Reroll

Of course, I dump the fatigue by putting away the body I used: I have no shortage of resources.

And I should probably do my follow up with the UN… I go to my hangar, get out my Library, and use Illusion on my new tactical dropship to render it invisible to all senses, permanently and selectively, because Spheres lets me do that.  I then climb in, and work with the ship and the Autopilot to coordinate flying it down to the UN building.  Yes, I can pilot it myself, but why bother?  

This way I can watch the view.

And oh what a view.  I watch as the big green and blue marble dressed in scraps of white grows to fill the windows and the stars give way to blue skies.  There's also a brief period where the reentry surrounds the ship in flames that don't burn, and then… I'm coming in high above everyone over New York. My ship dodges around existing traffic easily: Other than the single-purpose (but multiple use) orbital booster, it's not nearly as fast as most airplanes, topping out at eighty five miles per hour (not even fast enough to run a Flux Capacitor!)… but it is much more maneuverable, quite small, and has thrusters that will let it hover. 

That last is ultimately how I park it: Thirty feet to the side of the Secretariat Building, just a few feet below the roofline of the same: You need to be able to fly to get in and out.  It's invisible and stationary, so it is really difficult to see despite the size. Hmm… I can squeeze out a caster level of twenty six for Illusions now; a “Small” Starship is in the size range for a Colossal creature, and I can do three steps above that (four, if I hold onto a specific talent for a day) which would be a “Huge” (or “Gargantuan”) Starship… and my Cruiser is Huge.  I could refit that Gray Cloaking Device out… it would free up a lot of points. Hmm… but for now, I just hope birds don't run into my ride.

I fly down separately, and head into the general assembly building.  Invisible, incorporeal, and warded against detection by my Mythic ring, I walk right past a bevy of armed Guardians… I wonder who's remoting them… and into a room in chaos.  Most people are not respecting the mic rules, and everyone is shouting over each other.

One rep screams out, “No Corrupted has ever had that kind of power.”

Another counters with, “That can't really have been a nuke, it was too contained, must be an illusion.”

Another, “We had buoys in the blast radius: Regardless of what it was, that weapon was absolutely destructive.”

And don't forget, “We had eyes on the ship that fired it for about six seconds… that chunk of metal in space is bigger than most aircraft carriers.”

“What if we just give them Avalon like she said? She has a legitimate grievance…” ah, finally, a voice of reason.

As people start to shout down the rational one, I place an oversized illusion of myself over the podium, just short enough to not overlap the ceiling. Who needs a mic when I can make myself sound like thunder?

“Just to be clear, my claiming of Antarctica for Avalon was a notification, not a request,” my avatar booms out, “As demonstrated, I have the firepower needed to pull that off.”

Some idiot warlord interrupts, “You can't have more than one, if you even had that and it wasn't a trick. You do not have the firepower.”

I and my illusion shrug, “I can certainly arrange a demonstration you can't ignore. Tell me: Which of your military bases would you like erased from the map?”

After a good twenty seconds of dead silence, I continue, “As for the legality of this, Avalon is not currently a party to Antarctic Treaty, The Outer Space Treaty, or any other - which means I am in violation of no applicable law in doing so,” at least until someone with more firepower says otherwise: International law is like that.

I consider, “And now that I have said my piece, I yield the floor.  Good day…” I fade out the illusion.

The room bursts right back into chaos, and I leave… after dropping off a few invisible illusionary Create Reality minions to act as monitors (skill based builds with Linguistics and Sense Motive) and relays, so they can alert me of any important developments and be my eyes, ears, and proxies: I won't have to come in person again, my minions left behind will alert me of anything important via Link and Otherworldly Audience, I will be able to use their eyes and ears by way of Greater Link, and use them as spell relays by way of Quicken Spell and Incursion Link.  It's not quite Omnipresence, but it gets really close if I drop a lot of relays.

I leave… and it’s raining.

I don't think anything of it until I see the crowd under my dropship… because while my ride isn't visible, the rain kind of is, the larger flow from where the rain slides off the vehicle definitely is, and the rain shadow it makes is obvious enough. Well… as long as they don't pull out any ordanance, it's fine.

I head up and climb in, give some orders, and look down as people gawk at the moving gap for a bit.

