Water damage, and easy to acquire. I could Shape thousands of the Braziers a minute. “Delivery time of the Braziers contingent upon delivery of the stone.

“If there is a particular design or fashion you wish us to use to make the Braziers, give us an example to emulate, the number and quantity, and our artisans will do so.”

The Sea Dragon Emperor blinked again. These would not only be such wonderful things, but in such quantities, and they would be artistic?!

Then she looked again at the sea serpents forming the column of the one behind me, and her whole body quivered as she suddenly realized that they weren’t sea serpents, but renditions of her, right down to her smallest scales and whiskers... only in this very inappropriate stone of Earth and Fire, scarcely doing true justice to her beauty!

It was like looking at an exquisite alternate variety of herself. The realization left her staring in gaping fascination.

I could feel the vanity blossom on this Sea Dragon like a flower unfurling.

I am going to shaft these bastards so hard.

I could just, just hear some very faint snickering from the Tokens of Leviathan and Flowing Silver Emperors.

“CAN YOU WORK IN CORAL, HEALER FAE?” she asked in helpless delight at the thought, unable to tear her eyes from the column now.

“The answer is yes, but no, Your Majesty,” I replied levelly, finally getting her to break her staring admiration of herself. “The shells of coral are the skeletons and bones of the creatures they are formed from, and vivus will break them down in regrettably short order. They are not suitable for this effort.”

“I SEE.” Her coils twisted and shimmered in repressed desire, her thoughts running away with her. “I CAN ACQUIRE A VOLUME OF WATER GOLD AND SEA JADE TO MAKE SUCH BRAZIERS FROM...” her voice trailed off at a thought.

I just tilted my head. “Do you want merely braziers, or columns?” I asked.

Her whole scaled body shivered with anticipation. “COLUMNS!” she finally admitted helplessly.

“How many? We trade in lots of a thousand.”

I distinctly saw her swallow, thoughts of a thousand of those marvelously perfect versions of herself in all directions, the heads coming together to emit that wonderfully purifying flame, danced in her inner eye.

“I WILL TAKE ONE THOUSAND, TO BEGIN,” she stated firmly, trying to hide her keening need to acquire them!

“For one thousand personalized columns and personalized Braziers of Vivic Eternal Flame, construction of which will commence after the Floodbreaker Ritual is finalized and the delivery of appropriate construction material, the price in trade is this.”

She listened as I listed out the items, all of which were things that had rarely, if ever, been seen on land, yet were hardly unknown or even particularly noteworthy in the deeps.

Of course, that was merely for one thousand of these things.

When I was done with the short list, the Sea Dragon just nodded. “THESE ITEMS I WILL HAVE WHEN WE MEET AGAIN. I WILL BRING THE STONE TO THIS PLACE... AFTER YOUR RITUAL IS COMPLETED.” Of course she’d be able to sense it being completed, as it would affect the oceans over the entire planet. Whether we succeeded or not was irrelevant to her.

She was going to surround herself with carved art the likes of which no Sea Dragon had ever possessed, and have the cleanest, purest Water in her caves imaginable!

“As your Majesty wishes. You may wish to bring this column away as a sample.”

That wasn’t even a question. Water surged forth around her scales, hardened even as it remained fluid, and with exquisite care it sliced the column free of the volcanic stone and buoyed it up as if the stone carving was made of cork.

“AFTER YOUR RITUAL, HEALER FAE,” the Dragon repeated, and then in grandiose and regal fashion turned around, her misting prize bobbing in a sphere of solid water as she flowed with deceptive speed towards the real shoreline a few hundred yards away. In mere seconds she was in the waves, submerging, and her speed increasing as a rippling furrow shot for the horizon.

-Just goddamn wow,- Sama /muttered, looking out my eyes after her. -I know Dragons are often vain, but that was absolutely incredible.-

“What’s the resale value on that stuff we’re going to get?” I asked her calmly.

Briggs /broke in, -It’ll go on auction, of course, but people are going to go apeshit all around the world at this new stuff. We’re going to have to do a lot of research on the properties, but a conservative estimate is a hundred million.-

“Not bad for a QL 40 stand of rock I can make in six seconds, and Vivic Eternal Flames we can churn out en masse.” Chained at 26 per Casting, forty Castings was nothing. Four minutes of work Casting, an hour and forty minutes of Shaping!

One hundred thousand dollars per end product. Dragons had no ideas of economics, but it was an insanely fast way to make a lot of money.

-And the absolutely horrible thing is, other Dragons are going to see those, and will have to have some for themselves...- Sama softly /chuckled knowingly.

The two Psychic Emperors were listening in, because I was letting them do so through my Astral Ward. Listening to a High Emperor Fox and a Great True Emperor Whale snickering in tandem was something to hear. The shed Sea Dragon Scales in the price were going to be split with the Whales, and there were other things the Land Emperors listening in would find useful.

