Chapter Eleven

Kingsley let out a long sigh, eyes closed in contemplation. A moment passed and his eyes opened, colder, calculating, mouth set in a thin line and his hands steepled.

"Probability that this works," he said. "That they breach into our world?"

"That's hard, sir, with the information we have," said Hermione. "I've been doing some reading, compiling and…less than a year is the safest estimate I can make. A tinker, that is, a person who can create magic-level technology, already figured out how to create their own variation of a Portkey in the span of week. Of course, in that time, she had watched the Portkeys Harry had created, but she still has that knowledge in her head.

"It shouldn't be easy building something that can breach the universal divide," Hermione continued. "But it is in the realm of possibility, especially if we look at things from a greater perspective: Travel to other universes has already been done in this world, tinkers learn from studying the work of other tinkers and, if they can work together, there've been signs that what they create is often better."

"And that's not taking into account the quirks of their abilities," said Andrew. Kingsley looked in his direction. "One of the tinkers, she calls herself Terminus, gets a complete image of what she's trying to build. She can tell how long it will take, the material that will be required and the amount of money each of those pieces might cost. With the help of Merlin and Vantage, people with few restrictions in what they can build—except in the artificial sense—there's the possibility that we might have overestimated their completion time."

Kingsley nodded slowly.

"Are we secure?" he asked.

We weren't in the normal camp site because Jay's ability was still so vague and the Crooked Man could maybe listen in. We'd moved again and this time we were in Ireland. I'd set up some enchantments in a very large area while making them more dense at the centre; even if someone could breach our primary protections, it was unlikely that they could do it undetected and without being incapacitated at the effort.

"We're secure," I said.

"Can we find them?" Kingsley asked.

"We're already working on it," said Hermione. "Andrew had a project he was working towards before this mission. A detector, he's thinking that he can repurpose it so that it can detect parahuman abilities. I've been working on integrating three spells into a device: Point Me, Patronus Charm and the Human Revealment Charm. I'm hoping that it might be able to point us in the direction of what we want. It might take me a week before I have it done, if I don't have any interruptions."

"Are you expecting interruptions?" said Kingsley. Then he shook his head, looking slightly in my direction before he looked at all of us. "Okay. What would happen if we just left? We don't have to stick around, and if we do, I might have to speak to the international community, make sure that we're not blindsided."

"I think that may not be for the best, sir," said Ron. Kingsley looked at him. "The guy we fought, the one who put this in motion, he believes that he has the favour of the Simurgh, one of the Endbringers. I've been reading up on them, I've even asked the Suits for access to their footage on the Endbringer attacks but that's still awaiting authorization, and it seems unlikely. The Endbringers seem to be chaos bombs, the Simurgh is usually more directed in her chaos, but nonetheless nothing to this scale.

"But we have to rely on the worst case in these things, and here, that's if Herald's words are true. The Simurgh, and by extension the Endbringers, are trying to gain access to our world. That means devastation," he ended.

My stomach twisted and turned. I had to calm my breathing, pay attention to my emotions, push down the guilt I felt when the stray thought would come that this was my fault. All of it.

A more rational person might have seen the power of the Endbringers, worked this out as a possibility and then just high-tailed it out of here. After all, the people of this world were dealing with this mess, they'd grown used to it, but the people of my world hadn't. If there was an attack, there'd be panic, the worst sort of devastation, and who was to say that the parahumans of this world would band together to protect our world as they did ours.

Kingsley just nodded. "Can we expect help from the people of that world?" he asked.

"I've been speaking with them since everything has started," Blaise said, sitting forward a little. "Getting allies. The King's Men have agreed to stand with us if hostilities are put aside," he said. I still wasn't sure how to feel about that bag, but holding on to hostilities meant nothing.

"The Suits were happy to work with us since we helped their people with Herald, and Harry tried to protect the people who killed their members," he said. "I was contacted by Dragon of the Guild and she says they're willing to work with us. She said she's already doing her best to look for any places the video might appear and stop it.