Of course, I don't HAVE to go the long way to the Antarctic, so I don't. I use my flexible talents to pick up Flawless Teleport and Teleport Structure, then Warp straight to the continent in question with my ride. I can't do interplanetary that way yet, and there's a limit to how large of a structure I can bring: With full support from my Library, I can get a “Colossal+” building or vehicle, which works out to a Medium starship… which is another reason to eventually downgrade, but I was planning that once we had the Base Ship for the party ship anyway.

And… wow that is a huge expanse of white.

But it's time to get to work. Now, if I read my maps correctly, I should be on the actual coastline here.  I start by building casting minions, my standard Mage build: The Mage Archetype, trading the natural weapons for Implement Bearer, and using the second talent for Magic Vessel so I can feed them spell points. I do double them up via Fusion so that they'll also have a workable Regeneration, just in case someone does bomb the area.

My first is a Destruction mage with Disintegrate, Scult Blast, and Calamity. Combined, this lets my minion clear an area in a ninety degree arc out to a distance of two hundred fifty feet, destroy everything within sixty feet of herself, or carve a ten food wide tunnel a thousand feet long.  This minion's job is the initial clearing of ice.

Next up I make a minion to keep the ice clear: It flows, after all, so as the first clears the ice, we need some limitless heat wells to keep it clear.  And ironically, making real heat is a job for the Illusion Sphere.  Illusionary Touch twice and Shadow Infusion so that the Illusions can create real energy, then Permanent Image and the required Lingering Illusion so that the effects stay.  Once the first gets rid of the ice, this minion's job is to put up giant Permanent walls of fire to melt the ice sheet as it advances, keeping the area clear… and incidentally, the entire area warm and lit up with a cheery red glow.  Of course, too much heat is bad, so I make two more and Warp them to the equator (one in the Pacific, the other in the Atlantic) with the job of making ice islands the same way via using Illusions to freeze the salt water solid.  Who knows? It might even help cool the Earth down a bit.

And, of course, the builders.  An area clear of ice is just a barren stretch of rock until I put something on it: The Creation sphere solves that. Create Materials and the required Lengthened Creation so they last forever, Expanded Materials to make things better than wood, Larger Creation to increase the volume, and Object of Force for windows.  I need a second minion too: Due to requirements, I can't have one minion with both Create Materials and Fabricate (currently), so I need a second with Fabricate instead of Create Materials, but otherwise built the same way for the detail work.  Both, of course, get suitable skills.

I also make a food vendor (a Creation Mage with Sustenance, Exquisite Detail, and Larger Creation), several investigators (Time mages with Past Sight and Query Self, plus skills for being observant), soldiers (my standard soldier builds), and administrators (skill specialists with people and orginizational skills).  Those won't be needed until I have a population here, but meh, better to be ready in advance, you know?

I set them all to work building my first city.  The Destruction mage clears the ice, the Illusion mage makes heat sources to keep it clear, and the Creation mages build housing, plumbing (very important, especially with all the water from melted ice), furniture, and so on. We even make generators (copper is a conductor available from Expanded Materials, rubber is an insulator made from plant matter, iron can be made magnetic permanently with a bit of work, and we have hot and cold wells from the illusionists… put it all together, and we have fuel-free electric generators).

Mind, it's a sizeable drain on my spell point production: Each of my three Illusion builds are spending four spell points each round, my Destruction build is spending three per round, the Materials maker is spending four, and the detailed work minion is spending two per round, for a total of twenty one spell points each round…  I get twenty-six per round, and can have them stockpile spell points, so I'm fine… but I can only have one set of city builders out at a time.

Still… they're building really fast.  A twenty foot cube of basic building takes just six seconds to produce (a bit more for the doors and wiring), and that's basically an instant two story building at four hundred square feet per floor: A small apartment, really. They don't even need to worry about supports thanks to “anchored” force walls being able to support weight in thin air.  Several castings make bigger buildings quite easily: In minutes I have plenty of office space for my administrative staff and police force.  In a few hours, I also have apartment complexes fit to house several thousand people, plus a restaurant, theater (with an illusion mage built for entertaining), and an area for gardens (although I'm going to need to import plants).

I mean, the city will die as soon as I do: All the firewalls will go out, which will cut power and let the ice sheet scrape it off into the sea, but as long as I can avoid that, I'm golden.

Oh, and it's almost time for another shift at the hospital.  I pack away my building crew, grab my dropship, and head over….