Pride, Vanity, and Greed. We were going to play the damn Sea Dragons like a fiddle, and they were going to beg us to do so!

Trade was quickly going to have a very different meaning among them!

I reflected that the Obelisk I’d given The Sea Emperor likely had a value in trillions in comparison. I had never seen The Sea Emperor, so I couldn’t carve the thing into something honoring him like I could these... but what were the chances He might just ask for another one, just to make that happen?

Doing something at 45 for a True Emperor was certainly on the menu, and QL 50 for a High Emperor wasn’t out of line. If He had some barely-suppressed vanity, greed, and pride at the same level as His descendants, then He was going to bite hook, line, and sinker.

I considered that thought vis-à-vis the other two High Emperors. The Ice Emperor had likely not taken a good look at the columns I was putting up, just the effect of the vivic flames. However, the other icy Emperors and Rulers I’d been giving custom columns to definitely had, and they were pleased as punch to get them.

I hadn’t put anything vivic in the Infinite Sands Emperor’s Demesne, because it might interfere directly with His expansion of the Sahara, as opposed to resisting it from the borders. I knew He had descendant Drakes in there, as they sometimes came wandering out, driven forth by need for territory, and got themselves killed by other Beasts unwilling to give up said territory for them.

Such was the fate of most Dragons in the world. They really weren’t liked by most other Beast Tribes, the Titans being one of the very few exceptions as they instinctively respected one another’s territories.

It appeared Old Mountain Emperor was not alone in his appreciation for stuff in his own image. Psychological flaws were easy to exploit, and if done right, you could be totally up front about it.

It was all on them to make the decision, of course...

But I had a Floodbreaker Ritual to oversee.

----------------

The hum of anticipation was in the air at the five different sites around the globe. Antarctica should have been included, but naturally we weren’t going there, and actually the ‘opposing axis’ principle was part of the Ritual, so the lack had instead been turned into a strength.

Fire Mana to destroy the Ice and Air Mana, Earth Mana to push the Water Mana away, Void and Chaos Mana to undo the spatial manipulations, Lightning to conduct it everywhere, and so forth and so on.

Thousands of mages were at each of the sites now, with varying degrees of enthusiasm and work ethic. The South American countries had the scantest showing by fraction of the population, their elites haughty and arrogant and unwilling to make the personal efforts to see this through.

Still, the international pressure kept ramping up on them, and the dismissive propaganda from the Church of Light was continually drowned out by ever-increasing calls from the people who wanted their lands and territory back, and did NOT want the littoral raids to return once the Aquatics were done fighting one another.

In the end the Archmages and Sages caved under the nearly-rebellious outcries, and had to join the effort. Their late efforts meant the governments also had to cough up precious Elemental Diamonds, stores of concentrated energy normally only used to cast major Forbidden Curse spells. As this Ritual was definitely in that category, that was not inappropriate, but all they’d really had to do was go early and join the Mana Formations with their own power, and they could have avoided the sacrifice.

Instead, they played their ‘generosity’ up for all it was worth, despite everyone knowing what was really going on.

Egypt had the most-developed military force in all of Africa, and was largely absent from the joint effort, as the Dead Zone there was restless and acting up again. The Elders in Ghana had organized the Ritual in the lands of Darkest Africa, Portals had brought the volunteers in to the site, and the many mages with their Contracted Beasts and Plants had long been at work under the patient eye of watchful Emperors and Rulers of ancient time-lost Tribes of Beasts not seen in the outside world at all.

Likewise, the Undead forces of the Dead Zone in Mexico were running around, and so the contribution from there was basically civilian volunteers... and Coralost Community mages totally willing to help out with the seas being quiet and the bandit forces being long-quashed.

China’s Dead Zone was oddly quiet in comparison, and the mages from China, India, Japan, Korea, the rest of Asia, Russia, and the scattered mages who shirked the Church of Light in Europe (led by Britain and the Scandinavian countries) had all piled into the Ritual Formation near Xian, in the territory of the K’un’lun Beast Court. Their site had by far the greatest numbers of mages, but also the largest territory to cover. Their disciplined pumping and accumulation of Mana rivaled that here in North America, and they brought quite a few Elemental Diamonds along, just in case.

Nobody was going to dare the K’un’lun Court’s wrath and interfere with them, either.

Australia’s Ritual Formation was naturally deep in the central desert, and Ancient Dream Serpent Emperor Herself was watching over it. The mages there had been very diligent, hurrying to feed the Mana to it as soon as the attacks from the seas calmed down, paying their respects to the True Emperor as they did so.

The South American site was the most vulnerable, but five Beast Emperors were around that site now, led by Grandfather Cloudcatcher Tarantula and the Fire and Ice Luan Emperors. Any planned attacks or disruptions were going to end with the attackers being lunch.

The Beast Emperors also wanted this to happen, after all...