"She also drew up plans which Seamus has gone to print out," he continued. "Contracts on a working relationship between us and the Guild. She's hoping that she might be able to study our 'technology' and produce it so that the Endbringer threat is nullified. I've also spoken to the Triumvirate, got a feel of what they might bring to bear; a team that calls itself The Elite, willing to help us in making business contacts, figuring out rates and the like. A man by the name of Accord also sent us a plans, he said they would be the best way of achieving our objectives on this world."

Thinkers, I thought. It hadn't even been a full twenty-four hours after things had happened, they hadn't even settled entirely and yet much of the world was already reacting, positioning themselves closer to us so they might be better off. I couldn't help but feeling a little paranoid that they might be 'watching' this very moment.

"You've been busy," said Kingsley.

"Yes," said Blaise and it sounded hollow. He'd been running off of Invigoration Draught since yesterday. His job wasn't as physically active as ours, but he'd been working nonetheless: Pushing so that the right people knew what we were doing in Belfast and holding off the military when we'd covered an entire city in birds. He was the reason we hadn't lost so many people in hospitals, that the people hadn't abandoned their duties to panic.

And after that, he'd had to travel around the world, doing his best to make deals that might carry us forward, and all through that he'd managed to even have breakfast with us this morning. Of course he'd gone to sleep after, but I had to admire the guy's work ethic.

"But I'm restricted, sir, because I don't have the power to authorise these deals," he said. "We're going to earn a commission for the stuff we build, royalties for technology that's built using knowledge from magic and magical devices, and we'll earn goodwill. But, thinking about possible threats…"

"You have the authority," said Kingsley to Blaise. "Spriggs and Danvers will determine the spells and artefacts that can be shown to them. It's better if we don't give them too much while understanding so little. We do our best to earn their goodwill because that might be what protects us if these people succeed."

"Another matter, then, sir," said Hermione. "We'll need more people. We'll need our full set of enchanters, we might need others too going by the possible threat-level. Working with others, I mean. Japan is far more advances with magic which relates to radiation than any other magical civilisations, the Americans and the their odd spellcasting techniques."

"I get it, Granger," said Kingsley, the words terse. He ran his hand over his features. "I'm liable to lose my job for this." He looked at me. "If that looks like it's going to happen, then I don't care how much it rankles you're going to take over."

Fuck me, I thought as I said, "Yes, sir."

That would be the worst sort of thing, but then weren't many people they would accept. It would be a stupid decision, a very stupid decision, but the Wizarding World saw me as the most powerful wizard alive even though there were extenuating circumstances.

What made things worse was Dumbledore. He'd been so humble about his power, showing it only when necessary, that he'd set a sort of precedence. When people looked at me now, they thought I was doing the same thing, hiding my power behind humility.

Fuck me.

"Do the best you can," said Kingsley. "That's all that can be asked for at this point. I'll start setting things up on my end, speaking to the right people." Kingsley moved his hand and the image disappeared, the mirror starting to shrink.

I let out a breathe. "What now?" I asked.

"Talks," said Blaise. "But first, a bespoke suit."

888

"This will take ages before it's complete," I said. I was standing with my arms at either of my side while an old man was working through measurements. We'd been going at it the last hour.

Blaise sat at a table, three stacks of documentation sitting beside him as he read through it all. He had his Quill out and it was floating in the air beside him, scratching at the paper at times and jotting down other things. He would flick his wand when he was complete, moving onto another piece of paper.

"It's not," he said. "There's a woman who calls herself Parian. Her ability is making clothes. She'll use this man's work to craft you a suit. I'm hoping it will be a considerably shorter amount of time."

"I already have a costume," I told him.

"We need to distance you from that image," he said. "When people see that costume they'll think of the Flock. They'll think terrifying and they might think invader. When parahumans see that suit they won't be thinking Minister of Magic."

