Beyond the Bloodline

‘It really gives off the vibe of a ‘Neutral’ continent. I wonder what happened to warrant this.’

He was curious about it, and so he asked the twins who were very likely to have been taught the reason for its existence.

“Well, apparently some great war happened like two thousand years ago. The conflict escalated off-world too and rumours say that even the Race ‘Kings’ joined the battles then.”

“Yeah, and even the races that tried to stay out of it could not avoid being dragged into the conflict.

And in their anger at being dragged into a very unnecessary war, the Kings of those races banded together and formed a third force that subdued the initial two sides of the war, and it was they chose here to settle the matter.”

Hearing Davina’s words, Jamie thought of some Race Kings he knew who were definitely part of that third force, before asking the reason why the war even began.

“According to what we were taught, it wasn’t just one thing but a group of issues that had been piling up for years.

Werewolves and Vampires, Humans and Elves, Beastkin and Flugels.”

“The Fake Angels too?”

“Yep, them too.

Anyway, stuff like territorial matters, Races enslaving members of another, tribal conflicts, Religion, Some countries of one race messing up another’s trade and commerce, and the icing on the cake was when the Elves housed an internationally wanted criminal just because it was the humans who were after the person.”

Jamie nodded to himself after hearing the reasons, understanding how that could turn into a full-blown war, especially when the conflicts had been festering for centuries.

Long story short, the Neutral Continent was established as a zone for Diplomatic Relations, Conflict Resolutions, Trade, Cultural Exchanges, Safe passage for those travelling between continents but are not exactly welcomed in certain territories, Refuge for displaced people, and most importantly, Dungeons, Quests and Trials.

The Neutral continent was home to powerful magic tools, ancient artifacts and treasures, both good and evil ones too.

The Southern part of the continent that had now turned into an array of islands known as the Cresway Isles were created when a transcendent who was influenced by one of said ‘Evil’ artifacts, ran mad and went on a rampage.

Jamie remembered this incident well because he was the one who beat the madness out of the transcendent when that happened and if it wasn’t that said transcendent was part of ‘her’ clan, then he would have outright killed them.

In essence, the neutral continent acted as a unifying space, fostering a certain level of cooperation, understanding, and some semblance of unity among the diverse races that existed on the large planet of Estea.

Its Central Region was also where the headquarters of the planet’s Interstellar Operations Management Board; which handled most of their off-world matters was located.

Each race had Regions they were in charge of and the responsible management of these territories was paramount. Most importantly, territorial wars were not allowed.

If you wanted a resource from another Race’s Region, you had to go the diplomatic route to get it.

Of course, smaller-scale conflicts still occurred, like wars within Regions, but then again, it would be foolish to think about eliminating war completely so there were no rules against that.

‘It’s a bit flawed but the system works fine when you look at the bigger picture.’

Such were Jamie’s final thoughts about the Neutral Continent’s matters, re-devoting his focus to the city around him and enjoying the festivities.

After messing around for a bit more, Jamie finally decided to go deal with the matter of selling the dragon’s corpse, prompting David to question where it was in the first place.

“It’s in my subspace.”

Jamie replied to David’s inquiry as they got into the rental car before Davina told the designated driver their destination and spoke to the Hybrid.

“Subspace? That’s some high-level spatial magic, huh?”

“You’re a bit wrong there. ‘Subspace Creation’ is less of Spatial ‘Magic’ and more of Spatial ‘Law Manipulation’.”

““Law Manipulation?””

The twins echoed his words back to him in the form of a question, one which Jamie answered with a question of his own.

“Exactly what do you know about the Legendary Realm?”

“Well, I know it’s the realm where you gain nodes on your soul that allow you to control ambient higher energy called law energy.”

David gave a textbook answer which Jamie nodded in response to before speaking.

“Yes. The power of Universal Laws.

I’m not going to go into all the boring details about the Concepts and how the Universal laws are derived from them, but just know that they are the building blocks behind major principles of the greater universe.

A simple example would be the Law of Fire. If that didn’t exist, then ‘Fire’ as you know it would not exist either.

It’s as simple as that.

Universal laws define what is possible and impossible within the universe, principles upon which everything operates, ensuring that events and phenomena can be predicted and understood, and also introduce limitations and constraints on the abilities and actions of individuals and entities.”

“That’s a lot of details, any more and it’d become an info dump.”

“I think it already became an info dump when we began talking about the Neutral Continent earlier.”

The driver who overheard their conversation had question marks on his head as the twins’ statements sounded incomprehensible to him.

“It wouldn’t be long as we have to sell the dragon materials though.

Anyway, when one gets to the Legendary Realm, they gain nodes on their souls like David said, allowing them to connect with the ambient law energies that are omnipresent within the universe and manipulate them the same way you can manipulate ambient magic power.”

“I see…So if Legendries gain the power to control these laws, what about Sovereigns? What do they get?”

Jamie flipped through the newspaper that was in the car’s map pocket as he replied to David’s inquiry.

“Still just ‘ambient control’.

The amount they can control, however, increases exponentially. After all, just because the energy is everywhere, does not mean you can control it all.

The amount someone can control is limited and is proportional to the amount of energy the person in question possesses.

Example: A Legendary with 500 units of magic/aura/ether and so on, can only control 500 units of ambient law energies, of elements/laws he or she has an affinity with.

If you try to control something you don’t have an affinity with, you either fail completely or succeed after consuming at least three times your personal energy.”

“And what happens if you try to go above that?”

“Best case scenario, you’d end up like how a magic-deficient person who forces still forces themselves to use magic would.”

David and Davina’s expressions turned dark when they heard Jamie’s answer. Especially since if this was the ‘best case’ scenario, what on Estea could the ‘worst case’ possibly be?