"That could not happen," I said. "Kingsley fought in the war. He was an Auror and he's been doing good."

"But he's not the Boy-Who-Lived," said Blaise. He didn't look at me, only kept at his work. "He didn't defeat Voldemort with the Disarming Jinx. He was there, but he might as well have been a non-presence. But you. Harry," and he sighed a little. "What you did was rightly impossible, and to make it possible, people had to be creative. Do you know that there's a rumour that you were being trained by Dumbledore's ghost while you had disappeared?"

I snorted at that.

"It's crazy," he said. "But had I not gone to school with you, I might have believed it. But then, sometimes it's hard not believing it. Harry kills our teacher who was possessed by Voldemort, Harry fights a Basilisk and survive, he fights Dementors and Death Eaters. He successfully infiltrates the Department of Mysteries. He does all that and then he kills Voldemort with a Disarming Jinx of all things."

He shook his head. "Every age has their prodigy. Dumbledore. Voldemort for his age. Maybe Mad-Eye Moody. We have you. People will react to that."

I let a long drawn out sigh. "Fuck me. This is going to happen isn't it?"

"Most likely," he said. "Which means you need to be prepared, and one of the first things you need to understand is image. Fudge, for all his faults, understood it well. He knew how to make people think what he wanted them to think. He even successfully got people to turn against you and Dumbledore, a feat that should have been nigh impossible to accomplish."

"But that was just using fear," I said.

"And that's part and parcel of it," said Blaise. "You use what people are feeling, how people are to get them to act the way you want them to act." I frowned. He'd caught it. "It might go against your Gryffindor nature, but that's how you'll need to play things, always with the knowledge that you're no longer representing just you but the Wizarding World."

I sighed again.

"It might help that you not keep sighing," he said. "Sends the image of petulance."

"You mean I should act more like you?" I said. "Cold and implacable?"

"That would be the worst thing," said Blaise. "Cold and implacable doesn't win you anyone but the smart people."

I snorted at that, muttering something about checking his ego. He ignored that.

"Be you, just not the childish parts of you. Not the more impulsive parts of you. Be like Ron, except without the tunnel vision he showed during things in Belfast; be like Hermione, except without the indecision that might plague her when she's under stress; be like me, calculating and looking at the greater image. Be everyone's best parts, including your best parts."

"That's easier said than done," I said.

Blaise hummed. "True. I've watched it often enough. People say they're going to change but when it actually comes to doing it's another matter. They don't try as hard or they fail and just choose the easier option, say their flaws give them character. When in truth it's because they can't change."

The words hit a little close to the chest. I'd told myself I would change, that I'd be tempered, but when it counted I was still the same impulsive Harry. I thought about the people that had died in my fight with Hellscape, all because I hadn't thought before the matter, considered that the first thing I should have done was pull everyone out.

People keep dying because of the mistakes I'm making, I thought. And I'm not changing. I keep falling back on them. When is it going to reach the point where that will sink into my head? Will it ever?

"Do people change?" I asked.

Blaise looked up, pursing his lips before he said, "In my experience, no. They act. They hide. But they're still the people they always were. But then, I have a limited experience."

That didn't help things at all.

"But you did," I said. "You're not as you were at school."

"You mean I'm not a purist?" he said. I shrugged. "I never was. I was in Slytherin and I put on the role. When I saw that Voldemort was winning I prepared myself for that future. When he didn't, I put myself in another role, this one."

"That makes you sound like a sociopath," I said.

Blaise shrugged. "I might be," he said. "Wizards aren't exactly cognizant to that sort of thing."

Then he returned to his work while I just stared at him. How was I supposed to react to that? How was I supposed to deal with that moving forward? How was I supposed to know the person Blaise was when he spoke about roles like that?

I stayed quiet, trying to put it all together, everything he'd told me. It was good advice, even if it came from a possible sociopath, but then it was geared towards his strengths, wasn't it? Cannibalising everyone, forming a role, an image that I put up to the world.

But it was good advice.

I started to sigh but I stopped it. I wanted to run my hands through my hair, but I stopped that too, it reminded me of my Dad and the image he'd put up as this cool-kid figure. I hadn't liked it, still didn't like it because it hadn't seemed genuine. But I'd still done it unconsciously, to the point that I could feel it every time I wanted to do so.

Could I do the same thing with everything else? Work at it until it was near automatic?

Should I do it? It was to help people after all, even if it would mean losing myself in the process.

Another sigh tried to form but I swallowed it. I caught the glimmer of a smile on Blaise's lips. I wanted to glare, to scowl, but then I remembered Kingsley, easing my features so they were softer without being implacable.

This will be to help people, I told myself. This is all to help people.

"How are we moving forward?" I said. My arms were now down and the man was going through the measurements of my legs.

"America's the best avenue to work towards," he said. "Everything is too close to the chest in the United Kingdom. People felt the Flock and they are still trying to deal with it. Still trying to figure the reality of everything. They'll be on uneven footing while we work. But I want us to leave things amicable, here. This is where we landed and the place we're best suited to building the anchor."

"We'll need to get started on protective enchantments on that front," I said. "The really good ones really take time to set."

"That's if people actually agree to us being here," said Blaise, "and that's if the public isn't in a panic."

There was a pop and Terry appeared, holding a stack of more papers. Blaise looked in his direction.

"Little reading on Accord and his a parahuman based in the American city of Boston," said Terry. "He's a villain and he's characterised for make grand plans, that, when you look at them in detail, require a lot of bad things to be done."

"Is this true?" I asked.

"He has us use the Imperius Curse a lot," said Terry. "On anyone from a diplomat that might get in our way to the powerful villains that don't often attend Endbringer fights."

"Useless, then?" said Blaise.

"Some of it is useful," said Terry. "How we might be of use with the Endbringers, the direction we could turn the prototype that Harry had been working on."

"Only that?" I said. Terry nodded. "Make a note to tell the Prime Thinkers that they might have a leak in their department." But then, with their powers it was possible that whatever leak they had would be hard to find, if they didn't already know it had had let it continue.

Terry gave a nod.

"How do the plans fit into what we we're already trying to do?" said Blaise.

"About the same direction," he said. "Outfitting people that are likely attend Endbringer fights with protection, enabling faster travel towards cities being attacked, that sort of thing."

Blaise nodded. "Then we'll do that," he said. "I—"

He stopped as a tiger appeared and, in Seamus' voice, spoke, "Bethany called. We've got six hours before the video is released. Dragon tries to stop it but it doesn't work."

Blaise let out a long sigh.

"Don't sigh, Blaise," I said and I was grinning. "It makes you sound petulant."

He scowled in my direction.

888

I didn't have a bespoke suit, but Blaise had done his best to make me look presentable. The suit was the sort that plebs like me usually bought, the sort that you bought off the rack and had a tendency to not fight. But he'd altered it as much as he could without being a seamstress and it looked good on me, all things considered.

I didn't know if this would be true if I was looked at by people with enhanced senses, but it was the best that we could do.

"Where to?" I said.

"New York," said Blaise, Terry, Archie and Susan were with him. We all grabbed the Portkey and then we were gone, appearing a moment later in front of a large building, Legend already waiting for us. There were the clicks of cameras from behind us at the sudden appearance, and I could see a few photographers coming alive. They'd probably been taking pictures of Legend.

Legend smiled. "It's a pleasure to finally meet you," he said.

"Likewise," said Blaise, he moved forward, extending a hand and Legend took it. I could hear more clicks behind us, a show we'd put on, making Legend wait the small amount of time enough that the crowd could gather. "The others should be—"

There were flashes of light, three in total and then there were more paras: Sirs Kay and Bors, and Dame Percival in her armour; the Kings of Clubs and Wands, and Queen of Spades; and the Black Knight of the Queen's Guard.

Alexandria and Eidolon appeared overhead, landing and coming to a stand at either side of Legend. Another figure, one I hadn't been expecting, followed soon after, Myrddin, dressed in robes and carrying a long staff. He landed beside the Triumvirate, Legend shot him a look but I got the sense from the man that he wasn't about to miss something like this.

"Shall we, then?" said Legend, and with that we walked into New York's Protectorate headquarters.

888

"If we're asked," said Alexandria. "We will say these are Endbringer talks, especially with an attack being so imminent."

"Helped by the fact that the show was good," said Myrddin. I got the sense that he was smiling, even with the dark cast that the hood of his cloak set. "Wizards," he said. "I'd thought I might be the only one."

"I take offense, Myrddin," said the King of Wands.

"Not the time," said Legend, though I caught the edge of a smile. "We have…" He glanced at a watch. "Two hours fifteen minutes before the video is released and the public knows. People will suspect that this was a show."

"People will suspect a lot of things," said Sir Bors. "But that suspicious will wane soon enough. It shouldn't be something we focus overly on."

The King of Clubs snorted at that. "Really?" he muttered. "I'd thought you'd prefer using the public. Especially where past action is concerned."

Hard feeling, no doubt. People had died because of the interplay of powers, even if it wasn't entirely their fault, it didn't mean anything to the Suits who'd lost people.

"Suppose it's best we say this now before it's used to blackmail us in the future," said Sir Bors. "We killed the Suits. It was impulsive but then things were chaotic. We were prepared to kill Mr Potter, prepared for war if it could make us come up ahead, but after he escaped we had time to think and thus we discredited his Gwydion persona. Burning bridges, sure, but we still can ahead in a minor way."

"Fuck," said Myrddin. "Fuck."

"You could have had more tact," said Dame Percival. Sir Bors shrugged. I remembered what Merlin had said, he took the shortest course through an action. I'd seen it when he'd attacked me, how he'd formed an idea of what he wanted to do and had not been willing to think otherwise.

"Is the possibility that this would happen again?" said Alexandria. Legend, Myrddin and the King of Clubs gave her a look, some of them surprised.

"No," said Sir Kay. "Lord Walston has tempered the effect of my ability."

"And there are no hard feeling on your end, Mr Potter?" she said. "There's no risk that something stupid on all counts might come from this?"

I shook my head. "All's forgiven so long as Aiden and Brody stay out of it," I said. "Terms that have already been agreed to."

She didn't say anything to the Suits, but then they weren't her concerned. The King's Men and the Suits would have to deal with their own troubles. It gave me a little of an idea of who Alexandria was, who Legend, Eidolon and Myrddin were by how they were sitting, the little I could see from their expression.

"People are going to be looking at your group under a microscope," Alexandria explained. "They'll be expecting the worst and they'll use any evidence they can to better form that image. They'll likely paint you as invaders, point to your master ability as a good starting point. We need to dissuade them of that image. Which means our groups working closely together to promote a better narrative."

"No consequences is what you mean?" said the King of Clubs. "We should just accept that they killed our people and that they're not to going to pay for that in any way, shape or form?"

"What consequences are you suggesting?" Dame Percival asked. "The truth coming out? Us being arrested? We don't need a thinker to know that that would turn out badly for everyone involved. The narrative has already been set and it won't be an easy thing to dislodge."

"The footage that will come out will say otherwise," said the Queen of Spades. "How do you think they'll show that Mr Potter is from another world? Only Herald and his word?" She shook her head. "People are used to magi-parahumans. They know it's a farce." Myrddin shifted and the King of Wands gave her a dry look. "They play along because it's fun. This is morbid, but they'll revert to what they know. These are just parahumans who believe themselves to be witches from another world and nothing more, and they're playing that up to Herald. Your words will be the credibility they need. They have video of your confession, I'm sure of it."

"We're moving away from the point," said Alexandria.

"We're not," said the Queen of Spades. "We're showing that there can still be consequences even while working towards the end goal. You were mastered, own up to it, admit it so that it doesn't happen again. Lord Walston would likely reverse the effect if asked, but Sir Kay gets arrested for his crimes."

"I think," said Sir Kay. "This would have been business we should have discussed on our own. If you'd accepted the request at a meeting—"

"No," said the King of Clubs. "Let's air the dirty laundry. Your organisation is shit, the more people that know about it, the better."

"Stupidity and passion," said Sir Bors.

"Says the man that was willing to risk a war," the King of Clubs countered. "All for what? Because he wanted to keep his master safe?"

There was quiet after those words, though the King of Clubs was breathing a little harder. He was angry and he was trying to keep it in, I could see, but it wasn't working. Too close to the surface, all of it, and the King's Men weren't exactly showing guilt for what they'd done.

Sir Kay sighed. "Lord Walston is the reason, in part, that this happened," he said. That garnered a reaction from the King's Men, mainly disbelief from those expression I could read.

"Lie if ever I've heard one," said the King of Clubs.

"No," Alexandria and I said at about the same time. She looked at me and deferred.

"Lord Walston told me this. He said that he did it without the King's Men knowing, that he magnified what Sir Kay's ability was doing so that the team wouldn't break apart because of the stress. That he didn't check on the effect and that was probably the cause for what they did."

"Any reason why he'd do this?" asked the Queen of Spades.

"He said teams often break apart, that the same was starting to happen to the King's Men and he wanted to stop it," I said. "He did. The members they had at that date have stuck it through even with everything. The Knights, the Mad Hatter, Makhai, Splice and the Puppeteer. I checked and the only person who entered the group in the time Lord Walston wasn't paying attention were Merlin and Cygnus. One left and the other…knew about the effect and was countering it. I don't think that would have been possible if Lord Walston were the cause."

"That paints an ugly picture," said Legend, sounding disconcerted.

For the first time, the Black Knight spoke, his voice booming. "The American government will not interfere with the workings of the United Kingdom," he said. "We are aware of your shadow unit."

The King of Clubs glared in his direction. "Good to know where Her Majesty's priorities lie," he muttered rather loudly.

The Black Knight said nothing. Legend let out a short sigh. "With that in mind, we should discuss the future. Controlling this, turning the narrative."

"We'll admit that we were mastered by Herald," said Sir Kay. "We'll put it forward that Mr Potter tried to undo the spells and we were under automatic orders to stop him at all costs. We've been fighting the Enlightened long enough that people are likely to accept it. It'll mean that we might suffer, but it makes things better fall in line."

Blaise nodded. "We've already discussed this with the King's Men," he said. He hadn't told me, but I schooled my features. Not that it surprised me in the least. I didn't know enough to get involved in the minutia of it all and I didn't want to.

"Herald starting this game is going to seem like he was protecting his investments," he continued. "When he saw that this wouldn't be achievable, he spread it out further so that the we might fall under the master effect which is the Simurgh."

"Dangerous," said Eidolon. "The Simurgh is the most intelligent of the Endbringers. This might seem like you're egging them on."

"It's true, though," said Terry. "The Simurgh is most likely after us with the degree of power I've read she has. Herald, from files we've been allowed access, first appeared during a Simurgh attack."

"Correlation doesn't mean causation," said Alexandria. "Coincidence still exists."

"Does that really apply when you're dealing with seers?" I said.

"The better question," said Blaise. "Does it matter where the public is concerned? The deception by the King's Men, as we heard, was likely known by all, it was known by the Protectorate and the PRT enough that they were already having discussions on how to deal with us and the villains that matter. The same will be true here. Is the public really a factor?"

"That's the dangerous sort of question to ask," said Myrddin. "We're, after all, doing all of this to protect the public."

"I meant in regard to the dealings of the Simurgh," Blaise quickly said. "The amount of information the greater world knows is limited. They make a lot of inferences some of which aren't true. Something like this is likely not to be out of the ordinary."

"What do the Prime Thinker think about this?" said the Queen of Spades.

"Good," Blaise answered.

"Eidolon?" said Alexandria.

The man was quiet for a long moment before he said, "Magenta."

"Good enough," said Alexandria. "The public dealt with, what about the villains?" I quirked a brow and she must have noticed because she went on. "They'll escalate because of both your presence and the scale with which you fight. They'll increasingly push their power because they're afraid the Flock might descend upon them without warning."

"You mean non-action," I said. "We don't get involved in the dealings between heroes and villains."

Alexandria nodded. "It's better if this was spread out across the entire world," she said. "There will be various groups who don't like your presence, they might be put at ease if they knew your involvement starts and ends with the Endbringers."

"And those that attack us for any reason," Blaise put in.

"Of course," said Alexandria. "That will be implicit in the narrative. Setting a clear case of black and white. Attacking you in any way means siding with the Endbringers."

"If you think it will work," said Blaise, "then we're prepared to accept this."

Alexandria nodded. She reached into her side and pulled out a phone. "I think that's the backbones of this done," she said. "I'll assume that you've already started seeding your idea?" Sir Kay nodded. "Then give us fifteen minutes to sort things on our end and we can get this phase started before we start talking about relations."

She stood and we stayed. The others would be chafing to move, but there was a greater image to be considered. We needed to look united even with everything that had happened.

888

I stood in front of a sea of journalists. It was late afternoon and in the small amount of time since the call they'd quickly come. I felt a little nervous, to be at the front of it all, but since I was at the front of this all, this was important.

Legend stood a little in front of me and he was speaking, "…ago. We've been in talks for the last while and, even with the villains that have tried to bar our path, things have started to set. It is with a pleasure then, that I introduce you to Harry Potter."

I stepped a little forward, smiling a little as flashes of light went off in front of me.

"Thank you, Legend," I said. I moved to stand in front of a growth of microphones. I felt the urge to let out a breath and held it back, instead I pulled forward happy memories and smiled, doing my best to project confidence even though this wasn't my battleground.

"I represent a the Allied Group for the Advancement of Wizardkind," I said. "Multiversal travellers that were hoping to open interdimensional communication between neighbours. I landed here over three weeks ago, making contact with the King's Men and hoping to learn some of your laws so that we might have a good neighbourly relationship.

"It was in this period that I learnt of the dynamics of this world, more especially of the threat you call the Endbringers." I swallowed, took a breath. "My world doesn't have any of these threats nor anything on a similar scale, and the knowledge that an entire world's population was under the degree of stress that something on this scale might cause, I couldn't stop myself but pull resources in so that I may help.

"Through an identity the King's Men saw fitting, Gwydion, I learned of the power dynamics of this world. Testing myself against so that, in abstract, I could form an image of the threat that the Endbringers command through studying the naturally forming powers in some of your world's population. Using this identity and the information gathered, my group and I have started forming artefact your world calls 'tinker tech' that might help mitigate the damage caused by the Endbringers. Automated shield, teleportation devices which will be outfitted to Endbringer attack participants and other such artefacts.

"However, almost a day ago, a villain who calls himself Herald attacked my group, forced us in a place where we could likely not act or our the timetable set might be extended, missing the next Endbringer fight. But this did not succeed, the villain and his group, the Enlightened, have been apprehended, the master effects he'd layered are being reversed and we're in the process of meeting more heroes that will help us form a better plan for the next attack.

"I hope, neighbours, that the power we can bring to bear might help you. I hope that, when the Endbringers next attack, they will fear the power of a united humanity. I hope that this heavy burden will be taken off your shoulders.

"Thank you," I said and turned as a cacophony started. Alexandria took up the stage, silence descend as she started talking about the plan for the next week.

Hopefully people wouldn't panic now when the footage got out.

888

AN: Not good at writing speeches, so the last section might be a little cringeworthy. I'll get better.